Here’s the best way to make restaurant reservations in Japan

Eating your way through Japan is easy — we didn’t have one bad meal during our 10 days there — but making the actual reservations can be challenging because of the language barrier.

Many of the restaurants only take reservations on the phone so, if you don’t speak Japanese, the best thing to do is let byFood, Japan’s premier one-stop food platform, make them for you.

We used byFood half a dozen times during our trip in December to book unique food tours and top dining experiences, and I can’t recommend them highly enough. They came through for us with hard-to-get reservations and were able to switch our booking when we needed to make a change.

ByFood also has partnerships with a number of restaurants where they can offer exclusive menus or even a complimentary drink or other perk. It’s worth checking out the site to see what’s available.

To give you an idea where to start, here are three of the most unique dinners we booked through byFood:

Sushi Koshikowa

One of the best experiences of our entire trip was a private omakase dinner at Sushi Koshikowa in Tokyo, where we feasted on the most incredible sushi, handmade right in front of us, and were transported to a whole other level of excellence.

Every single piece of fish was lovingly selected and sliced by our chef, who shared fascinating background stories about each dish he created, often via Google Translate. We tried things we never thought we’d put in our mouths (hello, tuna brain) and spent as much time excitedly typing messages back and forth with the chef as we did eating, which turned an already spectacular meal into an intimate, once in a lifetime experience.

In this lovely space, we were treated like family and were so well cared for that, when we left there many hours later, we felt intoxicated by the whole evening and were reminded that this is why we travel.

Gion Matayoshi

When our nephew raved about Gion Matayoshi after his stay in Kyoto, we knew we wanted to experience the two-Michelin-starred kaiseki, too. We were able to score one of the highly-coveted reservations through byFood and it was such a special night, shared at a counter with only half a dozen other guests from around the world.

The food was, of course, exceptional but we really enjoyed watching the chef and his sous chefs painstakingly prepare each dish. The English-speaking maitre d’ explained the ingredients and the process, often showing us all illustrations to help us better understand the dozen or so courses. The appreciative moans after each bite, on the other hand, were universally understood.

Every dish tasted as good as it looked and was served on beautiful tableware that were pieces of art in themselves.

Uosaburo

We booked the Michelin-starred Uosaburo because we were intrigued by its storied past and well-reviewed present. The site of a historic battle, the restaurant was opened in 1764 by a chef who was cooking for feudal lords so you know they understand how to please the hard to please.

Now in its tenth generation of being family run, Uosaburo is warm and welcoming and has officially been designated as a Kyoto landmark. It would be an ideal place to come with a group because the dining rooms are spacious and private and we honestly felt a little awkward eating alone in such a big room.

That being said, the kaiseki meal was excellent and we especially liked when the chef came in to cook in front of us. The fish dishes (“uo” means “fish” in Japanese) were stand outs — no surprise since the freshest fish is delivered each morning — and were accompanied by equally fresh and flavorful locally-sourced seasonal vegetables.

Each one of our dining experiences in Japan was different, a little out of our comfort zones and simply delicious. We’re glad we discovered byFood because, without them, we probably would have stuck to more English-speaking restaurants and missed out on some of the best meals of our trip.