Donburi Take-Out

I've been looking for good Donburi restaurant in Osaka or Kyoto that also does take-out service but I can't locate any! Anybody have any information?
If it's possible to find any then can I at least go to supermarket/convenience store/department store underground food courts and get good ready-to-eat Donburi or take-out Donburi?

Thanks!

Honestly, I think Donburi restaurant is not so common in Japan though many Japanese style restaurants offer various types of Donburis. Further "take out" is also not so common in Japanese style restaurants. I do not say there is not, but just say not so common.

There are many types of Donburis, such as Unagi donburi, Katsu donburi, Maguro donburi, Kaisen donburi, Oyako donburi. What kind of donburi do you want? If you tell us specific donburi of your taste, we might be able to suggest something.

Donburi just means something is served in a bowl over rice. So for example an izakaya that's open for lunch might serve a beef donburi or a grilled chicken donburi on their lunch menu. There are also very cheap restaurants that serve beef donburi all day long.

I was looking for Unagi Donburi take-out and did find some shops in Osaka. They specialize in Eel and sell bento as well. But I couldn't locate any shop with all kinds of donburi that also sells bento. I think I should rather search for bento shop. That'll be much easier.

Here is a list of branchs of the ultimate donburi take-out fast food chain, your Japanese version of McDonald's. Choose your favorite Fu and than your favorite Ku.
http://mb.yoshinoya.com/y/map/

I still don't understand what you're looking for. Is it specifically unagi bento, or do you want various kinds of bento? There are bento take-out specialty shops, and you can also get unagi bento at depa-chika, supermarkets and convenience stores. Sometimes the bento aren't called "donburi" - it depends on the shape of the container - but the main ingredients are the same, rice and unagi.

Thank you everyone for the reply.

Sorry about the confusion. I WAS looking for Unagi "donburi", not bento, but since it was so difficult to locate any take-out shop, I changed my option to Unagi "bento" and only then I could find number of places. Unagi donburi is something I'm dying to have.

Thank you very very much again everyone!

They are the same dish! If you get it to go, it's often called unagi bento.

Yoshinoya has una-don, too! And you can do o-mochi-kaeri (take out)!
http://www.yoshinoya.com/menu/don/index.html

Here's some clarification.

donburi: A relatively large bowl (not food).

(something)-don: A donburi meal of rice with that "something" as the topping.

bento: Boxed lunch, usually with rice and other dishes placed separately, but not always so.

una-don: A relatively large bowl of rice topped with grilled unagi. It's not the same thing as una-juu and not necessarily the same as unagi-bento, although it can be considered as a type of bento using unagi.

Other typical donburi meals: Ten-don, katsu-don, shirasu-don, tekka-don, kaisen-don......

It's not the same thing as una-juu and not necessarily the same as unagi-bento

Could you clarify how it's "not the same thing" though? How does it differ? In my experience, unagi restaurants differentiate unadon and unajuu mostly by the price point. But the actual ingredients are the same; there just be more eel in one version....

Thanks for the reply!

Uco is right! Donburi and Bento are different. You can simply think of Donburi as a rice bowl with the named dish along with additional ingredients on top of it (for example, Katsu-don would have Tonkatsu pieces on top of the rice bowl.)

Does anybody know if convenience stores sell ready-to-eat Donburi?

Sorry, but I'm starting to think that you're just trolling now.

What difference does it make to you if the unagi is on top of the rice or next to the rice?

I'm really honestly curious. Sorry if I'm missing something obvious here.

Could you clarify how it's "not the same thing" though? How does it differ? In my experience, unagi restaurants differentiate unadon and unajuu mostly by the price point. But the actual ingredients are the same; there just be more eel in one version....

I generally agree. In any case, there seems to be no fixed meaning of each dishes apart from the shape of the container. But still, you can't order "una-don" and expect a una-juu, or vice versa. That's all I wanted to say. By the way, many restaurants even seem to offer the same amount of eel for both.

https://www.google.co.jp/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=&oq=%e3%81%86%e3....

And to the OP, of course conbini carries donburi-mono. At least they usually have chuuka-don, another typical donburi dish.

Thanks for the information Uco!

In our culture (Korea), which is similar but also different to Japanese, donburi has the concept of 'covering' the rice. You can type 덮밥 in google and see the picture. While donburi is usually the dish only consisting of one main ingredient, bento is considered as general meal box that comes with varieties of side dishes. You can type 도시락 in google for this.
The reason I asked about donburi was because I did not want to have little bit of everything in one meal, but wanted single menu. That's all! If I made you feel bed Umami Dearest, I'm sincerely apologize.

Hi sleeplessletters,

Have you ever had Una-don? The reason why I ask this is that I think Japanese style Unagi is not so common outside of Japan. I think in Korea there may be some though.

I am a Japanese born and raised in Kansai area including Osaka and Kyoto. When I was a child I sometimes ate Unagi at home which my mother bought at some stores (I can't remember where it came from). Honestly I didn't like it since it was chewy, not hot, with some small bones in it. It was almost 50 years ago and things might change in Kansai area (now I am living in southern Kyushu).

