One Drop Cafe prides itself on having fresh locally sourced vegetables. One of my favorite downtown restaurants, it is a great option if you are looking for vegetarian in Yokosuka. 

One Drop Cafe itself is super cute with light and dark accents, small tables and some bar seats by the open kitchen. Recent top hits play in the background but the real reason I love it though?  The vegetables. They source everything from local farms and have a cornucopia of beautiful eats fresh every day. To top it off, they are all pesticide and chemical fertilizer free! 

Before you ask, I was very briefly a vegetarian and then a pescatarian for a few years but now don’t have any restrictions on my pallet. I’m a huge fan of vegetables though and sometimes it’s definitely hard to find good dishes available, yes, even here in Japan. When I do, I take note!

Looking to make your own Japanese vegetarian meal? Bentoya Cooking has classes in Tokyo and Yokohama to teach you some great Japanese recipes using all vegetarian ingredients and even some vegan sweets options as well!

What’s for lunch?

I will speak of lunch because that is when I like to go. The crème de la crème is the One Drop Veggie Plate. Perhaps my absolute favorite lunch in the world, and if you’ve been around Kristen Abroad for long, you know I love Mexican food. So this is a big deal!

Lunch will run you about 1,200 to 1,700 円 (about $12 to 17 USD) and includes a drink.  Their ice tea is delicious.  If you would like a non-vegetarian option, there’s plenty of those as well.  Taco rice, vegetable or meat Japanese curry, beef bowl, and both a chicken and pork option. Feeling particularly hungry? They have a larger bowl of curry available.

All of the dishes take advantage of the veggies but the ワンドロップベジプレート (one drop veggie plate) gives you the gambit.  It’s always revolving on what they have available on the day but the basic set up for this set meal is brown rice, miso soup with various vegetables, salad with homemade dressing, a few fried options, and then the 9 compartment plate full of bit-size morsels.  If you are vegetarian, this is your plate.  If you aren’t, get it anyway because it is amazing.

For this meal, you also start with a small shot of homemade smoothie which they normally will tell you what it consists of. Again it will be highlighting the seasonal fruit and vegetables available to them!

Lunch, Tea, or Dinner at One Drop Cafe?

One Drop is open for lunch (ランチ), an afternoon café (カフェ) menu (think tea time, cakes and parfait パフェ) and dinner (ダイナー) in the evenings. There’s a brief pause in between each that they are closed that are listed on their Facebook page.

Like everyone else, they are impacted by COVID-19, and is a perfect time to get some takeout! Honestly, for the novelty of takeout being an option, I always feel it is a bit rare in Japan.

One Drop Cafe : How to get here

One Drop Cafe is just around the corner from the Mercure Hotel on Dobuita Shopping Street (どぶ板通り or “the Honch” if you know it as an American), the closest train station is Shioiri on the Keikyu Line.

After lunch (or whenever you choose to go), take a stroll down Dobuita Street for some fun cultural aspects. It has a completely different feel between day and night. You can even use American dollars in many of the shops!

Where’s your favorite vegetable eateries?  Leave me a note in the comments!

For a fairly large city (300K+), it’s taken me awhile to find vege-centric restaurants in Yokosuka.  Though I’m not vegetarian at the moment, I definitely crave just vegetables sometimes.  Japan is two things. 1) sprawling metropolises, 2) farm land. One thing they do well, locally source a lot of things. If you’re vegetarian or vegan, and looking for some local options, I hope this compilation of vegetarian restaurants in Yokosuka will help you!

First, my vegetarian story…

My senior year of college, I took a Literature and Ecology class…I want to say to meet a requirement but it may have just been for fun.  I tested out of all my English classes being in engineering and wanted to get a literature course in, but I digress.  We were reading a book by John Miur, the “father of national parks”. This delved farther into the Sierra Club and what it means to conserve the earth. (Honestly, I’m surprised I remember all of this in detail, it was a long time ago).

Our professor challenged us to change one thing we were doing to help the environment, just for a week. Most of us turned off our computers instead of leaving them on all the time (yeah, I realize that doesn’t do much).  But when we reported back, one of the guys said he’d given up meat.  Which turned into a joke since he’s one of those that “looks” vegetarian, you know? Not to be mean.  He countered “yes, but I went vegan for the week”.  Our professor let it slide but I had a moment of “huh, I could do that”.  So I did.

For one month, I was ovo-lacto vegetarian. After that I was moving to our beach house for the summer and couldn’t give up crabs (I’m sorry, they are too yummy), so I became pescatarian.  That lasted a year or so, I decided I missed bacon, and now I still don’t generally “crave” meat but will eat it.  Here in Japan, I tend to be more pescatarian by default. Hello, sushi!

