Komeko Shokupan (米粉食パン, rice-flour loaf)

Rice flour is the point here, and also the fear. It has no gluten, so people expect a loaf that crumbles at the first slice or turns to paste by morning. The panya counter version solves that quietly: a neat kaku shokupan, square under its lid, with a white crumb that springs like mochi and tastes cleanly of rice.

The home method is not harder, only less familiar. We don't knead this dough into strength, because there is no gluten to build. We hydrate it until it becomes a thick batter, let psyllium give it a gentle net, and use 湯種 (yudane, a scalded-flour starter) so part of the rice starch swells before baking. That pre-gelatinized starch holds water, which is why the loaf stays moist for days instead of apologizing after breakfast.

Two paths matter in Japanese bread baking. ストレート (straight) mixes flour, water, yeast, and seasoning all at once; it is plain and quick, and a good bakery flour can make it work. 湯種 (yudane) is the slower science, honmono in the modern Japanese bakery: scald a little flour, then build the dough. Bake it lidded as kaku for square sandwich slices, or unlidded as yamagata, the mountain loaf. Same dough, two different manners. Watch the proof. Rice flour rises once, politely, and if you ask for more it collapses to teach you humility.