hibimeshi cook-along

i randomly clicked an intriguing thumbnail on a certain backup file distribution site the other day and discovered "hibimeshi"full christian name: hibi wa sugiredo meshi umashi, a collaboration between atto (non non biyori) and p. a. works (shirobako), one of the few studios that still consistently produces anime originals. the synposis i found online was spare, but it was enough to get the message across to connoisseurs: this is a show about cute girls who are doing Food/Cooking. i am currently going through both an anime and cooking phase, so i immediately added it to the rotation. if anything, this is a return to form for me, it's not well-represented on the Secret Page but this "genre" is my bread and butter, and one you can't find in any other medium.

anime watchers frequently speak wistfully of a desire to "make anime real", part in jest but also part sincerely, expressing a genuine longing for an impossible ideal fantasy world where everything runs on video game mechanics, or where they can live in walkable transit-oriented neighborhoods, or where girls are interested in them, or where they actually have friends. what they don't realize is that You Can Just Do Things and copy anime in real life, making anime real starts at home. i would never admit this to my friends but the reason i was so insistent on cooking curry during our camping trips is because i've seen it done many times in anime, or that the "hotpot nights" i occasionally host are inspired by all the times they do exactly that in hidamari sketch. might i also mention that i now have not one but TWO blog posts entitled "my budget bocchi the rock moment"? anyways, food-based as it is, this show presents yet another prime opportunity to make anime real, so why not give it a go by doing a cook-along?

the show gets into it right away by starting with a recipe, introduced by a giant talking egg in a video the main character is watching while rotting all alone in her apartment wearing booty shorts. the recipe is for "raw omurice", a particularly suitable dish for our main character's present circumstances, so she gets up and makes it right away. raw omurice is a variant of normal omurice, basically an omelette filled with fried rice and topped with ketchup. it's a classic yōshokufor those unaware, inside japanese cooking there are two wolves. one (washoku) is refined, elegant, dignified; deceptively-simple dishes made with a handful of traditional ingredients executed to absolute perfection, arrays of tastefully-arranged tiny plates of colorful pickles, classy ingredients like raw fish. the other wolf (yōshoku) is vaguely western-influenced "comfort food" that mostly involves putting ketchup on rice. although it's a staple in home kitchens and "family restaurants" across japan, the latter fare is almost nonexistent in america, i have never once seen even something relatively inoffensive like hayashi rice on a menu in america. so, you've got to make it yourself... dish typically made for kids, though it's also well-known as being a staple dish at maid cafes because it is cheap, easy to make, and most importantly, the omelette's yellow surface is a good canvas for drawing on with ketchup. i've actually never had omurice before, i once tried to order kyuuramen's wacky version that comes topped with a tonkatsu, but they told me it was "sold out". i've also never tried to make it at home before either, even though every japanese cookback i have includes it as an "easy homecooking classic", i'm just too lazy and don't want to take the leap to learn how to make an omelette.

fortunately, raw omurice is even easier to make because it avoids the omelette part entirely, you do not cook the egg (or anything besides the rice) at all. in the show to my frustration they didn't elaborate much on the exact details of the recipe, but on a hunch i checked the official X Formerly Twitter account and found that they had posted a full recipe:

ingredients (for 1 portion)

• 160g rice
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp ketchup
• 1 tsp olive oil
• parsley (for garnish)
• mini tomato (for garnish)

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1. crack the egg into a bowl, add worcestershire sauce and olive oil, and mix well.
2. add freshly cooked rice to the bowl and gently mix together
3. place onto an oval-shaped plate, top with ketchup, and garnish with parsley and mini tomato.

so yes, it is just raw egg and a few condiments mixed with rice. interestingly, this is basically a yōshoku version of a classic japanese breakfast dish, tamago kake gohan; instead of mixing the raw egg with japanese condiments like soy sauce or furikake, western-style condiments are used instead. in fact, though they called it "raw omurice" in the show, the recipe they posted online calls it "tamago kake omurice". i did make the OG TKG one lazy morning because james "kenji" lopez-alt raves about it all the time and i had to see what the fuss was about, but i wasn't a huge fan and haven't made it again even though it's dead simple and uses ingredients i always have around. will a more westernized variant be more palatable to me? we shall see...

