Cuisine · Japan

Japanese cooking

Rice, dashi, restraint. Every flavor earns its place. Ramen with honest broth, vegetables cooked like they matter, fish treated with reverence.

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Takoyaki with Seafood with octopus, dashi and flour — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Appetizers and Sandwiches

Takoyaki with Seafood

Traditional Japanese octopus balls made from a light dashi batter, filled with seafood, green onion, and tempura crumbs, cooked in a special round mold until golden. Topped with takoyaki sauce, Japanese mayo, bonito flakes, and aonori.

45 min40 kcal24 serves

🥑Keto

Tamagoyaki (Japanese Rolled Omelette) with eggs, dashi and mirin — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanEasy

Breakfast and Brunch

Tamagoyaki (Japanese Rolled Omelette)

A Japanese rolled omelette built in layers: thin sheets of sweetened, dashi-seasoned egg poured into a pan one at a time, each one rolled onto the last while still slightly soft, building up a spiral-layered log that shows the rings when sliced. The flavor is lightly sweet, subtly savory, and distinctly Japanese — nothing like a Western omelette. Tamagoyaki appears at breakfast alongside rice and miso soup, in bento boxes, and as nigiri sushi topping. The technique takes practice but the ingredients are few, the eggs always taste good, and the first imperfect roll is still worth eating.

15 min185 kcal2 serves

🌿Vegetarian⚡Quick

Tempura with flour, seafood and vegetables — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Appetizers and Sandwiches

Tempura

Vegetables and shrimp dipped in ice-cold batter and fried until shatteringly crisp. The batter must be barely mixed — lumps are good — and the oil held at 170–180°C. Done right, tempura is light enough to eat endlessly.

25 min320 kcal4 serves

⚡Quick

Teriyaki Sauce with soy sauce, mirin and sake — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanEasy

Sauces and Dips

Teriyaki Sauce

A glossy, deeply savory-sweet glaze built from soy sauce, mirin, sake, and sugar, thickened with a cornstarch slurry until it coats a spoon. Homemade teriyaki takes ten minutes and tastes nothing like the bottled kind — the fresh garlic and ginger give it a brightness that disappears completely in shelf-stable versions. I keep a jar in the fridge and use it on everything from grilled chicken to roasted vegetables.

10 min60 kcal4 serves

🌿Vegetarian⚡Quick

Tonkatsu with pork, panko and egg — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Meat Dishes

Tonkatsu

Tonkatsu is a popular Japanese dish — a breaded pork chop. A perfect example of adapting Western cooking techniques into Japanese cuisine.

23 min500 kcal4 serves

⚡Quick💪High protein

Udon Noodle Soup (Kake Udon) with udon noodles, dashi and soy sauce — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Cereal and Pasta Dishes

Udon Noodle Soup (Kake Udon)

Kake udon (かけうどん) is the plainest bowl of Japanese udon noodle soup: thick, chewy wheat noodles in a clear golden dashi broth seasoned with soy sauce and mirin, topped with spring onion and little else. The broth is nearly colourless but deep in umami, lightly sweet from the mirin. Udon is a specialty of the Kagawa region (Sanuki udon) and is eaten everywhere in Japan; the Kansai version uses a lighter broth, the Kanto version a darker, more assertive soy, and this recipe follows Kansai. The 20 minutes is hands-on time with dashi packets or powder; homemade dashi adds 20 to 30 minutes of passive kombu soaking. Make the broth right and the noodles take care of themselves.

20 min380 kcal2 serves

⚡Quick

Wasabi Peas with peas, wasabi and tahini — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanAdvanced

Appetizers and Sandwiches

Wasabi Peas

Crunchy slow-roasted peas coated in a sharp wasabi glaze — one of Japan's most addictive snacks. Long oven time gives them their signature crunch. Impossible to stop at one.

375 min180 kcal8 serves

🌿Vegetarian🌶️Spicy🌾Gluten-free

Yakisoba (Japanese Stir-Fried Noodles) with noodles, Worcestershire sauce and oyster sauce — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Cereal and Pasta Dishes

Yakisoba (Japanese Stir-Fried Noodles)

Japanese stir-fried wheat noodles with pork belly (or chicken), cabbage, onion, and carrot, tossed in a tangy-sweet Worcestershire-based sauce. Yakisoba (焼きそば) means 'grilled noodles' — it was born in post-war Japan, sold at outdoor teppan stalls and school festivals, and has been a beloved fast food ever since. The sauce is what defines yakisoba: Worcestershire provides the backbone tang, oyster sauce the umami depth, ketchup the fruity sweetness, and soy sauce the salt. Made at home in 20 minutes with a single pan, it tastes exactly like the stall version. The traditional finish — pickled red ginger and dried seaweed flakes — takes it from good to unmistakably Japanese.

20 min540 kcal2 serves

⚡Quick

Yakitori (Japanese Grilled Chicken Skewers) with chicken thighs, soy sauce and mirin — Japan recipe

🇯🇵JapanMedium

Meat Dishes

Yakitori (Japanese Grilled Chicken Skewers)

Yakitori (焼き鳥, yaki = grilled, tori = bird) is one of Japan's most beloved street foods and izakaya staples — bite-sized pieces of chicken threaded onto bamboo or metal skewers and grilled over charcoal, seasoned with either coarse salt (shio style) or brushed repeatedly with tare, a soy-mirin-sake glaze that caramelizes into a lacquered, sweet-savory coating. Authentic yakitori is cooked over binchotan (白炭), a white oak charcoal that burns at very high temperature with minimal smoke, allowing the fat dripping from the chicken to produce fragrant vapour rather than flare-ups. The two defining skewer styles covered here are negima (ねぎま) — chicken thigh alternated with long onion — and the plain momo (もも) thigh skewer. Both are grilled in multiple passes, dipped in tare, returned to the grill, and repeated until the exterior is lacquered dark and the interior is cooked through.

60 min310 kcal4 serves

💪High protein

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