Not wanting to seem like the stereotypical picky American, I always adhere particularly closely to this principle when visiting my in-laws. Happily, they’ve never steered me wrong yet when it comes to food. Thanks to my husband’s mother I’ve tried some unfamiliar things that were much better than I had expected (raw horse meat, pickled octopus) and some things that were astoundingly good (soup made with the head of a sea bream, simmered shark meat).

My most recent discovery is a dish called jūnen mochi. My husband’s family makes mochi every year from the rice they grow, and when we visited a few weeks ago we were lucky enough to watch mochi-making and get to enjoy mochi that had been freshly pounded only moments before. These days they use a special machine (which can also knead bread or pizza dough) instead of making it by hand. As the owner of a blog focused on Japanese food you would think this might inspire me to take pictures, but somehow I got so involved in the rush to eat the mochi while it was still soft and piping-hot that I entirely forgot to take any photographs of the process. Oops!

A variety of other intriguing preparations were taking place as the rice was being steamed and pounded by the machine. First my mother-in-law brought out a bag of tiny gray seeds that she had picked somewhere on their property. After dry-roasting them, she handed them to my father-in-law who spent a great deal of time grinding them into a fine paste in a truly gigantic suribachi mortar. Sugar and soy sauce were added to the paste, and then pieces of mochi were quickly dipped into the suribachi before being served to the hordes of hungry grandchildren who promptly licked off all the paste before demanding more. After trying it myself, I could understand how they felt although I forced myself to eat the entire thing before asking for seconds.

Grinding seeds in a suribachi

To tell you the truth, had I encountered this dessert anywhere other than at the home of my in-laws I might have avoided it. Jūnen (also called egoma) is the seed of a type of shiso (perilla) plant. I wish I could say I liked shiso, but except for rare exceptions the taste of this particular plant honestly turns my stomach. So had I known that egoma was a type of shiso, I would likely have never eaten it and sadly never known the particular joys of a piece of mochi slathered with sweetened egoma paste.

Several weeks after returning to Tokyo I was still thinking about this dish. Unfortunately, my research online indicated that jūnen mochi is a specialty in some of the prefectures that are located north of Tokyo but is fairly rare in most other places. I combed my local supermarkets for egoma but wasn’t able to find it anywhere, and had nearly given up when I happened across it at Tomizawa, a baking store inside the Keio Department Store in Shinjuku.

By the way, “jūnen” means “ten years” and apparently people used to say that eating this dish would add ten years to your life. According to my husband, for some reason it’s common in his home prefecture of Fukushima to drop the final “n” and pronounce it “jūne mochi.” But no matter what you call it, egoma paste is a unique flavor that somewhat resembles sesame but is a great deal more complex and fragrant.

I did debate whether or not I should post this recipe here. If I had such a hard time finding egoma in Tokyo, it seems even more unlikely that anyone outside of Japan could get a hold of it. But although the particular flavor of egoma is what makes jūnen mochi so delicious, it would be just as good made with black sesame seeds (although according to the Japan Perilla Society egoma oil contains a great deal more alpha-Linolenic acid than sesame oil) so those would be a perfectly acceptable substitute. But despite the health benefits, unlike some savory mochi preparations which make decent afternoon snacks, jūnen mochi is extremely sweet and should be eaten in moderation to avoid a sugar crash. For this recipe I used unbleached cane sugar, but in the future I plan to give it a try with maybe honey or barley malt syrup.

Not the world’s prettiest dessert, but still delicious!

Jūnen mochi
This recipe makes enough paste for at around six small pieces of mochi

5 tablespoons egoma seeds (or black sesame seeds)
5 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons soy sauce
Hot water
Mochi (any shape is fine – I used small blocks)

1. Dry roast the egoma seeds, swirling the pan to avoid burning them. When they become fragrant and are starting to pop, remove from the heat.
2. While the  seeds are still warm, grind them in a suribachi or food processor.
3. Add the sugar and soy sauce to the mixture in the suribachi (if you are using a food processor, stir them in by hand). The paste should be quite runny – if it is too thick, add hot water a teaspoon at a time until it is runny enough to adhere to the mochi.
4. Cook the mochi until soft. An easy way to do this is to sprinkle it with a generous amount of water, cover with a wet paper towel, and microwave until soft.
5. Dip the softened mochi into the egoma paste to cover. Serve.

