American tourists flock to Tokyo to enjoy a taste of home at Nihonbashi Philly. The authentic flavor of this restaurant’s cheesesteak impressed even a Philadelphia-born journalist

My wife and I opened this restaurant in 2011, and the name was always going to be Philly. I love Philadelphia music — especially Philadelphia soul — and I’ve always loved the city itself. I was born and grew up right here in Nihonbashi and I’ve looked out on this neighborhood through all these years. And despite the distance between these two cities, it has long been clear to me just how much they have in common.

Both Nihonbashi and Philadelphia are places with long histories that take real pride in their heritage and culture.

Nihonbashi is where Japan’s first bank and subway were born, and Philadelphia is where America’s Declaration of Independence was signed. Both are places where the foundations of their respective countries were laid. The atmosphere of the streets is similar too. When I was a kid, these alleys were lined with shops selling miso and soy sauce, dried goods stores, butchers, fishmongers, and similar places. And all these small businesses created a vibrant scene I still remember. When I visited Philadelphia, the streets looked so familiar that I felt nostalgic.

Many families have lived in this neighborhood for generations, and everyone has deep affection for the place. There’s a strong sense of community, and neighbors look out for each other. In Philadelphia, when you pass someone on the street, you let out a casual “Hey!” That’s another similarity I noticed.

It’s just like Philadelphia’s South Street. Nihonbashi is a place where different people and cultures blend together, and I think that’s why someone from Philadelphia like me can blend in here so easily.

Philadelphia’s signature dish, the Philly cheesesteak, has become one of our most popular menu items. We added it to the menu early on, but getting close to that authentic Philadelphia taste was incredibly challenging. Although the name implies a steak, it’s really a sandwich — you take sliced beef, chop it up, mix it with plenty of melted cheese, and stuff it into bread. Japanese people weren’t familiar with it, so we had no reference point and had to keep experimenting. In those early days, American customers would constantly tell me, “This tastes great, but it isn’t a cheesesteak.”

Cheesesteaks are an everyday food in Philadelphia. You’ll find them      everywhere — in food trucks, chain restaurants, specialty shops, and even more upscale places — and they come in a wide range of flavors.

When COVID hit and we couldn’t operate normally, I decided to close the restaurant and spend about a month in Philadelphia researching cheesesteaks. I was determined to master the authentic taste, so I ate as many types as I could. Including      that trip, I visited the city four times and ate at over 100 places. In the course of all that eating, I gradually developed my own philosophy about cheesesteaks. In particular, I came to realize that the quality of the bread is the key to a great cheesesteak.

At Nihonbashi Philly you bake your own bread in-house, right? That’s rare even in Philadelphia. Most cheesesteak places, even the more famous ones, usually buy their bread from bakeries.

The reason we bake our own bread is really simple — nobody else would make it for us! (laughs) I reached out to about 30 bakeries but they all turned me down, so in the end my wife started baking bread every day. If the bread isn’t good, the cheesesteak won’t be good either, so I couldn’t afford to cut corners. It’s like eating unadon — a traditional Japanese dish of grilled eel over rice — with poor-quality rice. It ruins the whole dish.

Through all that trial and error, I gradually got to the point where I could make a cheesesteak I felt confident serving. But I wanted to make sure that Americans — and especially Philadelphians — would approve of the taste, so I went around asking everyone, “If you have any friends from Philadelphia, bring them here!”

The first time I visited here was right around that time. In July 2023, when I was working as a newspaper reporter, I heard from a colleague about a place called Nihonbashi Philly that served cheesesteaks. Honestly, up to that time I’d never had decent cheesesteak in Japan, so I showed up without high expectations (laughs).

But at least you came and gave it a try.

The moment I tasted it, I was genuinely moved, thinking to myself, “Wow, this is the real thing.” The taste of genuine cheesesteak after such a long time was overwhelmingly intense. So, I immediately sent out a tweet about the place, declaring that “THE WORLD MUST KNOW.”

Then a reporter from the local newspaper, The Philadelphia Inquirer, caught that tweet and reached out to me. The next day, they published an article introducing Nihonbashi Philly together with photos I had taken. It was subsequently posted on social media and went viral – it might have reached over 100 million views.

Dan, who started the ball rolling, has been a godsend to us. The article in The Inquirer captured how highly we regard Philadelphia, and included the whole story behind why we started making cheesesteaks. That made me really happy.

They also wrote that you could spot that it was a genuine cheesesteak just from the photos. As a Philadelphian, that made me happy too. But we also wondered, “Why would you put so much effort into achieving this?”

The answer is simple. I love Philadelphia culture — the music, everything. That’s why I want to recreate authentic Philadelphia cheesesteaks.

Speaking of recreating things, it’s not just the cheesesteaks anymore. The whole vibe of this place has turned into Philadelphia over the past few years. In Philly, we are passionate about sports, especially football and baseball, and you can feel that same energy everywhere in here.

After Dan’s tweet and the publication of The Philadelphia Inquirer article, we started seeing a steady increase in foreign customers, especially Americans. That’s what’s behind all these changes you’ve been seeing in the restaurant. One day we had 60 customers, and to my great surprise, 50 were Philadelphians, eight were other foreigners, and only two were Japanese. During the middle of the winter, one guy walked in and stripped off his jacket to reveal a Philadelphia Eagles T-shirt and jersey underneath. He came bursting through the door like, “Hi, I’m from Philly!” My wife and I just looked at each other with an expression that said, “Are you kidding me? This is amazing!”

