I saw rice paper being made at Khlong Toei Market in Bangkok. (I think it is, but please correct me if I'm wrong.)
For a while, when people talked about utilizing rice flour, it seemed like they were only thinking in terms of bread. But looking at the rice culture in Asia, you can see so many different uses.
Why didn't we go for applications of those traditional methods? Is it because it can't be done with Japanese non-glutinous rice?
The kanji character for "flour" (粉) is written as "rice" (米) split "apart" (分), so it must have originally been a character born within rice culture.
Even so, when you read "米粉" not as "komeko" (rice flour) but as "beifun" → "biifun" (vermicelli), it already feels like a foreign culture.
Japan also has a culture of making senbei (rice crackers) and arare/okaki (rice snacks) from glutinous rice, so I can't help but feel that evolving uses and ways of eating from that could be possible.
Perhaps senbei-jiru (senbei soup)? I think senbei are excellent preserved food.
Besides "grains" where the rice stands out, couldn't "flour" also be a staple food in Japan?
I feel that new cultures are created in this way, and then remain as traditions.