Ribs, thighs and tongues: Japan’s favourite grilled items
In my quest to bring you the rather more obscure and slighly weird surveys of Japanese public opinion, here comes an odd report from DIMSDRIVE Research, who asked 4,551 Japanese of all ages what their favourite meat on a yakiniku (grilled meat) menu was. 44.7% of those who replied to their internet-based questionnaire were male. This survey was carried out last July.
As a vegetarian myself, I have to go for the “None of the above” option. I also must resist saying anything about the fact that so many young Japanese women seem to love nothing more than a bit of tongue. Oh, and if you too want to get away from meat and get some decent tofu and other soy-based foodstuffs, and live in the Kansai area, I hearily recommend “Mame no Hatake” and “Seed’s Kitchen” as semi-organic, semi-veggie eateries. The “Mame no Hatake” buffet, in particular, is quite amazing value, 1,900 yen for a high-quality all-you-can-eat buffet.
Q: From a yakiniku meat menu, what items do you like? (Sample size=4,551, multiple answer)
Cut (日本語) Cut (reading) Cut (English) Votes カルビ（牛） Karubi (ushi) Ribs (cow) 3,401 もも（鶏） Momo (niwatori) Thigh/drumstick (chicken) 3,122 ン（牛） Tan (ushi) Tongue (cow) 2,658 手羽先（鶏） Tebasaki (niwatori) Wingtips (chicken) 2,295 ロース（牛） Roosu (ushi) Sirloin (cow) 2,075 豚トロ（ピートロ） Tontoro (Piitoro) Pig neck (I think - resembles toro, fatty tuna bits) 2,064 ロース（豚） Roosu (buta) Sirloin (pig) 2,031 豚バラ Tonbara Pig flank 1,897 カルビ（豚） Karubi (buta) Ribs (pig) 1,670 皮（鶏） Hada (niwatori) Skin (chicken) 1,594 Looking at the more detailed breakdown, the top four cuts were identical for both sexes, and the only new cut coming into either chart was the tenth most popular cut for women, ハラミ（牛）, harami (ushi), which seems to get translated as “outside skirt”, but I must say I’ve never heard that term before.
Beef ribs are the top choice for almost every age group; however, twenty-something women by just a handful of votes prefer a bit of tongue, as it were; women over fifty and men over sixty want nothing more than to get their hands on the warm thighs of a tender spring chicken or two.
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Kayly said,
March 10, 2006 @ 20:04
Hi! Also a veggie in Kansai.
Have you been to VegiSmile (Kobe) http://www.arukusize.com/shop/gourmet/vegi.html
Cafe Peace (Kyoto) http://www.cafepeace.com/indexE.html
and ModernArk Cafe (Kobe) http://www.chronicle.co.jp/map/index.html
Ken Y-N (Seron) said,
March 12, 2006 @ 16:48
Hi Kayly,
I haven’t been to Kyoto for ages, but I’m a regular visitor to Kobe. ModernArk sounds interesting, and VegiSmile is a bit off the beaten track, but I’ll maybe give it a go next month.
Kayly said,
March 13, 2006 @ 19:43
Me again.
re: ModernArk = If you are vegan let the staff behind the counter know (sometimes the staff who wait tables are new so they might not understand). If you let them know they will make suggestions as the meal specials change every few days. There is usually at least one cake that is vegan and if you remind them they will not add cream or icecream.
Even if you are not vegan please say you are vegetarian when you make your order as this place started out as a regular place with only a few dishes that could be changed to suit. Over time with more and more of us asking for vegetarian dishes it has totally changed.
Now we just have to get it to be totally non-smoking
so if you are a non-smoker please ask if you can have a non-smoking table on the balcony. They will say sorry but that they only have a non-smoking section indoors. Then the choice is yours as if there are few people on the balcony it is a nice place to sit even though it is not completely open, and you can always move indoors if the smokers light up.
The cat that lives there is one of my clients and he is also called ケイ(Kei).
Buddhist priests favourite grilled beef » 世論 What Japan Thinks said,
July 6, 2006 @ 23:11
[…] Bearing this in mind, Triva no Izumi (Fount of Trivia) decided to ask 100 meat-eating priests what their favourite kind of 焼肉, yakiniku, grilled meat, beef in particular, was. What percentage of the total number of priests asked admitted to meat-eating is sadly not recorded. I have also previously translated another survey on the general population’s favourite grilled meat. First, they interviewed a number of priests who described their favourite cuts; most were brave enough to come out in the open, but a few were hidden behind mosaic blurs. The excuses used were varied, from just the simple “I know I’m not supposed to, but I do it anyway”, to more complex justification such as “The vegetarian diet is OK for young people, but I’m getting on a bit so I need the extra nutrition…”, via the enigmatic “I like shojin ryori (Buddhist veggie meals) of course, but yakiniku is yakiniku…” They then had the priests introduce their favourite cuts in just far too much detail, before presenting the final top three. From 100 meat-eating priests (with at least one liking to wash it all down with a beer or three), the third ranked was タン塩, tan shio, salted tounge with 19 votes. Second was ハラミ, harami, “outside skirt” with 22 votes, but the outright winner that forty-four out of a hundred vegetarian priests prefered was カルビ, karubi, ribs. […]