It appears that Japan’s Crown Princess Massako is being criticized in the media for eating out at some more lavish restaurants while she is on hiatus from her official duties.

Japan’s troubled Crown Princess has been eating like royalty in recent months — and getting pilloried in the tabloid press for violating the image of imperial austerity by living the high life in public.

The sightings, documented in paparazzi-style photos in Japan’s freewheeling news magazines, have compounded the impression the Harvard-educated Crown Princess — who regularly skips official events because of an unspecified nervous disorder — is taking her palace obligations too lightly.

“If she is well enough to regularly go out for fancy dinners, I wonder why she can’t resume her official duties,” said Sachiko Tomobe, a Tokyo florist. “A nice dinner outside the palace is fine if it makes her feel better, but not too often.”

The 44-year-old Crown Princess Masako, a former diplomat who married into the Imperial Family in 1993, has opted out of most Imperial functions for the past four years because of what is widely believed to be depression.

She skipped a rice-cake making ceremony attended by the Emperor and Empress on Dec. 28, but then joined Crown Prince Naruhito and their pet dogs’ veterinarian and his family that evening for a lengthy French dinner.

Crown Princess Masako’s lavish — and publicly funded — meals have attracted attention as the economy is showing signs of faltering, and many Japanese, including Emperor Akihito himself, say they are concerned about the widening gap between rich and poor.