Left to right: Black sesame, egoma, sesame

When people travel, they particularly like to enjoy and buy “meisanbutsu,” which basically means (usually edible) items that a certain area is famous for. Some of these are obvious and known to everybody, like gyōza dumplings in Utsunomiya, apples in Aomori, and kishimen noodles in Nagoya. Some are a bit more arcane like the fantastic koppa mochi (mochi made with sweet potato) my friend Maya passed to me recently that a friend of hers bought in Kumamoto. Of course there are regional foods in America as well (my personal favorite being the mini doughnuts served at the Minnesota State Fair), but just like regional dialects the differences in Japan are far more pronounced probably because they’ve had much longer for these differences to develop. I find meisanbutsu to be quite fascinating, so I thought it would be interesting to introduce some of them as I happen to encounter them. To start this series, here are two types of souvenirs I’ve had in my kitchen lately.

One of the most famous items in my husband’s hometown in Fukushima Prefecture is Mamador, which are tiny cakes that are roughly oval shaped and have a sweet filling. They taste sort of bland and have a truly horrible commercial jingle that goes “Miruku tappuri mama no aji” (“Made with plenty of milk…tastes just like mother”), so rather than giving my money to Mamador I prefer to buy Yubeshi from Kannoya (pictured above) for my friends instead. Yubeshi are Japanese-style sweets made from rice flour, sugar, walnuts, and a hint of soy sauce. They’re covered with a kind of sparkly, crackly starch. This year I was very happy to find that the winter version contained pieces of my beloved yuzu fruit in addition to the crunchy walnuts. As for how many of these I gave away and how many I ate myself, I’ll just leave that up to your imagination.

A friend who recently moved to Niigata brought us some Sasa dango, which are rice flour dumplings filled with sweet bean paste and wrapped in bamboo grass leaves. The dumplings are flavored with yomogi (mugwort) which lends them their characteristically green color, and the bamboo grass imparts a certain aroma that is rather hard to describe. I really like the combination of yomogi and bean paste and enjoyed eating one of these with a cup of strong green tea.

Sick of nabe yet? I’m not! We tend to start eating nabe some time in November and continue right up until early spring, so there are still a few weeks left to enjoy hot pot dishes of all types. (Cranking up the air conditioner and eating spicy nabe is also a decent way to feel revived during the disgustingly humid days of summer, albeit not a very environmentally friendly one.)

This nabe was inspired by Otona no Shūmatsu, which my husband Tsuyoshi reads every month. The title means “Adult Weekend” but don’t misinterpret it as the type of publication that’s sold in plastic sleeves at the convenience store – it’s actually a magazine about “gurume” (food and dining) with a heavy focus on seasonal foods and restaurants in Tokyo. The February issue contained a picture of an oyster nabe from some restaurant made with yuzu fruit. Given my obsessive love of yuzu, this immediately struck us as a fantastic idea and we set out to create our own version without the oysters, although I’m sure the oysters would be a good addition for people who like them (I tend to prefer nabe without shellfish, which makes everything else taste like shellfish).

Unlike the nabe recipes I’ve already posted, this nabe does not involve simmering different ingredients for a long period of time. Instead, the individual ingredients are dipped into the broth and cooked likely shabu-shabu style, which allows you to enjoy the unique flavors of each type of vegetable with only a slight touch of seasoning. The broth isn’t very heavily flavored so using high quality dashi is very important, and since we made it stronger than usual I included it in the recipe here. We added tōmyō (pea sprouts) because they were on sale, but as always you can substitute as needed with whatever vegetables are fresh and available in your area.

Sake is optional but is always a nice accompaniment to nabe!

