Food in Asia

With the help of my Shanghainese colleagues, I’ve compiled a list of 25 things to eat in Shanghai that we love, for food pilgrims to experience what eating is like in our city.

So special is the food in Nagoya that they even have a specific term for it. They call it Nagoya meshi, which roughly translates to “Nagoya food” or “Nagoya cuisine”. It’s a way of acknowledging the city’s unique regional cuisine regarded as one of the best in Japan.

Gion refers to Kyoto’s iconic geisha district. It’s one of the city’s most atmospheric neighborhoods, its traditional areas characterized by row upon row of wooden machiya houses with slatted sliding doors and bamboo inuyarai.

We love Kyoto. It’s our favorite city in Japan. Tokyo and Osaka are incredible cities but Kyoto has everything we love most about this country – culture, atmosphere, history, and of course, great Japanese food.

Sushi is my absolute favorite Japanese food in the world so I welcomed the opportunity to have sushi as much as I could in Kanazawa. It was fresh, available everywhere, and relatively cheap compared to other cities in Japan.

With delicious dishes like Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki, anago meshi, and the juiciest and plumpest oysters tempting you at every turn, it isn’t hard to see why Hiroshima is a favorite food destination for many Japanese.

I went on a food tour in Kyoto and according to my guide, when Japanese people travel for food, they usually go to one of three cities – Nagoya, Hiroshima, and Fukuoka. This was surprising to me because I had always assumed it would be Osaka or Tokyo, not a less visited city like Fukuoka.

airKitchen offers so many cooking classes in Japan that you could probably find one for whatever Japanese dish you want to make. As of this writing, they offer over 400 cooking classes in Tokyo alone!

There are many interesting neighborhoods in Tokyo, but for us, the best is Shinjuku. It’s got everything – lights, entertainment, shopping. Most important of all, it’s got food. Lots of it. There are so many interesting restaurants in Shinjuku.

I ate my way through Sapa, Hanoi, Hue, Hoi An, Saigon, and the Mekong Delta with the goal of writing a Vietnamese food guide that showcased the best and most interesting dishes this country had to offer. This list of 45 is what I’ve come up with.