The oldest is a miso brewery from 1337
The oldest entry on this site is Maruya Hatcho Miso in Okazaki, founded 1337 — close to the founding of the Muromachi shogunate. It still ferments soybean miso in giant wooden vats across two summers and two winters.
Hatcho miso underpins the whole of Nagoya food, and this brewery and its neighbour have carried it. The sauce on miso katsu, the broth in miso-nikomi udon, the doteni stew — all descend from here.
A ryotei from 1615, hitsumabushi from 1873
Next oldest is Kawabun, a ryotei in Fushimi, founded 1615 — the year of the summer siege of Osaka.
Then Atsuta Horaiken, founded 1873 and generally credited with inventing hitsumabushi, with its main house beside Atsuta Shrine. Knowing the dish began there changes how the queue feels. Miyakagi follows in 1899, Sugimoto (yakiniku) in 1900, Yamamotoya Honten (miso-nikomi udon) in 1907.
The old shops built Nagoya-meshi
Lined up, a pattern appears: the oldest businesses sit at the centre of what Nagoya is famous for. Hitsumabushi, miso-nikomi udon, hatcho miso, yakiniku. Most of what is now called a local speciality is simply a trade that started over a century ago and never stopped.
The opposite holds too. Taiwan ramen (1975) and Taiwan mazesoba (2008) are recent. Nagoya's food splits cleanly into an old layer and a new one, and you can eat both on the same day.
Old does not mean better
To be straight about it: a founding year and a good meal are different things. Surviving takes location, management and luck alongside cooking, and a century-old shop is not necessarily the best plate in town today.
The rankings on this site use price, distance from the station, seat count and founding year. They do not rank flavour. We think judging the food is the job of whoever goes.
Where this data stops
Only 43 of 567 shops carry a founding year. The other 524 are not modern — they simply have no data recorded.
We can only read the year when the HOT PEPPER Gourmet listing states it. There are certainly more old houses in this list than the number suggests, so do not read an absent year as "recently opened."
Practical notes for visiting the old shops
Older shops skew cash-only and skew towards no English menu — we put numbers on that in another piece. A few thousand yen in your pocket and the Japanese text on each shop page will cover it.
They also close early. Udon houses and eel restaurants finish when the day's preparation runs out. Go at lunch, or early in the evening.