The Food

Eating in Japan can be expensive if you aren't willing to try shady restaurants and grocery stores. If you stick to Western restaurant chains, you'll find yourself short on cash and miss many great opportunities. Personally, I've done a bit of both; it's nice, now and then, to eat "American". Still, depending on your craving, you can eat a good meal in any restaurant for as little as 5$ or as much as 50$. The choice is up to you.

A large pizza here will cost you around 40$ and actually be a medium. It won't taste very good either, as Mat commented. However, go for ramen or curry and you will get salad, drink and meal for less than 5$.

It would be hard for me to name every restaurant we have been to; many have no English translation to their names and don't speak English. Fortunately, most places have pictures next to their meals so we pointed and hope the food would be good. Most of the time, it was. Still, I cannot recommend any one of these restaurants because I would not be able to tell you exactly where they are located or what their name was. All I can do is name the restaurant chains we've been to and what that was like.

First of, Mos Burger. They have a particular burger where the patty is made of rice and the meat is minced beef in teriyaki sauce with shaved cabbage. It's delicious. They have a nice selection of soft drinks and side dishes (fries, onion rings, the likes) and most of the staff know enough English to serve you.

Then you have Pepper Lunch. It's a special kind of place. First, you pay at the door's vending machine, which lists all possible meals. You give the counter girl your ticket and she eventually hands you a heating plate with the ingredients of your meal. It's up to you to move the stuff around and make your meal. The longer you wait, the longer the meat cooks, so you end up with food the way you want it. The beef there is excellent and all of it is pretty cheap.

Next is Lotteria. Similar to McDonald's or Burger King but with an Asian touch. I had my first shrimp burger there (I thought I had ordered chicken). It's small, simple but so good when you're tired of noodles and tempura. Their chicken nuggets are rather good, too.

I hate myself for forgetting the name of this awesome place but if you ever get to Akihabara, hit the eight floor of Yodobashi-Akiba (a gigantic mall) for a Rolling Sushi restaurant that is just too good for words. You pay by the plate and you get everything from tuna to squid to eel and so on. I stuffed myself with so much sushi for not even 20$. Something I would have paid over 50$ in Montreal. It was amazing.

Curry Houses have to be tried. There are a few and I won't name them because you can find them in every neighborhood and are everywhere and (to my limited knowledge), about the same. Their curry is much different from traditional curry and feels like the closest thing to poutine sauce, which made me both happy and homesick at the same time.

If you go to Hiroshima, make sure to hit Ouenya, a hiroshima-style ramen shop totally dedicated to the Hiroshima Carps. So dedicated, their drinks come in the team's colour. Good food for low prices and pretty close to the train station.

For Hot Dogs (if you ever miss such a thing), you have Vie de France, a French bakery. I know, you're thinking "hot dogs in a bakery?" Yes, it's pretty strange. They come stuffed in croissants with all sorts of seasoning and are pretty good. Otherwise, you'd need to go to convenience stores like Mini Stop for your hot dogs and they are disgusting.

Finally, McDonald's. I know, right? Why go to McDonald's? Once in a while, you go out on a wild, drunk bender and you feel like total crap, the morning after. A tradition I have with Mat is to stop at McDonald's as a sort of hangover cure. Their burgers taste pretty much the same (except for the McShrimp and the Teriyaki McChicken, which we don't have home). However, they look good. I mean, really good. In Montreal, we're used to the idea that the burger in our hands looks nothing like the one on the picture. Here, they do. The cheese is different, too, so it actually melts and feels rubbery like melted cheese should. All in all, the chain here is much better than the one home.

I could go on but I would rather remind you that these are places to try only as an alternative to all the small restaurants you can find all around Japan. Dare go in and try something; the staff is always eager to please you, pretty much everywhere you will go.

-Pat