Rice dishes
Katemeshi
Katemeshi (Gunma) — rice stretched with barley, beans and root vegetables
Rice cooked with barley, beans, daikon and other bulking ingredients called kate. Born of rice shortages, it survives today as a mixed rice dish often served on the Tenjin festival day.
- Origin: Gunma
- About 100 km northwest of Tokyo
What it's made of
Rice is cooked together with ingredients such as barley, beans, daikon, and seaweed. Each grain, soaked in the flavor of the mix-ins, is said to carry the taste of vegetables and beans through every bite, giving a savory depth that plain rice alone lacks.
How it's made
The ingredients may be cooked together with the rice from the start, or mixed in after the rice is done. Barley, beans, carrot, burdock, mushrooms, and fried tofu are cut small and seasoned with soy sauce or simmered in broth beforehand, which is said to be the basic method.
Why it took this shape
In times when rice was scarce, ingredients called kate are said to have been added to stretch the rice and make a more filling meal. Even now that rice is easy to come by, it is said to remain a dish households make readily when people gather or time is short.
Before you go
- How to use a convenience storeA quick guide to choosing rice balls and hot snacks, buying coffee, paying by cash, IC card, or tap payment, using the eat-in corner, and sorting your trash — the basics for a first visit.
- Station food and ekiben (station bento)Where and when to find ekiben (station bento) before it sells out, etiquette for eating on board, how standing soba and udon stalls work, and where to find souvenirs sold inside the station.
- Soraben and airport diningA guide to what soraben means and how it differs from ekiben, whether to buy before or after security, etiquette for eating on board, airport restaurants, and things to check before buying food souvenirs to take home.
Dishes in the same style
- Aburafu DonDeep-fried wheat gluten, shaped into a log, is simmered in a sweet-savory broth and set with egg over rice, katsudon-style — a Tome City bowl said to trace to a tofu shop's shelf-stable gluten product, later turned into a bowl dish by a local innkeeper.
- Aburi-zushiNigiri with just its surface flash-seared by torch or hot iron. Unlike Edomae's shigoto curing for keeping, the searing here is done purely for the change in aroma and fat it brings — a relatively recent way of eating sushi.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Contrast
- KatemeshiRice bulked out with dried taro stems and vegetables, centered on Chichibu where rice was scarce. It grew from the thrift of tenant farmers who had to sell most of their rice, and is eaten at mountain-god and Doll Festival rites.
- Kate MeshiA Sagamihara City dish of rice mixed with simmered shiitake mushrooms, burdock and chikuwa fish cake. Said to have grown from the need to stretch precious rice, it is reportedly served as a festive dish at festivals and equinox gatherings.
Also from Gunma
- Fujioka RamenAn unassuming clear soy chuka soba, rooted in the town's diner culture.
- AmanejiWheat dumplings simmered in a sweetened red bean soup, mainly eaten around Shibukawa; Kawaba village calls it amadango. It was a treat during breaks from farm work.
- Ayu ShioyakiGunma's official fish, skewered in a zigzag and salted before charcoal grilling. Sweetfish from the Kanna river are prized for their aroma and firm flesh, drawing visitors once the season opens in June.
- GojiruGround soybean paste, called go, stirred into a miso soup with seasonal vegetables. Made in soybean-growing Gunma from autumn into winter, it has long served as a warming, nutritious dish.
- Sosu KatsudonBreaded pork fillet dipped in a house sauce blending Worcestershire with eel tare, served over rice. It spread as a delivery favorite in the textile town of Kiryu and is now found across the prefecture.
- Konnyaku Miso OdenSkewered konjac, simmered in sake and water then brushed with a sweet-savory miso glaze, eaten through the cold winter. Its nickname, hippataki oden, comes from the slap of drying the konjac against a cloth.