Rice dishes ── Sushi
Nezushi
Nezushi — salted trout, daikon, and rice fermented with koji for New Year's
Salted trout, daikon, and carrot are mixed with rice seasoned with koji and left to ferment for two to three weeks — a narezushi of the Hida region said to be so essential that, locally, it doesn't feel like New Year without it.
- Origin: Gifu
- About 230 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
A fermented sushi made by mixing rice worked with koji together with salted trout, daikon, and carrot and letting it rest for about twenty days, so each bite carries a fermented tang balanced with a sweet-sour edge, said to be milder and easier to eat than other fermented sushi. The characters used for its name literally mean 'sleeping sushi,' a nod to how much time shapes its flavor.
How it's made
Boned, bite-sized pieces of salted trout and salted daikon and carrot are all mixed into rice that's been worked with koji and left to cool slightly, then packed down to ferment for two to twenty days. How far it ferments is said to shift with the temperature and the ingredients on hand, so even the same cook is said to get a slightly different result each time — part of the appeal.
Why it took this shape
In the Hida region, where harsh winters left fresh vegetables and food scarce, a rich culture of pickling, drying, and fermenting food is said to have taken root. The dish became such an essential part of the New Year's feast in every household that people are said to still claim it doesn't feel like New Year's without it.
Before you go
- How to read a vertical menuIn shops with strips of handwritten menu items on the wall, the top-right spot is often used for recommendations.
- How to use a convenience storeA quick guide to choosing rice balls and hot snacks, buying coffee, paying by cash, IC card, or tap payment, using the eat-in corner, and sorting your trash — the basics for a first visit.
- How to shop at a supermarketHow to choose prepared foods, sashimi, and packaged sushi, when discount stickers tend to appear, region-only specialties, buying by weight, the checkout and bagging flow, and sampling etiquette at a local supermarket.
Dishes in the same style
- Aburi-zushiNigiri with just its surface flash-seared by torch or hot iron. Unlike Edomae's shigoto curing for keeping, the searing here is done purely for the change in aroma and fat it brings — a relatively recent way of eating sushi.
- Aichi HakozushiVinegared rice is packed into a wooden frame, topped with shrimp, eel, shiitake, and egg arranged diagonally, and pressed. Placing toppings on the diagonal so everyone gets a fair share of each is said to be a feature of the Owari and western Mikawa style, made for celebrations.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Also from Gifu
- Akadatsu no SubuteThe red-purple leaf stalk of taro, called akadatsu, has its fibers removed and is salt-rubbed before being dressed in a sweetened vinegar — a dish of Yamagata City on land whose lime-poor, thin soil suited taro cultivation, once said to be fed to new mothers to aid recovery.
- Ayu ZosuiAyu, grilled plain until fragrant, is flaked and briefly simmered with dashi and rice into a light porridge — a Gifu river-fish dish said to have begun as a way to use ayu too damaged from fishing to sell whole, often served as the closing course at restaurants specializing in ayu.
- FunamisoCrucian carp, first grilled plain, simmers for hours with rehydrated soybeans, then finishes in soybean miso and coarse sugar — a river-fish dish of the Seino region, where the miso's strong umami is said to soften the fish's characteristic edge, simmered until the flesh falls apart as a winter keeping food.
- Ayu no ShioyakiAyu are salted all over, given a decorative touch of salt on fin and tail, then grilled over charcoal on both sides — a river-fish dish of Gifu, said to draw on fish caught fresh at the 1,300-year-old Nagara River cormorant fishery or at the traditional yana weirs that channel fish into a catch.
- Gohei MochiCrushed rice is skewered and grilled, then glazed with a walnut- or peanut-flecked sauce — a dish of the Tono and Hida areas where soy-based sauce dominates north of the old Nakasendo road and miso-based sauce south of it, traditionally served to celebrate the new rice harvest or to honor a guest.