みなさん、こんにちは！帰国子女、海外経験者コミュニティーのBeyond Borderです！
『競争力を持った国際日本人になる！』、『日本の良さを再発見し、世界中に広めよう！』をスローガンに始まった、現在唯一の英文記事<Introducing Japan>第3弾！

The most surprising Japanese food for me

The most surprising Japanese food for me should be ‘tororo’, which is actually grated yam.

It is a kind of side dish in Japan that people usually have it with rice or over soba.

By grating the ‘yamaimo’ (Japanese yam) and adding some water with other condiments such as soy sauce, grated yam is done.

When I was living in the dormitory of my university in the first year I came to Japan, they provided us breakfast and dinner on weekdays.

I was quite surprised when I saw ‘tororo’ at the first time and I asked about it.

I was told that Japanese usually put it on top of the rice.

It was a bit sticky and not having a strong taste.

Having tororo with rice, a slight taste of it might increase your appetite to eat more.

Since then, I found that a lot of places provide ‘tororo’ as a side dish.

For example, when I go for restaurant of ‘gyutan’ (which is ox tongue), their usually have miso-soup, ‘tsukemono’ (Japanese style pickles) and tororo to serve with rice for a set menu.

I even found hamburg steak with tororo sauce in menus of family restaurants, which means that Japanese are not only using tororo for Japanese style dishes, but also for the Western one.

I personally do feel good with the texture of such kind of sticky food.

However, some of my friends who are from other countries do really appreciate it.

The taste of tororo is good or not depends on personal favor, but it is a kind of traditional Japanese food that I suggest people who come to Japan to try it if you have a chance!