I too took a sabbatical and took two JAL F flights - NRT-JFK and LHR-HND, both on 777-300s. I built an Asia Miles F multi-carrier RTW redemption around them.

Eating the kaiseki in JL F was an item on my bucket list. I eat my fair share of Rockpool and Morton’s and Wolfgang, but I have a thing for Japanese food. Since I have F sectors on BA where western fare will be the norm, I went all in kaiseki on my JAL sectors.

Some things you might have missed on the drinks list - Juyondai sake is like the Dom of sake - I skulled that as much as Salon. Then I caused a certain amount of envy with my mates on the ground when the Today’s Whiskey turned out to be Chichibu Whiskey - let’s say JAL drinks list is mandatory hangover on both legs.

I then tried to buy some of the JAL inflight exclusive shochu Inflight purchase of Mori Izo Shochu as well as drink it.

Regarding western fare on JAL, I get where you’re coming from. My last pre-pandemic birthday was at Karuizawa which was a Japanese village with a French theme. So were the dinners. I actually quite like that spin on French fare, but I know I’m not eating in Paris/Bordeaux/Nice/Mulhouse. YMMV on that Japanese spin on French fare.