Yuzu nabe
Serves 4

Dashi
2 liters water
2 pieces konbu
1 big handful katsuobushi (bonito flakes)
A couple of niboshi (dried baby sardines) or a small handful of niboshibushi (niboshi flakes)

Soup
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons usukuchi (light colored) soy sauce
2 tablespoons sake
1 teaspoon salt
1 large yuzu or 1.5 small yuzu

Ingredients
200 grams thinly sliced pork
1 large block silken tofu
2 pieces abura-age (fried tofu)
2 negi (Welsh onions)
8 shiitake mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) shimeji mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) maitake mushrooms
1 package (180 grams) enoki mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) moyashi (bean sprouts)
1/4 hakusai (Chinese cabbage)
A couple handful of greens (mizuna, tōmyō, seri, etc.)
2-3 servings fresh udon or thawed frozen udon noodles

Condiments
Ponzu (soy sauce flavored with citrus)
Momoji oroshi (grated daikon radish and red pepper)
Yuzu koshō (yuzu pepper paste)

Cooking pork by dipping it in the hot broth; tofu served with a dab of yuzu koshō

1. Make the dashi. Heat the konbu in the water until just before boiling, and then remove from heat. Add the fish flakes and/or niboshi and let sit for about five minutes. Strain.
2. Wash the yuzu well and cut them in half. Squeeze and strain the juice. Use a spoon to remove any pulp or pith remaining in the yuzu halves and reserve to float in the broth (if you are feeling particularly fancy you might want to throw the used halves away and cut slices from a fresh yuzu).
3. Wash and cut the vegetables and tofu into a convenient size for dipping and arrange on plates.
4. Add 1.5 liters of the dashi, yuzu juice, soy sauce, sake, salt, and yuzu skins to the nabe. Place on a portable burner at the table or the stove and cook over medium heat until boiling.
5. Turn the heat down to a gentle simmer and allow each guest to dip and cook the ingredients of their choosing. The thinly sliced pork should be swished through the broth until fully cooked, but the vegetables only need to be lightly cooked until soft before being eaten. Use the condiments suggested above if desired.
6. Finish the meal by adding the udon noodles to the broth. Be careful to remove and eat them before they become overcooked and too soft.

Mochi before and after grilling

Many people translate “mochi” as “sweet rice cakes,” but that’s a bit misleading because most mochi isn’t actually sweetened. To make mochi, glutinous rice is steamed and pounded into a paste and then dried until hard. At that point it can be grilled, microwaved, put in soup, or prepared in a number of other ways. Mochi is often enjoyed in the middle of winter, and even now there are events where people take turns at the long and difficult task of pounding the rice in a mortar until it is a viscous paste (mochi tsuki), but most people buy their mochi at the store. Many temples also toss mochi to spectators as part of various rituals (this is called “mochi maki” or “mochi nage”).

Mochi can be square or round, made of white or brown rice, plain or flavored with flecks of green nori seaweed, stuffed with anko (sweetened red bean paste), or cut into paper-thin sheets. The simplest way to eat it is to grill it over a burner or under the broiler until it is puffed up, then dip it in a bit of soy sauce and wrap it in a piece of nori. Mochi can also be put into any kind of soup or hot pot dish, and I’ve even had it served in ramen. Dango (dumplings) made from mochiko (mochi flour) are also covered with savory or sweet sauces – I fell in love with dango smeared with sweet bean paste during my first year in Japan, and I ate so many that I don’t think I’ll ever need to eat one again.

Mochi has especially deep connections with the Japanese New Year celebrations, when people display “kagami mochi” (literally “mirror mochi”) which are big round rice cakes that are decorated with ceremonial objects. After the celebrations are over the mochi are broken apart (called “kagami biraki,” or “opening the mirror”) and eaten. In the past, people displayed large handmade mochi on a wooden stand called a sanpō (note to Japanese language students: this word will never appear on any vocabulary quiz) and decorated them with real fruit and other objects. Nowadays most people buy small kagami mochi wrapped in plastic at the grocery store, many of which come with a convenient paper stand to display them on and plastic decorations that can be thrown away after opening the mochi.

Rather than religious events and celebrations, outside of Japan mochi is usually associated with dessert and often served with ice cream, frozen yogurt, crepes, and other similar foods. In Japan as well mochi stuffed with ice cream is a common thing to see both at convenience stores and cute little cafes, and round mochi balls are a favorite item atop elaborate parfaits.

One of my favorite ways to eat mochi is in ozōni, the soup that is traditionally served on New Year’s morning. But since over a month has already passed since the New Year, here are a few other ways to enjoy mochi.

