You can find a short description of all the items you might find in a Japanese pantry here. There are two sections: the first covers the every day essentials  - the ingredients you will use almost every time you prepare one of the dishes from the website. The second section covers the wider range of ingredients you'll want to purchase as you begin to be more adventurous with your choice of dishes.  I am lucky enough to have both a Japanese store and a Chinese supermarket within a short distance of my home but I appreciate that for many of you, there isn't somewhere close by where you can find these ingredients. So, you can find link under each ingredient where you can buy the goods, mostly from that wonderful emporium, Amazon. I make a small commission from Amazon every time someone buys via a link on this page but I never add links unless I know the product well and/or have bought it myself. So, if you would like to help me fund my site by purchasing through kurumicooks, simply click on the links to be taken to the Amazon and purchase there.