now this recipe is dead simple, but of course i immediately started second-guessing myself while getting the rice out of the rice cooker: does that 160g refer to the weight of the uncooked rice or the cooked rice? i knew i had put in approximately 150g of uncooked rice because that's how much the rice dispenser dispenses at a time, however when i weighed the cooked rice i found that it now weighed 286g. it also seemed like kind of a lot of rice for just a single egg and a couple teaspoons of seasoning, so i decided to double the recipe just to be safe. for the olive, i used one of this year's limited edition costco imported olive oils (i have already gone through almost an entire 1 liter bottle) and japanese (for "authenticity") bull-dog worcestershire sauce, which i went out and purchased despite managing to unearth an ancient bottle of lea & perrinscurrent tagline: "Unwrap the Flavor", vintage 1875 tagline: "pronounced by connoisseurs 'THE ONLY GOOD SAUCE.'" in the back of some cupboard. although worcestershire sauce supposed to last quite a while due to being stuffed with salt and vinegar, i was a little wary because the "best-by" date on the bottle was in 2018.⊕comparison image how did hers get so yellow? should i be using the artisan japanese eggs that were shilled in the episode?

when i mixed it all together, it did seem a little soupy, almost like a porridge. i consulted reference materials (screenshots from the anime) and theirs were definitely more, uh, grainy... maybe the weights really were based on uncooked portions. that didn't stop me from eating it, and i have to admit the japanese were right all along about ketchup on rice, it felt like the ketchup was carrying the dish. but, i still had to know for Science if i had been wrong about the rice portion size, so i made it again assuming that the 160g of rice referred to the uncooked weight...

yup, this time the rice grains like a look more defined, i think this is how it's supposed to be, it was also better because the rice was warmer, i hadn't taken it out of the rice cooker early to weigh it this time around. not sure how i could make it more yellow, maybe by adding some FD&C Yellow #5? but what this version made really clear to me is that this is basically just glorified ketchup on rice, with a bit of raw egg mixed in for plausible deniability. it's far from the worst thing you can put together in five minutes with barely any effort, and i think i do like it more than the normal tamago kake gohan...

anyways, all that covers the first three minutes of the episode (i'm starting to doubt i'm going to make it all 12 episodes). in the rest, we find out that our main character is makowhose fashion and mannerisms are strikingly similar to a girl i once [unintelligible], a lonely food enjoyer newly enrolled in college, who is a little anxious about eating alone at restaurants. one evening she gets captivated by a display of "sauce katsudon" in a restaurant window, but as she's looking an employee comes out and startles her, saying it's sold out, to which she reponds by saying she was only looking and running off. the next day at collegeis it just me or have anime girls been getting older lately? in zatsu tabi they're college-age too... then again i guess it would be a bit unrealistic if high school students were zooming off to random parts of the country on a dime..., she runs into her genki childhood friend Pickle, who ropes her into joining the "food research club", which needs one more member in order to receive official recognition from the school (the other members are Pickle's two friends Sheep and Korea). in the evening after work, she is once again lured in by the sauce katsudon in the window, but this time things are different: Korea comes up behind her and invites her in, it turns out she works there, and mako is finally able to enjoy the sauce katsudon.

although no official recipe was provided, it looked pretty easy to recreate based on what was shown in the episode: rice, sauce, shredded cabbagethere must be a law that says katsu always has to be served with shredded cabbage, tonkatsu sliced into squares, egg, more sauce. the most difficult part is the katsu itself, but i'm already pretty good at making it since it's a personal favorite of mine. the only question was, what's the mystery dark sauce? is it normal katsu sauce, or something else? it was important to figure this out as the dish is called "sauce" katsudon after all, so i searched online and found recipes for it on the asahi website, the suntory website, and even the kikkoman website. i used the suntory one that called for mixing together 50ml worcestershire sauce, 1 tablespoon sake, 2 tablespoons mirin, two teaspoons sugar, and of course, 2 tablespoons ketchup. you were supposed to bring it to a boil in a small pan, but instead i was lazy and put it in the microwave for a minute or so.