• How to cook mochi from DashiDashi
• Basic sweet mochi from CHOW
• Japanese mochi ice cream from Japanese Ice Cream
• Strawberry daifuku mochi from Chocolate & Zucchini
• Yakimochi (grilled mochi) from Momofukufor2
• Butter mochi from ‘Ono Kine Grindz
• Moffles (mochi waffles) from Kirbie’s Cravings
• Mochi pizza from Dad in a Foreign Land

In December I talked way too much about nabemono (hot pot dishes) and also shared a recipe for Kinoko nabe (mushroom hot pot) that was invented on a whim by my husband Tsuyoshi, who has the important job of making nabe for us nearly every weekend once it begins getting cold. Here is another nabe recipe I stole from him, which he titled “Sappari de koku ga aru kimuchi nabe.” This title is hard to translate in an elegant way, but it basically means “Kimchi nabe that is not overly rich but has great depth of flavor.” To make things easier I’m just calling it “Spicy nabe with kimchi.”

Kimchi (called kimuchi in Japanese) is a type of fermented Korean pickle usually made with Chinese cabbage that also contains a great deal of red pepper. In spite of the fact that traditional Japanese food involves few really spicy flavors, Japanese people love kimchi and I’ve ever heard that it’s consumed more than any other pickle. My Korean friends have told me that the kimchi sold in Japan is nothing more than a weak imitation of the real thing, and if you can get a hold of kimchi made by a real Korean person (or at least sold in a Korean grocery store) it is usually less sour and a great deal tastier than the Japanese brands.

I love kimchi but I don’t buy it very frequently because although I try to eat a lot of fermented foods I am generally way of the extremely high sodium content. Like most things it should be eaten in moderation, and I consider dishes that contain lots of kimchi (like this nabe) to be an occasional treat. It’s a bit heartier than some other types of nabe, so you might want to serve it on a day when everybody is really hungry (we made it for a single friend who doesn’t cook for himself and was in dire need of an actual meal).

This recipe contains Korean kimchi as well as Chinese hot bean sauce (called “tōbanjan” in Japan and “dou-ban-jiang” in China) and shūmai (pork dumplings), while the overall flavors have been adjusted to a Japanese palette. We also added some ground red pepper that had been given to us by a Korean coworker, which packs a realpunch and should be used carefully but is really good for warming you up!

Spicy nabe with kimchi

Ingredients (Serves 4)

2 liters dashi
1.5 tablespoons sesame oil
150 grams kimchi (adjust amount according to your preference)
4 cloves garlic, sliced
Ginger, sliced (a piece around the same size as the garlic)
200 grams sliced beef (or pork)
1/2 onion, diced
1/4 Chinese cabbage, roughly chopped
1 package (100 grams) shimeji mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) maitake mushrooms
1 package (180 grams) enoki mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) moyashi (bean sprouts)
1 package yakidōfu (grilled tofu) or abura-age (fried tofu)
1 package shūmai dumplings (optional)
A few handfuls of mizuna, seri, or other greens
2 servings yakisoba or udon noodles
2 eggs (optional)

Seasonings

Salt and pepper, to taste
2 tablespoons sake
1 teaspoon sugar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon ground red pepper (optional; adjust amount according to desired level of spiciness)
1 tablespoon tōbanjan (hot bean paste)
Hot chili oil, to taste

1. Heat sesame oil in the nabe. Add onion, garlic, ginger, kimchi, and tōbanjan, stir-frying until fragrant.
2. Before the garlic and other ingredients begin to brown, add the meat and stir-fry.
3. Once the meat is fully cooked, add the dashi. Simmer while removing any aku (scum or froth) that drifts to the top.
4. Season the broth: add salt, pepper, sake, sugar, soy sauce, and ground red pepper, tasting and adjusting as needed.
5. Add tofu, mushrooms, and Chinese cabbage, cooking until softened.
6. Add shūmai dumplings, mizuna, and bean sprouts, arranging them in an attractive way (mounding the greens in the center at the end is an easy way to ensure they aren’t overcooked before serving).
7. Drizzle hot chili oil (or regular sesame oil) over the nabe for fragrance.
8. Serve on a portable burner at the table or ladle into individual dishes from the stove top, adding more dashi and vegetables as necessary.
9. When the vegetables and other ingredients are mostly gone, cook the noodles separately in another pot and add them to the nabe, simmering for a moment or two to allow the noodles to absorb flavor (be careful not to overcook them). If desired, stir in two beaten eggs before serving noodles in the leftover broth.



