How do you say "I can't handle hot food or drinks" in Japanese?

Name: Japanese Has a Word for People Who Can't Drink Hot Tea. It Translates to Cat Tongue.
Uploaded: 2026-08-27T18:17:26Z
Duration: 28 s
Description: Learn to say 猫舌なんです (nekojita nan desu) — I can't handle hot food or drinks. A 30-second Japanese lesson for travelers from Kōfuku.

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Japanese Has a Word for People Who Can't Drink Hot Tea. It Translates to Cat Tongue.

To say I can't handle hot food or drinks in Japanese, say 猫舌なんです (nekojita nan desu).

Japanese has a whole word for people who can't drink anything hot. It translates to cat tongue.

猫舌なんです nekojita nan desu I can't handle hot food or drinks

Survival word-origin #learnjapanese #japanesewords #japantravel #japanesefood #nihongo

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In this video

猫舌なんです。 nekojita nan desu. I've got a cat tongue, I can't do hot stuff.
すみません、猫舌なんです。 sumimasen, nekojita nan desu. Sorry, I can't handle hot food.

Why this phrase

Kofuku burns his mouth on a bowl of ramen; Hana, calmly blowing on her tea, hands him the word for it. It is the everyday, completely normal way to say you can't handle hot food or drinks. Instead of a long apology while your soup goes cold, one word does it, and it makes people laugh every time a foreigner uses it.