Home-style
Soramame no Kofuki
Soramame no Kofuki — sun-dried broad beans simmered back to a mealy softness
Broad beans, left to fully ripen and dried for storage, are soaked, boiled with baking soda, peeled, and simmered with seasoning, a dish from east-central Tottori. Born of a way to keep enjoying beans that spoil quickly fresh, it's been served at gatherings and for guests.
- Origin: Tottori
- About 500 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Soramame no kofuki simmers dried, fully ripened fava beans that have been rehydrated, a dish centered on the eastern and central parts of Tottori. Unlike fresh fava beans, simply soaking and simmering the dried beans brings out a warm, deep richness, and the method is said to have spread as a way to keep enjoying fava beans long after fresh ones would have spoiled.
How it's made
Dried fava beans are soaked in water, then boiled in plenty of water with a little baking soda. Once peeled, seasoning is added and the beans are simmered again until they reach the desired softness. Some households use honey, mirin, or soy sauce in place of sugar, and the beans' softness can be adjusted to taste. They are eaten straight from the pot as a side for a packed lunch, mixed into rice, or tossed with bite-sized potatoes for a salad-like dish, among other uses.
Why it took this shape
Fresh fava beans are in season from April to June, but they are said to lose their quality remarkably fast, losing much of their flavor within about three days. Simply removing the beans from fully ripened pods and sun-drying them made it possible to keep them for months, and that ease is thought to be why drying became the standard method of preservation. Because peeling and other preparation take real effort, the dish is reported to have been carried on mainly as something served on special occasions, at ceremonies or when guests visit, rather than as an everyday food.
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
Also from Tottori
- Ago ChikuwaChikuwa made from the surimi of flying fish, called "ago" in Tottori. A knife through the firm grilled skin sends up a fragrant crackle, and it turns out darker than ordinary chikuwa. It's a taste of early summer, in season through the fish's spawning run from spring into summer.
- Akagarei no KomaburiRoe-bearing red flounder is sliced into sashimi and tossed with its own boiled, crumbled eggs, a dish from around the Amijiro area of Iwami Town. Said to have descended from a similar dish made with crucian carp roe, it pairs rich eggs with mild, fatty winter flounder for festivals and New Year's.
- Azuki ZouniSoft round rice cakes are added to a broth of simmered red beans, the mainstream style of New Year's zoni in Tottori. Red beans have long been thought to ward off misfortune, and the dish is said to be simmered on New Year's morning with the year's first water and a purified flame, then shared among family.
- Daisen-doriA branded chicken said to be raised end-to-end, from breeding stock to processing, by producers at the foot of Mount Daisen — free-ranged longer than usual on an antibiotic-free feed aimed at balancing fat and flavor.
- Daisen OkowaShiitake, burdock, and chicken are cooked into sticky rice seasoned with soy, a dish from the foot of Mount Daisen. Said to trace back to warrior monks preparing it before battle to pray for victory, it was later served at the horse-and-cattle market by Daisen-ji temple and carried on into festivals and hospitality since.
- Daisen RubyBred at Tottori Prefecture's livestock station by crossing a sow of the oleic-acid-rich Daisen Akabuta line with a Berkshire boar, said to inherit both breeds' fat quality and tenderness.