Japanese cuisine (nihon ryōri (日本料理^?) or washoku (和食^?)) strictly speaking denotes traditional-style Japanese food, before Westernization began in the Meiji Era (1868-).

This article will in general employ the more stringent, traditional sense of "Japanese food". Some of Japanese dishes in this sense that are well known outside the country are sushi and sashimi, tempura, and buckwheat noodles (soba).

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Some of the less formal kinds of foods that foreigners typically associate with Japanese food may not fall under this washoku definition in this strict sense. This will be explained with specific examples under this subsection.

Western-style dishes developed in, or significantly modified in Japan, such as tonkatsu (pork cutlet) and other deep-fried dishes, curry rice are referred to as yōshoku, and discussed in its own article. These, alongside Chinese-influenced dishes such as ramen will be surveyed in brief under #Foreign-influenced food.

donburi, a combo of an entrée on a big bowl of rice, is another familiar category of dishes, but in Japan these are standard fare served at the shokudō or "Japanese style cafeteria/cheap restaurant". (heroes and subs might be an apt comparison). They actually have a shallow history, and though unadon (kabayaki eel bowl) and tendon^(ja) (tempura bowl) that go back to the late Edo Period, the Oyakodon (chicken-egg combo bowl) is a Meiji era innovation, with other tamagotoji (卵とじ, lit. "egg sealed"^?) ) donburi dishes following suit in later years.