Sweets
Tobitsuki Dango
Tobitsuki dango — mochi dumplings coated in sweetened cowpea beans
A dough of glutinous and non-glutinous rice flour is boiled and coated with cowpea beans soaked in sugar water — an Obon sweet from around Awara city. The name is said to come from the pale red beans looking as if they had 'jumped onto' the mochi, its sweetness kept modest.
- Origin: Fukui Awara
- About 320 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Mochi made from a blend of glutinous and regular rice, coated in sweetly simmered cowpea beans as an Obon offering, so the beans keep their shape and give a distinct bite against the plain, softly sweet rice beneath. The pale red beans are said to look as if they'd jumped onto the rice — the source of the dish's name — and it's said to be loved by children and elders alike.
How it's made
Washed cowpea beans are boiled until soft, soaked in sugar water for about an hour, then drained. Glutinous and regular rice flour are kneaded with lukewarm water to an earlobe-soft consistency, torn into long pieces, boiled until they float, then lifted out and coated with the beans while still wet. In the past, salt or roasted soybean flour is said to have stood in for sugar.
Why it took this shape
Cowpeas were once grown at home by nearly every household for Obon, which is said to be how coating rice dumplings with them became the way to mark the offering. In an era when sugar was hard to come by, a salted version is said to have been the norm — the dish's shape said to owe to making do with whatever ingredients were close at hand.
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 Fukui
- Atsuage no NitaThick fried tofu, blanched and scored with a cross cut, is simmered sweet-savory in dashi, soy sauce, and mirin with a dash of ginger juice. Fukui leads the country in fried-tofu consumption, and this dish is said to have moved from a Honkoko feast dish into everyday cooking.
- BokkakeThick fried tofu, burdock, and shirataki noodles are simmered in a bonito broth and poured hot, broth and all, over freshly cooked rice — eaten for over a century since the early 1910s. In Katsuyama it is said to take a chazuke-like turn, topped with fish cake and mitsuba.
- ChameshiRoasted soybeans are steeped in hot roasted barley tea, and rice is then cooked in that same tea — a dish from the old post town of Imajo, said to descend from Nara's 'nara-chameshi'. It is said to be indispensable at memorial services, Honkoko, and for daughters visiting home.
- Choju NamasuGround sesame is worked into a paste with miso, thick fried tofu, mustard, and vinegar, then tossed with shredded daikon, carrot, and snap peas — a New Year salad whose name literally wishes long life, also said to appear at memorial services and Honkoko.
- Echizen Oroshi SobaA cold soba from Echizen, Fukui, topped with grated daikon and bonito flakes. It is said to originate with a soba maker a local lord brought from Kyoto to promote buckwheat as an emergency food crop.