Today we're checking out grocery shopping in Japan.
From very inexpensive stores to the grocery stores that have everything,
Come let's see what goodies we can find!
[Life in Japan Theme Song]
Ooo, we've got two today, huh?
Fuji apples! That's my favorite.
And right now it's apple season, so we take full advantage of the cheap prices.
And we are on a mission.
Of all the grocery stores in Japan, Gyomyu Super is one of our favorites.
Oooo, strawberries are starting to appear again, yea!
A couple potatoes.
Oh my!
It's what looks good to Sarah. Mommy, can I buy this?
Let me see which one you got. Chocolate bread.
OK Yes!
Joshua's favorite, huh? The Chocolate bread.
This is a staple that I love to have on hand because it's for yakisoba.
So you buy it, it's the noodles all cooked, all you have to do is heat 'em up.
And in here is the little package of all the seasonings,
So all you have to do is put in whatever vegetables you want
And if you want meat then the noodles and sauce are already all made.
Sausages that we like. There's good ham here, good chicken here.
This ham is so yummy — smoked ham.
And it's so great to just pop up or put in sandwiches.
Sarah used to love these. They're all made meatballs.
So all you've got to do is get this little package,
And put it in hot boiling water, and it heats it up.
Then you open the package and they're ready to serve.
They have two different types of meatballs. They have chicken.
I don't know what that is, but it does not look appetizing.
I never serve that one.
Big chunk of pork for $10.
Nice! Big ol chunk of pork, huh?
And all your seasonings...
Tons of different types of soy sauces and sauces.
Sometimes you just gotta buy some flour.
Ruth and flour go together.
We do. Oh this...
OK this is very Japanese. This is all the different types of seaweed.
There's so many types of seaweed.
Bug.
They have skinny ones, fat ones, chopped up ones,
See, it's like tinsel for your Christmas tree.
And then they have all the furikake.
These are like toppings for your rice, so plain ol white rice.
And you can change the flavor of your rice depending on what furikake you get.
So, I mean, it's endless.
This is my sister's favorite. It's egg. Egg with seaweed.
But then... there's so many.
They have these little variety packs for kids,
And they have oh! Just endless options.
Pretty cool.
Look at this seafood stuff.
Whoa, and it's takai (expensive)!
It's very expensive.
The thing about here, since tempura is a big thing, you can buy everything all ready.
Like all these shrimp already all breaded for tempura.
Look, like this is probably squid rings...
Octopus, and this looks like octopus.
Ice cream! Ohh.
Joshua! Yeah, that ice cream, that ice cream!
What the kids really want. Yea but we don't want it with all of the nuts on it.
That's right, we'll get the one without the nuts.
OK, let's find the one without the nuts. Right Sarah?
Well, we found the correct kind. Alright.
And the cart is filling up quickly. Quickly.
One thing I cannot find in Japan is Molasses or Corn Syrup.
No Corn Syrup, I've never found Corn Syrup.
I can't even buy it on Amazon Japan. Can we get two?
Um, yeah, we better buy two.
No, I want to get it!
Thank you.
No, I'm going to put it in the cart. Oh, excuse me.
Oh, and one thing you probably find mostly in Japan is Matcha ice cream.
Green tea ice cream. What?!
What?! Yep.
They do have western style things. Lots of French Fries.
Our local store is tight and small, but this tiny space is full of great deals.
If you can find it here, it’s probably cheaper than any other grocery store.
So is this like the international aisle here?
It's all kind of mixed — like this is more international here.
Oh, these are good crackers!
Onion crackers. Those are good.
Radishes here? I think these are radishes.
That's like what they do with... The Yakisoba.
So here they have all these... look at this! I have not a clue in the world what it is.
It looks like you eat it with beer!
And this looks like earth worms.
This looks like kidney beans.
These — ah! I don't have a clue what these things are, but they're very interesting.
You can get it in a glob, or you can get it broken up.
You can buy smaller packages, larger packages.
I have no clue.
Well you'll probably have a lot of people tell you what it is!
And there's always a line here.
Always a line. Let's go down this aisle.
Look what I found! Dr Pepper!
Dr Pepper! My mom would be so thrilled!
What I like about this store is that their prices are very cheap.
But... no, no, no, we're not buying that.
They have limited supplies of certain... like they don't have all the options.
You can't buy a lot of things here, but the things that they do have are very cheap.
And that's very good. What honey?
OK.
You found what you wanted? Oh nice.
That was the last one!
Oh, the last one! Whoa.
This is one of the few places where you still need cash to check out.
Joshua, come over here please so people can put their groceries there.
Now how good are you at this part, Ruth?
I'm good. Good?
Mommy knows how to bag the food the best way.
The kids are getting buckled in and all the groceries are put away. Time to move on.
Hey Daddy? Daddy what?
Joshua's out. Joshua's out?!
Oh did he eat so much, his tummies so full!
And now he's asleep? Let's just see how much asleep he is oh! Not so much!
Ah! He's awake.
What about Sarah?!
Is she awake?! Ahhh!
Now this store is a nice supermarket. There's many of them in Japan.
But in our area there's this one, there's Life, there's Odakyu OX.
They're like a regular, American grocery store that has everything
Oh our hands! Our hands.
Good job.
