Onigiri and specialty Japanese foods make their Tucson debut

If you've never had an onigiri rice ball before, we don't blame you. These triangular treats may have been a Japanese staple since the Nara Period, but they just arrived in Tucson for the first time this week.

Kukai opened quietly at the Mercado Annex the other day, making it the second food vendor in the westside shopping area after Beaut Burger. You may recognize the familiar face of Setsuko Mochizuki inside the shipping container kitchen. Her husband Kazuo Senda is the owner of Samurai on Oracle Road, which has been Tucson's go-to rice bowl joint for more than 30 years.

Kazuo is partnering with his son-in-law Michael McCormack at Kukai, crafting a menu that feels like Samurai meets Instagram. Michael assured me they're still working on the menu and changing it up before their grand opening Feb. 28. But right now the small space is making everything from ramen to those takoyaki octopus balls you may have lined up for at Tucson Meet Yourself.

We stopped by for a quick lunch yesterday and shared a few things on the small but eclectic menu. Michael had also worked at Raijin and was very proud about his pork-based Hakata ramen ... but unfortunately was still in the process of simmering his latest batch while we arrived for lunch. (I'm definitely coming back to try it soon.)

But no problem, that allowed us to really get into the onigiri. To put it lightly, this was a special moment for me. These utilitarian triangles of rice and pickled vegetables or fish are known for their convenience and portability. They're popular all over Japan because they're simple and cheap and can be eaten on the run.

I made them a regular part of my diet while I was living in the Bay Area, picking them up at the grocery store and unwrapping the delicate plastic covering when I was ready for lunch. Needless to say, the onigiri at Kukai are worlds better than the grocery store variety: the rice is fresh and warm, and the seaweed wrapper retained its snap.

Unlike sushi, onigiri are often made with salty pickled vegetables that preserve the triangle from the inside. So Kukai has a lot of vegetarian options on the menu. We tried the umeboshi salted plum, which was cut into bright purple little slivers that were nestled in the center of the rice. We also tried the tuna mayo, which was a little richer and more substantial if you eat fish. Right now they also have a pork belly and an unagi freshwater eel option for the rice balls, which range from $3.50 to $4.50 apiece.

Kukai's handrolls are also much better than your average teriyaki joint, as evidenced by the buttery salmon roll we enjoyed yesterday. And if you're going to get a rice bowl, Setsuko recommended the Mt. Fuji Don, which was basically a spicy tuna volcano bowl. Like everything here, it really hit the spot.

The Biggest Food Technology Advances of 2018

If the food-centric technological advancements of 2018 are any indication, humans are closer than ever to a world in which they no longer have to interact with each other at restaurants, and the very act of consumption may soon be in for a major disruption. Automated delivery vehicles, robot cooks and servers, and new ways to experience flavor and meet daily nutritional standards will soon be the status quo. Here's a look back at the major food tech advances of 2018.

Gadgets, gizmos, and dodads galore

In January, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Pizza Hut and Toyota teamed up to announce a terrifying driverless concept vehicle that, once the plans comes to fruition, will cook pies and deliver them straight to customers' doors. For some reason, the two companies designed this thing to look like a giant toaster on wheels instead of, say, a normal-looking car or truck that wouldn't scare the living daylights out of any innocent pedestrians or motorists in its path. The “e-Pallette,” as the vehicle is called, will reportedly debut in 2020. Pizza Hut's U.S. president Artie Starrs says it will allow his company to “define the pizza delivery experience of the future.”

In other displays at CES, tech enthusiasts gazed upon kitchen appliances with built-in tablets and Amazon Alexa connectivity, bottle openers attached to bluetooth speakers, and robots that both deliver beer and serve food and drink at the airport.

But the most interesting product may have been a countertop dishwasher that also boasts the ability to cook seafood: The Heatworks Tetra will be appreciated for its compact size and the ability to make its owners rationalize their living situations. If one has the ability to avoid washing dishes by hand and steam lobster in their own 350-square-foot home, things can't be too bad, right? Pair this with BuzzFeed's new single-burner smart induction cooktop, and anyone can transform an abode the size of Elaine Benes's cleaning-closet apartment into a professional restaurant kitchen.

Replacing old foods with new sensations

Those who are growing tired of the increasingly annoying marketing stunts and online personas cultivated by major fast-food brands will be wishing for simpler times if Soylent, a bottled solid-food replacement developed (and mostly consumed) by Silicon Valley tech bros, breaks into the mainstream. Despite a history of causing violent illnesses with its complex recipes, in February, chief executive officer Bryan Crowley proclaimed Soylent is “coming for fast food.” He went on to ominously say, “This isn't a tech product — when people see it, we want them to think about food.” While Crowley's goals are ambitious, it could be tough for Soylent to overcome the obstacle of being a product that people need reminding is food.

