September 2, 2024
TOKYO – Yoshinoya Holdings Co. has added an ostrich rice bowl to its menu, but only for a week.
The dish is served with slices of ostrich thigh and fillet meat cooked in a roast beef style to feature the succulent tasty red meat and is available for ¥1,683.
Having started Wednesday, the company plans to offer about 60,000 servings at about 400 Yoshinoya outlets, or about 20 servings per outlet per day.
Yoshinoya in 2017 began breeding ostriches and researching effective use of the animal at a subsidiary farm in Ishioka, Ibaraki Prefecture. There are about 500 ostriches on the farm. Hoping to diversify its food ingredients, the company views ostrich meat as the fourth meat after beef, pork and chicken.
Ostriches have a high feed efficiency as they require 30%-40% less feed than cattle. Their meat is known to be high-protein, low-fat and low-calorie.
However, as making a profit from the meat is still difficult, Yoshinoya will sell skincare products such as creams and face masks made from ostrich fat oil.