Rice and Japan

Rice is the staple food of Japan, eaten two or three times a day by most people, and it's so ubiquitous that the word for rice (gohan) doubles as the word for "food" or "meal." Japanese usually eat white rice steamed in electric rice cookers that are owned by virtually every household (although there other convenient ways to enjoy hot steaming rice at home). Rice is usually eaten as a side dish to other foods (hamburger steak, sashimi, etc.), and many Japanese imagine that Westerners each every meal with a big basket of bread on the side. Supposedly, the idea of eating a small amount of a main dish with a lot of rice comes from Japan's wartime past, when everyone was poor and had very little to eat except rice -- it was common for kids to eat Hinomaru Bento, or bento of white rice with only a single red pickled ume plum in the middle, so that it looks like a Japanese flag. The best rice in Japan comes from Niigata Prefecture, on the Sea of Japan side of the country (the Snow Country in Kawabata's famous novel, if you've read it). It's called Koshi-Hikari, and restaurants proudly boast of serving only this type of rice to their customers. The latest trend in rice is to print cute moe anime girls on the side, which seems to have helped sales quite a bit.

The latest trend in rice is printing cute anime girls on the packaging.