店の料理 means "Market food," though it can be transalted to mean many other things like "shop cusine". The word 料理 (Ryoori) is not very clear to me. Sometimes it means cusine, sometimes food, and sometimes a kind of set of food.
Don't you hate it when you need to go all the way to the market, then come back home, and all you want to do is just eat your damn food you just bought, but you need to cook it first. You could buy premade food, but it's all crap and expensive. You don't get any nutrition from it, they are all filled with toxic chemicals, and they are always overprized when compared to the portion of the food you get in return. Luckily this is not the case in Japan, but quite the opposite actually. In Japan premade food culture in super markets run a whole different course than in the west. Here it's not bad at all to buy premade lunches every day, since the food is always fresh and nutritious, cheap, too (If you come from Finland, that is).
Cooking home made food is kinda expensive to my taste, but this did not come as a surprise to me. Eating outside is cheaper than home made food, it costs around 5-6€. If it goes beyond 7€, you are really having a feast. A meal around 4-6€ is more than enough to fill your stomach to a point where you will shout: "お腹いっぱいです！" (Onaka ippai desu - I'm full!) to the chef. I'm the kind of person who tends to eat a lot, but a bowl of ramen is well beyond my league, and I have yet been unable to finish my bowl of ramen, which I have had three times now. I don't know how Japanese people do it, it's insane! Also, just like in Anime, they literally can eat it all within 3 minutes like it was nothing. They start slurping it loudly and before you can blink your eyes, the bowl is empty.
It is cheap to eat premade food in Japan, but this obviously varies between different kind of people. Some like to eat more than others, which means it will become more expensive (Duh). I usually spend 10€ a day for food, but I really don't need to do that, its a bit overkill. I buy 3 bento boxes, one for morning "朝ごはん" (Asagohan), one for lunch "昼ごはん" (Hirugohan), and one for evening meal "夕飯" (Yuuhan). All this costs me around 10€, which easily keeps me filled throughout the day. That 10€ also includes couple small drinks and/or a 2L water bottle.
You can forget about pizza in Japan, they literally do not know what it is. ピザ (Piza) as it is called here, is nothing more than a bread with filling on top of it which is usually anything but what you are used to. This one claimed to be pizza, but it's just bread with tomato sauce, cheese, and corn on top of it, freaking corn?! Though to be fair, it was satisfying in taste. But here's a shock for you, pizza is extremely expensive in Japan. If you really want a real pizza, like in pizza hut (which Japan has), the pizza itself will probably cost you around 15-20€ (small-normal size). Forget the big size, even the so called big size is small and costs a fortune. So yeah, say no to pizza in Japan.
There is no morning without my ultimate best コーヒー (koohii) drink, BOSS. I freaking love that stuff and have not found another drink that could match its taste. Though, I only drink it warm, their cold version of it is complete **** and I really mean it, you have been warned! For coffee lovers, Japan offers starbucks and other great sources of coffee, for cheap. If you can find a better drink than BOSS, let me know - No, really, let me know.
I have been avoiding snack shelfs, because I try to get lean before I come back from Japan. This literally is the best place to get lean, because believe it or not, being overweight in Japan is illegal - Yes, you heard me right, illegal. Google it, you will be amazed, or shocked, or both... But that's not the only reason why it's easy to get lean in Japan. The food is very healthy overall both in restaurants and in market, and the portions are just right for each meal. It's more hard to eat unhealthy than it is to eat healthy in Japan, but obviously you can do it if you want, it just takes a little more effort.
I have seen the snack shelfs in the super market, and I literally start drooling from the mere sight of them. Pocky sticks, which have been my #1 chocolate sweets for years now, Japan has them all and more. There are different variates of pocky sticks starting from chocolate all the way to strawberry and the special kinds like green tea. I really don't have any good examples, since I can not take pictures inside the shop without making a huge ass of myself. My camera literally makes a loud sound that can not be turned off, so every time I take a picture, people turn their head at me, and I feel like everyone are thinking: "外国人ですよ！" (Gaikokujin desu yo!) there is a foreigner!
Take a look at this bad boy. This thing cost me only 3,5€ and it easily made me feel full. I don't know what most of it was, but it was good.
To end this post, I would like to thank my friend from Sakura house who gave me the pleasure to take a picture of his disgusting-looking food. Not everything in Japan is good-looking and tasty, there are the black sheeps, too. But rarely you come across these type of foods. This one had nothing but rice (on the right) and some kind of disgusting brown sauce that did not seem like sauce at all. When asked how good it was, from 1 to 10 it was given 4/10 - very low score in Japan's standards. My bento food (picture above) was easily 7/10, maybe even 8/10 if I want to be generous about it.
So that was a small taste of Japan's food sold in markets. Believe me there's plenty more, and one could spend months trying them all. I will keep taking pictures of my food and post them here to my food gallery. I start to pay more attention on the exact prices so that I can give you realistic few of how much exactly different kind of foods cost here. I apologize ahead if I become lazy in converting the prices to euros.
Ps: My next post will be all about my work in Japan, so you finally get to read about what kind of work I do and how long is my work hours and so on.