the next most important part was the egg, which they made a big deal about in the show. it's supposed to be an "onsen tamago", a sort of softboiled egg that is traditionally made by soaking eggs in an onsen for like half an hour, which is obviously somewhat impractical for me. instead i tried to make something approximating it in the microwave, similar to how i make the egg patties for my "homemade" egg mcmuffins. in the process, i found a great tip for preventing the eggs from exploding in the microwave so much, apparently one thing that helps is to gently puncture the top of the yolk with a toothpick. unfortunately i had only a single remaining egg so i had no choice but to go with it when i overcooked the yolk, it wasn't runny like it is supposed to be, though i did somehow manage to get it to that perfect creamy consistency. ⊕comparison imagetechnically this is the fake one displayed in the window, but i mean it's all just drawings anyway

at the end of the day this is pretty much just a tonkatsu set meal with everything combined together in one bowl, so of course i enjoyed it (though i used a little too much cabbage and could've shredded it finer). i'm still not quite sure about the sauce, the sauce used in the show seems to be much thicker than the sauce i put together, which was firmly liquidy. however, my sauce consistency does match the pictures that were with the recipe i lifted it from so i'm pretty sure i didn't make it wrong, the one depicted in the show must be a secret house recipe or something of the restaurant they used as a model.

the annoying thing about making katsu or really anything breaded and fried is that it makes a huge mess in the kitchen, and if it's something large like a katsu then it's all for just a single serving. i still had two leftover pieces of pork loin and all the breading supplies out, so after i finished eating i decided to conduct a daring experiment: a test of the theoretical "Bread-Ahead" technique. was it possible to bread a bunch of pork loins all at once, then store them in the freezer so that i could take them at and fry them at my convenience? i didn't see any reason it shouldn't work, after all there are so many frozen fried foods products from the store that work that way, though maybe they're loaded with preservatives or something. so far i can report that the initial trial was a success, i breaded a pork loin as usual but instead of tossing it in the fryer i put it into a plastic bag and froze it, leaving it in for a duration of approximately 24 hours. as far as i can tell the only difference while cooking it was that it took a little longer to fry, presumably because i was heating it up from a lower temperature.

anyways, after mako is finally able to enjoy the sauce katsudon in the show, the next day she cheerfully meets up with her new friends in the food research club, now officially recognized by the school. they have been assigned a club room inside a haikyo that looks like a generic japanese civic building, and mako is looking forward to enjoying food and cooking with everyone... but then there's a devastating twist: it turns out the "food research club" was a front all along, Pickle's real intention was to create a do-nothing hangout club à la yuru yuri or yuyushiki, everything about food had been a cover story spun so the university bureaucrats would approve the club...

⊕can you guess which one is Sheep?

the gang spends the first part of the episode cleaning out their new club room, looking forward to all the lazing about they're going to be doing. mako is a little glum the entire time, and after she heads home she once again finds herself alone on the couch watching cooking videos, thinking "man wouldn't it be great to cook that with the fellas" and suffering from increasingly severe hypnagogic hallucinations of the egg guy. but things turn around the next day, when the further club room preparations are interrupted by an unexpected visitor: it's the stern university bureaucrat lady on a surprise inspection to check that clubs are properly partaking in their stated club activities, as there have been issues with fake clubs being set up as fronts for lazing about. Pickle's evil plan having been foiled, the girls scramble to acquire cooking supplies and ingredients so that they can actually do some cooking and avoid having the club disbanded. coming back to check later, bureaucrat lady is satisfied with the progress of the preparations, but declines to stay for food and reveals she had clocked Pickle's plan from the start. as a parting gift, she also informs them they're not allowed to use the portable stove indoors (ugh), so they have to cook on a picnic table outside.

