How to Plan a Kid-friendly Food Tour of Japan

“But what will happen to Japan?”

This was one of the last questions my wife, Laura, and I asked ourselves during a years-long debate about whether to have children. Trivial as it might seem when stacked against the responsibilities of procreation, Japan was no casual consideration. We’d been carrying on a torrid threesome with the country for almost as long as we’d been together. We fell in love in Japan, honeymooned in Japan, and spent months traveling the country together when I was researching Rice, Noodle, Fish, a book I wrote with Anthony Bourdain back in 2015.

As innocent as we were in those pre-parenting days, we knew enough to understand that everything would be irrevocably changed by having kids. We feared that the magic of Japan — the tiny restaurants; the quiet, contemplative spaces — would be compromised by our new traveling companions. So, we resolved to shelve Japan until our children were at least old enough to spell omakase.

But by the time our oldest son, Diego, was four, and his little brother Dylan was around eight months, we could feel the itch spreading. We were anxious: not just to return to Japan, but to test our mettle as a family. Could we still wander the world for weeks, even months at a time — and would we want to? And how would these little humans affect our relationship with the places most sacred to us?

So Laura and I decided to travel to Japan as if it were our first time: Tokyo and Kyoto, plus maybe a side adventure or two. Along the way, we planned to share as much of our collective passion for the country with our children as possible — the wonders of the convenience stores, the science of noodle slurping, the magic of a night in an ancient ryokan.

If the trip was a success, we told ourselves, maybe our two boys would come to love this country as much as we do. And maybe — maybe! — Laura and I would learn to love Japan in a new way.

What could possibly go wrong?

Day 1 

Shibuya, Tokyo

It doesn’t matter if it’s your first or your 50th visit to Japan, those initial hours on the ground hit like nowhere else in the world. We travel to stimulate our senses in wild and unpredictable ways, and at no time are they more heightened than in the inaugural moments of a stroll through Tokyo. Every tiny detail registers at an elevated pitch. Take advantage: food tastes better; beer slides down easier; neon shines brighter. 

When we step out of the taxi at 11 p.m. that first cool November night in Shibuya, Diego has one thing on his mind: ramen. Laura and I share this singular focus, so we venture off through the buzzing side streets, thick with the weekday post-work rabble, to Oreryu Shio-Ramen, a slurp shop for the late-night crowd.

Within minutes, before we’ve even breached our shimmering bowls of yuzu-scented broth, a group of well-lubricated Japanese businessmen and women sits down beside us and does the unthinkable: they grab Dylan, our baby boy, passing him between them like a hot mic in a karaoke bar, cooing a few notes before handing him off to the next in line.

I had hoped for a moment like this. For everything I adore about Japan, I’m often aware of the distance between me and its people. Part of this comes down to social norms — the Japanese value privacy, humility, and discretion. Part of it is linguistic: my Japanese stalled out years ago at a few basic phrases and some food vocabulary. The kids, I reasoned, would help tear down the walls that naturally exist between locals and foreigners. 

The fact that those walls come down before we take our first slurp in Tokyo suggests something special could be in store during the days ahead.

Day 2 

Roppongi, Tokyo

Any great love affair with Japan begins with food, and ours was no different. There was that tangle of pure buckwheat soba topped with slices of simmered duck; the coffee ceremony so delicate and devout it felt like a religious experience; the breakfast bowl of steamed rice and uni devoured before dawn.

After 20 years earning a living as a food writer, there is nothing I won’t eat. But it wasn’t always this way. Truth is, if I had gone to Japan when I was four, I probably would have starved. Nuggets, fries, mac and cheese: beige was the only color I allowed to enter my body. My kids would be different, I reasoned. I planned to raise them in a home that valued food above all — walks to the market in the morning, shelling peas and stirring sauces in the evening. And yet, they’ve somehow remained impressively impervious to the wonders of local ingredients and seasonal cooking.

Four years in, I can only say that eating remains a work in progress. Early on in our Japan trip, Laura and I decide we’re not going to choose the subdued counters of Tokyo and Kyoto as battlegrounds for our struggle. Instead, we lean in to the foods we know will land well. To deliver us to deliciousness, we enlist the help of Shinji Nohara, a.k.a. the Stomach of Tokyo: a fixer for visiting chefs and foodies and a co-conspirator in all things culinary during our years in Japan.

