Fermented & preserved
Heshiko
Heshiko — mackerel salted and then aged for months in rice bran
Salted mackerel is packed in rice bran for around half a year along the Wakasa and Echizen coast. Once the bran is brushed off it can be grilled, flaked over rice, or used as sushi topping — said to have been a winter protein source in lean months.
- Origin: Fukui
- About 360 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Mackerel salted and then packed in rice bran for around half a year, so the bite carries a strong salinity and fermented depth, with a smoky aroma said to recall cured meat. Brushed off and lightly seared, the fat turns sweet, and a very fresh batch is said to work even as sashimi. Sardines and pufferfish get the same treatment too, though mackerel is said to be the most common.
How it's made
The mackerel is first cured in salt, then packed tightly into a bed of rice bran, salt, and chili pepper, weighted down and left in a cool, dark place to ferment for about half a year. Once the bran is rinsed off, it's cut into pieces and lightly grilled, or used for ochazuke, a drinking snack, or sushi topping — more recently said to turn up in fried rice or even pasta, standing in for anchovies. Each household is said to have once done its own curing.
Why it took this shape
Winters along the Wakasa coast made keeping fish difficult, and layering a salt cure with a bran pickle is said to have grown as a way to fend off spoilage through the harshest stretch of the year. Seafood from Wakasa Bay traveled the old road to Kyoto, and the salt is said to have settled into the flesh just right over that long walk — a detail some trace this preservation method back to.
Dishes in the same style
- Achara ZukeWhite melon, eggplant, and lotus root are pickled in a sweet vinegar spiked with red chili — the name is said to trace to the Portuguese 'achar', carried in through Hakata Bay's old trade, and an odd number of vegetables is used for Obon hospitality.
- AhodakiOld takuan pickle, once its flavor and aroma have faded, is desalted and simmered again in soy sauce, a pantry staple from the Hokusei area. Its name — playfully self-deprecating, roughly "doing a foolish thing" — nods to eating it well past its prime, a frugal way to waste nothing.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Also from Fukui
- Atsuage no NitaThick fried tofu, blanched and scored with a cross cut, is simmered sweet-savory in dashi, soy sauce, and mirin with a dash of ginger juice. Fukui leads the country in fried-tofu consumption, and this dish is said to have moved from a Honkoko feast dish into everyday cooking.
- BokkakeThick fried tofu, burdock, and shirataki noodles are simmered in a bonito broth and poured hot, broth and all, over freshly cooked rice — eaten for over a century since the early 1910s. In Katsuyama it is said to take a chazuke-like turn, topped with fish cake and mitsuba.
- ChameshiRoasted soybeans are steeped in hot roasted barley tea, and rice is then cooked in that same tea — a dish from the old post town of Imajo, said to descend from Nara's 'nara-chameshi'. It is said to be indispensable at memorial services, Honkoko, and for daughters visiting home.
- Choju NamasuGround sesame is worked into a paste with miso, thick fried tofu, mustard, and vinegar, then tossed with shredded daikon, carrot, and snap peas — a New Year salad whose name literally wishes long life, also said to appear at memorial services and Honkoko.
- Decchi YokanSweet red bean paste is set with agar, sugar, and a pinch of salt into a thin, water-yokan-like winter confection. It is said to have begun when a young apprentice, home for New Year from a Kyoto shop, stretched a bar of yokan with water to share with neighbors, eaten by the kotatsu.
- Echizen Oroshi SobaA cold soba from Echizen, Fukui, topped with grated daikon and bonito flakes. It is said to originate with a soba maker a local lord brought from Kyoto to promote buckwheat as an emergency food crop.