This is a day in the life of a Japanese butcher
This is Teru, 44 years old, [living] in a suburb of Tokyo,
and he's just waking up for work.
He's not a morning person
and as much as he wants
to get the day started like his Japanese counterparts,
he often finds himself back asleep on the couch,
with his cute dog, Yume.
Oh, his wife is up.
He also has two boys,
but just like their dad, they enjoy their sleep too.
His wife is making a korokke sandwich for breakfast,
which is fairly uncommon for Japanese,
but it sure looks scrumptious.
Teru: Itadakimasu! Wife: Itadakimasu!
Teru, do you often eat a korokke sandwich for breakfast?
So it only takes him a few minutes in the bathroom
to get ready in the morning, and that sink shower surely helps.
Teru drives about 10 to 15 minutes every day to get to work.
Since public transportation in Tokyo is so ubiquitous and reasonable,
driving a car to work is quite rare.
In fact, only five percent of the people who live in Tokyo own a car.
So it's quite a nice luxury to own one.
His shop is located in Jutakugai,
which means an area where people live.
Once you step outside of the center city area,
you can find chill areas like this with a friendly vibe.
So I'm back with another "Day in the Life",
Teru should be coming just around the corner.
He drove to work today.
Let's see what time he went to sleep last night.
Good morning!
So what time did you sleep last night?
And what are you going to do now?
Teru runs a local butcher shop Yanagiya
which has been in his family for 73 years.
It's named after his family - Yanagi,
and "ya" is a Japanese word
that is commonly used at the end of store names.
So he's a third generation butcher,
as his grandfather passed this shop down to his father,
and his father passed it down to him.
The first thing he does is to prepare the showcase.
He turns on the refrigerator and cleans the shelves.
Teru, how long does it take you to clean in the morning?
Now, he has to take out the garbage from the previous day.
In Tokyo, businesses are required to pay for their trash,
in this case with coupon stickers.
In his ward, 120 liter bag this size costs about 1.50 cents each time.
Now, it's time to prepare the meat.
First, he brings up the meat from the refrigerator room
and stores it back in the showcase
while also taking a mental inventory.
The showcase has about 60 different kinds of meat
which requires a lot of preparation,
so from here on out it's his responsibility to continually fill
the empty spaces in the showcase.
So, what's your favorite meat?
How long have you been working as a butcher?
Although he started officially working with his dad when he was 18,
he actually got his first start when he was still in elementary school,
at his unkle's butcher shop, closer to home than his dad's shop,
he would stand on a crate behind the showcase and greet customers
as well as wash dishes in the back.
He also learned a great deal on how to cut meat from his uncle -
a skill he would continue to hone later down the road.
Okay, so what's the difference between that last meat and this one?
In Japan, thinly sliced meat
is commonly used in everyday home cooking
more often than thick steak meat.
It's part of a butcher's job to know
how to slice the meats in various thicknesses,
so it can be served in Japanese dishes
such as shabu-shabu,
shogayaki and yakiniku.
So, how is your meat different than, say, the neighborhood supermarkets?
Yanagiya only sells A5 Sendai Gyu Beef
which is famous for having a strict grading criteria for its meat
as only thirty percent of the cows in Miyagi prefecture
are good enough to be certified with that premium A5 medal,
and all Japanese beef is considered Wagyu,
but not all Wagyu is considered A5,
and the specific Sendai farm that produces Teru's A5 Wagyu
feeds its cows with an original blend of three kinds of wheat,
in addition to steamed rice, just as we humans eat.
One of his morning tasks is to prepare shipments
from an online supermarket in Japan called CookPad Mart.
It sells higher-end groceries from farms and local shops like Teru's.
Now, Teru goes out and makes personal meat deliveries
to local businesses such as restaurants
and even child daycare facilities.
In fact, this cafe uses Teru's meat to make their in-house signature curry.
Where are you going now?
Being the local butcher, he works closely with the community
and naturally develops many worthwhile relationships with its members.
That's the final stop, a Vietnamese restaurant.
The butcher shop is now open for business.
So the store is finally opened,
and when Teru was making deliveries, his two staff already arrived.
Even though the store is already open, they still have a lot of prep to do.
Let's go check out what else they have to do, to correct the story.
What's that?
So Yanagiya doesn't only sell meat
but also fried dishes like korokke, cheese tonkatsu, and ham katsu.
Damn, I'm getting hungry!
Generally, Japanese housewives pick them up when they don't have time to cook
or want to add one more dish to the table.
Looks like the shop uses a water fryer
which keeps the oil fresh by separating the frying waste
and preventing the oil from oxidizing.
