Atlantic Trivia for April 13, 2026: Japanese Cuisine
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According to the title of a 2011 documentary, the sleeping hours of the Tokyo restaurateur Jiro Ono are consumed by visions of what cuisine?
Hamachi, unagi, o-toro.
And by the way, did you know that sake was originally produced by chewing up rice and spitting it back out into a big vat? The early Japanese relied on the enzymes in saliva to kick-start the starch’s transformation into alcohol.
Eventually, koji mold replaced spit as the fermenting agent, but chewed sake continued to be used ceremonially until at least the 1930s. One 1938 report tells of a chewer chosen by her village for her beauty; it also notes that, beforehand, she brushed her teeth—beautiful and considerate.
See you tomorrow!
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