Sweets
Inoko Mochi
Inoko Mochi — taro-mashed rice balls coated in sweet red bean, offered at harvest
Non-glutinous and sticky rice are cooked with taro, mashed, and shaped into balls coated with lightly salted sweet red bean paste. Offered to the harvest god on the Day of the Boar in the old tenth lunar month, it's also made for autumn festivals in parts of southern Wakayama.
- Origin: Wakayama
- About 450 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Inoko-mochi is a rice cake made by simmering non-glutinous rice with a smaller portion of mochi rice and taro, mashing the mixture, shaping it into balls, and coating them with a lightly salted chunky red bean paste. The starch from the taro keeps the cake from hardening the way ordinary mochi does, so it stays soft even after it cools. In the Ayukawa district of Tanabe's former Otō village, the cake is offered alongside sacred sake, dried grilled saury, and a bundle of new-harvest rice, giving it a strong association with the autumn festival.
How it's made
Non-glutinous rice is cooked with about half its volume of mochi rice and taro, then mashed and stirred together while still hot. The resulting mixture, called "saru no atama" or "monkey's head," is shaped into balls slightly larger than a typical anko mochi. A lightly salted, chunky red bean paste is then pressed around the outside. Older recipes reportedly left sugar out of the paste entirely, and thanks to the taro's starch, the cake keeps its soft texture even after it cools.
Why it took this shape
The wild boar deity is said to visit the fields at the "spring boar day" in the second lunar month and depart at the "autumn boar day" in the tenth month, once farm work for the year is done. In the rice-growing north of the prefecture, families are said to have marked that autumn day with gratitude for the harvest by offering inoko-mochi, coated in red bean paste said to be the deity's favorite. The custom also survives in the Ayukawa district of Tanabe's former Otō village in the south, where the cake is reportedly still made for the autumn festival and offered with new rice and dried grilled saury.
Before you go
- How to shop in a depachika (department store food hall)A guide to browsing prepared foods and bento, choosing wagashi as a gift with a good shelf life, sampling etiquette, end-of-day discounts, asking for cold packs and wrapping, and finding your way around a depachika floor.
- 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
- Abekawa MochiFresh-pounded rice cake is dusted in soybean flour mixed with sugar. Named for the Abe River, it's said to have been famous among Tokaido travelers as a teahouse specialty and to appear in the travel novel Tokaidochu Hizakurige.
- Iga ManjuSweet bean paste is wrapped in rice flour dough, then coated with dyed sticky rice grains. One account ties the name to the grains' resemblance to a chestnut's spiny husk, and in the western Mikawa region it's said to be offered to Hina dolls at the Doll Festival.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Also from Wakayama
- BouriA whole, unpeeled parent taro is simmered over two days for this New Year's dish from the Ayukawa area of Tanabe City's Ото̄ district. One account holds that villagers gave up pounding mochi for six hundred years to atone for once turning away a fleeing prince, eating this in its place.
- Goma ToufuRaw sesame is skinned, ground, and worked with mountain water and Yoshino arrowroot into a simmered block of shojin cuisine. Said to have supplied protein for monks who abstained from meat and fish, it's now a familiar Koyasan souvenir and a fixture on Japanese menus.
- Gonpachi no Abura ItameGonbachi, formally known as itadori knotweed, is blanched, peeled, and quickly stir-fried in oil for this spring dish. Thick, well-grown stalks that snap with a crisp pop are prized for a crunchy bite and a faint sourness.
- Hatagonbo ZushiA stout, round burdock called hatagonbo, grown on the steep red-clay slopes of Hashimoto City's Nishihata district, is sliced into rounds, hollowed at the center, and packed with vinegared rice. Cultivation had nearly died out until a local cooperative revived it around 2013, roughly seventy years on.
- Igami no NitsukeIgami — what southern Wakayama calls the parrotfish — is simmered whole in a sweet-salty broth. Feeding on seaweed among winter rocks leaves it free of any off-flavor, and around Tanabe it's said to be served head-to-tail in place of sea bream for New Year's.
- Kaki MaburiDried tofu, shiitake, and seasonal vegetables are folded into sushi rice for this chirashi-style dish. Its name comes from "maburi," a Naga-area dialect word for "mix," and it's made in bulk for celebrations where the number of guests can't be known in advance.