“Mapo Tofu” Cedar Park, 2016
こんばんは！Hi, how’s it going?
Tonight’s photo is of the bowl of mapo tofu that I had for dinner. Mariko made this yummy and spicy dish from scratch, although you can buy the mapo (or mabo) sauce already prepared. It’s one of my favorite dishes.
Here in the States, many would call this type of food a “rice bowl”, meaning, a bowl filled with rice with some kind of topping. In Japan, there’s a similar type of food called “donburi” and it is just about my favorite. In particular, I love oyako-don, which is chicken and egg over rice, but I also love gyu-don (sliced beef over rice), katsu-don (pork cutlet over rice), and una-don (Unagi/eel over rice).
You could say this is a Japanese comfort food, because it is very commonly made at home. In fact, for my birthday dinner each year, I request oyakodon from Mariko, and she thinks it is a strange request because it isn’t very special. But it’s my favorite! Yummmm.
If you live in a city that has Yoshinoya, I urge you to go try one of the “beef bowls” (gyu-don). It’s so good!
I hope you ate well tonight, and we’ll see you tomorrow!
おやすみなさい！
– B 
