Help me find veggies :)

17 comments

1. Ummm. Usually at the supermarket, they print the name of the vegetable on the price tag/sign.

2. >can anyone point me to any place where i can find common veggies like spinach, celery, etc.

   Any supermarket?

   >went to grocery store but they are filled with so many leafy vegetables I couldn’t identify what is spinach,

   読めないことで確か困るですがほうれん草が見た目ためで区別できないなら本当に困るだよね。

3. You need a good Japanese cookbook with pictures identifying your veg.

   Take a pic of the sign near the veg & use Google translate. (Edit: or Google Lens to identify the veg itself.)

   Frozen veg is often very good in Japan. I like steamed broccoli and shrimp with oyster sauce for a very quick summer meal. Frozen spinach is often cut into small serving sizes. Spinach with tuna on top of silken tofu, dressed with soy sauce, is also a good summer meal.

   My favorite Japanese veg is gobo (burdock root), but you need a cookbook for that or a really good tutorial. Delicious but there are tricks to keep it from browning.

4. almost a decade ..

5. I assume that this is trolling, but you can get whatever veg you like in any supermarket you like in Japan.

   If you really want to try eating some Japanese veg you could try getting a nabe soup pack – on the label they will list the recommended ingredients, and you can just match those kanji to the kanji on the veg in the supermarket – the leafy veg are usually labelled both on the shelf and on the individual packaging.

   In terms of Japanese veg, my favourites are renkon and gobou, and I dunno if you can call negi especially Japanese but they are also awesome. Renkon and gobou require a bit of prep – you need to peel those two, and renkon sometimes has fibres that you need to get rid of. But any of those three fried in butter until they are either crispy or soft are pretty tasty!

   And you can make colcannon with negi – fry some of them in butter on a low heat until they are lovely and soft, stick in some chopped up cabbage until that goes soft; meanwhile boil some potatoes; when they are done, mash them with a ton of butter, chuck them into the pan with the negi/leeks and cabbage, add some cream and butter, and serve with a meat stew to enjoy a transformative eating experience.

6. Spinach and komatsuna look similar and they are usually beside each other. Spinach has thinner stems.

   Celery can be hard to find. It’s often sold one stalk at a time instead of whole bunches.

   Buy something new each time you go and eventually you’ll be familiar with lots of different vegetables. Most veg tastes ok if you just steam it and put on your sauce of choice.

7. Probably out of season right now, but I recommend aburana. If you stirfry the stem, it tastes sweet. I also rec kabu (white, fist-sized radish looking things). Just pop em in the grill with some oil and seasoning.

   Edit: Idk where to find them in Tokyo but I tried fuki and garlic scapes in a stirfry in inaka and now Im obsessed

8. > i have been living on konbini bentos for almost a decade

   I’m sorry but I really have to ask…. how did you manage this? You were eating 3 bentos a day, one for each meal? Most bentos don’t contain that many vegetables to begin with.. have you been eating no vegetables since you moved to Japan?

9. Leaving aside the decade of only konbini food (!!), depends on where you live but if it’s that much of an issue for you you could do an online shop for groceries? Would be easier for translation/identification purposes etc

10. Use a dictionary and Google Translate. Everything is marked. If I could do it one week into Japan with no Japanese, then you can do it too.

11. Where are you based? Sometimes there are cheap green grocerers near your home or just a 10min cycle away. And they carry lots of different vegetables that have signs. I also used google translator to identify them. Good luck with spinach though, thats not really a thing here. Try substitute it with japanese mustard greens

12. You need to learn the basics. I’d recommend finding a cooking class nearby where you live at a community center or something.

13. do you know google? google spinach and hourensou and use your photo memory to remember them. Can you read hiragana too after a decade

14. Supermarkets will have the common veg. If you’re looking for help to start cooking, check out Just One Cookbook (dietary>vegetarian selection for the veggie stuff). The author lives in the US but she’s Japanese and has authentic recipes in English, so the ingredients should be really easy to find actually living in Japan.

15. ほうれん草　

    Spinach has a very distinctive red color right at the base of the stalk, all the way at the bottom.

16. Good stuff is at poke-m.com

    Cheap stuff at your granma grocer down the street

17. OP is giving troll vibes. Too much sus!!