|
The
cuisine of Japan is shaped by its four distinct seasons and by
regions. It is a cuisine that first and foremost delights the senses
-- in Japan, the eyes, nose, and palate feast along with the stomach.
The essence of Japanese cuisine is based on various elements of
taste, cooking techniques, and the use of the freshest seasonal ingredients.
Geography
Japan (the land of the rising
sun) is composed of four main islands, stretching north to south:
Hokkaiko, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu. It also includes the islands
of Okinawa and around 4,000 smaller islands. The whole of Japan would
fit inside the state of California. The capital is Tokyo.
The Food
The typical Japanese meal
consists of a bowl of rice (gohan), a bowl of miso soup (miso shiru),
pickled vegetables (tsukemono) and fish or meat. While rice is the
staple food, several kinds of noodles (udon, soba and ramen) are
cheap and very popular for light meals. As an island nation, the
Japanese take great pride in their seafood. A wide variety of fish,
squid, octopus, eel, and shellfish appear in all kinds of dishes from
sushi to tempura.
Rice
Sticky, short-grained rice is the
staple food in Japan. Uncooked rice is called kome. The cultivation
of rice in paddy fields traditionally required great cooperation
between villagers and this is said to have been central to the
evolution of Japanese culture. Their are several thousand varieties
grown in Japan, with Koshihikari and Akita Komachi being among the
most popular. Rice is also used to make mochi (rice cakes), senbei
(rice crackers) and sake (rice wine). Rice can also be cooked with
red beans (sekihan), seafood and vegetables (Takikomi gohan) or as a
kind of watery porridge seasoned with salt (kayu) which is very
popular as a cold remedy. Onigiri are rice balls with seafood or
vegetables in the middle, usually wrapped in a piece of dried seaweed
(nori). They are traditionally part of a packed lunch or picnic.
Individually wrapped onigiri, usually a triangular shape, make a good
snack and are available at convenience stores.
Noodles
- Udon and soba
Udon noodles are made from wheat
flour. They are boiled and served in a broth, usually hot but
occasionally cold in summer, and topped with ingredients such as a
raw egg to make tsukimi udon, and deep-fried tofu aburaage to make
kitsune udon. Soba is buckwheat noodles, which are thinner and a
darker colour than udon. Soba is usually served cold (zaru soba) with
a dipping sauce, sliced green onions and wasabi.
When served in a hot broth, it is
known as kake soba. Served with the same toppings as udon, you get
tsukimi soba, kitsune soba and tempura soba.
Noodles
- Ramen
While udon and soba are also
believed to have come from China, only ramen retains its image as
Chinese food. Ramen is thin egg noodles which are almost always
served in a hot broth flavored with shoyu or miso. This is topped
with a variety of ingredients such as slices of roast pork (chashu),
bean sprouts (moyashi), sweetcorn and butter. Ramen is popular
throughout Japan and different regions are known for their variations
on the theme. Examples are Corn-butter Ramen in Sapporo and Tonkotsu
Ramen in Kyushu. Instant ramen (the most famous brand is Pot
Noodles), to which you just add hot water, has become very popular in
recent years.
Soy products
The humble soybean (daizu) is
used to make a wide variety of foods and flavourings. Soybeans and
rice are used to make miso, a paste used for flavouring soup and
marinating fish. Together with soy sauce (shoyu), miso is a
foundation of Japanese cuisine. Tofu is soybean curd and a popular
source of protein, especially for vegetarians. These days, even tofu
donuts and tofu icecream are available. Natto, fermented soybeans, is
one of the healthiest but also the most notorious item on the menu.
With a pungent smell and sticky, stringy texture, natto is easy to
hate straight away. Japanese people themselves tend to either love it
or hate it. It is usually served with chopped onions and a raw egg
and mixed into a bowl of rice.
Sashimi
and sushi
These two dishes are often
thought to be one and the same. Sashimi consists of thin slices of
raw fish or other seafood served with spicy Japanese horseradish
(wasabi) and shoyu while sushi consists of the same, served on
vinegared rice, but also includes cooked seafood, vegetables and egg.
Another form of sushi is norimaki, or sushi roll, in which the
filling is rolled in rice with a covering of nori. Cheap sushi is
available at supermarkets or at kaiten-zushi restaurants, where
customers sit at a counter and choose what they want from a conveyor belt.
Domburimono
These dishes consist of a bowl
(domburi) of rice covered with one of a variety of toppings such as
boiled beef (gyudon), chicken and egg (oyakodon), deep-fried shrimp
(tendon) or deep-fried pork cutlet and egg (katsudon). They are often
eaten as part of a reasonably priced 'lunch set', with miso soup and pickles.
