One of the things I like best about living in Japan is the food. From traditional types of Japanese cuisine like sushi and sashimi to rice bowl-based foods like Oyakodon ("parent-and-child rice bowl," made with chicken and eggs) to local versions of Chinese dishes and all types of bento, eating in Japan is a joy. Japanese food has a reputation for being healthy, and in a lot of cases it is, containing less fat and fewer highly processed ingredients, but the reverse is also true: there are plenty of popular foods here that can kill you. The most famous deadly Japanese food is fugu (pufferfish), which contains a poison that paralyzes your body while you suffocate, but since fugu chefs must undergo years of training and be licensed by the government, deaths from it are quite rare today. A more dangerous food is mochi, or rice cake, essentially a square of extremely dense rice that's been pressed into a solid shape. Cook it over a flame and it will turn soft and chewy -- so chewy in fact that 30% of accidental deaths among the elderly supposedly come from choking on it. A similar food is konjac or Devil's Tongue, a kind of yam eaten throughout Asia that's grated, pressed and boiled until extremely firm, like gelatin made with very little water. Although the low-calorie/high-fiber food is popular with dieters, konjac is so firm that it must carry warning labels on the packaging, and no matter how careful people are, occasionally children or elderly manage to choke on it. All told, a staggering 4000 Japanese choke from overly chewy foods each year in Japan, a very sad statistic.
I love, LOVE this stuff, mochi. Sadly, it's about the most calories you can have in one meal.
6 comments:
Dave suggested that we add Natto to the list, but I think he was joking.
does the mochi contain more rice since it's a lot more dense than just a cup of cooked rice?
or is it the added ingredients that up the calorie intake?
There's a scene in "Tampopo" where an elderly man is left at a restaurant, with instructions by his daughter not to eat certain foods. He goes ahead and orders them, then eventually starts choking, but is saved by the movie's main characters and a vacuum cleaner (it's a sort of slapstick scene).
I never knew what the foods actually were, but perhaps now that I've read this little article, I can go back and recognize them...
I've heard there a standard rice bowl of rice in one mochi, so it's like 2x as dense. It's so good, painted with soy sauce and nori, mmmmm.....
John, yes that scene is great. Wow, haven't thought of Tampopo in years. I like that director's films.
Hey, the dangers natto presents are no joke...especially when its that extra stringy kind. When I eat that stuff half the time I feel like it's sticking in my throat, like a spaghetti noodle that inadvertently got swallowed whole.
And yes, mochi can be a little daunting to eat as well. The stuff my neighbors used to make during New Years was especially dubious. Thinking back, I'm honestly a bit surprised that no one ever choked trying to eat that stuff.
I'm with you, Peter: mochi is possibly the most delicious thing ever. Whereas natto will kill you with good intentions.
Last year, I cracked and bought myself a mochi-maker. We have a good Japanese food store nearby, but I wanted to be able to have the stuff whenever I wanted, however I wanted it prepared.
And now that I'm thinking about it, guess what I'm doing tonight....
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