Hot pot & soups
Kanpyo no Tamago Toji
Kanpyo no Tamago Toji — dried gourd strips simmered in dashi and bound with egg
Kanpyo gourd strips too uneven to sell whole are simmered in dashi and bound with beaten egg — a dish born from farm households making the most of imperfect kanpyo, still common in homes and school lunches.
- Origin: Tochigi
- About 100 km north of Tokyo
What it's made of
Dried gourd strips (kanpyo) are mixed into beaten egg and gently set in dashi broth — a soup unique to Tochigi. The soft, chewy bite of the kanpyo meets the egg's gentle texture in a broth mild with dashi. It's said to have grown from a wish not to waste kanpyo that hadn't peeled evenly during processing.
How it's made
Kanpyo is rinsed, rubbed with salt, and boiled until tender enough to pinch apart, then cut into two-centimeter lengths and mixed well into beaten egg. Dashi is brought to a boil and seasoned with soy sauce and salt, and the egg mixture is poured in and stirred gently; once it sets softly, the pot is taken off the heat and served in bowls with a sprig of mitsuba on top.
Why it took this shape
This dish is said to have begun as a way of using kanpyo that hadn't peeled well, put to use in soup rather than wasted. Because kanpyo takes on any seasoning, it became a supporting ingredient in many dishes, valued as a quick, nutritious meal that even busy farming households could put together, and it's still eaten in homes and school lunches year-round.
Before you go
- Foods to look for in winterA guide to foods often seen in Japan around winter — nabe hot pot, fugu, oysters, crab, year-end soba, and osechi — with rough pointers for finding them.
- At yakiniku, shabu-shabu, and hot potGrilling your own meat at yakiniku, swishing thin slices at shabu-shabu, and sharing from the pot — the customs behind each.
Dishes in the same style
- Aichi Miso OdenA pot of sweet red miso sits in the center of the simmering pot, and daikon, tofu, and other ingredients simmered in dashi are dipped into it before eating. While soy-based Kanto-style oden spread in Edo, Aichi is said to have settled on dipping in soybean miso instead.
- Aichi ZoniSquare mochi and mochina, a traditional Owari green, are served in a plain clear broth for New Year — a notably simple zoni. It's speculated that using miso so often in daily cooking is exactly why a clear broth is chosen for this festive occasion, deliberately leaving miso out.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Uses
- Kanpyo no Gomazu-aeRehydrated kanpyo gourd strips are dressed with sesame vinegar alongside carrot and fried tofu — a light dish from southern Tochigi, whose Kanto loam soil has suited kanpyo growing for some 300 years since the Edo period.
- Gomoku MeshiTochigi's signature kanpyo gourd joins dried shiitake, burdock, and thin egg strands in a colorful mixed rice — festive fare reserved for holidays and farm rest days because of the work it takes to prepare.
Also from Tochigi
- Agemaki Yuba no NimonoFresh yuba sheets are layered, rolled into a log, sliced into rounds, and deep-fried before a slow simmer in a light broth — a Nikko dish built on the region's rippled yuba-making craft, served at New Year's and celebrations.
- Aiso no KanroniDace that gather to spawn each spring in the Naka and Kinu rivers, known locally as aiso, are slow-simmered in a sweet glaze until soft to the bone — food from a landlocked prefecture where river fish once meant protein.
- Ayu MeshiAlong the Naka River and other ayu-fishing streams, unseasoned grilled ayu is cooked into the rice — made for festivals and farm rest days, with any leftover fish skewered and hung by the hearth to keep.
- Bandai MochiIn the Kuriyama district of Nikko, firm-cooked non-glutinous rice is pounded on a wooden board — hence 'itadai-mochi,' board-mochi — and eaten with miso glaze, sweet bean paste, or a perilla-seed sauce depending on the hamlet.
- Battou JiruWheat dough is torn by hand into a miso soup simmered with seasonal vegetables — known by different names, hattou-jiru or dango-jiru, across the region, and long relied on when rice ran short.
- Chitake to Nasu no Abura ItameChitake mushrooms, which weep a milky sap when torn, are stir-fried with eggplant — a summer-only find tied to managed satoyama woodland, and also prized as a broth base for udon and soba.