Shinji takes us to lunch at an old favorite: Butagumi, a two-story temple of tonkatsu on a quiet residential street in Roppongi where panko-crusted pork is elevated to its highest possible expression. Choose the cut and the provenance of your pig (a lean loin from Hyōgo Prefecture, say, or a marbled cut from Kyushu) and let the pig whisperers do the rest. As Diego happily chews through succulent pork and shattering panko, trading stories with Shinji, I find myself wishing this feast would never end. 

For dinner, Shinji sets us up at the counter at Shirokane Toritama, a venerable yakitori outlet on the backstreets of Kagurazaka that we’ve been coming to for a decade. The yakitori experience itself is a series of lessons for the young eater: in the alchemic power of smoke and fire; in the complex anatomy of the seemingly simple chicken; in the all-important Japanese philosophy of mottainai, or “don’t waste it.” Diego doesn’t take to sunagimo (gizzard), but he develops an instant love for bonjiri (chicken butt), a word he will utter at random moments in the days ahead, much to the confusion/delight/concern of any Japanese people who happen to be within earshot. 

When we step back into the night, Diego is buzzing from the bonjiri. “We crushed that yakitori!” He high-fives Shinji and the two of them set off for the closest convenience store in search of something sweet. 

Day 3 

Daikanyama, Tokyo

The next morning, feeding off the momentum of yesterday’s movable feast, I wake with a head full of plans. A walk through the Modernist architectural wonders of Daikanyama, a visit to the magical Tsutaya bookstore, two lunches, two dinners. Now that we’re here, it suddenly feels as if we have a lot of lost Tokyo time to make up for.

But three blocks into the stroll through Daikanyama, Diego looks up and asks: “Where is the playground?”

As the day goes on the plans continue to fall, one by one, into the compost bin of my once-great expectations. Parenting is nothing if not an emotional rollercoaster, but in the first 72 hours in Japan, it feels as though I’m in the clutches of a powerful, dangerous drug. Every few minutes I find myself cycling through a new emotion, cresting a wave of euphoria only to have it crash into a whitewash of exhaustion, frustration, and doubt.

Just as I feel the architecture inside me begin to buckle, we are saved by a pool. Not just any pool, but the infinity pool at the Trunk (Hotel) Yoyogi Park, a new branch of one of Tokyo’s hippest hotel brands and our home base in the city. As Diego splashes around happily and Dylan naps on a lounge chair, Laura and I take in the waterline of the pool as it disappears into Yoyogi Park’s rainbow of autumnal colors. Slowly, the gathering clouds begin to part. Sippng our welcome cocktails, we level with each other. “I think we need to rethink our strategy,” Laura says.

We settle on a new approach: Two things per day. One for them. One for us.

Day 4 

The Bullet Train

When do your earliest memories start? When do the images in your mind develop from Polaroids into a film reel? Mine are from a boat in the U.S. Virgin Islands, cutting a vector from St. Thomas to St. John, wind whipping through my hair, the sun warming the faces of my three brothers and our parents. Like any good memory, it may or may not be entirely true, but in my mind, life began on that boat. 

I’ve asked a lot of people the first memory question these past few years, and so many of the answers I get involve travel. Camping with parents. Summer vacation in Hawaii. Moments that stick because travel pushes all of us, even kids, into a heightened state of being. Displacement breaks through the mushy memories of quotidian life.

If I had to guess where Diego’s memories will begin, I’m thinking right here, in the embrace of a speeding bullet, hurtling south toward Kyoto.

This is a moment I have been anticipating for years. The first time I witnessed the shinkansen’s smooth, elongated nose pulling into a station, my knees buckled. If a train could do that to a twentysomething man, imagine what it could do for a four-year-old boy.

We arrive at Tokyo Station an hour early, leaving plenty of time to scour the sprawling eating emporium surrounding the tracks. I try to convince Diego of the virtues of ekiben — bento boxes sold in train stations that showcase each region’s specialties — but he only has eyes for one lunch, a plastic mini-shinkansen filled with a plethora of kid-friendly treasures: a baby hamburger patty, a slice of sausage, a ball of rice with a smiley face fashioned from sesame seeds. 

I opt for an old favorite: gyutan from the city of Sendai, slices of grilled beef tongue slicked with soy and wasabi. When I crack the top of the container, a warmer under the rice gives off a curl of steam that heats it up. God, I love this country.

Judging by the constant stream of chatter and the fact that, after he finishes his lunch, he reaches across the armrest to hold my hand, I think my son might feel the same way.

