Adventures in Food: Jap-Mex

Japanese Mexican food.

It's called taco rice (タコライス takoraisu).


As weird as that might sound, it truly rocks! But if you ever visited Japan's distant island of Okinawa, especially in the armed forces, or spent more than a week anywhere in Japan, you're probably familiar with it and don't see it as weird at all.

The One-Minute Lunch

For such a tiny, remote island Okinawa offers some remarkably unusual, yet delicious food.

Approachable

That's the word I'm looking for. Alot of "unusual" food around the world, good or bad, can be very unfriendly to the less-adventurous diner. Okinawan food, maybe for it's simplicity, doesn't look all that different from Chinese. If the spartan marines are eating it, it can't be all that esoteric. But the MC of Okinawan food is the humble taco rice.

Legend has it that it was first whipped up in the '60's by a local chef trying to please the palates of US servicemen by making tacos, but substituting local rice for the tortilla shells - the only component which was difficult to obtain out there (if you think about it, everything else is pretty basic).

It's essentially taco-seasoned ground beef, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and whatever else served on a bed of steamed rice. It's as good as it sounds, and a notably healthy alternative.

It's so easy to make that you just read the recipe. But for the sake of bullet points, I'll elaborate with helpful Japanese shopping links:

• Brown the ground beef, drain the fat, return it to the skillet, and cook for a few more minutes with water and taco seasoning
  (chili pepper, onion, garlic, pepper, cayenne, and maybe cumin and paprika).
  You can do your own seasonings, or just use a package of taco seasoning like I do.
  
  
• Serve the beef over steamed rice.


• Here, I like the traditional Japanese "sushi rice" (uruchimai). Maybe that's just because it's what I'm accustomed to but I think the starchy, stickiness of this rice works best with the spicy beef and cheese; supporting it without overpowering it. Sometimes I mix in a little brown rice for substance and healthiness. But just about any rice will do, I guess.
• Here, I like shred the cheese directly on the hot taco meat so it will melt better. Now we're almost talking NACHO rice, which mine usually ends up resembling if I have enough cheese...so much for the health benefits.
• Chop up some lettuce or cabbage, tomatoes (cherry tomatoes, if  you have them on hand)...add some guacamole, onions, olives...whatever turns you on.
• Taco sauce or salsa on top. If you're in Japan, the best salsa by far is the Daniel's Fire Roasted line imported from the US. If you're in the States, you may know of  better brands, but I doubt it.  Daniel's Fire Roasted Salsas are so good, I've stopped making my own. The black bean and corn is my family's favorite. I used to get them at Sony Plaza when I was lucky enough to find them in stock until I found them online. Now I order them by the case and go through about a jar a week.
  You can order them from Rakuten through this link (complete links at the bottom):

★6,000円以上ご購入で送料無料！4月30日9時59分まで★《ダニエルズファイヤーロースト》サルサ... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）



• After That? Serve with beer and a good action movie. Might I suggest From Paris with Love?

• OR if sounds like too much work, heat up a  package of ready-made taco rice meat.

You can even speed up the process further by smashing a couple of plain onigiri/rice balls on a plate, adding the ready-made beef, and microwaving it (remove beef from foil bag first, genius).

Taco rice is equally popular with kids, at least in Japan. Try it with your kids and see what they think. Lemme know.

Either way, I'd like to hype Daniel's a little more. It's a small company, so I want to make sure they get all the business they deserve lest they stop selling in Japan and I lose my favorite condiment.
Try them all; they're all great.

トマトソースにハーブと乾燥燻製唐辛子をブレンド。濃厚だけれどマイルドな味。【monoria】〈Da... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）

★6,000円以上ご購入で送料無料！4月30日9時59分まで★《ダニエルズファイヤーロースト》サルサ... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）

★6,000円以上ご購入で送料無料！4月30日9時59分まで★《ダニエルズファイヤーロースト》サルサ... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）

ハラペーニョの辛みが病みつきになる、米国で多くの賞を受賞した自慢のサルサ。【monoria】〈Da... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）

フレッシュハラペーニョの刺激的な辛さがたまらない、辛いのが好きな方におすすめ。【monoria】... 価格：698円（税込、送料別）

Garbage Detail

Gomi-Toban/Trash Detail: 

In Japan, members of neighborhoods take turns putting out the trash bins and net.

