What Do Maiko Eat? Makanai Meals and Kyoto Home Cooking

We operate the Maiko & Zen Kyoto experience mentioned in this guide.

If you watched The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House on Netflix, you may be wondering what maiko really eat. The series follows Kiyo, the cook for a house where maiko live together, and the home cooking she makes for them. Here is what makanai and obanzai mean, how Kyoto home cooking works, and what official sources say about maiko mealtimes.

What Makanai Means

In Japanese, makanai has three related meanings, according to the Digital Daijisen dictionary:

• preparing meals;
• the meals made and served at a boarding house or dormitory;
• the person who makes them.

It also refers to the food that cooks make for themselves from whatever ingredients are on hand, and some restaurants now serve elaborate makanai ryori as a dish in its own right. In the Netflix series, Kiyo is the makanai, the person who cooks for the house where the maiko live.

Obanzai: Kyoto's Everyday Home Cooking

Obanzai are the everyday side dishes eaten in Kyoto homes. According to the Nipponica encyclopedia:

• Ingredients: dried foods such as kiriboshi daikon (dried radish strips) and hijiki seaweed, okara (soy pulp), and seasonal vegetables.
• Flavor: cooked to bring out a dashi stock made from kombu and katsuobushi (dried bonito).
• Spirit: using up leaves, peels, and leftover stock ingredients without waste, a habit called shimatsu suru.

The City of Kyoto lists Kyoto food culture as part of the city's intangible cultural heritage, describing its features as a sense of mottainai (avoiding waste), respect for the seasons, the "one soup and three dishes" meal pattern, and the savory depth of dashi. Kyoto cuisine (kyo-ryori) was registered as an intangible cultural property in 2022.

What Is Known About Maiko Mealtimes

Official sources say little about what maiko eat, so we do not guess at menus or rules. What the Kyoto Traditional Musical Art Foundation does describe is the shape of the day. Evening banquets start around 6:00 pm almost every night. Lunch comes late, after lessons such as dance end around midday or early afternoon, and she may eat it back at the okiya or go out with fellow maiko. She wakes between about 8:00 and 10:00 am and has breakfast afterward. Our guide to what geisha and maiko do covers the rest of her day.

Each of Kyoto's five geisha districts has its own customs, so some details described here may differ from one district to another.

For more on daily life in a maiko house, read The Makanai vs. real life.

Food in The Makanai

Everyday cooking is at the heart of the series. Netflix's episode guide notes that, in episode 2, the maiko are tired of ordering takeout when Kiyo finds her calling as their cook, and episode 6 features her cream stew. The anime version of the story, broadcast on NHK, also focused on the many dishes from the manga.

Taste Kyoto on Your Trip

You can try obanzai at Kyoto restaurants, and a formal tea ceremony is another way to experience the city's food culture; see our guide to tea ceremony in Kyoto.

Watch a maiko dance while you enjoy a cup of sencha. We operate Maiko & Zen Kyoto, a 90-minute session at Ikka-in, a sub-temple of Tofuku-ji, where a maiko dances in the same temple hall with no stage between you, then takes time for your questions and photos. You will also enjoy fragrant sencha green tea and a delicate Japanese sweet. See current session times and prices.

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