Setsubun is also the one day of the year that people eat something called ehōmaki, a type of rolled sushi. “Ehō” refers to the direction that is considered most auspicious for the current year according to Onmyōdō, which is a Japanese divination practice influenced by Chinese ying-yang divination and the Chinese zodiac (the ehō for 2011 is south-southeast). It’s really complicated and I don’t understand it very well, but suffice it to say that this system of beliefs is based on the concept that certain directions are lucky at certain times.  In literature from the Heian period the nobles were always using this as an excuse to visit the home of some lady they were trying to get close to by showing up and saying “Excuse me, I’m headed in an unlucky direction. Can you put us up for the night?”

(And speaking of Onmyōdō and the Heian period, if you haven’t seen Onmyoji you really should!)

Unlike other types of sushi rolls, ehōmaki are not cut into bite-sized pieces before they are eaten. Instead, you are supposed to stand facing this year’s lucky direction and eat the entire roll without speaking. This supposedly brings good luck of all sorts. My former boss was really into this sort of custom so each year he bought ehōmaki and we all lined up in the conference room, facing the same direction and silently eating our sushi rolls. This was always vaguely awkward for me because I eat so slowly, but it was an interesting way to take a break from work.

Like so many other foods in modern Japan, people rarely make ehōmaki at home anymore and most people buy theirs either from a specialty shop or convenience store. Since eating convenience store sushi always makes me feel somewhat ill due to the massive amounts of MSG and since it’s been a while since I rolled sushi, I decided this year to try making my own ehōmaki for the first time.

It seems that there are some ingredients which are considered particularly lucky for ehōmaki, but my husband and I decided on a simple combination of cucumber, egg, and braised shiitake mushrooms with kanpyō (dried gourd strips). We had some extra rice left so we also made a roll with some leftover nattō (fermented soybeans) and kimchi. Most ehōmaki also contain sakura denbu, which is made of shredded fish flakes that have been dyed a lurid shade of pink. It’s not my favorite so I left them out.

Here are some links that might be of use if you’re considering making ehōmaki this year. Even if you eat yours sitting at a table, I think that a delicious sushi roll is always a good way to bring a little luck into a gray February day!

• How to make sushi maki from Make My Sushi
• Setsubun: The Day Before Spring from Kyoto Foodie
• Setsubun Ehomaki from WASHOKU
• Homemade sakura denbu from Just Bento
• How to roll maki sushi from Sushi Day
• Tutorial: making tamagoyaki from Lunch in a Box

Ozōni is a soup that is served on New Year’s morning in Japan. In Japanese “ozōni” is written with the characters for “complex” (雑) and “simmer” (煮), which is a roundabout way of saying that this soup can contain a wide variety of ingredients. Grilled mochi (rice cakes) are almost always included, along with vegetables such as carrots, mitsuba (trefoil), or spinach. For a little extra holiday cheer, some people also include pieces of colored wheat gluten in auspicious shapes like ginkgo leaves. Tiny pieces of yuzu skin can also add an aromatic garnish.

But like most Japanese foods, ozōni is subject to a tremendous and perplexing range of regional differences. Depending on where a family is from, the broth of ozōni might be based on soy sauce, miso, or something else. Chicken or other meats might be incorporated either as slices or small meatballs. I’m sure there are probably whole books out there about different types of ozōni, but really the only constant is that it is served as breakfast on the first morning of the New Year. In that way ozōni is sort of like Japan’s equivalent of Thanksgiving stuffing – everyone has their own way to make it and everyone is convinced their way is best.

This recipe is mostly based on the ozōni that my husband’s mother makes, which is flavored only with soy sauce and sake and depends on the addition of chicken breast and burdock root to add depth to the broth. I’m not usually the type of person who bothers cutting vegetables into decorative shapes, but I did drag out the special tool to cut the carrot into the shape of plum blossoms in honor of the New Year (except I realized halfway that my tool is shaped like a cherry blossom, not a plum blossom – oops). Here’s a video if you want to try making the carrots fancy. This recipe is even prettier if made with a combination of regular carrots and kyōninjin carrots from Kyoto, which are a deep red color and are available in Japan towards the end of the year.