Oh, you can normally find any fruit here, except if it's really not in season.
But like strawberries are starting,
So you get, what? 10 Strawberries for $8.
So expensive!
So this little melon is $23.
You gotta really like melon for that, huh?
Here we get into the fish section.
So you have every type of fish imaginable.
The prices on fish are very good.
I personally love Salmon, so I mostly go for Salmon.
And I try to get the Salmon fillet because I really hate picking out the bones.
Daddy! What is it dude?
Come over here!
Oh, what do you see?
Music! Music?
And the fish are... well those fish aren't dancing anymore!
Game over for them. See you can get the octopus
Or whatever these are called. Squid, maybe.
You can get them all chopped up, ready for you.
This is a very common Japanese fish.
They eat this a lot with BBQs.
And think now in the fall too. We did that at the BBQ, didn't we?
We did it at the BBQ.
They eat the whole thing!
This reminds me a lot of Brazil.
Just very different types of fish.
In Japan, it's the king, all the ramens.
There's every type of ramen imaginable.
Tons of cup noodles. Tons.
And you can even get cup noodles in bowls.
Yakisoba, noodles, then you can buy a little more traditional types.
Then you have all your seasonings on this side, you have individuals, you have packages of 5,
Then you get into your little more fancier soups.
And then there's always curry,
And all different types — boxed. Everything's boxed
So you just have your whole seasoning and just add your meat.
Here's what Daddy likes. Lots of Taco kits.
This is where we get our Taco stuff when we need it.
And this is the baking aisle which is, it's not even an aisle.
It's a little section.
Things are so expensive though.
So like powdered sugar in Japan is super expensive.
This is probably 200 grams and it's $2.
So it's a dollar for a hundred grams.
And Vanilla. This tiny little thing of vanilla is 350 yen.
But these, they have some very convenient things.
And maybe they have them in the U.S., I don't really know.
I love these little tarts!
They're already all made, so all you have to do is to add your filling.
This is great for the lemon tart.
And then they have the chocolate ones that all you have to do is add a chocolate mousse to it.
And oh my goodness, it's so good.
And then they have these cute, cute cookie cutters.
All types of little thingies to bake things in.
But these are just so cute. I don't really need one, but oh, it's so tempting.
Oh, did you find tamago (egg) balls?
Yeah. That's what you want for a treat?
That's a lot of them, dude!
You hold it and we'll buy it. Don't squish it though, because you won't like it if you squish it.
And this is the kids' favorite aisle, because this is the snack aisle.
So you have tons of rice crackers.
Unimaginable amounts.
And the seasonal place, huh?
They're getting ready for Christmas.
These little cheeses are so yummy because you can try a bunch of different styles in one sitting.
Obentos, lunchboxes, are huge here in Japan.
And you can buy them at the grocery stores and they have every single type.
So look at a couple of them.
You can get just salads and fruits if you want,
You can get these types that have noodles and a type of meat,
And all of these little papery plastic things can be heated up in a microwave.
So when you buy it, right outside of the cash register,
every grocery store, every convenience store has a microwave you can use to heat up your bento.
Sushi bentos — you don't need to heat those up!
No but oh! This looks so delicious!
This is the type they like. That's what Becca and Anna like, huh?
No I think I'll get just the Salmon ones, they like just the salmon.
Oh Salmon, yum!
Daddy likes those too!
All kinds of bentos.
For tomorrow.
So we had to go back and get a basket. We weren't planning on getting so much, but...
Yes they have it right here. What?
This bread. These are amazing.
Then Dad's job is to finish the checkout, get the things so that mom can keep shopping in another store.
Oh yum!
You guys love pancakes, don't you?
Yum! Whoa!
So this is my morning breakfast. Two eggs, and some bread.
Some bread that we got the other day.
Yummy breakfast!
Hey, so we're leaving our house right now.
My whole family, we're going to go check out the new Maruetsu grocery store
New grocery store!
So we're putting together this video about grocery stores in Japan, and wouldn't you know it,
And brand new grocery store opened up this very weekend right next to us
So we have to go check it out!
Oh yeah! Everybody has Sketchers on.
Oh yeah.
The kids. I have one too!
You have Sketchers on too? Sarah's are new, they're clean.
Oh yeah, look at those Sketchers Sarah.
Those just jump out! They're just like Becca's.
Four little monkeys dancing in the road...
So there are some other honorable mentions, like OK Grocery stores. We really like OK.
They've got great prices. It's always really cold in there too.
Oh, very cool. Checking out our new grocery store by us.
How about this? Very cool.
Food is essential for life, so it’s nice to know there are a lot of options when it comes to grocery stores in Japan.
Everything from fast and convenient to inexpensive and practical to fancy and expensive, it’s all here and available.
Well alright. We've got the lay of the land.
It seemed pretty average priced.
I wasn't... it wasn't like Gyomu.
But they had a lot more options, I think, than Gyomu.
It's very conveniently located, so when I get back from language school, if I need something,
I can stop at a grocery store on my way home.
Yeah, that's nice.
Nice, huh guys?
Everybody's like munch, munch, munch! Drink, drink, drink!
So that's a look at how we do our grocery shopping here in Japan.
Do you have any questions or comments? Leave them below,
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We'll see you next time on Life in Japan. Bye bye.