Today in the SoraKitchen, we’re turning one Japanese comfort food into another one.

Between restaurants suspending eat-in service and personal social distancing decisions, a lot of people’s dining options these days are limited to take-out and home cooking. If you’re like us, odds are you’re leaning pretty heavily on the “take-out” side of that scale, but if you’re feeling tired of eating the same go-to to-go meal over and over, and want to do just a bit of cooking, we stumbled across a quick and tasty idea.

Japanese beef bowl chain Sukiya recently started posting “arranged recipes” on its official website, sharing ways to turn an ordinary beef bowl into something fancier even if you’re not a culinary expert. The first recipe, and the one we tried for ourselves, is for Melty Three-Cheese Doria. If you’re not familiar with doria, it’s a popular baked Japanese fusion dish made with rice, cheese, and pretty much whatever else you want (think of gratin, but with grain instead of pasta).

Step one is to pick up a take-out beef bowl, which we did at our local Sukiya. You’ll also need some thin-sliced/thin-sliceable cheese and parsley.

Officially, Sukiya recommends starting with one of their cheese-topped beef bowls, then adding more cheese of your own. However, theoretically you should be able to start with a cheeseless beef bowl and simply add more cheese, of as many varieties as you like.

Once you’ve got your ingredients gathered, transfer the beef bowl to a ceramic dish of some other oven-safe container. Next, sprinkle your cheese on top.

▼ Sukiya recommends using 50 grams (1.8 ounces) of cheese with a medium-sized cheese beef bowl, but if you’re starting with a beef bowl with no cheese on it, you’ll probably want to double that amount.

Next, pop the dish into a toaster oven, set to 260 degrees Celsius (500 degrees Fahrenheit) and let it cook for 15 minutes.

When time’s up, your beef bowl should be transformed into a doria, with a nicely browned top covering an enticingly gooey bowl of baked rice, meat, onions, and melted cheese. As a final touch, give the doria a few shakes of parsley for color…

…and you’re done!

While the recipe comes from Sukiya, there’s no reason it shouldn’t work with beef bowls from Yoshinoya, Matsuya, or whatever local brand you’re loyal to. So next time you’re feeling tired of take-out, but not energetic enough to handle all the cooking, remember there’s a third option, and if you’re looking for more hybrid meals, don’t forget this three-minute katsudon recipe.

Source: Sukiya
Photos ©SoraNews24
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
[ Read in Japanese ]

Follow Casey on Twitter as continues to hope that one day Sukiya will expand into southern California.