Pescetarian-safe Japan trip? (No raw fish!)

January 15, 2015 6:22 AM

I'm going to Japan with my pescetarian friend in late March/early April. I eat almost anything. She doesn't eat meat and shellfish, but she's fine with cooked fish and dashi. Her stomach is not a fan of raw fish. Help us figure out what she can eat while we're there, please! Specifics (and more questions) are inside.

Finding vegetarian food shouldn't be an issue, but we'll probably also be eating at non-vegetarian places while we're there. We'll mainly be around Tokyo, Kyoto, and Hakone, but these are general questions.

What are some dishes that she can safely order without having to worry about them containing meat that isn't fish? I've thought of unadon and kake/kitsune udon, but are there other things I'm blanking on?

What foods can easily be made pescetarian/vegetarian, even if they aren't inherently so?

Are there any food options for her at chains like Sukiya, Yoshinoya, or Matsuya? Or is there any other chain restaurant that tastes decent and is sort of pescetarian/vegetarian-friendly? Will convenience stores have pre-made bentos that she can eat? (We are not on a very large budget.)

Is there anything else we should be aware of?

posted by 35minutes to Travel & Transportation around Japan (11 answers total)

Onigiri are a cheap, convenient snack, and are available at any convenience store. They'll be clearly labeled with the type of filling (assuming you can read Japanese).
posted by Faint of Butt at 6:42 AM on January 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

She is probably safe with grilled fish - that is going to be the main dish she will have most of the time if she excludes land animals and shellfish. Kakeage would also been fine. I do not know the extend of your friend's restrictions, but please bear in mind that "meat" has a much narrower meaning in Japan than it does in the diet-vigilant west. So, the restaurant might say that the bowl of noodles is meat-free even though it contains a broth made from pork bones or fish flakes.

More especially in Kyoto, you could also go to a shoujin ryouri restaurant, which will serve vegetarian meals based on traditional Buddhist monastery cooking.

Convenience stores will have things she could eat such as tuna salad sandwiches or onigiri filled with seaweed. There is also McDonald's. A convenience store bento without an offending item would probably be rare, but they have clear tops so you can look for yourself. A lot of convenience store bread items would also be ok for your friend. If you can't read Japanese, this is going to be a challenge.

In the end, I think you are just going to have to read the menu of the restaurant you are in. I am going to assume from your question that neither you or your friend speak Japanese. But, even if one of you can jabber on like a Edokko, Japanese restaurants are just not used to a lot of special requests or questions about the menu. I think it is almost guaranteed that your friend is going to end up ingesting some land animal or shellfish while she is there in the form of a broth or sauce or some other non-obvious component. I don't take from your question that there is an allergy issue here, so I hope your friend can deal with that likelihood.
posted by Tanizaki at 6:45 AM on January 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

Actually, finding vegetarian food in Japan can be a giant pain. Japanese people are not always clear on the concept and there may be bits of meat in a surprising amount of dishes. But being open to fish will help a lot. Can either of you speak/read Japanese?

Cheap pescetarian ideas: soba, udon, definitely. Most shokudo places will have a teishoku option with a grilled fish main. Conbini bento - there will almost always be a fish bento option, or you can combine two onigiri with a salad and/or yogurt. (I think I ate that everyday for lunch for a year.)

You can go out for monjya/okonomiyaki and get the squid option. They might bring pork but you can cook that on the side for yourself.

Stay away from curry places: most of the sauces are meat-based, even if you get the veggie curry.

Indian restaurants in Japan are cheap, delicious, and very veggie-friendly, as are many Italian places. Good luck!
posted by chocotaco at 6:49 AM on January 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

So as someone severely allergic to shellfish (I carry epi pens!) and has a pretty severe food intolerance to all seafood (violent vomiting huzzah!) , and who has traveled to Japan a few times, she will need to accept that "dashi" can mean anything from seaweed based stock base, to bonito flake based to shrimp/crab based. This can make Ramen a bit of a minefield for someone like me, but should be fine for her. (the Ramen will taste amazing, I personally will just get violently ill)

I generally survive off of curries (but those are meatbased, so she'll need to avoid) and various forms of ricebowls (kastu don) and yakitori skewers. I try to stock up on Onigiri and rolls at conveniance stores, so that I always have something I can eat. She should be fine with Ramen and Undon.