Ozōni

Ingredients (serves 2)
3 cups dashi
Small handful spinach
100 grams chicken breast
2 shiitake mushrooms
1/4 package (25 grams) shimeji mushrooms
5 centimeters gobō (burdock root)
Carrot
2 pieces mochi
2 tablespoons usukuchi soy sauce
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon sake
Mitsuba
Yuzu skin, cut into small “needles” or slivers.

1. Heat the dashi.
2. Cut the mushrooms into bite sized pieces. Use the back of a knife to scrape the skin from the burdock root, then cut by “shaving” off small pieces (sort of like sharpening a pencil by hand). Cut the carrots into decorative shapes or simply chop into circles, about three pieces per person.
3. Cut the chicken breast into bite sized pieces and add to the dashi. Simmer until cooked all the way through, removing any aku (scum) or fat that floats to the top.
4. Add the mushrooms, carrots, and burdock root to the dashi and chicken. Continue simmering.
5. Season with soy sauce and sake. Taste, and adjust seasonings as necessary.
6. Blanch the spinach in a separate pot, then rinse. Chop and form into neat little bundles.
7. Grill the mochi according to the directions under the broiler or atop the stove.
8. Place a bundle of spinach and piece of grilled mochi in each bowl. Use chopsticks to arrange carrots and other ingredients in bowls, then pour broth on top. Garnish with chopped mitsuba and yuzu skin.

Grilled mochi and spinach

I don’t get sick very often and I almost never have a fever over 99, but at the end of December 2009 my husband picked up some sort of virulent influenza and passed it to me. With both of us too sick to travel to his family’s home, we spent the last few hours of 2009 listlessly partaking in the Japanese tradition of watching Kōhaku Utagassen, the lackluster singing competition that is held every year. At that point my fever was somewhere around 104, so I barely remember what bands appeared or what ridiculous costumes were featured. But I do remember the soba noodles that Tsuyoshi made, which were the only food other than English muffins and tea that I had consumed for several days at that point. I clearly recall carrots and enoki mushrooms atop a steaming bowl of chewy buckwheat noodles in a soy-tinged broth made from homemade dashi, accented by just a few pieces of yuzu skin to add a citrusy flavor and aroma. Despite the fact that this bowl of noodles was thrown together from things we had in the refrigerator even after days of no grocery shopping, somehow it made me feel like I might just survive to see 2010 after all.

Toshikoshi soba, which literally means “ending the old year and beginning the New Year soba,” is eaten after the clock strikes midnight on the first day of the year. Theoretically the reason people eat soba has something to do with the long noodles symbolizing long life and luck in the New Year (and according to this website it is also associated with severing the bad luck of the previous year), but it really takes very little to convince people to eat soba.

Most toshikoshi soba I’ve been served at the homes of friends has been fairly plain, with perhaps some green onions or kamaboko (cakes made from fish paste) on top. I had toshikoshi soba once at a Buddhist temple in the middle of the night, and their soba was served cold with wasabi and a soy-based dipping sauce. But soba is a pretty carbohydrate-heavy snack and I personally prefer my soba topped with plenty of vegetables to make it a more complete meal. (Unfortunately when I took the photograph up top, I had randomly bought some brown enoki mushrooms without considering that they wouldn’t look as pretty against the noodles. It would look nicer with the regular white ones.) This recipe for toshikoshi soba is not a traditional one by any means, but it’s a combination I like. I’m planning to eat it again this year, hopefully in much better health.

Toshikoshi soba with carrots and enoki

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 servings soba noodles (dry or fresh)
1/4 – 1/2 carrot (depending on size; add as much as you want)
1/2 package (90 grams) enoki mushrooms
Yuzu skin
Chopped scallions
1 liter dashi
2 tablespoons sake
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons usukuchi soy sauce
Pinch sugar
Pinch salt

1. Use a knife to thinly remove the upper layer of the yuzu skin (about 1 inch square). Chop into thin slivers.
2. Heat the dashi. Chop the carrot into half moons and cook in dashi until soft.
3. Add seasonings to dashi, and taste. Add more soy sauce or sugar if necessary.
4. Add enoki mushrooms.
5. Cook soba in separate pot according to directions.
6. Warm two serving bowls by pouring a little hot water into them and swirling it around. Pour out, then place half of the cooked noodles in each bowl. Add dashi mixture. Garnish with chopped scallions and yuzu slivers.

