The typical Yoshinoya will have an easy-to-read photo menu to order your food selections. There are plenty of standard noodle and soup dishes to choose from, such as the "beef and rice bowl" which every restaurant chain and frozen dinner company has seemingly adopted. Your Japanese-style breakfast can contain miso soup, pickles, salmon, and steamed rice. There are also some set menu meals that are reasonably priced, and that is important in an expensive city like Tokyo. Wash down your food with a tea or even a beer.

I recall ordering one meal with sautéed beef, white rice, a small soda, and a small round container of what looked like flan. Well, I was hoping it would be a dessert. Alas, it turned out to be something like a warm and hearty stew. It contained corn, mushrooms, and chicken swimming in a thick paste-like gravy. This stew is a bit of an acquired taste, but the rest of the meal was tasty.

The orange signs of Yoshinoya are omnipresent in Tokyo. With close to 800 shops in Japan, Yoshinoa is one of Japan’s most popular fast food outlets. You can find Yoshinoya from worker class areas all the way to posh Ginza.

The selection of food is rather limited. The main dish is beef bowl, which consists mainly of slivers of beef with onion served on rice. The medium bowl currently goes for yen 280 (about $ 2) and to the basics you can add pickles, miso soup and salads. You can also add salmon for a "Salmon Set" which includes salmon, beef bowl, soup, salad and pickles.

Breakfast sets are also available from 05:00 to 10:00. If you are brave (VERY brave) try the Natto set (fermented bean curd). Most breakfast sets include egg - of course served raw in a bowl on the side!

From 06:00 to 24:00 beer and sake are also served. There is a limit of three drinks per person as this is a fast food outlet not a bar. That said in most Yoshinoya’s you sit at a bar-like counter with one person running around behind the counter to fetch the food from the kitchen. As with most Japanese restaurants you pay the cashier, and not the server, after the meal. Your bill will be placed on the table and adjusted every time you add items to your order leaving you free to get up, pay and go anytime you are ready. Yoshinoya is fast food - if you spend more than 15 minutes you are lingering, which is rude if there is a queue outside. However, if you go outside lunch hour (12:00 - 13:00) things are much quieter and no one will rush you.

Yoshinoya has picture menus so it is easy to just point. Sometimes the reverse of the menu is in English but not always. Many of the employees in Yoshinoya and other fast-food outlets in Japan are students on part time jobs and many of them speak very good English so try first before going into mime.

Beef bowl in a Yoshinoya will never be confused with a kaiseki dinner in an expensive restaurant but it does make a more interesting alternative to McDonalds, the other major player on the bargain fast food field in Tokyo.