Japanska Torget — Supermarket in Norrmalm, Stockholm

Japanska Torget is an independent Japanese supermarket on Tegnérgatan in Norrmalm, a short walk from Hötorget station. The shop is small, and that shape decides everything about it: a tight run of shelves rather than long aisles, with the stock chosen for cooking from rather than browsing.

The rice is what you come for. It sells in large bags, and a ten-kilo sack is a normal purchase here rather than a special order. Rice flour sits alongside it, part of a range that runs wider than you would guess from the floor space, and the shelves also carry plates and Japanese goods in red and black lacquer that you will not find in the city's ordinary Japanese aisles.

What the shop does not lean on is the social-media snack. The goods are the everyday kind a Japanese kitchen actually runs on, which is why the range feels purposeful rather than piled high. Staff are helpful and friendly when you need a hand finding something, and the layout is compact enough that you rarely need to ask twice.

Prices are fair for what the range offers, and the sensible way to shop is to buy the staples in the quantity they are sold in: a large bag of rice and a bag of rice flour go a long way for the money. The one friction is size. This is a smaller shop than other Japanese shops in Stockholm, so a long list of specialist items may not all be here in one trip.

Come for the rice and the pantry basics, and treat the lacquerware and plates as the bonus you did not plan on. It is a shop for stocking a kitchen, not for a leisurely wander.