The most useful room in Japan, and the one most visitors use wrong.

An 居酒屋いざかや (izakaya · drinking place with food) gets translated as "Japanese pub," which sets you up to walk in expecting a bar and be confused by the menu, or expecting a restaurant and be confused by everything else.

Neither is right. The word is i (to stay) + sakaya (sake shop): a sake shop you were allowed to stay and drink in, back when shops sold sake by weight and let you taste it standing up. That origin still explains the room. Drinks lead, food supports, and you are expected to stay a while.

Here's the actual sequence, because nobody explains it and every part of it is unremarkable once you know.

You sit down and receive food you didn't order

A small dish arrives within a minute. Pickles, simmered vegetables, something in a tiny bowl. You didn't order it, and it's not free.

This is お通しおとおし (otōshi · the seated charge dish) — usually ¥300–700 per person, functionally a cover charge served as a snack. It is not a scam. In a country with no tipping, it's simply how the seat gets paid for — and the name itself comes from the kitchen signalling that your order had been "passed through". Not everywhere charges it: the chain Torikizoku states plainly that it has no otoshi or table fee, and at some places you can decline.

If you have an allergy, say so when you sit. The dish can usually be swapped.

Drinks come first, and they come fast

The convention is that everyone orders a first drink immediately, before looking at the food menu. The reflex phrase is とりあえず生とりあえずなま (toriaezu nama) — "a draft beer to start with" — and it exists precisely so nobody has to decide anything yet.

Then you wait. Food doesn't get ordered until the drinks land and everyone has said kanpai. Two things follow from this that catch people out:

  • Don't start drinking before the toast. Even in a casual place. Wait the extra fifteen seconds.
  • Don't pour your own. You fill other people's glasses, they fill yours. In a group this is genuinely the norm, not an etiquette-blog invention. Alone or as a couple, nobody cares.

Food arrives whenever it's ready

This is the part that reads as chaos to visitors: dishes come out in no particular order, one or two at a time, whenever the kitchen finishes them. Your fried chicken may arrive before the salad and after the second beer.

It isn't disorganised — it's the design. You order in waves: three or four small plates now, look at what happened, order more in twenty minutes. Everything is shared, straight off the middle of the table.

Ordering everything at once, restaurant-style, is the single most common visitor mistake. The food lands in a pile, goes cold, and the evening loses its shape. Order less than you think, then keep going. The room is built for a three-hour stay.

Getting attention is loud, and that's correct

You call the staff. Out loud. A clear sumimasen! across the room is the expected behaviour, not a rudeness — the same point I make in the piece on sumimasen. Many izakaya now have a call button on the table; press it without hesitation.

Sitting quietly with a raised finger, hoping to be noticed, is the thing that does not work. Staff are not scanning for eye contact. They're waiting to be called.

Two words that decide your night

飲み放題のみほうだい (nomihōdai · all-you-can-drink) — usually 90 or 120 minutes, often bundled with a set course. Whether it's good value depends entirely on your pace: it's typically priced around three or four drinks. It also puts a clock on your table, and staff will come to tell you when it's ending.

Time limits generally. Many places cap seatings at two hours when busy. You'll be told at the door. It isn't personal.

The bill

You pay at the register on the way out, not at the table. Ask for お会計おかいけい (okaikei · the bill), or make a small crossed-fingers gesture across the room, which everyone understands.

Groups usually do 割り勘わりかん (warikan · splitting the bill evenly) — the total divided evenly by heads, regardless of who ate or drank what. Nobody itemises. If you drank nothing and want to pay less, you'll need to say so before the split is calculated, and it will be slightly awkward. Among students and younger groups, splitting by app is now normal.

Tipping does not exist. Leaving money on the table will get you chased down the street.

Which one to walk into

  • Chains (Torikizoku, Watami, Shirokiya) — cheap, reliable, picture menus, often English. There is no shame in these; Japanese people use them constantly.
  • Small independents — six seats, one person cooking, no English menu. Better food, higher chance of a lovely evening, higher chance of standing outside reading a sign you can't read.
  • Yokochō alleys (Omoide Yokochō in Shinjuku, Nonbei Yokochō in Shibuya) — clusters of tiny bars. Atmospheric, cramped, and often with a cover charge higher than you'd expect. Worth doing once with modest expectations.

The honest advice: pick a small place that's about two-thirds full at 7pm on a weekday. Empty at that hour means something; completely packed means you'll wait.

Sources & further reading

Japanese-language sources — what Japanese readers read about this, not what's written for visitors.

I write Honne Japan — honest notes on Japanese living, the real thing behind the polite face. One small, un-aesthetic idea each week: Honne Japan on Substack →.