Food for Thought.

Yesterday, my Anthropology of Food class discussed 弁当 (bentô) boxes. Beforehand, we discussed in class a number of articles concerning Obentou: 'Japanese Mothers and Obentôs: The Lunch-Box as Ideological State Apparatus', by Anne Allison, was our only required reading, but our guest professor, Andrea Arai (from whom I took an introductory anthropology course last spring), also discussed topics brought up in Whitelaw's 'Rice Ball Rivalries'. I was intensely interested in the incredible amount of effort the mothers put into their お弁当 (in Allison's research); it intrigued me because it was relatively clear that with such carefully regulated preparation and consumption, there was much more at work that the simple making and eating of nutritious, healthy food. As it turns out, the お弁当, whose consumption was so carefully monitered by teachers, constitutes an unusual method (are they not all unusual, these methods?) of subjecting (or subjectifying) both mother and child to the state and its norms, its môres. I was not long into reading the article before I began to question the class of people about whom Allison writes. Although my first real hint was the number of full-time stay-at-home mothers (which may or may not mean as much as it would, here), I also was struck from the start by the way in which she wrote about the people she encountered, for it reminded me strongly of the private school at which my mother taught. Andrea was also quick to point out the regional and class differences between the preparation and consumption of the お弁当 and the ways in which the socioeconomic situation has impacted お弁当 consumption since the time of Allison's essay. The primary factors in this change have been the collapse of Japanese economic stability in the early 1990s (dealt with by Andrea in her lecture) and the increasing prominence and importance of Japanese コンビニ, or convenience stores (dealt with by Whitelaw). The transition of 御握り(rice balls) from 'slow food' to 'fast food' was carefully documented. Nevertheless, as far as fast food is concerned, rice balls are relatively nutritious -- more comparable to the Wendy's baked potato than to the infamous Big Mac.

Here in the Seattle area, that difference has become a sort of 'paradigm' of 'Asian' cuisine. For persons who only eat organic or vegetarian or health food, there are an infinite number of restaurants, many of which draw heavily or completely on Asian or Asian-based cuisine. At the same time, there are Chinese fast-food restaurants and teriyaki grills (steeped to the core in MSG) all over the place, a double-standard which is not easily reconciled.

And speaking of teriyaki, there was a most interesting article in the Seattle Weekly about the history and development of American teriyaki, which was originally a sauce composed (primarily) of soy sauce and mirin used only on fish. It was here in America that the first companies started mixing soy sauce with sugar instead of mirin to attract American companies. Since that time, teriyaki has not only been adopted enthusiastically by business-seeking Korean immigrants, but it has also been absorbed as a sort of cure-all menu-addition to many different kinds of Asian restaurants. The article is clearly well-researched and very insightful, drawing all sorts of questions in my mind about what we mean when we talk about the 'traditional' nature of any 'exotic' cuisine, for in all likelihood, most of it seems to be not so much adopted as adapted.

P.S. Here is a picture of my lovely お弁当. The 御握り(rice ball) is stuffed with 梅干し (a pickled sort of prunus called an ume) and bounded by seaweed (海苔). Opposite the rice ball are two small cupcake baking cups filled with pickled cucumbers in one corner and boiled bamboo chutes in the other. In the spaces between are the alfalfa sprouts planted in our sprouting containers on Monday, as well as tiny slices of pickled 大根 radishes and きゅうり cucumber. Two egg slices (soy-free) have been laid decoratively, one across the rice ball and the other covering the fringes of the baking cups. And finally, the お弁当 has been decorated with four pretty little soybeans and an umeboshi. So, what do you think? きれい、ね?