What is the food like on the Kumano Kodo?

On the Kumano Kodo, most meals are eaten at your accommodation rather than at restaurants. Dinner and breakfast are typically included in the room rate at minshuku and ryokan along the trail, served at a fixed time or according to your check-in time, and prepa

red from whatever the household or region has that season.

Standalone restaurants are rare near the trail. Lodgings will generally prepare a packed lunch if requested with your reservation, for around 1000 yen or less. The towns of Tanabe, Shingu, and Nachi-Katsuura have plenty of lunch and dinner options. In Hongu lunch is available but dinner is less so; check in advance if you hope to eat out in the evening there. 

There are two bento shops and a convenience store in Ukegawa. Cafe Bond has a large menu and will make your food to order. The vegetable shop across from the trailhead has pre-made bentos available on their business days.

The cooking is more refined than the setting suggests. A course dinner at a traditional inn may include 5 to 8 dishes, built around local ingredients. In Nachi-Katsuura tuna is sure to be served, as the largest tuna auction house in the country is right in town.

The friction for independent travelers is logistical rather than culinary. Reservations at the best places are taken by phone, in Japanese. Some of the region's most interesting kitchens — a Michelin-recommended restaurant, a coastal place run by a former Nobu sushi chef, a pastry chef working French technique into Japanese flavors — are difficult to find without a local introduction.