A more optimistic development in the science of eating came from New York City-based startup Analytical Flavor Systems, which in May revealed it is attempting to use artificial intelligence to create hyper-personalized flavors for snack foods. The company's Gastrograph AI platform aims to bring about “a day when we'll each have a Doritos of our own.” In addition to a whole new world of flavor, the future looks bright for the avocado, the berry that is so beloved by millennials and so loathed by mortgage lenders. In June, Apeel Sciences, a startup with backers that include billionaire Microsoft founder Bill Gates, announced it had found a way to keep avocados at peak ripeness for twice as long, a development that is expected to decrease food waste in supermarket produce sections. Maybe the future isn't doomed to be a dystopian nightmare, after all.

The robots are taking over

Or, maybe it is. At its I/O conference in May, Google unveiled AI technology that allows restaurants to use a robotic voice-answering service to take reservations, and the voice is so well done, it can trick diners into believing they're on the phone with a real person. The program is getting smarter and more intuitive with each reservation it takes, and it seems to be a safe bet high-powered executives will one day employ their own disembodied robotic voices to book tables at fancy restaurants. While we are reportedly still far away from an era of robots calling other robots on the phone, it doesn't take much imagination to jump to the end of the page and see what the inventor, author, and futurist Ray Kurzweil termed as an age of spiritual machines, when technologies created by humans will evolve beyond human intelligence and begin to experience human emotions.

Japanese Fast Food Chain Mos Burger Is In Trouble

This hasn't been a good past few months for one of my favorite fast food chains, Mos Burger.

With more than just tasty burgers, Mos Burger (Mountain Ocean Sun Burger) has cultivated its image of being a healthy alternative to McDonald's. Advertisements tout domestic produce and freshness, going as far as listing where the veggies are grown and posting photos of farmers on Facebook.

Myself included.

However, recently, things do not look good for Mos.

Last August, twenty-eight customers at Mos Burger restaurants across Japan got food poisoning. According to Kyodo News, twelve of those customers had the O-121 strain of E. coli bacteria.

Mos Burger acknowledged that it was “highly likely” that its food was the cause.

The cases were reported at 19 locations in Chiba, Gunma, Kanagawa, Nagano, Saitama, Tokyo, Tochigi and Yamanashi. It was so bad, apparently, at a Nagano location that public health officials shut the restaurant down for three days and one sickened customer was hospitalized.

“We'll step up our sterilization of vegetables, which are believed to be a cause of the health problem,” a Mos Burger spokesperson told Kyodo.

After the food poisoning news broke last month, stock prices suddenly dropped 7.6 percent. Business Journal reports that sales were already down 5.2 percent year on year for the same period. There were also 5.9 percent fewer customers. This was before the food poisoning incidents.

There was also an article in Gendai Business pointing out how this is only the second time since Mos Burger's founding in 1972 that the fast food chain has suffered a sales slump. Twitter user Mulboyne has a good summary of the article.

A new threat, Mulboyne adds, is the rise of newly arrived American chains like Shake Shack and Carl's Junior, which are still small scale in Japan but have room to grow.

If that weren't enough, earlier this week, the Japanese media reported how Mos Burger in South Korea was advertising how it didn't use any Japanese ingredients. This was apparently before the recent food poisoning cases and while not specifically stated, this appears to be related to lingering Fukushima concerns.

In South Korea, enough people are still worried about Japanese food safety for the fast food chain to print such a message on the food tray's paper placemat. “Please eat without worry! Mos Burger Korea does not use Japanese ingredients.”

In Japan many were angered by the message, believing that, the recent food poisoning problem aside, Japanese ingredients are safe and pass inspection. They viewed the message as an affront, with some calling the message discriminatory and anti-Japanese.

Among those Japanese TV interviewed in South Korea about the issue, one said that North Korean ingredients were safer than Japanese ones.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in has referred the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in speeches advocating for his country to change its energy policy, while the 2016 Korean film Pandora depicted a Fukushima-like nuclear disaster. This, along with vocal anti-nuclear protesters in South Korea, might explain why there are still concerns.

After the outcry in Japan, complete with people online swearing to never visit the chain again, Mos Burger South Korea replaced the controversial paper placement with an innocuous message about ordering takeout online. Mos Burger Japan also issued an apology.

A few years back, McDonald's Japan faced food scandals and a tremendous backlash. That fast food giant has since turned things around. It's now up to Mos Burger to do likewise.