The Journal
Michelin, lineage, and how Japan's restaurants take bookings
Field notes from our Tokyo desk — who is actually reachable and how, the histories behind the counters, and the realistic way in. Written by the people who make these calls every day.
189 articles
Definitions & Glossary
Kaiseki vs Omakase: What's Actually the Difference?
Kaiseki is a cuisine — a seasonal procession of small courses rooted in Kyoto and the tea ceremony, served in private rooms or at a counter. Omakase is a way of ordering — "I leave it to you" — and in Tokyo it usually means a chef-led sushi counter. The prices overlap: at the restaurants on our release calendar, dinner runs ¥20,000–40,000 for most Tokyo sushi counters and most Kyoto kaiseki houses alike in 2026.…
Regions & Itineraries
Nagoya Food Guide: Hitsumabushi and the Miso Belt
Nagoya is Japan's most underrated eating city, with a cuisine — Nagoya-meshi — built on dark hatcho miso and found nowhere else. The essential dish is hitsumabushi, grilled eel eaten in three acts, at its most storied at Atsuta Horaiken, the 1873 house credited with inventing it. Around it orbit miso katsu, miso-simmered udon, tebasaki chicken wings and Japan's most extravagant coffee-shop breakfast culture. Most…
Regions & Itineraries
Okinawa Food Guide: Ryukyu Cuisine Beyond the Beaches
Okinawa's food is not southern Japanese cooking — it is the cuisine of the former Ryukyu Kingdom, shaped by centuries of Chinese court influence and its own subtropical larder. The essentials: slow-simmered rafute pork belly, goya champuru stir-fry, Okinawa soba with soki ribs, umibudo sea grapes, island tofu, agu pork — and awamori, Japan's oldest distilled spirit. Naha's old izakaya, led by institutions like…
Ingredients & Seasons
Sanma: Japan's Autumn Saury and Where to Eat It
Sanma (Pacific saury) is Japan's defining autumn fish, in season roughly September through November as the schools run south past Hokkaido and the Sanriku coast. The classic preparation is shioyaki — the whole fish salt-grilled, eaten innards and all, with grated daikon, sudachi and soy — a dish so beloved it has its own rakugo story and Tokyo festivals. Catches have fallen sharply over the past decade, turning a…
Regions & Itineraries
Sapporo Food Guide: Miso Ramen, Jingisukan and the Northern Larder
Sapporo is Japan's great cold-climate food city, and its icons are all its own inventions: miso ramen, created in the 1950s at Aji no Sanpei; jingisukan, lamb grilled on domed iron over charcoal; and soup curry, the spice-broth dish the city created and still rules. Around them sits Hokkaido's larder — crab, uni, ikura at the markets, and a French fine-dining tradition led by Restaurant Moliere that quietly rivals…
Michelin & Rankings
Tabelog Award: Gold, Silver and Bronze Explained
The Tabelog Award is Japan's annual restaurant honor, chosen by Tabelog users' votes from among the restaurants rated most highly that year and split into three tiers — Gold, Silver and Bronze. The 2026 edition names 36 Gold, 160 Silver and 537 Bronze restaurants nationwide. It is separate from the genre-based Hyakumeiten lists, and because it rests on the ratings of ordinary diners rather than inspectors, Gold in…
Michelin & Rankings
World's 50 Best vs Michelin vs Tabelog: Reading Japan's Rankings
Three systems rank Japan's restaurants and they disagree by design. Michelin uses anonymous professional inspectors; Tabelog aggregates the scores and votes of Japan's harshest domestic diners; the World's 50 Best and Asia's 50 Best are voted by an international academy of chefs, writers and travelers — no inspections at all. The 50 Best rewards rooms international voters can actually visit, which is why publicly…
Prices & Money
Cash or Card? How Payment Works at Japan's Best Restaurants
Most Japanese restaurants take credit cards in 2026, and Visa and Mastercard work almost anywhere cards are accepted. A meaningful minority of the finest counters remain cash only, so confirm when you book and carry the full bill in yen. Withdraw at 7-Eleven or Japan Post ATMs.
Ingredients & Seasons
Hamo: Kyoto's Summer Pike Conger and the Bone-Cutting Knife
Hamo is the daggertooth pike conger, Kyoto's defining summer fish. Its first season opens around June and runs through high summer, with a second window in autumn. Fine intramuscular bones make honekiri — scoring the flesh without cutting the skin — essential. Eat it as hamo otoshi with plum sauce in Kyoto and Osaka.
Ingredients & Seasons
Unagi and the Day of the Ox: Japan's Summer Eel Tradition
Doyo no ushi no hi is Japan's midsummer Day of the Ox, when the country eats grilled eel; in 2026 it fell on Sunday 26 July, with no second ox day. Kanto steams its back-split eel, Kansai grills belly-split fish straight over charcoal. Book outside the July crush.
Regions & Itineraries
Best Kaiseki in Kyoto You Can Actually Book
The bookable kaiseki in Kyoto is almost always lunch. Kikunoi Roan, the Hyotei annex, Kyoto Kitcho's midday course and the tofu kaiseki at Shoraian take reservations with a month or two of lead time. Mizai and Gion Sasaki are effectively closed to strangers — plan around that, not against it.
Booking & Access
How to Book Kataori — Japan's Most Coveted Kaiseki Counter
Kataori's eight counter seats are not bookable by phone or on foot. Online inventory surfaces only on the Japanese platforms OMAKASE and Pocket Concierge at unannounced moments and vanishes in seconds; the rest of the room goes to regulars and introductions. Start four to six months out, keep several dates open, and treat it as a request.