Common Foods in Japanese Cuisine

      Soy Sauce/ Dashi/ Miso: Flavoring foods, which are essential in Japanese cooking. There is often at least one of these in each Japanese dish. They are often extremely low in fat but high in salt. Without any one of these, Japanese foods would lack taste and deliciousness.

   Tamago: A mixture of raw egg and boiled rice and often soy sauce. It is known as a Japanese breakfast food, as it is extremely common. It is a very simple, important dish, known by almost all Japanese hosts.


      Soups: Almost all Japanese meals, lunch and dinner, are served with soup, most commonly, miso soup. It is often served as a pre-meal appetizer, however sometimes it’s served as the main course.


      Noodles: Another extremely common Japanese food is noodles. Many noodle dishes, including ever-so-popular dishes such as Yakisoba or Udon noodles.


      Okazu : Dishes made from common substantial foods [such as meats, chicken (especially teryaki), tofu, vegetables, fish) served with flavoring foods (as mentioned previously}.


      Tsukemono (Pickles): Often used as a side dish, Japanese pickles are a very popular Japanese food item that is served plain or can be an essential ingredient in other popular food dishes.


      Sushi Rolls: Obviously, sushi is an extremely common, well-known, great tasting Japanese dish, which usually consists of cooked rice and a variety of other ingredients, most often fish and seafood. The other ingredients are either placed on top of the rice, or they are formed into a roll. One common ingredient in most sushi rolls is seaweed, which holds the roll together and provides a moist barrier between the rice and other ingredients. Sushi is often confused with Sashimi, however Sashimi is very different as it is plain RAW FISH. 


      Almost all of these main meal items are found in every meal, as most meals consist of a mixture of most or all of these items.

Below is a list of other ingredients commonly found in Japanese Cuisine:

▪                Eggs

▪                Beans

▪                Flour

▪                Fu (wheat sugar)

▪                Mushrooms

▪                Fruits

▪                Meats

▪                Vegetables

COMMON SEAFOOD

▪                Finned fish

▪                Roe

▪                Sea mammals

▪                Crab (known as Kani)

▪                Seaweed

▪                Processed seafood

▪                Shellfish

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