Tokyo Cuisine

What to order in Tokyo, from the sushi counter to the soba shop: our guide to the city’s own dishes, and the restaurants in our guide where you can taste them.

The Tokyo table

Tokyo’s own cooking grew up in Edo, a city of fishermen, merchants and labourers who ate quickly and well: sushi from the bay, tempura from stalls, buckwheat soba and grilled eel. Those dishes became the city’s classics, and today they sit beside the most refined Japanese, French and Chinese cooking in the world. Eat at the counter where you can: watching the cook is half the meal.

Edomae sushi

Edomae means “in front of Edo”, the bay where the fish once came from. Edomae sushi is served piece by piece at a counter, the rice seasoned with vinegar and the fish often cured, marinated or simmered: kohada (gizzard shad) in vinegar, anago (sea eel) simmered and brushed with sweet sauce, kurumaebi (tiger prawn) cooked just before it is served. Eat each piece as soon as it is placed in front of you, with your fingers if you like, fish side down to the soy.

Sushi from the bay, tempura from the stalls, soba and eel: the fast food of Edo became the classics of Tokyo.

Tempura

At a tempura counter the chef fries prawns, fish and vegetables in a light batter one piece at a time and hands them straight to you; dip them in tentsuyu, a light dashi-based sauce with grated daikon, or in salt.

Soba

Buckwheat soba is Tokyo’s noodle. Order zaru or seiro soba, cold on a bamboo tray, and dip each mouthful in the chilled sauce; at the end the restaurant brings sobayu, the hot water the noodles were cooked in, to pour into the remaining sauce and drink.

Unagi

Grilled freshwater eel, glazed with a sweet soy sauce and laid over rice in a lacquered box (unajū), is an Edo classic, traditionally eaten for stamina in the heat of summer.

Yakitori and the counter bars

Yakitori is chicken, every part of it, grilled on skewers over charcoal, with leeks, shiitake and ginkgo nuts; order with salt (shio) or with the sweet sauce (tare). The little counters of Omoide Yokochō and the starred Yakitori Takahashi in Nihonbashi show both ends of the craft.

Ramen

Ramen came to Tokyo from China and became Japan’s own. The city’s classic is shoyu ramen, in a clear soy-seasoned broth; most shops sell tickets from a machine at the door, and you hand yours to the cook.

Wagashi and tea

Wagashi are the sweets made for tea: bean paste shaped into the flowers and leaves of the season, and yōkan, the dense sweet bean jelly of Toraya. Matcha, whisked green tea, is served in a bowl with a sweet beside it; eat the sweet first.

Where to taste it

Sushi: Harutaka (Three MICHELIN Stars, 2026), Sushi Kanesaka and Nishiazabu Sushi Shin (Two Stars). Tempura: Tempura Kondo and Tempura Motoyoshi (Two Stars), Nihombashi Sonoji (One Star). Soba: Kyorakutei, Hamacho Kaneko, Osobano Kouga and Asakusa Hirayama (Bib Gourmand). Eel: Nodaiwa Azabu Iikura Honten (One Star), Yaesu Unagi Hashimoto and Hatsuogawa (Bib Gourmand). Ramen: Ginza HARU CHAN Ramen and Chukasoba Ginza Hachigou (Bib Gourmand). Tea and sweets: Toraya Akasaka, HIGASHIYA GINZA and Ippodo Tea.

Our advice: give yourself one great counter dinner, then eat the city’s classics at lunch: soba one day, eel the next, and a bowl of ramen when you need it.