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Kare Raisu

If you did a statistical survey of the average Japanese child’s favorite food,kare raisu (curry rice) for sure will be at the top. Japanese style curry rice dish best represents the average Japanese’s diet.

Curry is not a native Japanese spice but has been arranged to have a distinct category of its own apart from for example, Indian curry. The sauce is usually thicker and the typical kare raisu contains onions, carrots, potatoes, and chicken or beef. However, this popular dish has reached new levels in recent years and has a culture of its own where there is even a food theme park dedicated solely to kare raisu.

Now there are soupier curries, curry wrapped inside an omelet, baked with cheese, used as filling inside bread or Chinese style buns, or used as a soup base for udon (thick wheat flour) noodles. The options are endless, and so is the number of curry restaurants within Japan. Out of those millions, the restaurants that become exceptionally popular often end up selling their own brand name instant kare packages at local convenient and grocery stores.

Similar to the Japanese populace’s passionate relationship with ramen (Chinese style) noodles, which is another long food story to be told, it is not out of the ordinary for fans to wait inline for hours to get a taste of a legendary curry restaurant’s curry.