A friend of mine from America lives in Japan and has a soy allergy... kinda sucks.

I could ask her if she has any tips.  But I'm pretty busy so I won't see her until June 2nd.

I had a soy allergy the first time I went to Japan.  If I ate soy I would get the runs, a headache, and fall asleep.  I wouldn't die or anything, but it was still really annoying.

There's not much you can do except stay away from food with soy.  Here are some foods I recommend eating:

- Sushi without soy sauce
- Tonkotsu or Shio ramen (とんこつ・塩ラーメン)
- italian dishes
- Some おにぎり from コンビニ.  You'll have to look on the label to make sure there is no soy sauce in it.
- Maybe Indian curry?
- 大福 (usually made with 餅 and あんこ.  I think あんこ is also a legume, so if your friend has problems with other legumes than maybe they should also stay away from あんこ.)
- 焼き鳥 as long as your order the 塩 version and not the タレ version

Here are some foods I recommend to stay away from:

- Chinese food
- Udon and Soba
- Anything with a dark sauce (because it usually has soy sauce in it)
- Most processed foods (but this holds true in America as well)
- Most どんぶり
- soups in general are pretty dangerous

If I think of more I'll update my list.

yudantaiteki wrote:

Of course one important question is how serious the soy allergy is -- is he fine if he just avoids eating soy products or does he have to avoid things that were manufactured in places with soy, or on machines that may have encountered soy before?

That's true. But if the allergy is really severe, then my advice doesn't apply.  It's too dangerous to eat out at all.

As I understand it, anything to do with soy.  I am wondering whether restaurant meals will be out completely.  He is used to dealing with this but not usually in countries where soy is so ubiquitous.