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Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/3 00:29
Two questions:

1. What foods are there from the convenience store for vegetarians? (no meat or fish, egg and dairy is ok)

(I know you can buy onigiri with ume inside and I think therefs one with just seaweed mixed in? Also inarizushi? Any other suggestions?)

2. Could anyone please type the Kanji for the foods so Ifll know which ones to choose?

Thanks.
by Asha (guest)  

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/3 12:15
Theres a number of different foods, as you said onigiri can come with just umeboshi, or even plain white rice. Inarizushi should be fine. There's also plenty of different salads and vegetable stuff offered. You can see the salad and if there is tuna or not yourself pretty easily. Skip any bento-type foods, as the majority will have meat in them. Also be careful with breads... often there's something in the middle, though whether its cream or chocolate, or something meaty, depends.
by scarreddragon rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/4 01:27
Combini salada is available for vegitarians.
http://www.sej.co.jp/products/salada.html

Seven-Eleven and Ito-Yokado's vegetable curry(178 Yen) has no animal products in. You can eat with rice or bread.
http://www.sej.co.jp/sej/html/products/7premium/2010/384102.html

"Takana spinach Onigiri" is a green vege leaf onigiri.
http://www.family.co.jp/goods/omusubi/hc0g7400000uqw6n.html

"Zaru-soba noodle" is also available at any combini.
http://www.family.co.jp/goods/men/hc0g7400000var4o.html

"Udon noodle" is available at any supermarkets or combini without soup.
http://www.sej.co.jp/sej/html/products/7premium/2010/371102.html
You can cook green salada + Udon called "Salada Udon" which is a typical summer food(with vinegar + soy sauce).
by tokyo friend 48 rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/4 03:50
Plain fruits (cut or whole), cheese and tofu are also available.

If you don't have a problem with meat/fish broth or extract such as gelatin, you'll also find refrigerated stewed or stir-fried vegetables in transparent plastic lids.

If you're buying hot "oden" stew from conbini counters, you can ask for a lot of things.
http://www.sej.co.jp/sej/html/products/ff/oden/

Tell us about broth and extract, then perhaps someone may be able to give you more details on the oden.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/5 21:41
Oh yes sorry, I donft eat meat/fish extract or gelatine.

Thanks for the examples, itfs really helpful.
by Asha (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/5 22:48
I donft eat meat/fish extract or gelatine

Then I'm afraid you have to avoid oden, because it's stewed in beef and fish broth.

You can go to department basements (the so-called depa-chika) for more authentic vegetarian take-away food, warm and cold.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/6 11:40
You should also avoid inarizushi then as it is often flavored with fish broth.
by yllwsmrf rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/8 15:27
I just came back from a month in Japan, travelling with my vegetarian friend. She found it easiest by "ignoring" meat- and fish-based broths - if she couldn't read the packaging she figured it gave her "plausible deniability" in not knowing it contained meat products! The only true vegetarian things she ate would be the onigiri, plain soba and bread products. It is very hard to be truly vegetarian in Japan, and she felt quite restricted in choice; I had something new for lunch everyday, but she could only choose between a few items.
Regarding labels, I suggest you try to learn katakana before you leave. This was the only Japanese writing system I knew when I went over, but it saved us from many food mistakes. Katakana is mainly used to write foreign words, so if you can read the characters you can normally deduce the foreign word the Japanese is based on. For instance, we were in a bakery (great place for vegetarians! So many bakeries with so many options!) and saw what looked like a delicious jam doughnut. Luckily I could read the katakana and we recoiled in horror when we discovered it contained "kare"...curry! Knowing katakana will help you out in situations like these. Other food words I saw a lot were choco (chocolate), amondo (almond), raisu (rice) and remon (lemon).
Fortunately, even if you don't know katakana most conbini foods come in clear packaging so you can easily see what's inside. Don't forget to watch out for bonito flakes as a topping - these are made from fish.
by sq (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/9 11:11
Luckily I could read the katakana and we recoiled in horror when we discovered it contained "kare"...curry!

I hope you, the meat eater, were at least able to try it. If not you missed out. Kare-pan is one of Japan's most delicious bakery creations.
by yllwsmrf rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/11 22:41
Hi,
I'm a very strict veggie, no fish or meat extracts, and I made a list of veggie friendly restaurants. Private message me your email and I'll send it to you. I ate very well!
by umshamrock rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/12 00:15
Triangle sandwiches also come in vegetables-only varieties (sometimes they come in packs when one out of three will have ham in it, but you can just throw it away).
by Firas rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/12 14:33
Again, be wary as non-veggie condiments such as cheese and mayo are common in the sandwiches too.
by yllwsmrf rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/12 22:42
OP said dairy and eggs are okay for her, though.
by Firas rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/13 09:24
Hi Umshamrock

Would it be possible to provide that list of vegetarian friendly restaurants via email to jasmineislotus at gmail please?

I am a guest and came to this post via google

regards
by Jasmine (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/18 15:37
My mom is a vegetarian who is fine with egg and dairy, like you - last time we were in Japan she ate a lot of baked goods from the convenience stores (I can read some Japanese so she could avoid any with meat inside them), for triangle sandwiches she liked the ones that had strawberry and cream inside (more of a dessert, I feel, but she had them for lunch haha), also they have prepackaged sandwiches in the baked goods area that contain things like peanut butter (these are easily deciphered, the peanut butter one has a peanut image imprinted on the sandwich). I thought the peanut butter was sweeter than I would have liked, though. Watch out for the potato salads, my mom was enjoying them but at one point she bought one from a grocery store and it tasted very much of fish, so unless you can read Japanese very well to check the ingredients you may want to avoid. Of course, they have things like potato chips too.

I DEFINITELY second the idea of learning katakana, it's not very hard to learn and could save you a lot of trouble when it comes to convenience store foods
by Kirjava444 (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Conbini foods for vegetarians? 2015/1/18 15:37
We also enjoyed eating at Saizeriya, where they have a margherita pizza that she likes
by Kirjava444 (guest) rate this post as useful

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