Vegetarian Restaurants in Yokosuka

Each of these I have written about separately, so for more information, head to their specific posts. Sometimes, having everything in one place is much easier!  In addition to these, Indian Curry is a dime or dozen in Japan and all have vegetarian options.  They all are also amazing and speak like 4 languages so you can ask for specifics if need be.

One Drop

My favorite lunch spot in Yokosuka is One Drop.  Doesn’t hurt that its a quick walk from my office!  But the food is always fresh and locally sourced.  They do also have meat served here but I always go for the vege-plate daily special.  Comes with a small smoothie and drink.  Located in “the honch”, it’s easy to find.

Cotonoha+

Don’t let the original post name confuse you, こ, can be romanized “Ko” or “Co” so I went with how it would be found on google with the more natural “ko”.  Cotonoha+ is a truly vegan restaurant and open for lunch into early evening.  Serving a vege plate or veggie curry as your options. Delicious!  Just up the road from Yokosuka Chuo Station.

Coco Ichibanya

If you didn’t know Coco’s had a vegetarian option, now you do.  There are a couple of locations around town. They have curry with vegetables with no animal-derived products in it.  Just look out for the vegetarian menu or use the Japanese help below!

Other Options

Though I haven’t written it up yet, Beach Muffin in Zushi is an awesome vegan option. I’ll be adding as I find more and more places :).

Japanese 101 for Vegetarians or those with Allergies

Here’s some useful words you should probably put in your repertoire.  These first you just need to make sure your pronouncing the Japanese way!

• ビーガン, bi-gan, Vegan
• ベジタリアン, be-ji-ta-ri-a-n, Vegetarian
• グルテンフリー, gu-ru-te-n-fu-ri-, Gluten Free
• ソイミルク, so-i-,mi-ru-ku, Soy Milk

These are kanji to look out for on the menu if you are trying to avoid any (or just need tips for deciphering!).

• 肉, にく, niku, meat
• 魚, さかな, sakana, fish.  Though for fish, there are LOTS of kanji.
• 牛乳, ぎゅうにゅう, gyuu-nyuu, milk. Literally, cow breast.
• 玉子, or 卵, たまご, tamago, egg. Two ways of writing.
• 豆乳, とうにゅう, tou-nyuu, soy milk. But you can use the one above too.
• 大豆, だいず, daizu, soy.
• 枝豆, えだまめ、edamame. You probably know this one!
• 豆腐, とうふ, toufu (long “o” sound in Japanese), Tofu.
• 小麦, こむぎ, ko-mu-gi, wheat.  Literally, small wheat.

Help me out

Do you know of a place I haven’t mentioned?  Let me know in the comments and I’ll go check it out and add it to the list!

Slowly but surely I’m finding more and more vege-centric restaurants.  I may not be a vegetarian anymore, but I’m still a big proponent of vegetables.  Which surprisingly enough, are hard to find sometimes.  I noticed Kotonoha+ up the street from Yokosuka Chuo Station months ago but it’s rare that I head up that way so it slipped my mind.  Luckily the other day, I wanted to try something new and remembered it was there.  With the addition of the big “Vege Cafe” on the outside, I got excited.  Though I knew it was a new place, I didn’t know what type of place it was past food.

Kotonoha+

Best I can tell, they actually opened at a different location close by in 2015 (and I vaguely remember hearing about it) and this was the second location, hence the +, but before you get excited that there is yet another yummy restaurant, they are using that to rent out and this new location that opened in February 2018 is the cafe now.  There website isn’t working that I’ve tried but they do have a Facebook page. Their about page states they are “Non egg, non milk, non sugar, non chemical…Organic, Vegan, Macrobiotic…Live with nature, Live with being…”.

Kotonoha+ Japanese Vege Cafe – Menu

The menu makes ordering very simple.  There is a rotating vege plate every month with five vegetable dishes and a nice pilaf of some sort.  Or there’s a vegetable curry.  You can have a set meal with coffee or herbal tea (of your choosing) or they also have organic beer.  Beer made with hemp was definitely a new one for me but I tried it just to see what it was like (not my cup of tea, but sometimes something different is nice).

I went with the vegetable plate, and though I really like One Drop’s variety, this was spectacular as well. Great flavors, that soup was amazing and the sauce on the broccoli was to die for.

I’m not normally a tea drinker but it was a nice change of pace after the meal.

Kotonoha+ Japanese Vege Cafe – Ambiance

Except for the larger table that I sat at (I was the only person and I feel like they were close to quitting time), there’s two small tables and a couple of stools.  Enough for 10 people comfortable I would say but it is a nice cheery little restaurant, once you’ve been in Japan long enough, you get use to seeing small places.

Access

It’s maybe a 10 second walk from Yokosuka Chuo Station. That’s only a slight exaggeration.  Come out of the station and head right up the hill and it will be on your right past the Starbucks at More’s. Super easy to get to. Hours are 11 – 17 so watch out for that.