timblesworldtour

We always knew that we may experience some problems finding things to eat in Japan. It’s a very different culture with some ‘unusual’ culinary tastes. Add to this the fact that one of us is vegetarian, and the other would rather starve than eat anything that ever had a shell, tentacles or valves, and you can see our problem!!

I have to say it’s been a struggle. The difficulty is that most restaurants don’t have English menus. They do have mock-up plastic food, on plates, outside as a representation of what you can get. But, if it’s in a crispy crumb it could be anything! And, we didn’t really want to start munching our way through the cast of Free Willy, morals aside.

It’s also customary to put meat into everything, especially sandwiches and salads. Even a certain American burger chain’s garden salad has bacon sprinkles.

Ironically, the best meal we’ve had was in the small mountain village of Nikko. It was a tiny Japanese restaurant on the main street, no bigger than someone’s front room. Outside the sign said ‘Vegetarians Welcome’! We had delicious japanese noodles with vegetables and skewered chicken with rice, and virtually licked the plates clean. All for about six pounds too!!