A lot of the restaurant’s Philadelphian customers leave souvenirs of their home city behind as gifts. I brought a bobblehead and a friend of mine left a Frisbee from the city’s professional Ultimate team. Since those of us who live here can’t go back to Philadelphia very often, visiting this place is the next best thing to coming home.

At Philly, we pour Philadelphia local beers and use glasses and cups you can only get in Philadelphia. The city has teams that compete in all five major North American sports leagues, and we’ve got pint glasses for every team as well as Phillies stadium cups. My favorites are the SEPTA pint glasses. I handle them with great care as if they were priceless treasures.

Those walls that used to be blank white are now plastered with signatures and messages from customers.

Well-known Philadelphia musicians and athletes sometimes drop by too. We’ve had Grammy-winning drummers, highly-regarded jazz artists, you name it.

What kinds of conversations do you end up having with these celebrities?

Everyone, whether famous or not, asks the same things: “Why did you name it Philly?” “Why are you making cheesesteaks in Tokyo?” From there, the conversation usually turns to music, sports, or the city itself. Sometimes I flip it around and ask them, “What brought you to our place?”

One reason so many Philadelphians know about this place is word-of-mouth recommendations from cheesesteak joints back home. They tell people, “If you’re heading to Tokyo, you’ve got to check out this place called Nihonbashi Philly.”

That’s something we are very grateful for.

Philadelphians had no idea that there were people in Japan who took making cheesesteaks so seriously. At the same time, many Philadelphians must be thinking, “Only the Japanese would put this much care into every detail.”

I keep saying this, but I want to recreate Philadelphia, including the cheesesteaks and the restaurant atmosphere. Even the music we play here is chosen by me every day from the selections of a DJ introduced to me by ESPO, a graffiti artist from Philadelphia.

I think it’s becoming more and more like the real Philadelphia. Nihonbashi Philly feels like a second home to me now. Even though I can’t get back to my hometown very often, coming here wraps me in that warm feeling of being at home. And I’m not the only one who feels this way.

A friend of mine ate the cheesesteak here and literally started crying because it reminded him of home. You know how deep those childhood flavors can hit you and how they pull at your heart. I’ve been in Japan for 19 years now, but every time I come here, I feel a stronger and stronger connection to home.

I’m thrilled you feel that way. This May, we opened a pop-up place selling Philly cheesesteaks in Philadelphia. It was in Fishtown, which has become one of the city’s trendiest neighborhoods, a bit like  Shimokitazawa or Kichijoji in Tokyo. My wife had baked 350 rolls, but we ended up with about 1,000 people waiting in line, and ice cream trucks even showed up to serve the crowd. The response really blew us away — I was honestly floored. My only regret was that we couldn’t serve everyone.

That long line included some of my senior colleagues and people who had previously visited Nihonbashi Philly. Social media exploded with posts saying things like “Something incredible is happening thanks to this Japanese cheesesteak place!” The atmosphere was electric. People near the back of the line knew they wouldn’t get served, but they lined up regardless just to meet you and your wife.

They told us, “To meet you guys, we’d normally have to fly to Tokyo. Compared to that, waiting in line here for three hours is nothing.”

You were also named as an ambassador by Philadelphia City Council, and you were invited to go on live TV, weren’t you?

That surprised me too. We were invited to Philadelphia City Council and walked into the main chamber at City Hall without really understanding what was going on. The city council was tackling some serious issues such as funding requests for disaster recovery and poverty support. In the middle of all that, they introduced a resolution about recognizing Nihonbashi Philly as an official ambassador for Philadelphia, and this was passed unanimously accompanied by a round of applause.

That really shows how people view you in Philadelphia. Everyone wants to welcome you and your wife for putting so much heart into making cheesesteaks. How was the TV thing?

We went on a morning news show live and demonstrated how to make cheesesteak. Newspapers and TV stations covered the pop-up too. It was very heartening to realize that everyone in Philadelphia was so welcoming.

These days, Nihonbashi Philly has gained an almost legendary status among Philadelphians all thanks to word of mouth. What really blows me away is how often unexpected reunions happen here. I’ve bumped into high school classmates I hadn’t seen in 20 years, and when I posted about the restaurant’s Super Bowl viewing party on social media, teachers from middle and high school messaged me           saying, “I can’t believe there is a place like this in Tokyo.”

We Philadelphians tend to think that only people from Philadelphia can truly appreciate Philadelphian things. But Philadelphia is also the city of Brotherly Love, and if you genuinely love this city, we’ll welcome you like family no matter where you’re from. That’s precisely why it moves us so deeply to know that someone on the other side of the world cares so much about Philadelphia.

As an ambassador, I want to spread the word and get the Japanese people excited about Philadelphia. I think it’s a city you’ll fall in love with once you experience it, and I would love for more Japanese people to make that trip. If someone comes to me for travel advice, I’ll load them up with recommendations on places to go and people to meet. And if they come back telling me, “I followed your advice and had an amazing time!” that would be perfect.

Through Nihonbashi Philly, I’d like Japanese people to discover what makes Philadelphia special, and I hope this restaurant will keep being a place where Japanese people, Philadelphians, and people from everywhere get together and connect.

Absolutely. This restaurant was born out of my love for Philadelphia. I’ll keep bringing Philadelphia to life here in Nihonbashi and sharing that passion with Japanese people. It’s not just what I do anymore — it’s who I am.