Name: I Tried Tokyo's CHEAPEST Restaurants 🇯🇵 5 Meals Under $10 | Budget Japan
Uploaded: 2025-09-25T18:54:26.000Z
Duration: 21 min 19 s
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Modal verbs - B1

Now in the UK, this might get you a sad sandwich, a packet of crisps, and a passive-aggressive smile.

Transition words & phrases

Here in Japan though, this is a passport, a passport to a bloody good meal.

Today we're going for five meals at five different restaurants, each for 1,000 yen or less.

Now I know what you're thinking, oh, some serious cutbacks abroad in Japan.

What do you expect, given I blew all my budget on Connor's exotic train ride last month?

I've chosen these five restaurants for two reasons.

No matter if you're lost in Tokyo, Kyoto, or anywhere in between, they're there when you need them the most.

And number two, they're examples of culinary efficiency at its absolute peak.

Many with wonderful backstories of Japanese ingenuity and entrepreneurship, these are restaurants where the food is fast, cheap, weirdly satisfying, and occasionally served up by a robot cat with trust issues.

So without further ado, let's see what 1,000 yen really gets us in Japan.

All right, shh, this is a secret, don't tell anyone about this restaurant.

This is my favourite restaurant chain in Japan.

I eat there twice a week, nobody knows about it because it's concealed, usually typically on the second or third floor, right, hidden away, and my God, is it good.

Well-balanced meals at a reasonable price, follow me, don't let anyone see us.

Founded in 1958 in Tokyo, Otoya's concept was simple, recreate the warmth and nutrition of home-cooked meals, but in a casual restaurant setting, with their slogan being, a taste of home.

Thankfully, not my home, because we all know just how bad my cooking is.

They say in life, the toughest decision you'll ever make is choosing your career.

It's a lie, it's choosing what to eat at Otoya.

Also, I keep pronouncing Otoya wrong, it's O-to-ya.

It's just quite hard to say that naturally, when you're as bad at saying Japanese words as I am.

But what makes Otoya so good is, if you're a health-conscious consumer like I am, each item on the menu has a breakdown of the ingredients, and how much calories, protein, fibre is in each and every dish.

So I've gone for this nice, healthy fried chicken, caked in vinegar soy sauce.

Look at this, look at this assortment of wonderful dishes.

We've got gokoku rice, literally five grains of rice.

I remember the first time the staff came up to me and asked me what kind of rice I wanted, they were like gokoku.

And luckily, it turns out it means five grains of rice, and it's healthier for you than regular white grain rice.

We've also got the literal pile of food here, served on this wonderful green plate.

Fried chicken, green beans, onions, carrots.

And the last piece of the puzzle, a little cheeky salad as well, with some sauce to drizzle upon the salad.

But this vinegar sauce is so sticky, so beautiful.

For many years, I've sort of been reluctant to tell people about Otoe, because it feels like a secret.

Like, I don't know any other friend that eats here.

And it's the best chain restaurant in Japan, in my opinion.

And I don't feel that sort of sense of guilt that you get some of the other restaurants I'm going to go to in this video.

Yes, I could have gone for the boiled fish, and got something a little bit healthier.

You know, you can eat fried chicken when it comes with salad, right?

You can delude yourself that it is healthy.

With each passing year, I grow increasingly deluded on abroad in Japan, especially with the loudest alarm and world history in the background.

Got four more restaurants to go, good God.

But for less than 1,000 yen, this is absolute witchcraft.

I don't understand how they can give you this much food at such a ridiculous price.

You might not be able to find them, but when you do, you're in for a bloody good time.

Let's face it, with a taste score of 9 out of 10 at that price point, it's certainly going to be hard to top Otoya.

Balanced, delicious, and surprisingly healthy, it's the culinary equivalent of finding out your tax refund includes a free foot massage.

The only downside is it's the rarest restaurant on our list.

Fortunately, though, our next stop is the exact opposite.

In fact, avoiding it at all might be the real challenge.

When I like to feel like a criminal in Japan, I head to Gusto, Japan's largest family restaurant chain, where its bottomless drink bar featuring tea, coffee, and soft drinks costs a ridiculous 250 yen.

It practically feels like daylight robbery.

There's scarcely a town in Japan that hasn't got one, with 1,300 stores nationwide.

And with many open 24 hours a day, it's a dream come true for insomniacs and jet lag travelers.

With its budget-friendly mega menu, serving up everything from pasta and shrimp to steak and chocolate sundaes, there's truly something for everyone.

But this is the one that excites me the most.

The Gusto lunch menu, where you can pick three items, get a seat, and an all-you-can-drink drink bar for just 990 yen.

Having placed our order via touchscreen, because speaking to humans is so 2012, a robotic cat on wheels rolls over to our table, caked in plates.

The high-tech future we were promised has finally arrived, and it's never looked so goddamn delicious.

Fun fact, my first ever date in Japan was in a Gusto.

We bonded over reasonably priced french fries and Harry Potter.

And while that love affair didn't really work out, because it turns out she was in Slytherin, scum, scum, my love affair with Gusto blossomed, because the food is ridiculously cheap.

This is a well-balanced meal, definitely.

We've got spinach covered in bacon and butter, karaage fried chicken, and the star of the show, cheese and hamburg, which sounds like a romantic dinner date in Germany.

It's a hamburger stuffed full of oozing hot cheese.

But for 991 yen before tax, and it comes with a soup, and an all-you-can-drink drink bar, right?

But Japan has no shortage of family restaurants.

Gusto is the most widely spread, with 1,300 stores across the country.

But you find different people have their own favorite family restaurant.

It's Royal Host, but it's a little bit pricier, right?

For the younger folks, Caesarea usually comes out on top, because of its Italian aesthetics.

And the food there is thoroughly delicious, if you have your taste buds surgically removed.

I have to say, out of these three dishes, the spinach smothered in butter is probably my favorite.

It does look a bit like something you find at the bottom of a dishwasher.

You don't have to worry about the soup you got today.

We'll put that over there for the cameraman to enjoy.

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I Tried Tokyo's CHEAPEST Restaurants 🇯🇵 5 Meals Under $10 | Budget Japan

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