Japanese Pork Basics– category –
Japanese Pork Basics from TokyoPorkPlus: what brand pork and kurobuta mean, how to say pork in Japanese, the cuts, the dishes to know before you go, and the regional pork dishes of all ten regions.
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Most Searched Japanese Brand Pork: Top 10 by Google Search Impressions (November 2026 Edition)
Top 10 Japanese pork brands by Google Search impressions of their English pages in the 419-brand Japan Brand Pork Encyclopedia. October 2026: TOKYO X leads for a second month. -
What Japanese Pigs Eat: Shochu Lees, Green Tea, Plums and More
What do Japanese pigs eat? Our Japan Brand Pork Encyclopedia (日本ブランド豚事典) lists 419 brands (as of October 2026), and 401 of those pages carry a note on feed. Among them, 68 brands (duplicates removed) name at least one of the fol... -
How to Read a Tonkatsu Menu in Japan: Rōsu or Hire, Grams, Grades and the Pork Brand Line
A tonkatsu menu asks you to make four decisions: the cut, the size, the grade and whether you want the set. Once you can read those four lines, most tonkatsu shops in Japan — from a ticket machine by the door to a hand-written board abov... -
Japanese Pork Dishes to Know Before You Go: 15 Names, Photos and How to Order
Japanese pork dishes come with their own vocabulary: tonkatsu, katsudon, butadon, shōgayaki, tonkotsu. Here are the 15 you are most likely to meet on a trip to Japan — what each one is, where to eat it if you are passing through its home... -
Japanese Pork for First-Time Visitors: What Surprises People, the Dishes to Try (Tonkatsu, Shōgayaki, Okonomiyaki) and How to Eat Them
Why pork is Japan's everyday meat, what surprises visitors (pink tonkatsu, paper-thin slices, milky tonkotsu broth), the pork dishes travelers love, how to eat tonkatsu like a local, what Kurobuta means — and tips if you don't eat pork. -
Japanese Pork Cuts Explained: Rōsu, Bara, Hire, Katarōsu, Momo — What the Label or Menu Means, and Which Dish Each Cut Is For
In Japan, pork reaches the shop counter in seven main retail cuts: kata (かた, shoulder), katarōsu (かたロース, shoulder loin), rōsu (ロース, loin), hire (ヒレ, tenderloin), bara (ばら, belly), momo (もも, leg) and sotomomo (そともも, ou... -
“Everything but the Squeal”: Okinawa, the Pork Heartland [Journey #10 Finale]
The final stop of our journey. When we counted the official database at the start, one place claimed 11 of Japan's 39 pork dishes: Okinawa. Ryukyuan cuisine is said to "begin with pork and end with pork" — meat, offal, face, ears, even b... -
Agu Pork: Okinawa’s Native Japanese Pig — and Why “Agu” and “agu” Are Not the Same Thing
Agu is the native pig of Okinawa, Japan. Katakana アグー means the breed; hiragana あぐー is a JA Okinawa trademark. How to tell them apart on a menu, and where to eat it. -
Champon, Samurai Stew and the Museum of Pork’s Arrival: Kyushu [Journey #9]
Stop nine, and the journey nears its climax: Kyushu, with 11 dishes in the official database — the most of any region alongside Okinawa (Nagasaki 3, Kumamoto 2, Kagoshima 6, as our overview showed). Kyushu has not one but two gateways th... -
Zero on the Map, Stars on the Table: Shikoku’s Pork Discoveries [Journey #8]
Stop eight: Shikoku — the second region, after Tohoku, with zero entries in the official pork database. This is chicken and fish country: Kagawa's famous honetsukidori is chicken, Kochi's katsuo tataki is bonito. But dig a little, and Sh...