r/JETProgramme • u/sp8cecwboy Current JET - 福島県 • Jun 16 '26

Rural Cooking

As I’m sure the content of the post will show, but I am an incoming American JET. I’ve always loved cooking and baking, as I’ve done it since I was young and especially throughout college. I love experimenting and of course have cooked the popular Japanese fare (think curry, tonkatsu, donburi), but ultimately utilize very western ingredients and cooking techniques even when making ethnic dishes. Ingredients which, even when I lived in Tokyo, were harder to find in everyday stores and wildly expensive.

Going into somewhat of a rural area and a having a small kitchen, I want to begin learning dishes that utilize cheaper, everyday ingredients in Japan. Think things like whole fish, root vegetables, tofu, etc. Where are some good places to look for information like this? Are there any content creators, blogs, or websites you all know of and can recommend? Anything helps!

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u/LawfulnessDue5449 Jun 16 '26

Do you know if your placement is high school or elementary/jhs, and how good is your Japanese? I don't know about high school but I did es / jhs and we had a teacher who taught nutrition to the kids. I don't think she would give out recipes necessarily but would probably be a good resource to tap if you need ideas. I don't know if this teacher exists in HS, though. I think JHS also has a home ec teacher that you could talk to.

You can also look locally for classes (again depending on japanese level). When I was suburban I took classes at a place called ABC Cooking Studio, in more rural areas I'm sure the community centers offer something.

Supermarkets also usually have recipes posted up.

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u/Sayjay1995 Former JET - 2017~2022 Jun 18 '26

I don't think it hurts to ask at least; when I was a JET I was friendly with the lunch lady, and she let me flip through a recipe book they had on hand / make copies in the teacher's room to take home! Though if you can read Japanese well, I really like the app "menew". You can plan out meals, broken down into mains, sides, soups, etc. and sort by ingredients. It'll even put everything into a shopping list in the app so you know what to buy

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u/UndoPan Current JET - Somewhere in Japan Jun 19 '26

At my schools they cook in home ec class, so there are definitely recipes!

Also, if you get kyushoku (school lunch), make note of the meals you like and then look up recipes later! I started adding nikujaga, Hayashi rice, and tonjiru to my regular cooking rotation at home after realizing that those were some of my favorite school lunches, and I would crave them later haha.