Pure Vegetarian food is going to be next to impossible to find. Dashi goes in EVERYTHING.
posted by larthegreat at 6:52 AM on January 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: I can speak basic Japanese and read hiragana and katakana (slowly). I can also decipher kanji with a dictionary app. She'll be carrying this card around.

My friend can deal with accidentally consuming something meat-based or with tiny bits of meat in it, but we are keen on avoiding that if possible.
posted by 35minutes at 6:53 AM on January 15, 2015

The kosher crowd has lists available on-line, written in Japanese, showing the foods that they will not eat. A large red "NO" symbol (circle with crossbar) is overlaid on the list. The sheet can simply be handed over in the restaurant.

I don't know if your friend's cohort has such a resource available, but it's something to look for.

On preview: Maybe the card mentioned in your update is the kind of thing I'm referring to. I was not able to see the card on the web page you linked.
posted by JimN2TAW at 6:54 AM on January 15, 2015

I spent 10 days in Japan and at the end of it I realized I had fish at every single meal, without particularly looking for it. And none of it was raw/sushi, which you kind of have to seek out. Not much of it was shellfish. So this should not be hard to accomplish.
posted by beagle at 6:59 AM on January 15, 2015

I noticed that the Japanese on your friend's card is silent about shellfish, so she is going to need something like 貝類を一切食べられません。

If you want, I can make a PDF for your friend that will say whatever she needs.
posted by Tanizaki at 7:14 AM on January 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

Note that soba/udon/ramen restaurants make their own broth and it can have chicken or meat boiled in, too, even if it's sold as "soy" or "salt" broth.
posted by sukeban at 7:47 AM on January 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Yasai tempura. Sempre Pizza has vegetarian pizza options. Denny's has a couple of vegetarian or fish-only meals. I could even eat one or two dishes at Saizeriya, but I guess you won't want to eat fake Italian if you're only in Japan for a short time.

Also, I was a vegetarian in Tokyo two years ago and it was hard. (I try to avoid dashi etc. but sometimes have to give in some because people are not that tolerant about bothersome eating companions.) Even salad can have pieces of bacon in it.

There are vegetarian restaurants, and some are even affordable. My boyfriend took me to a great little hidden Taiwanese place in Nakano, and we even had something affordable (3000 to leave the both of us very full) in Roppongi, also Taiwanese. There was also an Okinawa cuisine place close to Waseda University, as well as a Japanese-run vegan restaurant.

Here's a nice little list:
http://vegetarianjapan.blogspot.de/search/label/tokyo

(Some of these places might not exist anymore.)
posted by LoonyLovegood at 12:12 PM on January 15, 2015

When I visited Japan, it was with a (Tibetan) Buddhist who speaks some Japanese. He was able to get something he would eat almost everywhere we went, but it wasn't always very interesting. He had a lot of onigiri, and they are delicious. I miss them and can't understand why my local 7-11 doesn't have them.
He and I both had a vegetarian dish at a okonomiyaki - it was aubergine based. And we visited an organic food store in Tokyo with a lot of vegetarian options. Maybe someone in Japan can say where? There was a farmers market nearby as well.
However, I was really surprised at how few fresh vegetables are eaten in Japan, compared to Europe. A lot of rice, yes, but even at that farmers market, the choice was really narrow, and at the end of the day, a lot of vegetables are converted into delicious preserves, rather than stuff western vegetarians/pescetarians would eat. Real Japanese tofu is wonderful, but I have no idea what was in the broth at tofu restaurants.
My friend is OK with meat or shell-fish broths, so he was OK.
posted by mumimor at 2:22 PM on January 15, 2015