Donburi is basically a large bowl of rice topped with a mixture of cooked and fresh vegetables, and meat or fish in a surprising, and delicious, number of variations.
Ingredients are simmered in a sauce. The sauce varies seasonally, regionally within Japan, and also (of course) according to the individual cook’s taste.

Oyako-don

A real signature donburi, this one. The name, oyako (literally, “parent-and-child”) donburi is a virtual summing-up in one of the Japanese sense of humour:  caustic, straight-facedly matter-of-fact and, at the same time, pitying. The main ingredients: chicken and egg. The chicken, egg, green onion and other ingredients are all simmered together in a sauce, and then served over rice. Delicious and simple.

Katsu-don

Trapped in the cycle of “examination hell” (juken jigoku), a tradition of Japanese students about to sit a major test or a school entrance exam is to eat katsudon the night before; (katsu, for the dish, refers to the deep-fried pork cutlet, but katsu – the sound – also means “to win” or “be victorious”). Whatever, the breadcrumbed cutlet and egg combination, with rice, is real comfort food – either before, or after a test.

Una-don

A particularly delicious dish, with a filleted, grilled eel, slathered in a sweet shoyu-based sauce, over the top of rice. What appear to us as mere degustationary quibbles are major national sticking points in Japan: in the Kanto region, the eel is grilled first, and then sauced; in the Kansai region, the other way around. However, with a nation of such sensitive gourmands, devoted to the order and preparation of food, this should come as no surprise.

Ten-don

A somewhat similar idea to tempura served over noodles (I mentioned this in the section about different types of Japanese noodles). This is tempura prawns, and vegetables, served over rice. Delicious. No more need be added.

Holding the bowl in your hand is basic to Japanese dining.

Of course it is not European style to pick up the plate or bowl with your hand, but in Japanese dining the smaller crockery, such as the rice and soup bowls, the small plates and even the larger donburi rice bowl are supposed to be held or supported when eating, and mothers throughout Japan can be heard every night admonishing their little ones to “hold your bowl”. Of course, large serving dishes, such as plates bearing sashimi, grilled fish or tempura are best left on the table.

Let’s start by picking up the rice bowl.

The Japanese hold the rice bowl in their left hand (or right hand for left-handed people) to start in on their food; sort of like a soldier holding a shield. The chopsticks are used deftly to reach out for the delicately portioned food. Then, you dish a piece of okazu (the food that accompanies the rice, such as meat, fish, vegetable, tempura etc) onto the top of your rice to rest for a moment, and from there it is a simple matter to lift it, together with a little of the rice, into your mouth. Throughout most of the meal the rice bowl remains in your hand and the meal is supposed to be enjoyed using the rice as a base for the other food. It is perfectly OK to exchange the rice bowl for the miso soup bowl, and to drink the soup directly from the bowl (this bowl is actually considered to be a kind of cup in Japan – think of a latte bowl for example).

The diner is presented with all the dishes.

In a Japanese meal, each diner is presented with set of miso soup, rice, main dish and small dishes all set on the table at once. Basically they do not arrive in an order such as entree, soup, main, and dessert; (although of course some restaurants and households have adopted such Western systems).
The various flavours can be mixed inside the mouth.
Traditionally, Japanese food is designed so that the various flavours can be mixed inside the mouth. This is different to European food styles where the flavours are mixed on the dish; the sauces, potatoes and meat of the European and American dining culture often all being thrown together on one plate.
Of course, being flexible and adaptable the Japanese have also developed their own ways to enjoy food efficiently such as the donburi (rice-bowl-with-topping) and the nabe (pot stew) where various elements are combined in a single plate.

Order a number of dishes to share.

At an izakaya (dining bar), the idea is to order a number of dishes from the menu for everyone at the table to share. The wisdom of this is that everyone gets to enjoy a variety of tastes (just don’t get into an argument when the time comes to pay the bill). Having shared the food, the diners generally divide the bill evenly amongst themselves. It is not customary to try to pay only for what you have had yourself; with the inevitable result that there are sometimes cries of “unfair” from those who could not partake in the evening’s alcohol consumption.

We recommend that beginners order a gozen or set menu.

To discover the dishes that will become your favorites, we recommend that beginners order a gozen or set menu, while more experienced diners should try ordering various dishes to share among friends*. There is no such thing as a poor combination, so you can order with confidence.
*Note that sharing is not so common in a business setting.

The simple and most formal way of eating sushi, which even many Japanese do not know, is the expert’s way, described below:

1. Tip the sushi

First, tip the sushi onto its side on the plate. Pinching the topping and the rice together, pick the sushi up keeping it on its side.

2. Soy sauce & wasabi

Apply a small amount of soy sauce and wasabi to the tip of the topping. Be careful not to apply too much.