In most neighborhoods, garbage is separated into recycling bins like in many countries. Plastics, glass, metal, and appliances. Trash bags are covered with a net to keep the crows from tearing into the bags and strewing garbage all over the street.

Residents take turns getting up very early every morning and putting out the net and bins on their respective days, then bringing them back in later. Oh, and cleaning up the street when the crows strew filth all over the place because some thoughtless jackass didn't cover the bags with the net properly.

Duty in my neighborhood rotates monthly. My detail is on in August and January, the hottest and coldest months. Also the months when everyone else enjoys going away on vacation. Clearly, I need better representation in the neighborhood council. But because of the New Year public holidays, January is about a week short, so that's something in my favor. We weren't going anywhere, anyway.

We always celebrate the beginning of September and February because we can finally sleep late and stop worrying about trash detail for a few more months.

Sometimes I miss American and it's easier garbage pick-up (two months a year), but I have to respect this system. It keeps a community spirit in the neighborhoods and reduces the burden on the local department of sanitation. But if I ever find out who's not covering the bags, I'm going to to my part to reduce the burden on the local department of kicking-the-snot-out-of-inconsiderate-jerks.

Dirty Paws

I don't mind taking off my shoes before I come inside. I actually like it. I had a string of roommates back in Texas whom I'd convinced to follow this protocol, long before I ever knew I'd be coming to Japan.

But I'd never considered the problem of our shoe-less pets.

My third year in Japan, my wife and I moved to an apartment that had apparently already been claimed by a local cat. The first time we opened the door to go in, he appeared out of nowhere (as cats do), darted past us into the apartment, and made straight for a spot in one of the rooms where he curled up and gave us a look like, "it's about time you showed up to let me back in."

We assume he co-habitated with the previous tenants.

All the local kids knew him, and called him Byon (Japanese for "boing..." rhymes with "phone"). He was a good cat, so he remained welcome and spent most of the time hanging around inside, only popping out once or twice a day for a brief prowl.

But once our son was born, my wife, probably at her mother's directive, took to cleaning Byon's paws every time he returned from patrol outside. Whenever he scratched and howled at the door, she'd sit down with a package of wet-wipes and clean his paws to a mil-spec shine. I swear, she'd spend ten minutes on it. I always thought this was amusing, until she started making me do it, too.

I've lived with cats and dogs all my life, who had free run of both inside and outside, and this was new for me. I thought she was nuts, but since then I've found that it's not uncommon in Japan. My mother and sister-in-law clean their dog's paws after every walk, and I see people doing it everywhere I go. I can see the sense in it, even if I'd never bother with it if it was just me. Maybe she imagines that if it were left up to me, I'd also let chickens and pigs roam our apartment like some Viking longhouse.

So if you're one of those hyper-clean people, this is just one more thing you can obsess about. You're welcome.

No Ovens

We love food.

We love cooking.

However, we live in Japan.

That means, "no oven."

The average Japanese domicile does not have an oven, unless it's a little toaster oven. I've had friends tell me how they were able to perform impressive feats of baking in those little toaster ovens, but for me it takes all the joy out of big-oven baking.



One of the wonderful things about food in Japan are the ingredients. There are lots of locally grown ingredients you'd never find off the island, and which wouldn't last long in shipment.

We enjoy alot of the American Food Network shows that feature beautiful dishes that really require a proper oven to cook. But ovens have never been a part of the Japanese/East Asian culinary culture, and with the diminutive homes here, even if I did manage to wedge an oven in here somehow, the entire house would be super-heated in no time. Most homes don't even have space for dishwashers.

So for the time being, I'll have to be content with the excellent bakeries that abound and hope I can someday afford a big enough house to accommodate a proper oven.