Where I am from, eating together with the family just meant having a good meal and some time talking to your loved ones. In Japan, that is different, you will be socially frowned upon or given weird looks if you were to subvert these social standards that I want to discuss today.
Before eating a meal, Japanese people always say ‘頂きます’, it is the Japanese phrase not for ‘thank you for the meal’ but ‘to receive’. It is meant as a way to express thanks to the people that worked hard to provide the ingredients and cook the meals. This same gesture is repeated at the end of the meal where they will definitely say ‘ごちそうさまでした’, which means ‘thank you for the feast’. As seen in the photo above, as they say this phrase they clasp their hands together and pray as if they are receiving and offering from the gods, a tradition closely linked to Shintoism. Something that actually surprised me when reading about this topic is that Japanese people tend to have a set order to how they eat their food and eating in a different order would be seen as deviating from the social norm.
In my opinion, going about minimizing culture confusion would be difficult. Japanese people already typically have weaker English literacy compared to other globalized countries, making it difficult for Japanese to correct foreigners. Without knowledge of this, sharing a table with Japanese will eventually isolate you culturally as you would be shunned, making it an unnecessarily negative experience. To minimize cultural confusion, people need to research about these manners beforehand and let the people they are sharing the table with know about their lack of knowledge.
External sources used:
https://www.kobejones.com.au/a-complete-guide-to-japanese-dining-etiquette/
https://web-japan.org/kidsweb/cook/intro/intro01.html
http://www.iromegane.com/japan/culture/why-japanese-say-itadakimasu-together-before-they-eat/
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/04/06/national/japans-latest-english-proficiency-scores-disappoint/
Japan through the Food Lens 