3. Turn the sushi

Turn the sushi around and eat. Eaten this way, the soy sauce can be applied properly to the topping, and the sushi eaten delicately.

*Once the topping has been dipped in the soy sauce, put the sushi into your mouth like that – upside down with the topping at the bottom. In this way, you can taste the topping with your tongue. Sushi has much greater effect when eaten so that the topping comes into direct contact with the tongue.

Wasabi

This is an indispensable ingredient in sushi. It is used to cancel the fishy smell and sharpen the taste as well as for its antibacterial properties. Wasabi is usually already sandwiched between the topping and the rice, so there is no need to add extra.

Green tea and pickled ginger

The green tea, known in sushi circles as “agari”, contains a bitter component called “catechin” which prevents the activity of bacteria that can cause food poisoning, as well as being effective in killing carcinogen-producing bacteria in the intestine. The pickled ginger, known as “gari” refreshes the palate, removing fishy smell and also acting as an anti-bacterial agent.

1. Hold one chopstick

Hold one chopstick between your thumb and middle finger. Position the chopstick so that it lies at the base of your thumb (on the joint) and on the lower joint of the third finger. This chopstick shouldn’t touch the forefinger.

2. Place the other chopstick

Place the other chopstick between your thumb and forefinger. Hold the upper chopstick as if it were a pencil, held between your middle finger and forefinger, and use the tips of the thumb to keep it in place.

3. Hold the food

Make sure the tips of the chopsticks are always even, and the same length.Keep the first chopstick stationary as you practice moving the second chopstick toward the stationary one. Use this technique to hold the food. firmly as you lift it toward your mouth.

Chopstick bad manners

With regard to chopsticks, the following are to be avoided. Most of these are actually common sense, and would probably hold true for western utensils too. Nevertheless, it’s comforting to have it laid out clearly.

1.”Planting” your chopsticks

(Tukitate-bashi) – Sticking the chopsticks upright in the middle of the food.

2.Handling dishes with chopsticks

(Yose-bashii) – Using your chopsticks on dishes to pull them closer and push them away.

3.Passing food with chopsticks

(Awase-bashi) – Passing food from your chopsticks to somebody else’s chopsticks. Transferring directly is how bones are passed as part of Japanese funeral rites.

4.Indecisive chopsticks

(Mayoi-bashi) – Hovering around over the dishes with your chopsticks while struggling with indecision about what to take.

Where sake is brewed – and uses only rice – shochu is distilled, and can be manufactured from rice, barley,potato, brown sugar, or soba/buckwheat. Sake’s alcoholic content is between 10 – 20%; shochu’s is 25%- weaker than whiskey, but stronger than wine or sake.The taste? “Nutty”, or “earthy”. Production of shochu is centered around Kyushu,Okinawa, and other islands – the very south of Japan.This is reflective of how shochu first came to Japan, via Thailand, China, or Korea, prior to the 16th century.

Korea has a similar drink called Soju, and China’s version is named either baijiu or shaojiu. One of the first recorded instances of shochu in Japan is some graffiti on a wooden roof tile from a Shinto shrine in Kagoshima Prefecture, in Kyushu.

Dated to 1559, two carpenters complain in writing about the extreme stinginess of the shrine’s high priest who refused to give them shochu, despite all their hard work.Ten years earlier, a priest of a different kind,Francis Xavier, noted that there were no drunk people in Japan since “once inebriated they immediately lie down and go to sleep.” How convenient. What would Boccaccio or Chaucer have made of this? (Incidentally,Kagoshima Prefecture makes no other alcohol).

Prior to 2003, sake was more popular but, since then, shochu has experienced a boom. Thanks to Izumi Shigechiyo, a regular consumer of shochu who lived to the age of 120 years old, shochu’s health benefits came to the fore in clever marketing campaigns. Mind you, the old bird also took up smoking at 70, and his doctor advised him not to drink shochu at his age. Go figure.

Personally, the best reasons for drinking shochu would likely be that it tastes good, and that it gets you where you want to go. Shochu can be drunk neat, on the rocks, with water (shochu 6:4 water), with hot water (5:5), mixed either with (Chinese) oolong tea or fruit juice; mixed with alow-alcohol beer (the resulting concoction being known as “hoppy”), or, in one of its most popular incarnations,as chuhai, shochu mixed with soda, ice, and some form of fruit flavouring.

Kome-jochu (shochu)

Kome (rice) shochu: shochu distilled from rice and,for that reason, the original – in Japan. The 400 year-old method for this is entirely different from, but shares the same base ingredient with, sake. It has a fairly thick taste, and appears to have originally developed in regions too warm for sake production. Kumamoto prefecture is the area most famous for its rice shochu, so much so that they have their own version of a “Grand Cru” class rice shochu, “Kuma Shochu”, produced in the township of Hitoyoshi.

