Yakiniku at the Greyrat Mansion

FOR A WHILE, I’d been thinking about what I could do to truly showcase to my family how delicious rice is. With that in mind, I had Aisha make me some onigiri and some raw egg over rice with soy sauce—the classics. Aisha was a genius of a cook, so they were both delicious. Despite that, my family only ever acknowledged rice as “that weird stuff Father is eating again.” They didn’t understand its fantastic culinary qualities, which was such a shame!

Now, fried rice was a different beast. They loved that, but it might as well be another dish entirely. I’m sure Nanahoshi would say the same. Something along the lines of “I mean fried rice isn’t rice, is it?”

How could I make them understand?

One day while puzzling over my goal, a thought occurred to me. Rice was a staple in my past life, but it was never really the main dish, was it?

The main dish was always something else, and rice acted as a foil for it. The main dish, something like salted mackerel or tonkatsu or curry, got to be “delicious.” Though you might say the same for fried rice. Or heck, even curry. No discrimination here!

All that was to say that the main dish should have a strong flavor that complemented the delicate flavor of the rice. That would be the key to showing them the wonderfulness of rice.

What, then, would be the optimal solution? What was the most loved counterpart for rice in Japan? The moment I asked myself that, I knew the answer: yakiniku!

I decided to have a little barbeque in the garden. First, I made a big fire pit, created an equally large grill grate, and readied my charcoal and meat. My wives watched me with eyes filled with exasperation, as if to say, “There he goes again.” I convinced them that I only wanted to have the children try an adventurer-style meal, and they started to help me out after that.

I took the utmost care in the selection of the meat. After all, there weren’t many countries in this world that raised cattle for food. Only a subsection of the very wealthy ate beef, so it was tough to get a hold of in the markets. It had to be well-marbled and tender. It was a herculean task to find grade-A meat that would taste good after something as simple as cutting and grilling it.

Well, it would’ve been tough, if Orsted hadn’t known about just the thing to fit my criteria! I sourced it on the continent of Begaritt. Instead of cows, I got the meat from a sand aurochs, which is very similar to cattle. After defeating, butchering, grilling, and eating one, I confirmed it was close to beef in taste and texture.

Once I had the meat at home, I portioned it, then marinated it in a sweet and salty sauce. Next came cooking an absolutely massive amount of rice. With the amount of people in the house, they could easily eat the whole aurochs. I also had some birds prepped, just in case. Thus, the preparations were completed.

So began the Greyrat family barbeque! We surrounded the firepit, and each of us grilled our own meat, added the sauce (although it was good enough on its own that we didn’t always add it), and brought it to our mouths while it was still steaming.

Usually something barbecued (as opposed to grilled) requires slow cooking. But the cuts on this occasion were all thin, so I thought it counted!

“Now, watch what I do.”

As I said that—as humbly as I could—I pounded, sliced, and grilled the meat I had sitting in the sauce. Then, I tapped it on the rice, placed it in my mouth, and let the sweetness spread on my tongue. I followed that with another mouthful of rice. Mmm, nothing better! I could eat the rice all on its own, but doing this made the rice absolutely hit the spot for a beginner.

“Ooh!”

Lara’s interest was the most piqued out of anyone’s.

She immediately took a few slices of the prepared meat and placed it on the grill grate with a spluck. Her eyes sparkled with anticipation and seriousness as she waited for the meat to char. It was unusually attentive behavior for her, but I was just glad she was so into something.

She kicked it off, then my wives and other children followed her lead. Lilia, who had finished passing the rice out to each person, had a troubled look on her face as if to say, “What should I do?” However, one of the great pleasures of yakiniku is grilling one’s own meat, so I asked Lilia to make sure Zenith had help.

After ten or twenty minutes, I knew my operation was a success.

“Seconds!”

Arus, Sieg, and Eris too began to order more rice. They were chowing down like they couldn’t get enough! Pairing it with meat had been the right call. I was finally able to impart a little bit of my culinary culture to this world. At least, that’s what I thought—until I turned my eyes to the child next to me. She was grilling meat at a rapid pace while the rice next to her sat untouched.

“Lara, eat your rice,” I said.

“Why? Meat tastes better. If I filled up on it, I couldn’t fit in more meat. Leo isn’t eating his, either.” Lara indicated Leo with a glance. He was eating a hunk of raw meat a short distance away.

Leo looked our way for a second as if to say, “What is it?” but he quickly turned away again, indicating it wasn’t his business. Leo occasionally scolded Lara, but only when she’d done something generally considered rude. As this was just my ego talking, he left it to me. In the end, I couldn’t think of anything to say.

“Well, I guess it’s fine.”

There’s no reason anyone had to eat rice with their yakiniku, I figured.

With that successful start under my belt, I continued to develop many dishes to pair with rice for my family! But that is a story for another time.

About the Author

About the Author
Rifujin na Magonote

Resides in Gifu Prefecture. Loves fighting games and cream puffs. Inspired by other published works on the website Let’s Be Novelists, they created the webnovel Mushoku Tensei. In 2022, the 26th and final volume of the main series was released, and from 2023, they began Mushoku Tensei: Redundant Reincarnation, a collection of stories set after the main series.

“This year, I decided to build a house,” said the author.