Despite this, I found myself following my husband around the kitchen with a notepad in late November as he threw this nabe together. Part of the reason was that I wanted to post it here, but I also just wanted to have some kind of record. Tsuyoshi is the kind of cook who doesn’t like using recipes and therefore his nabe turn out slightly different each time, and I was curious to see exactly what he was doing differently.

Please consider this recipe a rough guideline to be tweaked as necessary depending on your preferences and what ingredients you can find. It can be easily modified to feed a large number of people if you simply increase the amount of broth, vegetables, and protein (which can be added in several batches at the table) and keep plenty of dashi on hand to add to the pot when the liquid is getting low. This meal is also very vegetarian friendly – I like to add a small amount of meat to make the broth more flavorful, but you can leave it out if you want.

A note about the nabe itself: we use a ceramic nabe that is a Japanese size 9 (approximately 23.5 centimeters in diameter). This is technically the size to feed four or five people, and provides two meals for us. If you don’t have  a Japanese-style nabe, you can make nabe in a wide pot– just make sure it’s shallow enough that you can arrange the ingredients inside without having them float around in the broth like soup. It’s also traditional to serve the nabe at the table atop a small tabletop burner sold for just this purpose. I’ve never seen an equivalent outside of Japan (although maybe something similar is sold for camping), but you can certainly keep the nabe cooking atop the stove and get up from the table when you want another serving.

Kinoko nabe (mushroom hot pot)

Serves: 4

Ingredients
1.5 liters dashi (more if necessary, depending on the size of your nabe)
2 tablespoons sesame oil
3 cloves garlic, sliced
Ginger, sliced (roughly the same amount as the garlic)
3-5 dried chili peppers, cut and seeds removed (depending on how spicy you want it to be)
1/4 onion, diced
White miso, to taste
1 package (180 grams) enoki mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) shimeji mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) maitake mushrooms
1 package (100 grams) Moyashi (bean sprouts)
1/4 Chinese cabbage
1 block tofu, any type, cut into large squares  (more if not using meat)
200 grams sliced pork
A few big handfuls of greens (seri, etc.)
Mochi, cubes or sheets (optional)
Ponzu, yuzu koshō pepper, sesame sauce, etc. for serving (optional)

1. Drizzle sesame oil into your nabe. Cook the garlic, ginger, and onion over low heat to flavor the oil.
2. Add the hot peppers and continue cooking while stirring constantly.
3. Add the meat. Cook until no longer raw.
4. Add ½ of the total amount of mushrooms. Cook while stirring until slightly softened.
5. Add enough dashi to cover your ingredients. Simmer gently, using a wire whisk or other implement to remove the aku (scum) that floats to the top.
6. After all aku is gone, use a miso koshi strainer to add the white miso (or remove some of the soup into a small bowl, mix the miso in there, then return it to the nabe).  Start by adding a few teaspoons, then taste. Continue adding miso until the soup tastes flavorful but not overly salty – the goal isn’t to make miso soup but to add another dimension of subtle flavor.
7. Add the rest of the mushrooms, Chinese cabbage, tofu, and mochi (optional) arranging them nicely inside the pot. Add more dashi to cover if necessary, but you don’t want to submerge all the ingredients – they should peek out from the broth.
8. Add a final drizzle of sesame oil for fragrance. Mound the greens in the center of the pot.
9. Bring the nabe to the table and set it on the portable stove. Turn the stove heat as low as necessary to maintain a very gentle simmer.
10. To serve, provide each person with a small dish and have them use chopsticks or a ladle to select their own vegetables, meat, tofu, etc. You can put ponzu or sesame sauce inside the dish to dip the ingredients in, or smear them with a bit of yuzu koshō pepper paste.

After eating, save all of the savory broth that remains as well as any leftover scraps of vegetables. If you are still hungry you can finish the meal with rice porridge. If not, save the broth and make porridge for breakfast the next morning. Just be careful not to add too much rice, since it tends to plump up and expand. You can either rinse the rice to remove extra starch, or add it to the broth as is to create a heartier porridge.

