Travel Like Bourdain
Japan
Ignore the tourist version. The city worth eating in is underground.
The Forgotten Atlas — Field Report
Ignore the tourist version. The city worth eating in is underground.
Tokyo has more Michelin stars than any other city on Earth. That fact tells you almost nothing useful. The Michelin stars are real but they are not the point. The point is the ramen shop under the elevated train tracks in Shinjuku that has been open since 1965 and serves one thing and does it better than anyone. The point is the tiny tempura counter in Asakusa where the chef has been frying the same ingredients in the same oil for thirty years and has achieved something that cannot be taught. The point is the yakitori stall in the alley behind the station where the smoke rises into the night and the beer costs two dollars and the skewers cost one.
Japan is the only place where I can eat something I do not even know what it is, and it is perfect.
Anthony Bourdain
Go underground. Go into basements. Go through the unmarked doors and down the narrow staircases. Tokyo's greatest restaurants are not visible from the street — they are tucked into floors that require a local to know they exist. The food halls in the basement of any major department store (the depachika) are an introduction to the range and quality of Japanese food culture that nothing else prepares you for. Walk through one before you do anything else.
Shinjuku for the izakayas and the chaos of Golden Gai — a tiny grid of alleyways containing over 200 bars, each one the size of a large wardrobe. Shibuya for the crossing and the energy. Yanaka for an older, quieter Tokyo that survived the war and the earthquakes and feels like a village inside a megalopolis. Tsukiji outer market for the best breakfast in the city at 6am, surrounded by people who have been working since before dawn.
Give it a week minimum. Five years would not be enough. Come back.
The eating and drinking centre of the city. Golden Gai's 200 tiny bars. Omoide Yokocho's yakitori smoke. The department store food halls. Start here.
A neighbourhood that survived the wartime bombing intact. Old wooden buildings, independent shops, a cemetery with cherry trees, and the feeling of a city that used to be.
Bohemian, musical, vinyl record shops and jazz bars and small theatres. The Tokyo that artists and musicians live in.
The market proper moved but the outer section remains. Come at 6am. Eat tamagoyaki, fresh sushi, and grilled scallops for breakfast.
Solo dining booths, a customisation form, and a bowl of tonkotsu ramen that arrives through a bamboo curtain. Strange, private, and extraordinary.
Yuzu shio ramen — light, citrus-bright, completely unlike the heavy broths you may be expecting. A revelation.
Arrive at 5am. Queue. When you sit down, order the omakase and eat the best nigiri of your life surrounded by people who work in the market.
Under the train tracks. Smoke, noise, cold beer, skewers. Every office worker in Tokyo comes here on a Friday. Join them.
One of Tokyo's great sushi institutions. Expensive. Worth every yen. The toro here is the benchmark against which all other toro is measured.
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