JAPANESE HOME COOKING: Bento with mustard, soy sauce-flavored pork
2012/05/03
A box lunch with mustard and soy-sauce flavored pork (Photo by Katsumi Oyama)
Time-saving tips appeal to most of us in fast-paced modern Japan. Yet we
do not want to sacrifice taste or our health. Making packed lunches
involves many time-saving techniques. Using just a frying pan, cooking
expert Megumi Fujii whips up a colorful box lunch with pork, egg and
vegetables.
Ekiben - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- [ 翻譯此頁 ]Ekiben (駅弁) (Railway boxed meal) are a specific type of bento boxed meals, sold on trains and train stations in Japan. Today, many types of ekiben can ...Ekiben: Take an epicurean trip around Japan without leaving Tokyo
By LOUIS TEMPLADO Staff Writer
2011/01/22
"Kamameshi," or lunches cooked and sold in ceramic pots, are among the original types of "ekiben," or boxed lunches sold at train stations around Japan. (Photos by Louis Templado)
"Hipparidako-meshi," or octopus and rice cooked in pots, is from Nishi-Akashi Station in Hyogo Prefecture.
Mitsuo Okamura of Shichinohe, Aomori Prefecture, shows off a "sakura bento" from his town that contains horsemeat.
The event's top-selling item this year is "ikameshi," or "mochi" rice-stuffed squid from Hokkaido. They come two or three to a box, which sells for 500 yen.
To sample some of the best Japanese flavors requires some train travel, but sometimes you don't even have to leave the station. Among the most memorable meals can be "ekiben," "bento" box meals sold right on the platform or in the train itself.
And right now, if you time it right, you might not even have to leave Tokyo. Until Jan. 25, head over the Keio Department Store above Shinjuku Station for the "Yumei ekiben to zenkoku umai mono taikai" (Famous Ekiben Convention).
Now in its 46th iteration, the yearly foodfest gathers together bento dealers from all of Japan's prefectures except for Okinawa. The resulting cook-off makes the department store venue seem as crowded as rush hour in the vast station downstairs.
How much so? The department store gets 100,000 visitors a day during the event, according to representative Chigusa Miyama, compared to about 70,000 normally. Some 600 million yen (about $7.3 million) worth of bento and other foods are sold during the 13-day event.
Here you can grab a box of "ikameshi" (squid stuffed with glutinous rice and cooked in ink) without heading to distant Mori Station on the Hakodate Line in Hokkaido. The transplanted kitchen here sells close to 64,000 of those.
Just a few steps away there's "hipparidako-meshi" from Nishi-Akashi Station on the Sanyo Line in Hyogo Prefecture. Octopus tentacles steamed with rice, it's cooked on the spot in cute ceramic jars that you take home with you. Both are among the top 10 sellers of the 200 varieties of bento available, made at 30 kitchens set up for the event or shipped in daily.
Fanning the flames of the bento event, so to speak, are an ongoing interest in things train-related along with a boom in so-called "B-grade" cuisine. A festival of one-bowl regional dishes, for example, ran earlier this month at Tokyo Dome baseball stadium.
B-grade or not, a lot is riding on these little lunch boxes.
"We are here to get word out about our local products to the public," says Mitsuo Okamura, leader of a kitchen retinue from rural Shichinohe in Aomori Prefecture making its debut at the Keio event. The town's rail link, Shichinohe-Towada Station, he explains, just opened in December with the extension of the Tohoku Shinkansen Line to Shin-Aomori, so the regional lunchbox is a new invention.
"After eight weeks of planning and a contest, we decided to make a bento that touches on our history," he says. The area used to be known for its horses; thus, the "sakura bento" contains grilled horsemeat, boiled burdock root and, unusual for a boxed lunch, a bit of garlic.
"Japanese people are traveling less these days," says Keio's Miyama. "But here they can try delicacies from Hokkaido to Kyushu. A bento is one way of getting a taste of travel, and it's inexpensive."
* * *
"Yumei ekiben to zenkoku umai mono taikai" continues until Jan. 25 at the Keio Department Store in Shinjuku Ward, 7F. From 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (until 5 p.m. on Jan. 25). Visit (www.keionet.com). A small-scale version of the event will be held at LaLaport Shin Misato in Misato, Saitama Prefecture, from Jan. 28 to Feb. 3.
Prices range from 500 yen to 1,500 yen.
And right now, if you time it right, you might not even have to leave Tokyo. Until Jan. 25, head over the Keio Department Store above Shinjuku Station for the "Yumei ekiben to zenkoku umai mono taikai" (Famous Ekiben Convention).
Now in its 46th iteration, the yearly foodfest gathers together bento dealers from all of Japan's prefectures except for Okinawa. The resulting cook-off makes the department store venue seem as crowded as rush hour in the vast station downstairs.
How much so? The department store gets 100,000 visitors a day during the event, according to representative Chigusa Miyama, compared to about 70,000 normally. Some 600 million yen (about $7.3 million) worth of bento and other foods are sold during the 13-day event.
Here you can grab a box of "ikameshi" (squid stuffed with glutinous rice and cooked in ink) without heading to distant Mori Station on the Hakodate Line in Hokkaido. The transplanted kitchen here sells close to 64,000 of those.
Just a few steps away there's "hipparidako-meshi" from Nishi-Akashi Station on the Sanyo Line in Hyogo Prefecture. Octopus tentacles steamed with rice, it's cooked on the spot in cute ceramic jars that you take home with you. Both are among the top 10 sellers of the 200 varieties of bento available, made at 30 kitchens set up for the event or shipped in daily.
Fanning the flames of the bento event, so to speak, are an ongoing interest in things train-related along with a boom in so-called "B-grade" cuisine. A festival of one-bowl regional dishes, for example, ran earlier this month at Tokyo Dome baseball stadium.
B-grade or not, a lot is riding on these little lunch boxes.
"We are here to get word out about our local products to the public," says Mitsuo Okamura, leader of a kitchen retinue from rural Shichinohe in Aomori Prefecture making its debut at the Keio event. The town's rail link, Shichinohe-Towada Station, he explains, just opened in December with the extension of the Tohoku Shinkansen Line to Shin-Aomori, so the regional lunchbox is a new invention.
"After eight weeks of planning and a contest, we decided to make a bento that touches on our history," he says. The area used to be known for its horses; thus, the "sakura bento" contains grilled horsemeat, boiled burdock root and, unusual for a boxed lunch, a bit of garlic.
"Japanese people are traveling less these days," says Keio's Miyama. "But here they can try delicacies from Hokkaido to Kyushu. A bento is one way of getting a taste of travel, and it's inexpensive."
* * *
"Yumei ekiben to zenkoku umai mono taikai" continues until Jan. 25 at the Keio Department Store in Shinjuku Ward, 7F. From 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (until 5 p.m. on Jan. 25). Visit (www.keionet.com). A small-scale version of the event will be held at LaLaport Shin Misato in Misato, Saitama Prefecture, from Jan. 28 to Feb. 3.
Prices range from 500 yen to 1,500 yen.
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