Umami is the savoury meatiness in seaweed and miso and soy sauce. It is, to a large extent, the concept that enables Japanese cuisine to be healthy and attractive at the same time.

The concept of “delicious” was born in Japan in 1908 when a chemist called Ikeda discovered a “fifth taste” called umami that was neither bitter nor salty nor sweet nor sour but something more wonderful and compelling than any of these.

We tend to automatically associate hearty meat dishes with men and lighter salads and sweets with women, and these stereotypes are replicated in cultures as different as France and Japan.

Hara hachi bu is a Confucian principle, popular in Japan since medieval times, that you should eat until you are only eight-tenths full. This principle has since been given backing by nutrition scientists who note that when we eat there is a time delay between the body receiving the food and the brain registering that we are full. When the urge comes to have a second helping, it’s worth waiting twenty minutes, and the feeling may pass.

Noodles arrived in Japan with Buddhist monks from China in the Middle Ages, but until the twentieth century they tended to be made from buckwheat, or a mix of wheat and rice.