Tempura
Seafood or vegetables dipped in
batter and deep-fried, tempura is served with a dipping sauce and
daikon. The word 'tempura' comes from the Portuguese 'tempero' (gravy
or sauce) and this dish dates from the mid-16th century, when
Portuguese and Spanish culture was first introduced to Japan. Tempura
can be served with a side bowl of rice and soup or on a bowl of rice
(tendon) or noodles (tempura udon, tempura soba).
Sukiyaki
This is a savoury stew of
vegetables and beef cooked in a large nabe and dipped in a bowl of
beaten raw egg. The vegetables usually used are green onion, shiitake
mushrooms and chrysanthemum leaves (shungiku). Also added are tofu
and gelatinous noodles (shirataki) and the ingredients are cooked in
a sauce made of soy sauce, sugar and sweet cooking sake (mirin).
Shabushabu
For this dish, diners dip
paper-thin slices of beef in a pot of boiling water and stock for a
few seconds and then dip the cooked beef in sesame sauce (goma dare)
before eating. Later, vegetables such as enoki mushrooms and Chinese
cabbage, tofu and shirataki are added. When cooked, these are dipped
in a soy and citrus sauce (ponzu). After the beef and vegetables have
been finished, udon can be added to the pot and eaten with the broth.
Other flavourings used include crushed garlic, chives and daikon.
Economical (for those with a big appetite) all-you-can-eat meals are
common in Shabushabu restaurants
Okonomiyaki
This can best be described as a
savoury Japanese pancake. Chopped vegetables and meat or seafood are
mixed with batter and cooked on a griddle. Like a pancake, the
okonomiyaki is flipped over and cooked on both sides. It is then
topped with a special sauce and mayonnaise and sprinkled with nori
and dried fish flakes (katsuobushi). Variations include adding a
fried egg or soba.
Yakitori
Yakitori itself means broiled
chicken. Various cuts of chicken, including heart, liver and
cartilage are cooked on skewers over a charcoal grill. Also cooked
this way at yakitori restaurants (yakitoriya) are an assortment of
vegetables such as green peppers (piman), garlic cloves (ninniku) and
onions (negi). They are flavoured using either a tangy sauce (tare)
or salt (shio). The menu will usually contain a variety of other
foods as well. Yakitoriya are usually laid-back places where the food
is a snack to accompany drinking.
DRINK
Japanese beer brands such as
Kirin, Asahi and Sapporo are known worldwide. The major breweries
produce several top-selling beers, such as No.1 seller Asahi's Super
Dry (the No.1 beer in Japan), (my personal favorites) Sapporo's Black
Label and Ebisu, and Kirin's Lager and Ichiban Shibori. In addition,
they sell dozens of 'seasonal' brands for a few months at a time.
These are generally lagers and easily outsell other brands such as
stout (black beer) or happoshu (low-malt beer), although the latter
has become more popular recently. In fact, happoshu accounted for
over a fifth of the beer market in 2000. Its popular appeal is based
on heavy marketing and the low price brewers can charge because the
low malt content puts it in a lower tax category. Happoshu typically
retails for 30-40 yen less for a standard 350ml can than regular
beer. The bigger breweries also produce other alcoholic beverages
such as whiskey, wine and shochu as well as soft drinks.
In Japanese, the word sake
is also used as a generic term for alcohol. The correct term for
refined Japanese rice wine is seishu, or more commonly nihonshu. Like
wine made from grapes, there are regional variations and good and bad
years but sake is not usually stored for more than a year. Good sake
is produced all over the country and with thousands of small
breweries, finding one to suit your palate shouldn't be too hard.
There are different grades of sake depending on the milling process
used on the rice and what additives are used, if any. The production
cycle takes about one year: Autumn rice is used in the brewing
process, which starts in winter and ends the following spring. The
sake matures during the summer and is finally bottled in the autumn.
Sake has an alcohol content similar to wine, around 16%. It can be
served either warmed or chilled. The cheaper varieties are usually
served hot (atsukan) straight into a glass in cheap drinking
establishments like izakaya or yakitoriya. Otherwise it is served in
an earthenware bottle (tokkuri) and poured into small cups (sakazuki).
Shochu is a distilled liquor made
from grain and averages around 50% proof, although there are large
variations depending on the ingredients and region. It is most
commonly drunk in a mixture with ice and things like oolong tea
(oolon-hai) or citrus juices (lemon-hai). These drinks are available
ready made in cans. Ready-made cocktails have also become popular
recently. Whiskey and other distilled liquors tend to be popular
among middle-aged men.
|