March 11, 1981

The Reagan Administration announced plans today to tie welfare benefits to a work requirement, known as ''workfare,'' that it said could place as many as 800,000 people in community jobs. The proposal, which needs Congressional approval, was disclosed in the budget President Reagan submitted to Congress. David A. Stockman, the budget director, said that most welfare recipients, who are largely mothers with children, would be required to work about 20 hours a week.

OSAKA, Japan SHIZUO TSUJI leaned back in his maroon plush armchair, surveyed his ornate dining room with its chandeliers and Oriental rugs, and cut a slice of chocolate cake freshly baked by one of his students. ''Let's not talk for a few minutes, just eat,'' he said, with the air of one who knows how to savor the good things. As Japan's most famous gastronome, he has turned his appreciation of fine food into a career. An expert on French and Japanese cuisine, Mr. Tsuji heads the leading professional cooking school in Japan and has written 29 books on cooking, travel, music and medieval French banquet fare. Despite his professional specialization in French cuisine, Mr. Tsuji admits to a nostalgic delight when eating Japanese food. ''With French food, it's my work and my study,'' he said. ''I'm automatically curious and write about it. But when I eat the Japanese way, I don't take any notes. I wish my palate to have to talk.'' The food, he said, is ''like a souvenir of daily life, situations, circumstances of my friendships, music and paintings.''

President Reagan sent to Congress today a proposed $695 billion budget for the fiscal year 1982 that he portrayed as the centerpiece of his plan to ''stop runaway inflation'' and ''revitalize the economy'' by shrinking the role of the Federal Government. ''The next steps are up to Congress,'' Mr. Reagan said, and, in a brief budget message, he issued a blunt warning to Excerpts from documents, page B6. lawmakers who might oppose the many cuts in nonmilitary programs that he has made in the 1982 budget first drafted by President Carter. ''I urge the members of Congress to remember that last November the American people's message was loud and clear,'' Mr. Reagan declared. ''The mandate for change, expressed by the American people, was not my mandate; it was our mandate.''

In SportsMonday this week, a chart of the pairings for the National Collegiate Athletic Association's basketball tournament was incorrect. In the Mideast region, the bracket containing Indiana and the one containing Wake Forest should have been transposed.

''I urge the members of Congress to remember that last November the American people's message was loud and clear.