Fermented & preserved
Shoyu no Mi
Yamanashi shoyu no mi — the koji-fermented soybean solids left from making soy sauce
Boiled soybeans are mixed with barley koji, wrapped in straw, and left to ferment for several days — a keeping food from the Ashiyasu area, said to be a byproduct of home soy-sauce-making once common there, eaten over barley rice as a valued source of protein.
- Origin: Yamanashi Minami Alps
- About 120 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Boiled soybeans are mixed with barley koji and wrapped in straw to ferment for several days. As fermentation progresses, the beans develop a sticky richness, and a bite is said to release the koji's toasty flavor slowly. Served over barley rice, the koji's savor is said to work its way through the whole bowl.
How it's made
Boiled soybeans are mixed with finely broken barley koji, spread over a thin layer of straw in a wooden box, and covered with more straw. Kept warm under towels or a blanket at a steady temperature, it's left to ferment for several days, people say. Once the white mold turns darker, the beans are dried to finish, then rehydrated in water or sake with salt added before eating, it's said.
Why it took this shape
In the steep, high-elevation farmland poorly suited to rice, cold-hardy soybeans are said to have long been grown widely. Rather than waste the beans left over after each household made its own soy sauce, fermenting them into a preserved food is said to be how this dish began. Its role as an essential source of protein alongside winter barley rice seems to reflect the mountain wisdom of using a limited crop to its very last bean.
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 Yamanashi
- Akebono Daizu no EdamameThe 'akebono' soybean, said to be 1.6 times the size of an ordinary bean, is picked young and salt-boiled — an edamame from the Akebono area of Minobu town. Grown since the Meiji era but resistant to mechanization, aging growers have made it scarce enough to be called a 'phantom bean'.
- Amanatto no OsekihanMade without azuki or cowpea beans, glutinous rice is dyed red with food coloring and mixed with candied sweet beans — a Yamanashi take on celebratory red rice, sweet-salty with a sprinkle of sesame salt. A similarly sweet red rice is said to exist far away in Hokkaido and parts of Tohoku.
- AnbinSweet potato and wheat flour are kneaded with hot water, wrapped around bean paste, slapped flat, and steamed — a sweet from the Kyonan region. Its name is said to come from the slapping motion, revived in Ichikawamisato town's Rokugo area after a local school's closure sparked a heritage-food effort.
- Awabi no NigaiAbalone from Suruga Bay was soy-sauce-marinated and hauled in barrels by horse, the jostling and body heat said to have worked the flavor deep in — a specialty from landlocked Kofu. Sliced thin and paired with its liver, shiso, and cucumber, it endures as a taste of the sea inland.
- Azuki HotoHoto noodles, cut thicker than usual, are simmered in sweet azuki bean soup in place of mochi — a festival food in Yamanashi. The summer festival at Miwa Shrine in Hokuto city's Wakamiko area is nicknamed the 'hoto festival', and azuki's red color is said to ward off misfortune.
- Hirauchi TanmenA salt-based tanmen from Kofu, Yamanashi, built on wide, flat noodles said to feel almost like fettuccine. Bean sprouts, pork, and napa cabbage pile on top for a vegetable-heavy bowl carried on today by several shops around the prefecture.