Unprecedented Rice Shortage: Resellers Now Bottling Pre-Cooking Steam

As the rice shortage worsens, innovation leaders in the reselling world have begun bottling 'pre-cooking steam' and selling it as 'Zero-Calorie Rice Experience.' Despite the 3,000 yen price tag per bottle, items are selling out with rave reviews claiming 'it smells just like a rice cooker,' leaving the Consumer Affairs Agency at a loss.

2025-06-30

Translations: JA

Money Maze

As the rice shortage worsens, innovation leaders in the reselling world have begun bottling ‘pre-cooking steam’ and selling it as ‘Zero-Calorie Rice Experience.’ Despite the 3,000 yen price tag per bottle, items are selling out with rave reviews claiming ‘it smells just like a rice cooker,’ leaving the Consumer Affairs Agency at a loss.

While rice stocks nationwide are drying up, what’s flooding the market is an “invisible staple food.” In many households, next to the “rice cooker timer button” sits a 120ml bottle with water droplets, not rice stalks, designed on the label. The contents are just steam with no molecular-level mass perception—yet social media is buzzing with praise comments like “zero burden on taste buds” and “diet-friendly,” brilliantly bridging both hunger and empty rhetoric.

The anonymous reseller credited with the idea boasts, “If I apportion water and electricity costs by mood, it’s 4 yen per bottle” when asked about costs. That’s a 7,400% gross profit margin, yet they claim to have “tearfully settled on this price to protect common folk pricing.” Purchase limits of two bottles per person to prevent hoarding have only amplified the long queues, adding a new concrete example to economic textbooks on queue theory.

The Consumer Affairs Agency launched an investigation claiming “it’s just water vapor,” but after sampling, officials commented they “certainly felt the illusion of rice.” Weak admissions leak from the ministry that “the legal basis for regulating illusions is thin,” with only the ink in paperwork asserting any physical quantity. Rice farmer associations cry “buy substance, not steam,” but younger generations have elevated it to a symbol of ethical consumption as “steam is the ultimate sustainable meal.”

Health debates are also heating up, with zero-calorie advocates clashing online with zero-nutrition critics. Nutritionists warn of “only saliva intake” dangers, while aroma believers counter that “placebo sufficiently activates satiety centers.” Medical institutions have coined the new term “aroma anemia” and quietly follow suit with diagnosis certificate businesses. Side effects are said to be auditory hallucinations when hungry, though many insist the only “growl” they hear is their own stomach—not an illusion.

Economists warn with straight faces that “air is finite.” The bottled steam surge has lifted rice cooker manufacturer stocks, even leading to futures trading of “pre-evaporated water.” Markets have entered futures trading for even steam precursors, inflating a bubble that makes tulip mania pale in comparison. But since bubbles are essentially air, what scatters when they burst is also just air. Investors remain bullish on risk.

Environmental groups condemn the “privatization of water cycles,” but the reselling industry counters: “Emitted steam immediately becomes clouds, eventually returning as rain. 100% sustainable.”

Selling steam before pressing the rice cooker switch—this inverted causality traps both hunger and satiation in a single bottle. The stomach of Japan’s economy continues to hiss into the void today.

Stakeholder Comments

Reselling platform operator: “We’re an innovative company that turns humidity into cash flow”
Consumer Affairs Agency staff: “Can’t grasp the steam, but I’m stuck holding the responsibility”
Local housewife: “If dinner’s done with just aroma, dishwashing becomes so easy”
Rice cooker (personified): “Never thought outside air would profit before scooping my contents—made my pot whistle”
Steam (itself): “I excel at freestyle, but being bottled is honestly tough”
Bottle manufacturer: “With no contents, it’s hard to advertise our break-resistance”
Nutritionist: “When hunger is elevated to art like this, I must recommend silent eating”
Rice farmer representative: “Steam got priority rights. Should I sell rice stalk shadows next?”
Convenience store clerk: “When scanning the barcode at checkout, empty bottles seem to beep higher”
Diet app AI: “Divided user calorie intake by zero and encountered a bug”