Day 5 

Kyoto

The Japanese are shocked to hear that there isn’t a word in English to describe the sight of dappled light filtering through the leaves of a tree, a phenomenon currently holding all but my offspring spellbound. What takes 10 words in English takes but one in Japanese: komorebi.

As we wander the grounds of our hotel, Aman Kyoto, I too am shocked by the oversight in our language. If anything, it denotes a troubling lack of appreciation for one of nature’s most bewitching phenomena.

Kyoto may be best known for its sakura, or cherry blossoms, but for my money, fall is the best time to visit the ancient capital. The ginkgo and maple trees turn the city into a patchwork of autumnal majesty. I’m addicted to this light and, like any self-respecting addict, am willing to go to unreasonable lengths to chase it down.

The good news is that the Aman appears to be built as a tribute to the dance between light and leaves. The Asano family, owners of a profitable textile company, bought the property in the 1940s with a plan to turn it into the most beautiful garden in the world. To them, beauty didn’t mean sakura, which they saw as too flashy; beauty meant maple. Today, 3,000 maple trees cover the property, which recalls another special Japanese phrase: shinrin-yoku, forest bathing, an act of communion with all things arboreal.

That night, as Laura and the boys sleep off the last vestiges of jet lag, I slip out to the onsen for 30 minutes of contemplative soaking. I lie with my back against the smooth, warm stone, body and brain buzzing from the cocktail of komorebi, shinrin-yoku, and 106-degree water.

My thoughts run wild.

Why do we travel? I know, I know: few questions have been afforded more ink over the years, including in these august pages, but in my cerebral onsen state, I’d like to offer a theory.

We travel in search of the new and the wondrous, those beautiful bedfellows of the young mind. Our earliest years are powered by curiosity and wonder; we then spend much of our adult lives trying to rekindle that energy. And no place evokes wonder in the traveler as deeply and consistently as Japan. At every turn, the discoveries leave you awestruck: The conductor who bows to an empty train car. An 80-year-old apprentice. A calendar that marks not four, but 72 (micro) seasons.

Maybe the question isn’t what will happen to Japan, as I wrote earlier, but what happens to all the things we love? How does the presence of new humans in our lives irrevocably alter the way we see the world?

In the end, we travel because it’s the closest we can get to becoming a kid again.

Day 6 

Arashiyama, Kyoto

For the better part of a week, we have assiduously avoided the kind of meals we used to take 12-hour flights for, embracing instead a steady stream of noodles, crispy pork, and grilled meat on sticks. Ramen and yakitori prove reliable daily staples, buttressed with an ever-rotating roster of convenience-store snacks.

But today is different. Today, we go to Tempura Matsu.

Years ago, I wandered into a kaiseki counter on the outskirts of Kyoto and had a meal that would change my life. Not in the overused superlative way of modern food writing, but in the truest sense. After dinner, I begged the proprietor, Shunichi Matsuno, and his son Toshio to let me stand at their shoulders and watch them work — buying blowfish at the morning market, unearthing tender bulbs of bamboo from dense green forests, sharing simple family meals before service. I dedicated a chapter to the experience in Rice, Noodle, Fish, and the Matsuno family traveled to New York to cook for our book-release party. Shunichi, the bighearted patriarch, passed away a few years later.

Later, Diego was born on the anniversary of Shunichi’s passing, a karmic connection that the Matsunos take very seriously. As do we. I spent many hours in the run-up to the trip telling Diego about our Kyoto family, and about the magical restaurant they operate along the Oi River in Arashiyama. Upon arrival, we are showered with attention and a Santa sack of beautifully wrapped gifts. As Mama-san picks up Diego and lifts him toward the light, a trail of tears slides down her cheeks.

Behind the hickory counter, in a generous open-air kitchen, Toshio Matsuno works his sorcery. He grills planks of Wagyu on metal skewers, carves fat-frizzled dominoes from a lobe of wild tuna belly, whisks white miso into a pot of boiling dashi. He serves Laura and me the full omakase — a dazzling sequence of tastes and textures that fan the flames of my long-burning love for this family and its cooking. For Diego, Toshio has made something special: handmade ramen noodles with a little sidecar of dipping sauce. I breathe a sigh of relief, and we shower Toshio with arigatos and half-bows.

But when it comes time to eat, Diego’s chopsticks don’t budge. “These aren’t the ramen noodles I like,” he protests. I am not amused. I lean over the bowl and in my most menacing whisper, assure him there is no other food in all of Japan if these noodles don’t get slurped.

