Hot pot & soups
Keno Jiru
Keno jiru — a slow-simmered New Year root vegetable and bean soup
Diced daikon, burdock and fern shoots simmered with mashed soybeans in a smoky dried-fish broth — a Tsugaru dish traditionally made in a big pot for the Little New Year and reheated over several days.
- Origin: Aomori
- About 550 km north of Tokyo
What it's made of
A miso soup packed with daikon, carrot, burdock, bracken, fried tofu, freeze-dried tofu and soybeans, all diced to roughly five millimeters and simmered in a stock of smoke-dried fish and kelp. The finely cut roots and wild greens turn tender enough to crumble on the tongue, while crushed soybeans, called zunda, add body. The flavor is said to deepen each time the soup is reheated, as more of the ingredients' essence dissolves in.
How it's made
Preparation begins with dicing daikon, carrot, burdock, wild greens, fried tofu, freeze-dried tofu and soybeans into small cubes. A large pot of stock is made from smoke-dried fish and grilled kelp, the diced ingredients and water are added, and the soup is seasoned with miso. Tradition has it that a big batch is made at once, then ladled into smaller pots and reheated over several days.
Why it took this shape
In the Tsugaru region, when rice was scarce, it is said the finely chopped ingredients were meant to stand in for grains of rice. Some trace the soup to a stockpile prepared by women before they returned to their parents' home at Koshogatsu, leaving a ready meal behind for the men. The laborious dicing and the habit of cooking a large batch are thought to reflect a cold region's wisdom for stretching preserved food across many days.
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
Contrast
- HittsumiHand-torn pieces of kneaded wheat dough are simmered in a chicken-and-soy broth with carrot and burdock — a dish from the old Nanbu domain spanning southeastern Aomori and northern Iwate, once a rice substitute in lean years.
- NiaekkoShredded daikon, carrot and preserved fern shoots are stir-fried with crumbled tofu until the liquid cooks away — a Shimokita dish born of frequent crop failures, made in bulk when autumn daikon came in.
Also from Aomori
- BekomochiColored strips of glutinous and non-glutinous rice-flour dough are bundled and steamed so each slice reveals a pattern — a Boys' Day treat from rice-poor Shimokita, its designs elaborated around Oma town.
- KakkeThin buckwheat dough is cut into triangles, simmered with daikon and tofu, and dipped in garlic miso — said to have begun when the Nanbu domain banned fine-cut soba, leaving people to eat the offcuts instead.
- Kujira JiruSalted whale blubber is parboiled to render off excess fat, then simmered in a big pot with daikon, carrot and potato — a New Year dish from around Hachinohe's old whaling grounds, said to deepen in flavor over several days.
- Mame ShitogiMashed boiled green soybeans are kneaded with rice flour and sugar into a log and sliced — a Nanbu-region sweet that stretched scarce rice with beans, once offered to the mountain and harvest gods.
- Aomori ShamorockSaid to be developed by Aomori's livestock experiment station over roughly two decades of research from a shamo and Barred Plymouth Rock cross; reportedly reared about 100 days for cockerels and 120 for hens, 50–60 days longer than a standard broiler.