29 recipes. Page 2 of 2
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In Kagoshima, tonjiru is made with barley miso, which is sweet and mellow. Pork, daikon, taro, konjac and atsuage (thick fried tofu) go in so generously that they nearly fill the bowl, and thin scallions and slivers of ginger go on top.
Fine powder left over from making koya-dofu, Japan's freeze-dried tofu, is stirred into a pot of diced chicken and root vegetables, where it drinks up the dashi and clumps into soft, crumbly curds. This home dish from Takacho in Hyogo is eaten with a spoon: everything from carrot and burdock to konnyaku, chikuwa fish cake, and fried tofu is cut small so each bite gets a bit of everything.
Seven ingredients, all diced to the same 1.5cm, float in a clear soy-seasoned broth: chicken, shiitake, taro, chikuwa, konjac, carrot and grilled tofu. In the Hitoyoshi and Kuma area of Kumamoto, families keep the count odd, seven or nine, and serve the soup with red rice and nishime at occasions such as the Okunchi festival. It also grew out of thrift, since trimmings left from making nishime could become a complete dish. The tofu is added last so the cubes stay neat.
Red soybean miso, aged from a soybean koji, gives this Aichi stew a dark broth with deep savoriness, a little acidity, and a faint astringency. Also called misoni, it grew out of the soybean miso tradition best known through Hatcho miso. Every household loads the pot with daikon, carrot, burdock, taro, konnyaku, and fried tofu, but some keep plenty of broth and eat it like a hot pot while others cook it down to a thicker simmer.
In Niigata's noppe, the broth thickens lightly from the taro's own starch, with no thickener added. Water from soaking dried scallops and shiitake forms the base, and taro, bamboo shoot, carrot, konnyaku, kamaboko fish cake, ginkgo nuts, and salted salmon are cut to similar sizes. Families make big pots for New Year, weddings, memorial services, and funerals, eat it warm or cold, and top each bowl with salmon roe.