Mugi-jochu

(Barley shochu). Lighter, and goes down easily. This might explain why this style of shochu, and sweet potato shochu (imojochu) are the two premium kinds most popular in Japan. If cask-aged, the taste of mugijochu can be sharper, and more strongly reminiscent, of a single malt scotch. Nagasaki Prefecture was where mugi jochu was first made, and the shochu made in Iki there is justly famous. Oita Prefecture may not have been first, but they are famous for their 100% barley malt shochu, which is not “cut” with any other ingredients.

Imo-jochu

Imo (potato, or sweet potato) shochu. One of the two current premium styles of shochu, originally the taste and aroma of this was too strong for most consumers.However, since a low-pressure distillation system was developed, the new, lighter flavour (reminiscent of almonds) has sent its popularity through the roof;so much so that a serious shortage of sweet potatoes resulted ! Originally produced in Kagoshima, since the rocky soil there was not conducive to growing rice, and tubers were more readily available. Miyazaki is famous for imo jochu, too.

The word sake just means “alcohol”. Japanese people call what we refer to as sake, “Nihon-shu (Japanese wine/liquor)”. The word “sake” will be used here for convenience, though.Sake’s beginnings in Japan are not well-documented because they are ancient, but they derive from China. However, as with many borrowings from China, sake went on to become something quintessentially Japanese. The earliest mention of a Chinese liquor similar to sake is in the8th century B.C.

As with any group of people intelligent enough to create alcohol, both the Chinese and the Japanese associated their liquor with the gods, and with royalty. The Chinese made their gods offerings and, even today, you will find sake barrels prominently displayed in many Japanese shrines. (So far as other cultures go, the Sumerians – one of the oldest recorded civilizations – had a beer god, and the kind of beer which we drink today was invented by a legendary Belgianking, Gambrinus).

Of course, in its latter-day western infamy, alcohol became the “demon drink”, but not in Japan. There the word onikoroshi (demon killer) is merely used to refer to sake that is so bad it would kill a demon; (some clever dick went on to use this word for a brand of sake – so good that it would kill a demon ! In the sense, of died and gone to heaven – or the other place – we suppose).

By the 7th century A.D. improved Chinese brewing techniques resulted in such increased popularity for sake that a professional brewing organization was established at the Imperial Palace in Kyoto. With Japan’s opening to the West in the 19th century, laws were promulgated which allowed anyone to construct and operate their own sake breweries. Almost overnight 30,000 of them sprang up.Predictably, the government saw this as an excellent tax revenue base and, after a number of years, the amount had dwindled to 8,000.Sake, as we know it today, is both a staple and a sophisticated drink within Japan. There are many different kinds. Let’s look at some of the more well-known ones.

Ginjo-Shu

A premium grade. Ginjo is to regular sake what single malt is to regular scotch. With sake rice, the more the exterior of each grain is milled/polished away prior to brewing, the more elegant and pure the flavour of the sake brewed will then be. With Ginjo, each rice grain has been polished away by at least 40 – 50%. Ginjo should be enjoyed either at room temperature, or only slightly chilled. Excessive heating or chilling will destroy the all-important taste of this sake.

Daiginjo-shu

A subclass of ginjo-shu, and prized above all others as the acme of Japanese sake. Uses the most highly milled rice of any sake (polished away by at least 60% or over), and involves the most precise and labour-intensive methods. Generally light, complex and fragrant. Same applies.

Junmai-shu

Sake made only from white rice, rice koji (cultured rice, which has formed a mold, for the fermentation process – without this, there is no sake), and water. It tends to have a mellow bouquet and a rich, smooth flavour.

Honjozo-shu

Sake made using water, the koji mold, a small amount of pure, distilled “brewer’s alcohol”, and white rice which has been milled so that 70% or less of the grain remains. Light, mild, an unobtrusive bouquet, and (most importantly of all) easy to drink.

Nama

The Japanese word nama, in its most basic translation, means raw or uncooked. It is used in Japan in several different contexts, for example: draft beer is known as nama beer, and nama sake refers to sake which has been left unpasteurized. Normally sake is pasteurized twice; nama sake not at all. This imparts a fresher, livelier flavour to the beverage, and makes it more aromatic. Serve it chilled, and finish it all the evening you start it. This type of unfiltered/unpasteurized sake does not last long otherwise. Good with
either beef or tempura.

This is no-frills, focusing on hot meals served in a bowl. There’s no sushi or sashimi to speak of, but all of the food is definitely Japanese, and definitely nutritious. The majority of fare is items like tonkatsu (pork cutlet and rice), curry-rice, eel and yakitori donburis, and set menus of fish, chicken or beef bentos, which come with rice, salad, and miso soup.
The world over, there will always be a place for eateries such as this. If it were Roman (by way of example), it would be in somewhere like the Trastevere − not the same cuisine, but a similar clientele. Saika is a welcome addition to these ranks.