Fielder’s Choice

This place is the king of salads in Osaka.
Obviously, that’s not saying much. Indeed, Fielder’s Choice was, before anything, a sight for sore eyes. But on top of that, Fielder’s Choice is a knockout in its own right: an innovative salad bar, satisfying deli, and trendy café and bar all at once.
I moved to Japan a couple years ago. I am a salad fanatic. Anyone who has been in Japan for more than a few days can see the huge struggle I live with every day.
Fielder’s Choice is so-​named from the establishment’s obvious obsession with baseball. That this is cleverly also a reference to farmers and produce says something about this restaurant. Although owned and run by Japanese nationals, they clearly grasp and understand the culture from which they derive their cuisine, perhaps better than most within that source culture itself.
These are not knock-​off salads. Fielder’s Choice is no Lawson or ⁷⁄₁₁ plastic-​wrapped nightmare. It’s not even the solid green-​and-​goma attempt you can find at trendy cafes and coffee shops with usual egg or tuna salad sandwiches. It’s a legitimate salad bistro that could easily contend with the best in any major American city.
The salads on hand are diverse and innovative. They use vegetables and fruits readily available in Asia to their advantage, instead of lamenting the shortage and expense of salad-​standard vegetables in the west, or otherwise loading them in anyway and charging too much. They improvise instead. For example, they rework the proportions to have less tomato, and instead use a bit more rankon and Japanese radish, without sacrificing full, green, romaine lettuce. It makes the salads unique and refreshing, but for once in Japan, you’re eating a real, actual salad.
At the same time, they go after the cheaper imports and must-​haves for salad officianados and to satisfy the nostalgic westerners as well, making great use of chick peas, walnuts, spinach, avocado, and focusing on heavily chopped salads to redistribute the many ingredients.
The dressings are superb. My favorite is the Sesame, but the Mexican Sriracha has a good kick as well.
As a result these salads are often unique to the establishment, and speak of a cultural and economic awareness that stretches across the entire planet.
Fielder’s Choice can put all the best salad ingredients in a satisfying and filling bowl for well under 1000 yen. My favorite rings in at 842 yen after tax. But if you’re feeling hungry, there are a couple of meatier, gourmet salads for those willing to pay up to 1200 or 1300. Not a fan of the preset options? The restaurant boasts a make-​your-​own-​salad option. The ingredients on hand make this customizable from a green snack to the last meal on death row.
They even have a wrap option — you can turn any salad into a wrap. Considering Fielder’s Choice fresh cooks their own bacon, beef, chicken, shrimp, and pasta, Fielder’s Choice doubles as a capable deli on top of being Osaka’s undisputed king of salads.
In proper anticipation of a large western clientele, the staff not only understands all the necessary English to make your salad, they even have an English menu.
And they somehow managed to squeeze a bar into the mix. On Friday nights the … erm… I don’t know what to call it in this context anymore… location… is open until 11 PM. They have several kinds of trendy beers you would never expect to find in Japan — like Brooklyn Lager and Almaza. They even have hard liquors.
This place has whatever you need. Salad, wraps, meats, cheeses, coffee, beers, hard drinks, more salads, the authenticity you expect from a farmer and the quality and dedication you can expect from Japanese service. I cannot recommend Fielder’s Choice enough.
They are the King of Salads in Osaka.