Sweets
Misogi Dango
Misogi dango — bean-paste dumplings glazed with a sweet miso sauce
A rice-flour dough wraps sweet bean paste, gets skewered, and is grilled while basted with a sweet miso glaze — a confection of Hashima City devised at a local sweet shop in the early Showa era and named for the town's misogi purification rite, a seasonal sight around June 30.
- Origin: Gifu Hashima
- About 280 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Rice-flour dumplings filled with smooth red bean paste, skewered and brushed with a miso-and-sugar glaze before grilling, a sweet from Hashima City, so the glaze's savory char plays against the refined sweetness of the paste hidden inside. A scatter of sesame on the charred surface is said to linger on the palate.
How it's made
Rice-flour dough is wrapped around smooth red bean paste, skewered two to a stick, grilled, then brushed on both sides with a miso-and-sugar glaze in a style borrowed from grilled tofu skewers, finished with a scatter of sesame and grilled once more. It's said to be sold at shops and stalls in the Takehana shopping street each year around June 30, tied to the local purification ritual.
Why it took this shape
The dish is said to take its name from the Misogi Shinji purification ritual held every June 30 at Takehana Yatsurugi Shrine, its earlier version — originally sold under a different name — later renamed to match the rite. A belief took hold that eating this dumpling washes away the first half of the year's impurities, letting you spend the second half in good health.
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 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 NarezushiAyu heading downriver to spawn in autumn, often carrying roe, are salted and stuffed with freshly cooked rice, then packed in a barrel to ferment for about two months — a narezushi of Gifu City said to have been made from fish caught at the Nagara River's cormorant fishery and once presented to the shogunate.
- 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.