You might have heard that Unagi is mostly cooked in Kabayaki style and there are two types of Kabayaki, Tokyo style and Kansai style. As a former Osakan, I believe the center of cooking in Japan is Kansai region, however I also think Tokyo style Unagi is more sophisticated and popular. Tokyo style cooking includes "steaming" which soften Unagi and remove chewy texture from Unagi.

Here in Kagoshima we have many Unagi restaurants and they are mostly Tokyo style, and after moving to Kagoshima I began to like it.

http://tabelog.com/unagi/rank/

This is Unagi restaurant ranking in Tabelog, most popular restaurant review site in Japan. As you can see, most top rated restaurants are in Kanto region. At 4th there is a restaurant in Kyoto, but this restaurant comes from Saitama.

So, honestly Kansai is not good for Unagi. Anyway why you stick to "take away"? I think Unagi should be hot and its smell is gone after storage. Maybe you are with your family and other member prefer other sort of food and you will buy something other than Unagi at the same time? If this is the case, I would recommend you to go to department stores or such to gather other types of food.

bento is considered as general meal box that comes with varieties of side dishes

Ah, okay, I understand your concern now. However unagi bento usually just have unagi. If you do a Google image search on うなぎ弁当 you'll see that most of the bento that show up are just unagi over rice.

Wherever you end up buying one, you'll get a chance to see at least a picture before you buy, so you can make sure that it's what you want.

Thank you Umami Dearest for the tip :)

Thank you frog1954 for wonderful sharing.
Maybe you are with your family and other member prefer other sort of food and you will buy something other than Unagi at the same time?
Yes, that's excatly one of the reasons I'm insisting on donburi. I am originally from Korea but have lived in 4 other Asian countries so I think I know enough to admit how unique Japanese donburi dish is, 'cause I simply couldn't find such anywhere else. In Korean culture though, donburi dish is indeed common but is different from Japanese in number of ways. Mostly, Korean donburi is more like a rice with 'stew' on top of it. That's also why I previously referred to the expression 'covering' the rice. From what I figure, Japanese donburi has different style. The main ingredient is cooked and simply 'put' on top of the usually flavored rice, and this is exactly what I wanted to try out.
When I was young, eel dish was always part of everyday meal as I lived by the seaside and believe me Koreans looooooove eel for not only its' taste but also its' health benefit for men. So I absolutely understand what you mean about eel's cooking style in Kansai region and I think you just gave me billion dollar advice. If I'm gonna get disappointed after having 'not-at-all-what-I-thought-it would-be', I won't go for it from the beginning.
So now I crossed out Unadon from my must-try list, but I'm gonna DEFINITELY EAT ONE in my next Japan visit to Kanto region. Maybe I should start planning now :D

Thank you soooooooo much!!

Just something to consider:
- I can't imagine a donburi that wouldn't taste significantly worse eaten as take out rather than freshly prepared
- it doesn't take long to eat a donburi. Couldn't you pop into a restaurant and eat one while your family do something else for 15 minutes? It's fast food.
- as said above, you don't really get donburi restaurants (i.e. places that just do donburi). You get donburi in all sorts of places, and these places offer all sorts of food. If your family don't want donburi, you can all go to the same restaurant and they can eat something else.
- if you're wanting to go to a specialist eel restaurant, and your family don't like eel, and you don't want to be parted from your family for even a minute, then they're going to have to come with you so that you can get your take out eel on rice box. By the time they've done that, couldn't they just go to a neighbouring restaurant and eat what they want, while you eat at the eel place? For one meal on a holiday, I can't see that it'd be a problem (but all families are of course different).

Beef donburi at Yoshinoya may be fast food, but the last time I had unagi over rice in an unagi restaurant, they prepared it from scratch and it took at least thirty minutes, and that's pretty typical for good eel restaurants.

Obviously it's not quite the same, but you can get some pretty decent take-out unagi over rice in the food halls of upscale department stores.

Regarding the last two posts, I think authentic donburi-meshi and fast food donburi-meshi are two different things, and then take-out is another different thing.

The former, be it ten-don or katsu-don or unagi-don does take more time to prepare, is better fresh, and they don't let you take it out most of the time.

As for the latter, frankly, what Winter Visitor is saying sounds like suggesting you eat a Big Mac on the spot rather than taking it home. Sure, even a Mac is better fresh, but taking food home is beneficial in many ways.

I usually take a lot of stuff home when I don't have the luxury to eat there after I've waited for it to be prepared, and most of all, if I take it home, I can enjoy it with other foods I bought elsewhere while watching my favorite TV show in a quiet room all by myself in pajamas.

The OP mentioned that (s)he hopes to buy something with just unagi as the topping, so it makes sense to bring that home and have some fresh soup or salad along with it, even though the taste may not be authentic.