Made oyakodon* for dinner tonight -- a nice comfort-food meal that comes together quickly on a Friday night. When I was born, our next door neighbors were a Japanese family on assignment to the US, and my Mom, who has always had an adventurous palette and been a great cook, asked the woman for a recipe for katsu donbur**i. As my Mom tells the story, she hemmed and hawed before finally sharing a recipe, and my Mom always interpreted it as a reluctance to share a homestyle dish that (50 years ago) you'd never serve to guests or eat in a restaurant. (Maybe the US equivalent would be chili mac or tuna noodle casserole.) Anyway, I grew up eating homemade dishes like katsu donburi, paella, and mu shu pork, among others, and it's definitely influenced my palette!

Fortunately my husband is equally adventurous (or he wouldn't be my husband). Years ago I went on a date with a guy (Chicago firefighter) who told me he'd never eaten Chinese food. (You live part time in a firehouse where everyone cooks and you've never had Chinese?!) He then proceeded to order a caesar salad, hold the anchovies, dressing and parmesan (in other words, romaine lettuce with croutons). Needless to say, it didn't work out.

* For those who don't want to google, oyakodon is chicken, egg and onions simmered in a soy/dashi broth, then served over rice and topped with scallions.
* Katsu donburi is the same onion and egg mixture simmered in the soy dashi, but you fry a panko-crusted pork cutlet, slice it, put it atop the rice and then put the onion/egg/broth over it.