Omelette rice

What it is

Omelette rice (蛋包飯, dan bao fan) is fried rice wrapped in a thin sheet of egg. The classic filling is chicken rice cooked with ketchup, and more ketchup often goes on top. The Japanese name, omuraisu, joins the words omelette and rice. It belongs to yōshoku (洋食), the Western-style dishes Japan adapted after the Meiji Restoration, alongside croquettes and spaghetti Napolitan.

Where it came from

Two Japanese restaurants claim the dish. Renga-tei (煉瓦亭), a Western-style restaurant in Ginza, Tokyo, is said to have wrapped tomato fried rice in egg around 1900. Accounts of its inspiration differ. Some point to the French omelette, others to chakin-zushi, sushi rice parcelled in a thin egg crêpe. The rival story comes from Hokkyokusei (北極星) in Osaka, where in 1925 a cook is said to have added rice to the omelette a regular customer always ordered, to give him something new.

The soft, open style is much younger. For the 1985 film Tampopo, the director Juzo Itami worked with Taimeiken (泰明軒) in Nihonbashi, Tokyo, on an omelette that sits on top of the rice and is slit open so the half-set egg spills over it. That version has since become the restaurant's standard.

How it is made

Rice is stir-fried with onion, diced meat such as chicken or ham, and ketchup. Beaten egg goes into an oiled pan over low heat and cooks until half set. The rice is laid on the egg, which is folded round it, and the whole thing is turned onto a plate as a neat oval. Ketchup is the usual sauce, but curry, demi-glace and beef brisket gravy also appear. In the soft style the omelette is placed over the rice and cut open.

How to eat it

A one-plate meal. At old Taiwanese eateries it sits on a menu of home-style dishes, and the rice may use pork rather than chicken. Japanese-style specialists in Taiwan let diners pick the sauce and the size: one chain offers four portion sizes and more than ten sauces.