Food · Curated list
Sushi, Tofu, Sake and 22 more, ranked by how much of the world has written about each one.
Most written-about first. Each description summarises the dish or drink's Wikipedia article, which its name links to.
1
Japanese dish with vinegared rice
A traditional dish of Japan built on vinegared rice, usually seasoned with salt and sugar, paired with many kinds of ingredients such as meat, vegetables or seafood; raw seafood is commonest, though some is cooked. Of all its many styles and presentations, the one thing that now defines sushi is the vinegared rice, called shari (しゃり) or sumeshi (酢飯).
Wikidata · Photo: Yumi Kimura, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Alcoholic beverage of Japanese origin
Also spelled saké or saki, and called Japanese rice wine, an alcoholic drink from Japan made by fermenting rice polished to remove the bran. Despite the name, sake, like other East Asian rice wines, is brewed more like beer, turning starch into sugars that then ferment, a process called multiple parallel fermentation; wine, by contrast, gets its alcohol from fermenting the sugar already in fruit, usually grapes.
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East Asian liquid condiment
A liquid condiment from China, traditionally brewed from a fermented paste in which soybeans and roasted grain are combined with brine and with kōji moulds, Aspergillus sojae or Aspergillus oryzae. It is known for its salty taste and strong umami.
Wikidata · Photo: Tim Reckmann from Hamm, Deutschland, CC BY 2.0
6
Japanese dish of raw fish
A Japanese delicacy: thin slices of fresh fish, or of other meat, served raw and often dipped in soy sauce.
Wikidata · Photo: No machine-readable author provided. Arnaud 25 assumed (based on copyright claims)., CC BY-SA 3.0
7
Japanese dish of battered, deep-fried fish or vegetables
A Japanese dish, usually vegetables and seafood dipped in a thin batter and deep-fried. It began in the 16th century, when Portuguese Jesuits brought the Western way of frying food coated in flour to Japan through the Nanban trade.
Wikidata · Photo: Lisa Pinehill from Osaka, Japan, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Japanese savory pancake
A savoury Japanese pancake cooked teppanyaki-style on a teppan, of wheat-flour batter and other ingredients. Cabbage, seafood and meat are often added, and it is topped with things such as pickled ginger, Japanese mayonnaise, katsuobushi, aonori and okonomiyaki sauce.
12
Noodles sold in a precooked and dried block with flavoring
Also called instant ramen, noodles sold as a precooked, dried block with seasoning oil, flavouring powder or both. The block was first made by flash-frying cooked noodles, still the main method in Asian countries; Western countries prefer blocks dried with air.
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Family of stocks used in Japanese cuisine
A family of stocks of Japanese cooking. It is the base of miso soup, clear soups, noodle broths and many simmering liquids, bringing out the savoury taste called umami.
Wikidata · Photo: Sakurai Midori, CC BY-SA 3.0
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Japanese type of grilled chicken
In Japanese cooking, chicken on a skewer, grilled over charcoal and seasoned with salt or tare sauce. The word sometimes means kushiyaki in general.
Wikidata · Photo: 竹麦魚(Searobin), CC BY-SA 3.0
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Japanese dish of deep-fried pork
A Japanese pork cutlet: slices of pork fillet or loin coated in panko and deep-fried in oil.
Wikidata · Photo: Minseong Kim, CC BY-SA 4.0
22
Paste made from adzuki beans
Also called red bean jam, adzuki bean paste or anko, a paste of red beans used in East Asian cooking, made by boiling the beans and then grinding or mashing them.
Wikidata · Photo: RudolfSchreier, CC0
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Japanese hotpot dish
A Japanese nabemono hotpot in which thin slices of meat and vegetables are cooked in boiling water and eaten with sauces for dipping. The name imitates the sound, "swish swish", the ingredients make as they are stirred in the pot.
Wikidata · Photo: Don Ramey Logan, CC BY-SA 4.0
25
Distilled alcoholic beverage from Japan
A Japanese distilled drink. Distillers usually start from rice, barley, buckwheat, brown sugar or sweet potatoes, but sometimes use other things, such as carrots, potatoes, sesame seeds or chestnut.
Wikidata · Photo: https://publicdomainq.net/shochu-japanese-liquor-0014762/, CC0
Every Wikidata item that is a dish, drink, dessert or cheese whose cuisine, on Wikidata, is Japanese cuisine, or whose country of origin is Japan, and that has its own English Wikipedia article, ranked by the number of Wikimedia sites with a page about it — Wikipedia's language editions, mostly, and sister projects such as Wikiquote. That counts how many communities independently thought it worth describing, and nobody can buy a place on it. The top 25 are shown.
Fetched from Wikidata on 2026-09-25. Each description is this site's summary of the entry's Wikipedia article, which its name links to: the wording is ours, the facts are Wikipedia's, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. To correct an entry, correct it there; the next refresh carries the change.
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