Kyuushoku Goes Korean

White rice
Bibimbap (A dish consisting of various toppings served on rice)
Suiton-jiru (A soup with boiled flour dumplings)
Takuan-dzuke (Yellow slices of pickled daikon radish)
Milk
(889 calories)

Notes: Bibimbap (ビビンバ - “bibimba” in Japanese) is a Korean dish of meat and vegetables served on top of rice.  It is often crowned with things like sautéed meat slices (often beef), bean sprouts, spinach, julienned carrots, a spicy red Korean chili pepper paste called “gochujang,” and egg (most commonly just a raw egg or egg yolk plopped in the middle that is then mixed in before eating). Ishiyaki bibinba (石焼ビビンバ), or bibimbap that is served in a heated stone bowl, is also a popular choice at many restaurants here too, as the hot stone gives the rice a flavorful char on the bottom that really tastes great when mixed up with the runny egg and other ingredients. But our school lunches don’t get quite that fancy with it, as you can see here.  Our version just came with scrambled egg, chopped pork cooked with ginger, and bean sprouts (もやし – moyashi, perhaps the cheapest vegetable you can get in the stores here for around 20 cents a bag).

“Suiton” (水団) refers to the boiled flour dumplings that have been dropped into today’s vegetable and pork soup, and I’m told by my coworkers that this dish has kind of an old-time peasant food feel to it (as it was an easy, filling soup to make on a tight budget).

The bright yellow, slightly sweet daikon radish pickles are also a pretty popular item at school, and many kids are thrilled if they’re lucky enough to snag an extra helping from any less-enthused classmates. Usually it's the girls who shy away from them, as the pickles are also super crunchy and therefore chewing them produces a lot of noise (many of the women teachers have expressed to me their own embarrassment over eating such a noisy food).