It's a favorite dish of mine, so much so that I love adding instant ramen noodles to make curry ramen. The best way I can describe how I feel about curry is comfort. It's a nice, hearty, mildly spicy home-cooked meal that makes great leftovers.
Basic curry is a mix of vegetables, usually onions, carrots, and potatoes, with meat, usually chicken, pork, or beef . The ingredients are stewed in a thick curry sauce and served over white rice. This basic curry can then be altered to taste, by being made spicier or sweeter, and it is sometimes served with pickled vegetables. One such add-on is the cutlet, thus making katsu curry.
Curry did not originate in Japan. It was brought there by the British, and its basic recipe is the same. Nonetheless, there are regional differences. Eastern Japan prefers spicy curry, including adding spicy red miso to give it some kick. Western Japan includes sweet white miso, perhaps to complement some of the natural sweetness of curry's ingredients. Seafood is a popular inclusion in curry in Hokkaido, as Hokkaido has an abundance of seafood. A perfect example of this is Hokkaido's soup curry, which includes shrimp broth. A popular curry topping is cheese, especially in Kyushu, which is known for its baked curry. You can add whatever you like to your curry! I like to add a spice mix and top with mayonnaise. (Information on regional variations on curry comes to me from the article "Exploring Regional Differences in Homemade Curry" from News on Japan, written on June 3rd, no author, no date.)
