Donburi

Donburi means "bowl".
Donburi as a Japanese food is a dish that cooked ingredients are put on rice in a donburi bowl.

Common rice is eaten from a rice bowl, but Donburi is more than twice as big as the rice bowl.

We can eat main dish and rice together.

Because they are very convenient dishes, we eat donburi as lunch or the meal when we don't have enough time to enjoy our meal.

There are many fast-food restaurants for Donburi dish in any city.

Of course, there are various kinds of Donburi dishes.
The following dishes are the popular dishes.

As you can see, "don" at the end part of the name comes from "donburi".

Various Donburi dishes

Oyakodon

Oyakodon is a dish that chopped chicken, beaten egg and chopped onion are all simmered together in a sauce of dashi, shoyu and mirin, then are served on the top of rice in a donburi.

"Oyako" means "parent and child", and it comes from using both chicken and egg as main ingredients.

Gyudon

Gyudon is the dish that sliced beef and chopped onion are all simmered together in a sauce of dashi, shoyu and mirin, then are served on the top of rice in a donburi.

It is often called "beef bowl" in English.

In Japan, it can be found in many Japanese restaurants and some fast food chains specialize exclusively in the dish.
The followings are the main Gyudon chain stores.

Yoshinoya Sukiya Matsuya Nakau

Tendon

Tendon is a combined word of the head parts in "Tenpura" and "donburi".

It is the dish that some kinds of tenpura are put on the top of rice.
A little sauce of shoyu and mirin are poured to season the tenpura.

Generally main ingredients of tempura are one or two prawns and a few vegetables.

Tenpura restaurants often serve Tendon as lunch menu.
And soba noodle restaurants sometimes serve Tendon and sobe noodle as a set menu.
The following is the main Tendon restaurant chines.

Tenya

Katsudon

Katsudon is the donburi that Tonkatsu (Japanese pork cutlet) is put on rice.
To season the tonkatsu, it is simmered with beaten egg and sliced onion in a sauce of dashi, shoyu and mirin.

"Katsu" has the same sound as the word for "win" in Japanese, so students taking an entrance exam and athletes somtimes eat it before their fights.

Unadon, Unajû

"Una" is abbreviation of "unagi" which means eel, so Unadon is the donburi which kabayaki eel is put on the top of rice.
Kabayaki is a cooking method to broil a fish after pouring the sauce of shoyu and mirin over.

Also Unajû is the same dish, but it is served in not a donburi but a lacquer box (jûbako in Japanese).

Generally, Unajû is a little more expensive than Unadon.

These are the common style to eat kabayaki eel.

Kaisendon

Kaisendon is a donburi dish that various sashimi are put on the top of rice.
Because various fish are put in a donburi, it is very colorful.

Maguro (tuna) is the most popular fish, so there is a donburi dish of only maguro.
It is called Tekkadon or Magurodon.

These are eaten by pouring a little shoyu with grated wasabi on the fish in general.

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