Jason here. Kayleigh and I are back from our fantastic two
weeks in Japan. It was an amazing experience getting to see the modern sites of
Japan like the Tokyo electronic district Akihabara, and the fashion district of
Harajuku, but also the various museums, gardens, temples, and shrines. The food
was definitely no exception. It really did not matter where we went, the
service was always great and the food presentation was fantastic. It never
dawned on me before, but we have not really spent much time discussing
presentation on this blog before. I feel like the dishes we have had in the
past have all been fairly standard with maybe a simple garnish or two. Japan
seems to be the opposite. Nearly everywhere we went took great lengths to
present the food. There was also more of an emphasis on enjoying the meal
rather than trying to quickly eat and get out. For instance, it was a common
occurrence to order smaller dishes throughout the meal, rather than everything
all at the start.
Seemingly contradicting the previous statements, restaurants
felt a lot more streamlined. Now granted it could be because we entirely
misunderstood social situations, but it was common practice to call the
waiter/waitress over and ask for the check, or to order a new dish. Many places
brought the check out immediately after each order and left it on the counter.
Most of the time you paid at the register at the front. This made the meal feel
extended, and the waiting around to pay and get change almost nothing.
Kayleigh here. The experience of dining really was something
different. Like Jason said, menus tended to consist of smaller dishes that you
would mix and match to make your meal out of. So instead of ordering a roasted
chicken that comes with a salad and two sides, you could pick whatever you
thought would go well together. I actually think that may have made things
easier for us, since the wait staff could construct a gluten free meal for
Jason without having to substitute sides or parts of the dish.
If you are anything like us and have a very limited
understanding of the Japanese language, then there are a few tools that will be
essential. First, bring a card in Japanese explaining what gluten intolerance
is and what you can and cannot eat. There are several companies devoted to
creating allergy cards in all sorts of languages, but we settled on printing
out the information on this blog onto an index card- we thought that it did a great job mentioning all
the most common gluten-containing foods, and it ended up working one hundred
percent of the time for us.
For when you just want to pick up something prepackaged,
come prepared with a way to translate the ingredients on the label. We used a
translator app on our phones, but you could just as easily use a thorough
pocket dictionary or a written list of words to check for. Unfortunately, you
will not find any warnings if they have been processed in a gluten-containing
facility, and there are several ingredients that can contain hidden gluten-
starch syrup (found in sweets) and food starch (blanket term for any blend of
flours and starches) being the common tripup terms. Do a bit of research before
traveling to become familiar with what you need to look for, and make sure to
check for the hiragana or katakana word as well as the kanji. Finally, if you find
something you like that doesn't poison you, take a picture or save the wrapper!
It will save you from having to search through the shelves, trying to remember
which labels you had already checked and which were safe.
Oh, and it seems to be commonly spread around the internet
that you may be kicked out of a restaurant when you explain your allergy. We
were met with nothing but kindness and excellent hospitality wherever we went,
and it probably helped that we researched a dinner restaurant for each day we
were there, plus a few more just in case (we turned to convenience stores for
breakfasts and lunches most days). Even so, we were very politely turned away
twice over two weeks of constantly eating out, so it can happen. Just remember
that gluten intolerance is not nearly as widespread an issue, so the restaurant
may not have the knowledge or ability to make a safe meal for you. Really, it
was better that we got turned away than Jason got glutened.
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