Food/Groceries in Japan
 

Hi all. I just stumbled upon this forum recently and have found it to be incredibly helpful so far. So thanks in advance for all the info.

Anyway... I'll be moving to Tokyo in about 3 months, and there are a number of things I'm trying to prepare myself for. One which I am still seeking some help with is the food situation.

Specifically, I'm looking for a few cheap/easy solutions for how to feed myself while I'm over there. I imagine that will mean learning to cook a few things (I'm pretty much a novice at cooking anything right now), so recipes would be appreciated. More importantly, however, I'd like to get some information on grocery shopping... I cannot read any Kanji yet, so any tips on how to pick out ingredients for some simple meals and such would be much appreciated.

Also, I'll be living/working in the vicinity of Keio University. Any suggestions for places to eat out in that area?

Thanks!

theirs a Japanese Grocery store im going to tomorrow. they have imports and such from japan. the bookstore i go to next to it has pretty good prices, ill check out the prices while im their. but what works out even here in america is eating ramen noobles. only 20 cents a cup

I almost never cooked for myself because there were so many take-out and conbinis around me. Actually it would have probably cost me more to cook for myself than eat bento and other take out every night.

Hmm, are you replacing a certain person at the university who was deported recently? Apparently one of the foreign teachers there was making a little money on the side dealing marijuana.

Anyway, have a look at your apartment's kitchen facilities before deciding how much cooking you are going to do. If it's like most apartments, it will have a single electric burner which takes about 30 minutes to heat water to boiling. It'll take much less time (and, as MMM said, a little less money) to go to the nearest convenience or grocery store and get a prepared meal. The Japanese are artists at making such things, they are tasty and reasonably priced.

Conversely, I cooked for myself for breakfast and dinner 80-90% of the time while I lived there, and enjoyed doing so. Simple stir fry, pork chops, spaghetti, scrambled eggs, etc are all very easy and inexpensive to make.

My fridge fit about 2 six packs of beer and I had one burner, a toaster oven and a microwave. It was easier for me to eat out, didn't make much difference financially, and I was never much of a wiz in the kitchen.

True. especially when you first move you really dont have time to cook and its a pain in the ass to try so eating out is quicker. but a good homecooked meal is also good from time to time.

As someone who cooks for a 3 member family each day - it is MASSIVELY cheaper to cook. Trust me on this. Our food budget for the month (not that we really have a set one, but...) would be gone in a week if we tried to pull off eating out and buying preprepared stuff. I`d have trouble thinking of things to eat that would knock the normal food up into the "prepared" food category in prices.
It is usually as fast for me to heat something as it is for me to make something - just a little more hand movement is involved.

Of course, if you have no kitchen things change, but yes - I have lived with a tiny tiny refrigerator before, and it can be done. Buy a tiny rice cooker and learn to make curry and some donburi things for starters. I`d like to see someone pull off eating for 3 days on 600 yen like you can with curry and rice. (90 for the half the curry base, 65 for a couple onions, 35 for a carrot, 50 for a couple potatoes, 150 for meat of choice... plus about 200 for the amount of rice you`d need from a bag.) The only ingredient that needs to be refrigerated is the meat. After you make the curry/stew/similar thing - you can keep it on the stovetop for 2 days as long as you thoroughly heat it every 8 hours or so.

That's not much less than what I had... I had a 3' tall fridge, and 2 burners on the stove, and a microwave. But you really don't need very much to cook with. And I definitely think I saved money when I cooked for myself. For instance, you can buy a dozen eggs for $2 or so, right? Well, that works out to 50 cents for a 3 egg omelet. Throw in a few green onions and maybe a couple chopped mushrooms if you like for only pennies more.

A whole package of spaghetti costs $1 or less, and lasts 3-4 meals. You can buy a jar of sauce that will last at least 2 meals for about $3. Again, add fresh onions and mushrooms for very little, along with some Italian seasonings and maybe some meat, and you can have a big spaghetti dinner for about $2, maybe a bit more.

There are lots of other meals too, like the curry rice Nyororin mentioned, that can be easily made for very little money, much less than even a 7/11 pre-made bento. Honestly, one of the reasons why I saved so much money during my time in Japan was because I cooked at home. People who frequently ate out were not able to even come close to my food budget, and IMHO, I think the freshly cooked dinners were better than the conbini bentos anyway!

They probably were, Samurai. I saved by working a part-time job at night, but that didn't allow me to learn to cook. I am not saying cooking for yourself is wrong in any way...I just wasn't smart or motivated enough to do it.