"japanese food" news and stories

• The Cake Boss has an Easter surprise for you. (Hint: It's not cake.)
• Remember Chicago's Charlie Trotter? No? He's trying to change that.
• Meet the man behind the East Village Japanese food scene.
• How to braise meat without browning? That is the question.

How to explain the rather dull and predictable options when it comes to vending machines in America compared with the rest of the world? Why can't we get on-demand ramen, as the Japanese do. Or, even if we wanted one, a Chinese hairy crab? Sure, as Slashfood reported in May, there are Maine lobsters out there in a machine somewhere, but in the U.S. these aren't exactly around every corner, as they are in many other countries.

Vending machines in America: They're pretty much everywhere you don't want to be. Airports. Hospital waiting rooms. Down a long, fluorescent-lit hall in your office at ten o'clock at night as you curse your boss for another late night and try to cobble together dinner from a bag of chips, some powdered donuts and a Coke. Which is what makes the Village Voice's compilation of "10 Wild and Crazy Food Vending Machines" from around the world so refreshing, from a Chinese contraption that allows you to try to catch your own live hairy crab with a robotic claw to the Dutch automat that serves up croquettes.

Before we even had a chance to figure out the sound of one hand clapping, the Japanese have given us a riddle of a different sort: kokumi. Think of it like this: when is a flavor not a flavor? When it's kokumi! Confused? Apparently, so are a lot of food journalists who got all excited when Japanese researchers announced that they had discovered a whole new taste to add to the five we already know -- except, wait a minute, kokumi has no taste. Huh?

Sweet, sour, salty, bitter-those are pretty self-explanatory. Then there's umami, also identified by the Japanese and now commonly accepted as the "fifth" basic taste. It roughly translates to "savory." (According to the Food & Think blog at Smithsonian.com, it more accurately translates to "yummy," but that's not very helpful for explaining things.)

Now here comes kokumi. Unlike sugar, which of course tastes sweet, or salt, which (duh) tastes salty, the compounds in food that relate to kokumi don't have an identifiable taste in and of themselves. Instead, they appear to heighten the sensation of other flavors by activating calcium receptors on the tongue, making salty foods taste even saltier, for example, or savory foods taste more savory.

In a welcome respite from subpar airport fare, "Iron Chef" Masaharu Morimoto is partnering with hospitality and food service company Delaware North to provide fast-casual eateries serving Japanese bar food in airports across the country.

The bistros, appropriately titled Skewers, will serve an assortment of yakitori -- skewered grilled or deep-fried meats and vegetables -- served with rice bowls for portable consumption, as well as soups and salads. The restaurants' settings would take the form of two different models -- a take-out counter and a traditional sit-down approach -- and both would feature open kitchens.

According to Vito Buscemi, director of Concept Portfolio for Delaware North, the line has "great menu variety and great presentation -- all the meats and vegetables are grilled right in front of you. It's very quick, convenient and healthy, and we think it's going to have mass appeal."

I love Japanese food. And I love Monty Python. But the two can never blend.

So when one blogger sent a URL describing Spam onigiri, I naturally launched into Monty Python's immortal "Spam Sketch" (Spam! Spam! Spam! Spam!....) while simultaneously dreaming about the taste of those glorious triangles of rice Japanese eat for lunch...until I stopped short.

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