Hot pot & soups
Itoko Ni
Itoko ni — sweet azuki beans with rice-flour dumplings in a clear broth
Sweetened azuki beans are paired with rice-flour dumplings in this Yamaguchi dish, its style shifting sharply by region. The Hagi-style version, from the Sea of Japan coast, is served cold in a clear kelp broth, its dumplings dyed red for celebrations and white for funerals.
- Origin: Yamaguchi
- About 770 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Sweetened azuki beans are paired with chewy rice-flour dumplings in this dish made for special occasions, and the style shifts sharply by region. In Hagi and other spots along the Sea of Japan coast, "Hagi-style itokoni" is served cold in a clear broth of kelp dashi seasoned with sugar, soy sauce, and salt, with shiitake and fish cake joining the azuki and dumplings. Along the Seto Inland Sea side, the dish is instead simmered down until the liquid is nearly gone and finished sweet, so the same name covers a wide range of results.
How it's made
The rice-flour dumplings are boiled ahead of time, while the azuki beans are brought to a boil once in ample water, drained, then simmered slowly, skimmed of foam, so the skins stay intact. Once soft, they are seasoned with sugar and salt. Shiitake is brought to a boil in dashi, seasoned with salt or soy sauce, and the dumplings and fish cake are added at the end. The custom of dyeing the dumplings red with food coloring for celebrations, and white or green for memorial services, is still passed down today.
Why it took this shape
The name carries several explanations: one holds that ingredients were added one after another like nephews joining a family, giving the dish its "cousin" name, and another says it was called "itokuni" (legacy stew) in memory of a modest banquet the Choshu domain's lord Mori once held to thank his retainers. The custom of switching the dumplings' color between celebrations and mourning appears to reflect the practicality of using one dish for both. That it was served at the December start-of-preparations day and at banquets fits with this occasion-bound origin.
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 Yamaguchi
- Chikin Chikin GoboBite-size fried chicken and deep-fried burdock are tossed in a sweet soy glaze in this dish, born in Yamaguchi's school lunches. A nutrition teacher is said to have devised it around 1995 from recipes submitted by families, and its catchy, rhythmic name helped it spread into a statewide favorite.
- Chisha NamasuKakichisha, an heirloom crinkled lettuce grown around Shimonoseki, is torn by hand and tossed with vinegared miso, flaked grilled fish, or whitebait. It is said to have been devised by the Mori domain's people after being impoverished by the Battle of Sekigahara, and is also known as "chishamomi."
- Choshu KurokashiwaSaid to draw on the blood of Kurokashiwa, a natural-monument fowl native to Yamaguchi and Shimane, developed into a jidori by a Yamaguchi research station and finished and named by a poultry farm; reportedly free-ranged for 80–100 days.
- Fugu no KaraagePufferfish, marinated in soy sauce and sake, is coated in potato starch and deep-fried—a homely dish from the Shimonoseki and Hagi areas. While pricier tiger pufferfish goes into sashimi and hot pot, the more affordable shirosabafugu species is the one most often fried this way.
- Fuku SashiPufferfish sashimi is sliced so thin it becomes translucent, then arranged in a chrysanthemum pattern in this Shimonoseki dish. Locals call the fish "fuku," a homophone for good fortune, and eat it with citrus ponzu and scallion; the practice traces to 1888, when eating pufferfish was legalized in Yamaguchi alone.
- GobomakiLizardfish skin, a byproduct of making fish cakes, is wrapped around a skewer of burdock root and grilled with a basting sauce—a dish from Hagi. Because it uses lizardfish, prized for the region's grilled fish cakes, seafood processors often make the two together, and it is a fixture of festival and cherry-blossom bento.