Raw tuna on rice

Tekka-don. Although this is actually sushi-grade tuna so it might be called maguro-don, but let's not quibble about what to call it, any of those will do. 

I intended to include cucumber and toasted sesame seed, but then I forgot, and you know what? There was nobody around to say, "HEY, THIS WOULD BE PRETTY GOOD TEKKA-DON IF THERE WAS JUST SOME RAW CUCUMBER AND TOASTED SESAME SEEDS WITH IT!"

The rice is flavored with one tablespoon of ground up popcorn seeds which alters the taste toward grits (in the US) or polenta (everywhere else). It also tinges the rice yellow. But wait! There's more: The rice-steaming water is also flavored with bonito flakes. 

Bonito flakes are very strange and wonderful indeed. Also known as katsuobushi, it's skipjack tuna that has been dried and fermented and smoked and then shaved into flakes. The flakes turn plain water into, POW! Fish-flavored broth. Usually in combination with kombu kelp. The two together are wonderful. You get your essence of the ocean right there almost instantly. It's mystifying and magical and alluring. 

But here, we are just using bonito flakes with Japanese sake, and sugar with white pepper and sea-salt. And ground corn. So each day it's an adventure into a new combination of familiar things. Never are two meals ever exactly alike. I don't think I am capable of it. So that's the rice. 

The tuna is cut thinly and alternated with strips of nori, a dark seaweed processed into sheets like paper. 

The sauce is tamari, a type of thick fermented soy sauce, wasabi, Japanese sake, sugar, dried red chile flakes, and water. 

This tekka-don was lunch. It is so good, perfection really,  I feel like making it again for dinner. And maybe next time I'll use regular white rice with cucumber and toasted sesame seeds. I can also mix it up a little bit with other types of seafood to an appealing form of sashimi, or a mixed bowl with rice. There are not any actual rules restricting my impulses ... that I know about.