Back home, a chicken skewer is an afterthought. In Japan, it's a discipline. A good yakitori restaurant might do nothing else for forty years.

Yakitori — literally "grilled bird" — is one of those Japanese foods that looks simple on the surface and reveals its depth slowly. It's chicken (and sometimes beef, pork, or vegetables) threaded onto bamboo skewers and cooked over a charcoal grill called a binchōtan. The charcoal matters. It burns hotter and cleaner than regular charcoal, produces very little smoke, and gives the meat a faint aromatic char that you can't replicate with gas.

Tare vs Shio

Every yakitori order comes down to a choice: tare or shio. Tare is a sticky glaze made from soy sauce, mirin, sake, and sugar — sweet, savoury, slightly caramelised. Shio is simply salt, and the right choice when the ingredient can speak for itself. The etiquette at a serious yakitori place is to ask the chef — they'll tell you which preparation suits each cut that night.

At the place we went in 2023, near Yurakucho in Tokyo, the chef had exactly one expression: focused. The skewers rotated on the grill with the kind of constant attention that makes you understand this is not a side job for him. We ordered everything tare on the first round, then shio on the second so we could taste what we'd been eating underneath the glaze.

Beef yakitori skewers with a deep mahogany tare glaze on a black tray
Beef skewers at the counter. The tare glaze goes on in layers — each pass over the coals adds another coat.

The Cuts

Most people know momo (thigh) and negima (thigh with spring onion), but the menu at a proper yakitoriya goes much further. There's kawa (crispy skin), sunagimo (gizzard), rebā (liver), hatsu (heart), and tsukune — ground chicken formed into a patty or ball, seasoned with ginger and sometimes bound with cartilage for texture. Tsukune is often the dish that converts people who think they don't like yakitori; it's richer and more complex than it sounds.

Two tsukune chicken meatball skewers on a white ceramic plate with dipping sauce
Tsukune — ground chicken skewers. The texture is closer to a loose burger than a meatball. Order two.

Where and How to Go

The best yakitori in Tokyo is found in the back alleys under the train tracks — the Yurakucho area beneath the Yamanote line is the classic spot, a row of tiny smoky counters that have operated since the 1950s. They're not on every map. Walk until you smell the charcoal and hear the sizzle.

Sit at the counter if you can. Order a beer first, then let the kitchen send things out. Avoid asking for everything at once — the chef is working to a rhythm and the skewers are better experienced paced across an hour than rushed across twenty minutes. Finish with a bowl of tori-zosui if they have it: rice porridge made from the chicken stock left at the bottom of the grill tray. It's the best thing on the menu and it costs almost nothing.

Find a counter yakitoriya and commit to it. Order the tsukune. Try everything shio first. Drink slowly. This is not food that rewards hurrying.