Most etiquette guides for Japan spend their words on chopsticks and soy sauce. The rule that serious counters actually watch for is quieter: what you put on the wood. Get this one right and a chef who has never seen you before will treat you as someone who has done this.
Why the wood matters
The counter at a top sushi, tempura or kappo house is usually a single plank of hinoki cypress or another pale, unfinished wood — sometimes one tree, often the most expensive object in the room. It is not varnished; it is planed and left bare so it can be wiped and, over years, gently re‑planed. That is why it looks the way it does, and why the chef wipes it in front of you between courses. To the house, the counter is not your table. It is the far edge of the chef’s cutting board, and you have been seated at it.
Everything below follows from that.
What stays off the counter
Your phone. In a pocket or bag, on silent. A phone lying face‑up does two things a chef dislikes: its metal frame and camera bump mark the wood when it is slid or set down, and its screen tells him where your attention is. Take it out for the quick photo you have asked permission for, hold it in your hand, put it away. No calls at the counter — if one cannot wait, step outside.
Keys, coins, a camera body. Anything with a hard edge or metal. A camera lives in your lap or a bag between shots.
Your bag. Under the counter. Nearly every house keeps a basket or a shelf beneath the counter for exactly this, and the staff will show you as you sit. Coats and larger bags are taken at the door. Nothing hangs from the back of the chair, where the staff pass.
Elbows with hardware. Resting your forearms lightly on the edge is fine; that is what the edge is for. A watch with a metal bracelet or clasp is best taken off and pocketed before you sit — hinoki is soft enough to take a mark from a clasp dragged across it. Rings with a raised stone: keep that hand in your lap when you lean.
What is fine
- A card case, a folded handkerchief, a cloth glasses case — small, soft, no hardware.
- Your oshibori (hot towel), your chopsticks on their rest, your cup and plate — whatever the house places.
- A notebook, if you are the type. Chefs are used to it.
- A leather‑strap watch left on, if you keep the clasp side up.
The oshibori and the spill
The hot towel is for your hands — before the meal and, at a sushi counter, whenever you like between pieces. It is not for your face, your neck or the counter. If you spill sake or drop a piece of fish, say so and let the staff wipe it. Do not scrub the wood with the towel and do not slide your plate over the spot. The house wipes the counter dozens of times a night; a quick word is all anyone expects.
Where the rule relaxes
This is a bare‑wood rule. At a lacquered counter, a stone or resin bar, a yakitori shop with a scarred old plank, or any izakaya, a phone on the bar bothers no one. Tatami rooms have their own logic, which we cover in kaiseki and ryotei etiquette. When you cannot tell what the counter is made of, the safe reading is simple: put down only what the house has put down.
Why it is worth doing
Chefs notice hands. A guest who pockets a watch, keeps the phone away and rests the forearms lightly is read, before a word is spoken, as someone who understands the room — and the counter is a place where being understood gets you the extra piece, the better cut, the seat next time. The rest of the manners are in Japan restaurant etiquette; the sushi‑specific ones in sushi counter etiquette.