While one staff prepares the fried goods,
the other staff takes care of the customers,
and, of course, Teru continues to cut meat.
So in a Japanese butcher shop,
you'll notice there's a lot more raw meat products
when compared to sausages, hams, marinated meats and skewers
as this is what customers prefer.
Oh, that's a CookPad Mart shipping service he was preparing for earlier this morning.
Teru, what's that for?
As a butcher and owner,
it's part of his job to find and develop partnerships
in order to create new products to attract customers.
Wow, that looks delicious!
So he was looking into making an original bacon for his shop
and through his meat producer he was introduced to this sausage shop,
and although his family already has established vendors
he says it's still his responsibility to develop, evolve and adapt his business.
So you've probably already noticed that all of us are wearing masks.
I actually wanted to ask Teru how it's affected his business.
Let's go ask him now.
Teru, so how is the business during this pandemic?
How about now?
For everyone's safety, he limits the number of customers
up to three at a time in order to maintain social distancing,
asks customers to wear masks,
and they clean the store throughout the day.
So it's just after one. It's quiet down a little bit.
Let's go ask them some questions.
So why did you decide to work here?
And how about you?
Nice, I feel like everyone loves him in this area.
Time for deliveries and look at the size of that pig!
Incredible, never thought I'd see a guy carrying a pig
on his shoulder on the streets of Tokyo.
Oh, and there's a poultry and the beef delivery, too.
Where are you going now?
Finally, lunch time!
He usually takes a short lunch at a nearby cafe
or simply goes for takeout.
Today, he's quickly eating at one of the shops he delivered to earlier.
What's that?
So before it gets busy around 4 pm,
when all the housewives come to shop for dinner,
he usually strips the bones from the pork meat.
What part is that?
Apparently, refrigerating the meat with the bone in and no vacuum pack
helps evaporate moisture which then condenses the meat
and creates a deeper umami flavor.
At his shop, the pork is stored bone in,
but the beef is too big to store that way,
so the vendor delivers the beef with bone stripped,
umami rich and vacuum sealed.
These little details make a huge difference in taste.
So Teru works diligently to provide his customers
with the best meat possible.
Oh, that's curry from the cafe, it smells amazing!
As part of his job, he also trains the staff
how to prepare and package products for sale
as well as how to cut the meat.
So it's three in the afternoon and he's still cutting meat.
I thought that maybe, by the afternoon, and towards the end of the day,
all of the stuff he cut, he can just use,
but he's still cutting meat. It's amazing.
So as mentioned earlier, the shop only serves A5 meat,
which is the highest quality of meat you can get in Japan,
based on their own grading system,
factoring qualities like yield, firmness, texture and marbling,
nothing beats A5 Wagyu beef!
So as I'm looking around, I'm actually pretty curious
as what's the most expensive meat in the shop.
Let's go ask Teru.
It seems like the store is getting busy!
And it's pretty clear that Teru loves everything about being a butcher
including communicating with his customers.
Oh, a customer is buying the premium A5 beefsteak
and included in the wrapping is a white square block.
In Japan, butchers commonly provide
free blocks of beef fat to cook the steak with.
The Wagyu fat provided has a sweet flavor called "Wagyukou",
and it adds a distinct scent and flavor to the dish.
So two hours before the store closes,
Teru and his staff start cleaning the store.
They wash every single knife, chopping board, sanitize the whole store,
also they thoroughly clean each machine.
He takes it apart, piece by piece, every night.
I wonder if every country is this meticulous about cleaning?
So Teru tells me that refrigerated meat usually expires within three to five days.
But his shop almost never has any dead stock.
Are you done for today?
So before going home, he needs to make a couple deliveries.
He drops off pork at a tonkatsu restaurant
and the pork bones he cut out earlier at a ramen shop.
I guess little goes to waste at his shop.
Tadaima! [I'm back home]
Yay, finally home!
It looks like they're having sukiyaki for dinner.
And of course using Yanagiya's meat.
Ah, that looks incredible!
Teru: Itadakimasu! Family: Itadakimasu!
So this is how Teru ends his night.
He spends time with his family having dinner,
and then after that, he'll probably have a bath,
spend some more time with his family
and then go to sleep by 12 o'clock.
That's pretty much a day in the life of a Japanese butcher.
If you guys like this video, help me out and hit that like button.
If you guys want to help support the channel,
check out the Tokyo merch.
If you want to see what I'm doing on the daily,
then definitely check out my Instagram account.
And if you want to see more "Day in the Life" videos
hit that subscribe button and the bell button,
and I'll catch you guys in the next one!