On New Year's Eve, people go and eat a soba noodles. This tradition is called toshikoshi soba (年越しそば). Although there are many different ways to eat soba, we ate it with tempura. I also ate a lot of what are called osechi-ryouri (御節料理). This is traditional New Year's food. You eat pretty much all day New Year's Day, and then you continue to eat the leftovers for another day or two.
There are a variety of osechi-ryouri. I've listed a few below that seem to be the most common.
- ozouni - Hot soup with mochi inside. You have to eat it quickly in small bites or it hardens and you can't swallow
- kuro-mame - Literally, black beans. These are quite sweet
- kuri-kinton - Sweet chestnuts. These are yellow and have a sweet paste around them
- kamaboko - Not necessarily a new years food, but those pink fish circles
- tai - This is snapper. It's cooked whole and is eated due to the fact that it sounds like omedetai, a word meaning Congratulations
- ebi - Shrimp
- kinpira - a type of cooking style mainly used for vegetables. often sour
- kuzonoko - herring roe, supposed to increase fertility (They're a little salty for my taste)
- Tataki-gobou - not really sure how to describe this. It's called the great burdock root in English, but we don't really see it much in the U.S. It's a bit spicy on New Year's
- datemaki - an egg, but it's rolled...it's hard to translate
- konbu-maki- rolled seaweed
- chorogi - A root that is pickled and typically dyed red for the New Year
- konnyaku - There really isn't an English word for this one. It's called konjak, but that still won't sense to many. It's kind of squishy and doesn't have much taste on its own. It gets flavor from whatever it's cooked with.
Disclaimer:
None of the pictures in this post belong to me. All rights belong to their original owners.
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