Japan

ztoical

Hi all,

I'm off to Kyoto, Japan for a 10 days in November and am looking forward to trying some veggie food there. Slightly worried about the language barrier when ordering food but sure I'm going to give it ago.

Has anyone been to Japan and got some rec's food wise to look out for?

biZrb

My sisters back from some traveling around Japan and being a vegitarian she had a though time finding veggie food. They eat loads of fish over there. She said she ordered something that she thought was vegitarian but it turned out it had chicken in it and she only realised when she tasted something that didn't taste like tofu or veg!
They don't speak much english either so its hard to communicate with Japenese people.
But from what she told me about it, Japan is an amazing place so I hope you'll have a great time dispite the food issues you might have there!

sweet-rasmus

they there! biZrb's report does indeed sound scarey.

I had a quick look on Happy Cow ( http://www.happycow.net/asia/japan/kyoto/index.html ) and it seems you will be ok. Have a look through! A superb 24 restaurants are listed and I am even surprised to see some purely vegan restaurants there

Setun

There's a japanese language exchange in dublin you could go to. It'd be a great help to know a bit of the language - even if it just consists of knowing how to specify odering vegetarian food. They're on facebook so have a look for them on that.

Enjoy Nippon

Paola L.

ive been to japan 2 years ago for 15 days (tokyo and kyoto) unfortunately i have to agree with biz.... as veggie i havent had an easy life, and yes... language is a barrier, but fortunately most of the rest have a model to visualize the food they serve... i suggest you to try the okonomiyaki (a sort of omelette) and there are some place where you can prepare your own soup... in that case check the ingredients will be easy.
in kyoto i suggest you to try the yuzu (hope the spelling is correct, not too sure about it) is a kind of orange. delicious!!!

Kazzo

Hi

I am from Osaka, Japan. My husband(Irish) and I were in Kyoto around last Christmas-New Years Holiday. There are a lot of tourists from all over the world in Kyoto and Osaka, and some restaurants have their menus in English.

http://www.bento.com/kansai/kf-veg.html

↑ Vegetarian-friendly Restaurants list in English.

and also Food in OSAKA is GREAT!!! Try "OKONOMIYAKI"

Hope you have a great time in Japan !!!

Cool link thanks kazzo.

Do you mind me asking how Japanese people generally feel about vegetarians?

Kazzo

Hi Moonbaby

Actually I am not a vegetarian (I was just searching "JAPAN") and I have been living in Ireland too long to keep up with how things happen in Japan...
As far as I know most Japanese vegetarians choose not to eat meat because they think it's a healthier option or they just simply don't like the taste of meat.

boxplayer1973

I've heard that some Japanese vegetarians sometimes eat whale instead of meat? :eek: Isn't it supposed to be very healthy?

Kazzo

No, that's not true, boxplayer 1973.

They eat a lot of fish, but not whale.

ztoical

Kazzo wrote: »

No, that's not true, boxplayer 1973.

They eat a lot of fish, but not whale.

actually they do eat whale meat in japan but they've been under pressure from various groups to stop and some of the larger fisheries have begun to stop selling whale meat.

Kazzo

Anyway I haven't seen whale meat for almost 30 years and it looks like I will never see it again.