The Daikon Ultimatum.

Here in Japan, it is nice to see the continuing boom in “eco bag” use.  In addition to the crafty types who make and sell their own bags, brands like the rootote and Susan Bijl have popped up. (If you happen to be in Omotesando station any time soon, check out the rootote shop. It is quite amusing to see so many people clamoring for these bags.)

I meant to make one or two or three of my own for a long time, but could never find just the right pattern. I always walk to the supermarket (five years and counting without owning an automobile), and the more I thought about it, the sillier and sillier it seemed to keep taking plastic bags for my groceries. Enter the Naganegi Conundrum; or perhaps more illustrative, the Daikon Ultimatum:

The daikon, and “long onion” naganegi are staples in most kitchens in Japan. To many foreigners, the question of what to do with a daikon (shred it, simmer it, pickle it) cancels out the appealing large size and equally appealing low price of this vegetable. The naganegi, on the other hand, can serve as a culinary chameleon, used properly in Japanese dishes like nabe and stir fry, or as an understudy to a regular onion in many western dishes.

But how to properly pack these versatile vegetables has always gnawed at me. No, really, it has. Flimsy supermarket bags just don’t do the trick. I have had my own naganegi slide right out of a plastic bag, without provocation, into a rain puddle, and I have watched countless times as a person tried to keep at least half of the onion in the plastic bag (futile!) inside a bicycle basket, while trying to steer/brake the bicycle at the same time.

I had high hopes for an eco bag that could fulfill my two big wishes:  be good to the environment, and hold the darned oversized vegetables.  I think I succeeded:

My pattern is based loosely on ones I saw in Kurashi no Techou, this special edition of Tennen Seikatsu magazine, and an issue of Come Home (can’t remember which one).  It is heavy duty (I used red and toile decorator fabric), lined, and the way the bottom corners are tucked in, it can hold a lot.  The raw edges of the fabric are left as is on the handles, but since the bag pieces are cut on a slight (20-25 degree) angle, the fabric frays nicely.  Unlike my nerves used to do when the onion would plot its escape from my bag.