Hot pot & soups
Satsuma Jiru
Satsuma jiru — a chicken-and-vegetable miso soup rooted in cockfighting tradition
A hearty miso soup thick with chicken, burdock, and taro. It's said to trace back to Satsuma-domain cockfighting, where the losing bird was slaughtered on the spot and simmered with vegetables by the samurai who kept it — an early mark of Kagoshima's enduring taste for chicken.
- Origin: Kagoshima City, Kagoshima
- About 970 km southwest of Tokyo
Lineage
What it's made of
This hearty miso soup brings together chicken with dried shiitake, konjac, burdock root, carrot, taro, and daikon. The vegetables are stir-fried before simmering in stock, and once miso is stirred in, the broth carries the chicken's savory depth, its warmth spreading through you alongside the soft, starchy bite of the root vegetables. A single bowl on a cold day fills the mouth with the richness of the chicken's own fat.
How it's made
Chicken, shiitake, konjac, burdock, and daikon are stir-fried, then simmered in stock. Once everything has softened, miso is stirred in to round out the seasoning, and green onion or ginger are often added as a finishing garnish. Ingredients and seasoning vary from household to household and by season, with some adding extra ingredients in cold weather to make the soup more warming.
Why it took this shape
Satsuma samurai are said to have staged cockfights to sharpen their fighting spirit, and the losing bird was reportedly butchered on the spot and simmered with vegetables into this soup. Even after cockfighting was banned, households kept chickens for guests and celebrations, butchering one as needed, a habit that reflects how deeply chicken-raising took root in the region's own soup. Kagoshima's local chicken breeds are well known today, and the sheer number of chicken dishes in the local repertoire is said to speak to that history.
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
Also from Kagoshima
- Abura ZomenPork and somen are fried together with a splash of broth, the oil and stock emulsifying into a silky coat on the noodles. Just how somen took root in wheat-free Amami isn't clear, but the dish is a fixture whenever people gather, not least for the August Dance festival.
- AkumakiMochi rice steeped in wood-ash lye is wrapped in bamboo sheath and boiled for hours in more lye water — a Boys' Festival sweet said to have fed Saigo Takamori's troops in the field. The lye's alkalinity holds bacteria back, letting it keep for days in Kagoshima's heat and humidity.
- Amami Kokuto-jochuKokuto-jochu permitted to be made only in the Amami Islands of Kagoshima Prefecture. It's said to carry a sweet aroma distinctive to islands where sugarcane cultivation thrives, and around 30 breweries are said to compete on character while observing the liquor tax law's condition that rice koji be used.
- Buta Hone YasaiBone-in pork cut into big chunks is simmered in a large pot with tsuwabuki, daikon, and koshaman taro — an Amami dish essential to New Year's Eve, also called wanfineyasse. It's regarded as a wisdom born of using every part of the island's own black pigs.
- Buta JiruPork simmered with daikon, taro, and other roots in a miso broth, built on Kagoshima's own pork — the prefecture raises more hogs than any other — paired with a barley miso high in koji and correspondingly sweet. A warming bowl for winter, common at home and in school lunches alike.
- Buta MisoBoiled pork is pounded together with miso and sugar into a keeping paste, with peanuts and bonito flakes added in Amami versions. It's said to have grown out of the need to use every part of the one pig a household slaughtered each year, alongside salting and other preserved forms.