Understanding the Menu in Japan

Filed in archive Tips and Tricks on December 27, 2009

© avlxyz


I can across a site recently that brings some sanity to the task of choosing what to eat from a Japanese menu. It reminded me of just how difficult getting past the language barrier can be when you order food overseas...

I remember sitting in a little restaurant in Penang, Malaysia. I'd studied Malay. But euphemisms are still tricky for any non-native speaker. The menu said padi ayam. I knew that padi was rice - though it is the word for rice growing in the field, not for the rice you by in stores (beras) or for cooked rice (nasi). But hey, rice is rice... right? I knew ayam was chicken. And I knew that the Chinese in Malaysia love white rice and chicken. So I ordered it. The waiter was resistant and seemed to be searching for words to explain to me why I didn't want padi ayam. After a few minutes of exasperation and charades, the waiter found someone who knew the English word for "frog" - the "chicken" of the rice padi. And I reconsidered my order...

My Japanese isn't as good as my Malay. I know a dozen or so Japanese words. Words like: arigatō (thank you), dōzo (please), sayōnara (good-bye), Toshiba, Sony, Toyota, Karate, Nissan. You get the idea. Somewhere along the way I learned the words saké (rice wine) and sushi. If your Japanese vocabulary is on a par with mine, ENGmenu.com might be a helpful website.

The LA Times describes ENGmenu.com this way:

Certified Perfect English Menu is easy to understand and use even if you don't know a lick of Japanese. It caters to foodies as well as English-speaking tourists trying to figure out what to expect before they visit. You can search for restaurants in Kobe, Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo, or surf the website by price and cuisine.

Once you're actually in Japan, the site's most useful features might be the list of restaurants with phone numbers and a note about whether the staff speaks English.