What to Eat in Japan — Must-Try Dishes, How to Order, and Table Manners

The noodle soup that became each city's hometown dish — broths run from clear shoyu and salt to rich miso, all the way to milky tonkotsu pork-bone, topped with chashu, a soft-boiled egg, and spring onion. Slurp it loud and hot. It's one of the most filling and best-value quick meals you'll have.

Bite-sized rice topped with fresh raw fish (nigiri), or raw fish on its own with no rice (sashimi). The freshness of the ingredients here is hard to match. Beginners can start at a conveyor-belt (kaiten) shop where plates cost a few dozen yen and it's all good fun, or sit at the counter for a chef-made omakase — a different experience entirely.

Thick, soft, chewy wheat noodles, served either in a hot dashi broth or chilled with a strong dipping sauce. The most famous is "Sanuki udon" from Kagawa, with its signature springy bite. It's a gentle, easy-on-the-stomach dish, friendly on the wallet, and you'll find it almost everywhere — from stand-and-eat counters in train stations to long-established shops.

Light-brown buckwheat noodles with a distinctive nutty aroma, eaten cold on a bamboo tray (zaru soba) dipped in a strong sauce, or in hot broth. The famous regions are Nagano (Shinshu) and Izumo, where cool mountain air suits buckwheat. It's lighter than ramen and is the lucky dish Japanese families eat on New Year's Eve.

Prawn, fish, and vegetables in a thin batter, fried until lightly crisp and never greasy, dipped in tentsuyu sauce or matcha salt. The skill is all in the wafer-thin batter and clean oil. Specialist shops fry each piece to order and serve it piping hot from the pan, or have it over rice (tendon) or with udon.

Pork coated in panko breadcrumbs and fried crisp outside, tender inside, served sliced with shredded cabbage and rice (tonkatsu), or simmered with egg over rice as a hot katsudon. Some regions, like Fukui, drench it in a dark sauce instead of egg. With a thick tonkatsu sauce, it's a hearty, great-value plate that goes down very well with Thai palates.

A savoury pancake nicknamed "Japanese pizza" — batter mixed with cabbage and whatever fillings you like, grilled on an iron plate, then drizzled with thick sauce and mayo and topped with bonito flakes that wave in the rising heat. The Osaka style mixes everything into the batter; Hiroshima layers it with yakisoba noodles. Many shops let you grill your own at the table — great fun.

Round balls of batter with octopus inside, cooked in a dimpled pan until crisp outside and molten within, then topped with sauce, mayo, and dried bonito and seaweed. It's Osaka's hometown street food, a must while you stroll Dotonbori. Heads up: bite straight in and the centre is scorching — blow on it first to be safe.