as mako and Korea begin cooking (Sheep and Pickle don't know how), we finally find out what they're making: "camembert curry pilaf". now we're really getting deep into the yōshoku iceberg, baffling dishes with no recognizable national origin that may as well have been created by aliens who have no idea they're committing inconceivable culinary crimes. although i'm pretty accustomed to it by this point, this dish managed to get even me a little at the very end, when as if it was the most normal thing ever the anime girls cheerfully topped off the rice with a whole camembert cheese. it was practically a jumpscare. besides that, the dish has a little of everything: rice, wieners, some random japanese seasonings and an onsen tamago, and there is of course KETCHUP. you could probably copy this one fairly readily from what they showed in the show, but here's the recipe they posted online:

ingredients (serves 4)

• 2 servings rice
• 1/6 onion
• 100g mixed vegetables
• 4 wieners (large)
• 2 tablespoons ketchup
• 2 tablespoons curry powder (japanese-style, e.g. s&b oriental curry powder)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon soy sauce
• 350ml water
• 30ml apple juice
• 20g butter
• 100g camembert cheese
• dried parsley flakes (to taste)
• 1 onsen tamago

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1. finely chop the onion, cut the wieners into 1cm slices, and wash the rice.
2. mix the washed rice, wiener slices, chopped onion, mixed vegetables, ketchup, curry powder, salt, soy sauce, water, and apple juice in a frying pan, then let sit for 30 minutes.
3. add butter to the pan and cook on high heat until boiling, then cover with lid, turn heat down to low, and cook for 15 minutes.
4. open lid to add camembert cheese on top, then replace lid and steam for 15 minutes.
5. turn off the heat, take off lid, sprinkle parsley flakes all over, and add onsen tamago to your liking. gently mix everything together and eat.

i thought this was going to be easy since i already have 90% of the ingredients, but turns out after a thorough inspection neither of the -co stores i frequent have camembert cheese, only endless varities of cheddar and maybe some brie. i found it at the third store i went to, and at $9.99 it is officially the most expensive ingredient i have bought for this project so far. i also spent an excessively long time trying to find apple juice in a small individual container that wouldn't be humiliating to be seen buying before realizing that i could just buy and juice an actual apple instead. overall i probably spent more time wandering around stores in a daze looking for those two ingredients than actually cooking the dish, though to be fair i was somewhat sleep-deprived (at least i also managed to discover an outrageous deal on wine at costco).⊕comparison imagethe yellow stuff on the cheese is the onsen tamago, which i decided to forego in my own after two failures

since i was cooking it for myself i shrank the recipe given above, halving it instead of quartering it though because i figure i probably need more than just one anime girl portion of food. i did opt to use only a quarter of the cheese, as the american-size package seemed significantly bigger than the japanese one. like most yōshoku dishes it was relatively inoffensive once i got rid of my preconceived notions of where ketchup or slightly-fancy cheese belong and dug in, the cheese went with it better than i expected but i think the dish would be fine without it too, if i make it in the future i'll probably leave the cheese out since it's expensive and not really an ingredient i use to make any other dish. i also don't see any reason why it has to be camembert cheese in particular, perhaps i could experiment with some other options like brie, or cheddar, or kraft singles...

overall i'm not sure this particular dish will become a staple, though the general "pilaf" technique this has introduced to me (cooking rice soaked in seasonings and veggies) seems ripe for experimentation and improvisation on lazy days. that's another advantage of this recipe, it requires very little prep work or complicated cooking techniques, you basically mix the rice with a bunch of stuff and then boil it all for a bit, there's barely anything you need to do with a knife even, the only annoying thing is that it does take a little time to make, what with the 30 minute soaking and all. the supplies needed are also very minimal, after all the girls in the show put it together on a picnic table using a single frying pan and portable stove, i could see this dish going hard on a camping trip after finishing a hike to the Big Tree... "here, let me whip up some dinner real quick, a very traditional japanese dish... can you hand me the ketchup and rice?"