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Junjun
Junjun — sukiyaki-style hot pot of beef, chicken, or lake fish
A sukiyaki-style hot pot made with beef, chicken, or lake fish, its name said to echo the simmering sound of the pot. Local ingredients such as Omi beef or the lake's isaza goby rotate in with the seasons, making it a year-round dish.
- Origin: Shiga
- About 360 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Junjun is a hot pot of beef, chicken, or lake fish seasoned sukiyaki-style. Its name is said to come from the sound, junjun, that the ingredients make as they simmer. It pairs well with foods distinctive to Shiga such as Omi beef, Lake Biwa's isaza, Toyoura scallion, choji-fu wheat gluten, and red konnyaku, and is said to have been eaten around the lake's shore, in Hokubu, Kosei, and Koto, with the ingredients changing by season.
How it's made
Meat or lake fish is lightly sautéed in a sukiyaki pot, then vegetables and seasoning, or a pre-mixed warishita sauce, are added. Once the liquid starts to run, shirataki noodles, tofu, and wheat gluten are added and simmered together. Versions with beef or chicken are said to be made more often for celebrations like New Year's or Obon, while versions with lake fish are reportedly eaten as everyday fare, paired with whatever vegetables are in season.
Why it took this shape
Lake-shore life is said to have long included simmering isaza, eel, or catfish caught in Lake Biwa together with whatever vegetables were in season at the time. The fact that ingredients distinctive to Shiga, such as Omi beef, choji-fu, and red konnyaku, were grown and raised nearby is also thought to have enriched this hot pot over time. It's said to have taken hold as a way of bringing the lake's bounty and the land's bounty together in a single pot.
Before You Go
- How to shop at a supermarketHow to choose prepared foods, sashimi, and packaged sushi, when discount stickers tend to appear, region-only specialties, buying by weight, the checkout and bagging flow, and sampling etiquette at a local supermarket.
- Food for Obon and the harvest moon (tsukimi)A guide to the meat-free shojin ryori and somen served at Obon, and the tsukimi dango offered on the night of the harvest moon.
- At Teishoku Diners, Shokudo, and Machi-ChukaA guide to the teishoku set-meal format, free rice refills, table placement, and paying at a shokudo-style diner.
Dishes in the same style
- Agonoko UmaniThe roe of egg-bearing flying fish, caught only in early summer, is simmered in stock and soy sauce as an Oki bar snack. Its large grains and dense, sticky texture are prized as a delicacy said to be scarcer even than the fish's flesh.
- Funa MisoCrucian carp is simmered slowly with soybeans for around five hours, then finished in a sauce of red miso and coarse sugar. A freshwater fish dish of the Kiso rivers' lower basin, made with fatty winter carp simmered until the bones soften through.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Uses
- Chojifu no Karashi AeChojifu, a square baked wheat gluten unique to Shiga, is paired with cucumber and dressed in mustard-miso vinegar. The gluten also appears in Buddhist vegetarian meals, and its chewy texture with a refreshing tang makes the dish a staple at family gatherings.
- Aka Konnyaku NiKonjac dyed reddish with iron oxide, a specialty of Omi-Hachiman, is pan-simmered with bonito flakes and soy sauce. The color holds even after cooking, and the dish is a fixture at ceremonial meals and school lunches alike.
Also from Shiga
- Amenoio GohanA whole Lake Biwa trout, migrating upstream to spawn, is set atop rice and cooked together; "amenoio" means "rain fish," a name tied to the trout's autumn run after rainfall. The flesh and roe are flaked and mixed through the rice, traditionally made in large pots for gatherings.
- Biwamasu SashimiBiwamasu, a trout found only in Lake Biwa, is filleted and served raw as sashimi. The fish grows richest from early to midsummer and is prized locally as "the jewel of Lake Biwa" — a fish so scarce that it rarely reaches markets beyond the lakeshore.
- Dongame JiruEggplant scored with a crosshatch pattern is simmered in dashi, then finished with miso and ground sesame. Said to originate in the merchant town of Gokasho, the name compares the muddy look of the sesame in the broth and the eggplant's scored skin to a turtle's shell.
- Ebi MameFreshwater shrimp from Lake Biwa are simmered sweet-savory with soybeans. Inexpensive and long-keeping, the dish is eaten as everyday fare, but is also served at New Year's with a wish for long life — that one might live, like the bent-backed shrimp, into old age.