JAPAN’S BEST WAGYU is an independent awarding body that selects and publishes Japan’s finest wagyu and yakiniku restaurants. It takes no money from any restaurant, producer or company it covers — no place can be bought. The selection committee, chaired by Takayuki Toriyama (Wagyu Journal), dines and judges by independent standards.
JAPAN’S BEST WAGYU is an independent awarding body founded to celebrate Japan’s wagyu culture and the excellence of its yakiniku restaurants, and to carry that story to audiences at home and abroad. Applying standards people can trust, we select and publish the finest wagyu Japan has to offer, and the chefs whose craft presents it at its very best.
Wagyu is emblematic of Japanese food culture. Generations of selective breeding by farmers, combined with the skill of Japan’s chefs, have produced a delicacy of flavour found nowhere else in the world. Yet until now there has been no clear benchmark for what stands at the very top.
JAPAN’S BEST WAGYU offers the industry a set of standards judged from an independent vantage point, with the aim of becoming a platform on which restaurants, producers and diners can advance wagyu culture together.
This award accepts no financial support of any kind from any restaurant, company, or organization. Every assessment is made by the independent judgment of our committee members, with outside influence shut out entirely.
Wagyu Journal (Takayuki Toriyama)
A food influencer who eats his way through more than 300 wagyu and yakiniku meals a year. He is also the owner of the dining community NIKUKAI.
Takayuki Toriyama chairs the selection: he decides, with the committee, which restaurants are chosen.
Yuki Kaneko is co-operator and editor: he runs the publication — the English edition, the primary grading data behind it, and the technical side. He takes no part in the selection itself.
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For restaurant recommendations, press and interview requests, or any other enquiry, please get in touch via direct message on the Wagyu Journal Instagram account.