Hot pot & soups
Nigui
Nigui — a broth-heavy simmered dish eaten first as soup, then again as a stew
Taro, lotus root, and other ingredients — always an odd number of them — are cut small and simmered in a broth-heavy pot from the Buzen area. Eaten once as a soup and again once the liquid reduces, its name is said to come from 'eating it twice'.
- Origin: Fukuoka
- About 820 km west of Tokyo
Lineage
What it's made of
Chicken is joined by an odd number of chosen ingredients — taro, carrot, lotus root, burdock — all cut into small cubes, smaller than a typical simmered dish, and cooked with plenty of broth into a taste described as gently comforting. In the Chikuho area it goes by a different name and is sometimes finished with a light thickening, seasoned with soy sauce and salt with only a hint of sugar, like a soup packed with ingredients.
How it's made
Vegetables and chicken are cut into roughly 1.5cm cubes, with the vegetables parboiled first so they hold their shape. Everything simmers together in dashi, seasoned partway through. It's said to be eaten first as a soup, then again once the liquid has reduced — a second helping that may be where the dish's name comes from — and it's considered ready once everything has cooked through, with matching the size of each cube said to matter too.
Why it took this shape
It's said to have started as a meat-free dish for Buddhist observances before chicken was added, and it has been passed down as essential fare for both funerals and celebrations like weddings. It's described as a special treat once made using a household's own kept chickens to welcome guests, often paired with chicken rice and chicken soup, a dish still tied closely to local events today.
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.
- Osechi and zoni for the New YearA guide to the meaning behind osechi's tiered boxes, the regional differences in zoni (square vs. round mochi, clear vs. miso broth), and the nanakusa-gayu custom.
- Setsubun: ehomaki and lucky beansA guide to ehomaki, the uncut sushi roll said to be eaten facing a lucky direction on Setsubun, and to mamemaki, the bean-throwing custom with roasted lucky beans.
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
Also from Fukuoka
- Abutte KamoSmall damselfish are salted overnight, then grilled whole, scales and innards left on — a bony fish often passed over elsewhere, but said to have caught on in Hakata Bay after a Meiji-era glut led someone to salt and grill the excess.
- 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.
- Amagi no KawatakeA rare wild freshwater algae, found only in the Kogane River in Asakura, is dressed with sweet or three-flavor vinegar — said to have once been presented to the shogun, and now conservation efforts continue as it's listed as endangered.
- Beta MochiWheat dough is flattened, steamed, and topped with soybean flour or sweet red bean paste — named, it's said, for its resemblance to a flat local sole called 'beta', and tied to the feast marking the end of rice planting.
- Kabocha no Dango JiruA giant local pumpkin from Buzen's Mikkado district is simmered soft, then torn wheat dumplings are dropped in — the pumpkin, said to trace some 450 years back to Portuguese traders, was once a lifeline in leaner years.
- ChanraaA noodle dish said to have started at a diner in Moji, Kitakyushu. Chanpon-style noodles go into a Japanese dried-sardine broth closer to udon than to the original pork-and-seafood soup, devised, it's said, for a student who wanted Nagasaki champon but couldn't afford it.