Toshio returns with a bit of tempura, hoping the crispy sweet potatoes and shrimp will break the standoff. But they don’t. I eat them, bitterly, and the struggle continues. I swing from angry to desperate, yet the more I push, the harder he stands his ground. Laura tries to break the impasse in the graceful way only mothers can do, but neither of us budge.

We pull out in a taxi, the Matsuno family bidding a spirited goodbye from the edge of the property. As the last waving hand and bowing waist disappear in the dusky rearview, I blink away tears — uncertain about what, or who, exactly, I am crying for.

I turn to Diego to say something conciliatory, but he’s already asleep.

Day 7 

Gion, Kyoto

To wash away the Matsu hangover, I need an easy win. I enroll us in “Ninja University” — a class at the Samurai Ninja Museum. Four years ago, I would have shuddered at the thought of such shameless tourist bait; today, I’m manically refreshing the website, desperate for two slots in today’s class.

The teacher is a tall, slender twentysomething whose wry sense of humor is wasted on his students, who only have eyes and ears for the weaponry waiting behind him. First, we tackle the ninja stars. Made of hard plastic, they sink into the Styrofoam wall with a decent flick of the wrist. Next we move on to katanas, or samurai swords, then finally to the sacred blowguns.

Seeing Diego wrapped in black, blowing faux darts from a metal tube, is enough to make the desperation I felt during our meal a figment of the past. When Laura hears about the class, she feels a pang of jealousy for having missed out on the fun, so she and Diego re-enroll while I venture out temple hopping with Dylan.

For all the focus we’ve paid to our older son, it’s the baby Japan is most interested in.

Everywhere we take Dylan, he commands an audience. Maybe it’s the blond hair, the chubby cheeks, the high-wattage permasmile. Or is it just that I never really understood how much the Japanese love babies?

I carry Dylan in a BabyBjörn for hours a day on my chest, pointing him at people like a flashlight to watch their faces light up. I find that it works especially well in the quietest corners of Kyoto. Take him to a temple and he’ll bring the house of holy down. Something about the juxtaposition of hushed contemplation and giggling baby makes people unreasonably happy.

But the truth is that there aren’t many quiet corners left in this city. The crowds in Kyoto are every bit as big as I’ve been warned — bigger, in fact. Japan was projected to receive 35 million visitors in 2024, and that afternoon, as we amble along the outskirts of the Gion, it feels like most of them are concentrated in the temples of Kyoto.

Nevertheless, Dylan and I push on, winding our way down the Philosopher’s Path — where Nishida Kitaro, one of Japan’s most famous thinkers, practiced meditation — in search of enlightenment. There are more than 1,600 temples and shrines in this city; surely some of them still offer solitude, I tell myself. 

We pass Nanzen-ji and its pulsing crowd. Heian is a thicket of visitors. Between the two, a three-hour line at the world’s most beautiful Blue Bottle Coffee: a temple of caffeine and pastries. 

At the Shōren-in, we climb staircase after staircase, past ever-thinning crowds, until we find ourselves alone in a tatami-lined room perched at the edge of the temple complex. Below, a small cemetery, and beyond, the sprawl of greater Kyoto in the fading afternoon light. By now Dylan is asleep, and the intimacy of the moment — unthinkable just a few hundred yards down the mountain — awakens something deep inside me.

A ringing bell, a branch of birds, a chorus of monks, and the rhythms of your baby dreaming on your chest. The magic is alive, there to be unearthed just paces from the pandemonium.

Day 8 

Universal Studios Japan, Osaka

We hadn’t planned to go to Osaka. We wanted this to be a simple trip, with as few stops as possible. But by the end of our stay in Kyoto, the siren call of Japan’s most underrated city becomes too much to ignore. Not just because of the people — those famously funny, hospitable denizens. Not just the cuisine: the pitch-perfect blend of high-low that I crave, where you can eat uni from the island of Hokkaido at a raucous street stand, or spend four hours in the hands of a seventh-generation master at one of Osaka’s formidable counter-style kappo establishments.

All of that has been reason enough for my wife and me to make Osaka a stop on every trip we take to Japan. But this time around, there’s something — or someone — drawing us back.

Mario.

Osaka is home to Super Nintendo World, a wildly popular attraction inside the city’s branch of Universal Studios Japan. It’s the kind of thing that the famously fastidious Japanese book months in advance, and that this infamously indecisive Spanish-American family most certainly did not. 

