<
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/09/bread-easier-japan-rice-staple-food>
"The Dojima branch of Yoshinoya in Osaka is doing a roaring lunchtime trade. As
soon as one diner vacates their counter seat, another takes their place, while
staff take just seconds to assemble the next order of the restaurant’s
trademark dish:
gyūdon.
The
Observer has joined the rush, ordering a set lunch of seasoned beef and
onion on rice, and side dishes of pickled cabbage and miso soup – all for a
extremely affordable ¥632 (£3.46).
A bowl of gyūdon, for years a symbol of Japan’s deflationary spiral, is the
lunch of choice for time-poor office workers on a budget, even after the chain
– which has about 1,200 outlets across the country – raised the dish’s price in
2021 for the first time in seven years.
But the enthusiasm with which they demolish bowl after bowl of the salty,
satisfying dish masks an unsettling trend for its staple ingredient: the
Japanese are eating less rice than at any time in their history.
And
washoku (Japanese cooking) purists are worried. A short walk from the
restaurant, a stone sculpture of a giant grain of rice – set against a murky
river and an overhead expressway – is a reminder of Dojima’s historical
connection to the cereal that has long-sustained the world’s third-biggest
economy.
The Dojima rice exchange was the centre of Japan’s rice trade during the 18th
and 19th centuries, a time of unprecedented prosperity for Osaka’s brokers when
rice prices set here were disseminated, by flags and couriers, all the way to
the capital Edo, present-day Tokyo.
Today, though, rice’s place in the Japanese food firmament is under strain from
depopulation, changing lifestyles and the sheer proliferation of tasty
alternatives.
Rice consumption in Japan peaked in 1962, when every person ate an average of
118kg a year, or just over five average-sized bowls a day, according to the
agriculture ministry. By 2020, per-capita consumption had more than halved to
just under 51kg annually. And in 2011, Japanese households spent more on bread
than on rice for the first time."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
