Bento Boxes + Food in Japan

This article serves as a “Japanese food” catchall to make a point visually that may or may not be obvious from your experiences in the United States: Pretty much any Japanese food you’ve tried in the U.S. is probably even better in Japan. This isn’t always true with foreign cuisines – it’s possible and even common to have German or Thai dishes that taste exactly the same here or there – but in Japan, it’s common. The reasons aren’t so much ingredient availability as craftspeoples’ pride, trade skill, and access to excellent materials, combined with a consistent combination of strong demand and supply.

Just a few examples include bento boxes – shown here as served at Osaka’s Kansai Airport and in train stations, not even in restaurants! – supermarket sashimi, fruit sandwiches, Kobe / Wagyu beef, and conveyor belt sushi. As you can see from the images above and below, they’re all steps up in presentation from the versions commonly sold here, and they taste better, too. Contrast the individually perfect-looking conveyor belt sushi below with comparatively plain, “good enough” photos from places such as Kura Sushi to see what we mean.