Lucky for us, the kind folks at the W Osaka are well versed in the ways of Western ineptitude, and after some gentle pleading, they score tickets for the final day of our trip.

In short order, we discover something that hadn’t crossed my mind in a dozen previous trips here: Osaka is a brilliant city for families. From the formidable aquarium, with not one but two giant whale sharks circling its main tank, to Osaka Castle Park and (more importantly) its wondrous playground, to the preponderance of casual eateries run by bighearted people, my love for this city takes on a new dimension.

And yet, after weaving through the sea of cheery mascots and park employees that greets us at the gates of Universal Studios, I am skeptical. There’s an hour-long line for rainbow popcorn. Bus after bus of schoolchildren (“I want to go to school in Japan!” Diego says). A wild collision of humans memorializing their every second inside the park.

But when Laura emerges from the gift shop donning a floppy red Mario cap, I’m reminded that we’ve entered a new age of travel, where we need to embrace whatever sliver of overlap we can find in the Venn diagram between our children’s interests and our own. After dropping in on the Minions and the Hogwarts alumni, the big moment arrives. Laura leads the way into the Warp Zone, her Mario hat flopping from side to side, Diego bouncing with equal energy between us. Dylan hangs from my chest, kicking and cooing as we press through the darkness of that long green pipe and into the bright light beyond.

When we emerge, it’s as if we’ve stepped through the screen of my parents’ rabbit-eared television. Carnivorous plants snatch at the sky. Golden coins glint in the afternoon sun. Toad and Princess turn to address the crowd. Welcome to the Mushroom Kingdom. 

Diego does his little happy dance. Dylan kicks and coos. Laura reaches out and squeezes my hand.

This place isn’t made for the kids. Nor for the parents. It’s a moment when the Venn diagram between us and them, between traveling and raising children, between what we’ve lost and what we’ve found, becomes a full eclipse. 

How to Visit Tokyo

Trunk (Hotel) Yoyogi Park

After cornering the hip-hotel market with its Shibuya location, Trunk (Hotel) Yoyogi Park opened a second property in 2023 on the edge of Yoyogi Park. While the rooms exude a pitch-perfect blend of Japanese design and Danish Modernism, the real draw is the rooftop pool, its infinity edge giving way to the foliage of the park.

Butagumi

Found in a two-story house down a quiet side street in Roppongi, Butagumi is one of Tokyo’s top purveyors of tonkatsu, the panko-breaded pork with a mixture of crunch and savory deliciousness that will conquer even the pickiest of eaters.

Shirokane Toritama

An elegant but accessible yakitori restaurant with locations across the city, Shirokane Toritama offers more than 30 different cuts of chicken — from juicy momo (thigh) to chewy cartilage — plus an array of seasonal vegetables, all grilled over binchotan charcoal.

How to Visit Kyoto

Aman Kyoto

Aman Kyoto turned a storied maple forest in the quiet hills of this ancient city into a luxurious sanctuary. It’s worth the splurge for the refined minimalism of the rooms, the multicourse kaiseki feast at the restaurant, Taka-an, and the supremely tranquil outdoor onsen.

Tempura Matsu

Kaiseki, the traditional multicourse dining of Kyoto, is not made for the younger set. But Tempura Matsu plays by its own rules, from the relaxed service to the modern twists on Kyoto classics employed by chef Toshio Matsuno. (And if your kids don’t want to test their palates through 10-plus courses of fish, meat, and vegetables, Toshio-san serves a mean bowl of handmade noodles.)

How to Visit Osaka

W Osaka

The W Osaka is that rare hotel that’s cool enough to attract a steady stream of locals. Staff are well equipped to help families navigate everything from toddler-friendly dining options to finding Warp Zones in Universal Studios Japan’s surreal Super Nintendo World.

Universal Studios Japan

Osaka’s status as a destination for families — both Japanese and foreign — owes much to Universal Studios Japan. All the fan favorites are there, but the real draw is Super Nintendo World, which opened in 2021. Entry to this mind-bending mix of mushrooms, Warp Zones, and Koopas requires its own separate ticket; be sure to book in advance.

How to Visit Nara

Fufu Nara

Japan’s ancient capital is today known for its temples and wild deer. Take it all in from Fufu Nara, which offers a slick blend of old ryokan beauty and new school comfort.

A version of this story first appeared in the December 2024 / January 2025 issue of Travel + Leisure under the headline “Family-Style.”