Left: Adding the meat to the mushrooms, onions, garlic, and ginger

Right: After adding blocks of mochi

Kinoko zōsui (mushroom rice porridge)

Ingredients

Leftover nabe broth
Cooked rice, any kind (about 1/2 cup-3/4 cup per person)
1 egg per person

1. If rinsing the rice, place in a strainer and gently rinse under running water.
2. Add the rice to the leftover broth in the nabe, and cook over medium-low heat until rice begins to plump and expand, stirring to make sure it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan.
3. Beat eggs in a bowl. Gently pour into the pot, stirring to cook.
4. Ladle into individual bowls and serve.

There’s something I wait for every year, one thing that keeps me anxiously counting the days once that first autumn breeze makes itself felt. No, I’m not talking about New Year’s celebrations or Tokyo’s one yearly snowfall. Instead, the part of winter in Japan that gets me the most excited is the appearance of the fruit known as “yuzu,” which is sometimes called “citron” in English.

Yuzu is a round yellow citrus fruit that is smaller than an orange, with a unique smell that simply cannot be described in words. Unlike other citrus fruits, the flavor and aroma of yuzu are concentrated in its skin that is either zested or cooked and eaten. Yuzu skin is used to add a bright accent to many winter foods such as simmered root vegetables. It is also incorporated into many dishes that are part of traditional New Year celebrations, like the ozōni soup that is served on the first morning of the year.

If you were to taste yuzu juice by itself you probably wouldn’t think it was that worthy of notice since the juice actually resembles lemon juice a great deal. This is where some recipes go wrong – if your recipe calls only for yuzu juice and not yuzu zest, it’s always a good idea to put some zest in as well to ensure that you retain the real smell and flavor of yuzu.

Yuzu is also widely used in both beverages (many alcoholic) and desserts. I’ve had yuzu sours, yuzu soda with lemon, green tea with yuzu, yuzu cheesecake, yuzu candy, manjū buns filled with yuzu and white miso, candied yuzu skin, yuzu jam, yuzu white chocolate, yuzu shortcake, and many more delicious yuzu offerings. Yuzu is often made into ponzu, a citrus-flavored soy sauce that is used for dipping vegetables from hot pot dishes or made into salad dressing. The only way that yuzu is definitely not eaten is by itself like an orange. I’ve even bought yuzu shampoo and body soap. And speaking of bathing, yuzu are sometimes floated in hot bath water to perfume it (and the bather) with their fragrance.

This is the signal that yuzu season has arrived

I wasn’t always so crazy about yuzu, though. For me this particular fruit was an acquired taste. It took a few years for my nose to learn to appreciate the aroma of yuzu, which is somehow both flowery and a bit pungent at the same time. Now I like to keep a couple of yuzu in my refrigerator constantly from the time they come into season, so they are always at hand for garnishing vegetables or noodles, making pickles, or whisking into salad dressing.

Generally on this blog I will try to give suggestions for ingredient substitutions or encourage people to try making a Japanese-style recipe with familiar vegetables if something happens to not be available locally. Yuzu is an exception because I don’t think there is another citrus fruit that is even remotely similar. If you’ve never tasted or used yuzu, do yourself a favor and try one even if it means convincing your local produce guy to put in a special order. Yuzu is becoming gradually more popular out of Japan, so I bet that it isn’t that hard to find in most places with a decent selection of Asian food. And if you do get a hold of some yuzu, here are some recipes to start with.

• Seared Hamachi with Carrot Salad and Yuzu Dressing from Food & Wine
• Yuzu Lemon Cocktail from White on Rice Couple
• Namasu Daikon, Carrots and Yuzu Pickles from Foodista
• Yuzu Cremes Brulees from Tartelette
• Yuzu Liqueur from Kyoto Foodie
• Yuzu macaron with candied grapefruit and wasabi from Zen Can Cook
• Pan Fried Sole with Yuzu Wasabi Butter from New Food
• Candied Yuzu Peel from Suite101
• Japanese Yuzu Dressing from Nifty Noshing
• Yuzu Tonic from Tokyo Terrace