Regions' cuisine
Tohoku
Tohoku (literally «region of northern East») is a region of Eastern Japan on Honsyu island. The center of region is Miyagi prefecture.
O-furo ("Yu") - national Japanese bathhouse. Iwate prefecture
 O-furo is very popular in Japan. Home bath is a wood barrel, filled with hot water (45°C). There are sittings inside to take comfortable position. One is taking a bath for several minutes, having sunk whole body except heart region.
There is a pool (rotenburo) in public Japanese bathhouse with hot water, warmed up to 50°C. The bottom of the pool is planked down with chunk stones, and water is regularly changed that makes it closer to a natural pond. Japanese wash themselves in the next-door room, sitting on the floor before taking a bath.
It is proved that the Japanese bath helps to cope with stresses and metabolic diseases, releases rheumatics. Japanese say that o-furo is wonderful way of refreshment.
Lake Towada. Akita prefecture
 Lake Towada is a good picture with wealthy natura and rich landscapes. During summer when all the Japan's population suffer from the heat, it is cool and comfortable here.
There is a road, leading to lake Towada, and it is called "oirase" or "golden road". The Japanese like to stroll here in autumn specially, because everything stink with wealth of golden autumnal leaves.
Local dishes :
- Wanko-soba - buckwheat noodles in small bowls
- Zunda-mochi - rice flat cake
- Inaniwa-udon - wheat noodles made of Inaniwa
- Kiritampo - fried and stuck on chop sticks rice
- Ikameshi - squid stuffed with rice
Local products:
There are differences between local dishes made in mountainous and flat-bottomed lands in Aomori, Akita, Iwate, Yamagata, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures that are included in Tohoku region. Such cereals as millet, buckwheat etc, are traditionally used in mountains. Products are being prepared in store here quite often. These are pickled vegetables mainly, eatable mountainous herbs etc. Such products as inaniwa-udon in Akita, hittumi and soba-kakke in Iwate, dango-jiru in Fukushima and others made of flour are widely used.
Zunda-mochi
|
Rice harvest is high enough on the flat-bottom land; therefore mochi made of rice is usually served at holidays Bon and Segatsu (New Year). In Miyagi and Yamagata the local dish is zunda-mochi. The assortment of dishes made of boiled rice is very wealthy; these are hotate-gohan (scallop rice), uni-gohan in Aomori (rice with sea urchin), and kurumi-gohan (rice with nut) in Fukishima. These dishes are considered to be very nutritious. In winter people hook hata-hata (sandfish), tara (codfish), salmon etc. In summer people hook such delicacy as awawi (abalone), hotate (scallop) and uni (sea urchin).
Nabemono and surimono in a local variety are spread all over Tohoku. During a long cold snowy winter people gathered at a fireplace and warmed up with hot dishes, most commonly with soup. The most famous among them are zappa-jiru made of tara (codfish) in Aomori, kiritampo in Akita, donko-jiru in Iwate, kaki-nabe (pottage with oysters) in Miyagi, natto-jiru in Fukushima.
Previous
|
