Traditional Japanese foods for New Year's Holidays

Saturday, January 5, 2019

Traditional Japanese foods for New Year's Holidays

New Year's holidays, which are called oshogatsu (お正月) in Japan, are the most important holidays for Japanese people.

Traditional Japanese Food for New Year's Eve
It's a Japanese traditional that osoji (大掃除), big cleaning, is done in late December before the New Year comes. Then, on New Year's Eve, it's a Japanese traditional to eat soba noodles, which are called toshikoshi soba (年越しそば, 年越し蕎麦).

Toshikoshi Soba (年越し蕎麦)

       In 2017, my husband and I had toshikoshi soba at Nakau restaurant (なか卯) in Japan and also had instant soba noodles which the hotel we stayed in Tokyo served. This New Year's Eve, we stayed at home in the U.S. We purchased frozen soba noodles at a Japanese supermarket, and he cooked toshikoshi soba. :) If you would like to try making soba noodle, you can check my previous entry, How To Make Toshikoshi Soba. (By the way, you can use any type of soba noodles such as frozen, dried and raw noodles.)

Traditional Japanese Foods for New Year
       Japanese New Year (Shogatsu) runs January 1 through January 7 (O-shogatsu, 大正月) or January 15 (Ko-shogatsu, 小正月). Specially, January 1 through January 3 is called sanganichi (三が日), and people visit shrines and meet families and relatives for the first time in the year and enjoy Japanese traditional New Year's foods.

   ■ Zoni (雑煮), Mochi Soup
       During New Year's holiday, it's a Japanese traditional to eat mochi. Specially, mochi soup which is called zoni (雑煮) or ozoni (お雑煮) is commonly eaten in Japan during New Year's holiday.

Zoni, 雑煮

This year, I cooked this zoni for New Year's soup. I'll share how to make zoni with you next time. :) When I was a child in Japan, my grandmother used to make large quantity of mochi (She used to make about 1,000 pieces of mochi in late December every year.) and our families enjoyed zoni and mochi dishes during New Year's holiday. Now, you can find mochi at most supermarkets in Japan in winter. In the U.S., you can also find mochi at most Japanese supermarkets around this time of the year.

　■Osechi (おせち, おせち料理)
Osechi (おせち), Osechi Ryori (おせち料理), are a traditional Japanese New Year's foods. Osechi is a collection of lucky foods. When I was a child, my families had these foods listed below on January 1. I remembered that large boxes of salty kazunoko (数の子), herring roes, were in a refrigerator in our kitchen during New Year's holiday. My mother and grandmother cooked a large quantity of osechi dishes on December 31 for New Year's meals.

Osechi Dishes (New Year's Lucky Foods)
・kuromame (黒豆) : sweetened black beans
・kazunoko (数の子) : herring roes
・tazukuri (たづくり), gomame (ごまめ) : dried Japanese anchovy
・tataki gobo (たたきごぼう) : burdock root dish
・kamaboko (かまぼこ, 蒲鉾) : fish cake
・datemaki (伊達巻) : egg and fish cake
・dashimaki tamago (だし巻き卵) : Japanese omelette
・kurikinton (栗きんとん, 栗金団) : sweetened chestnut with sweet potato paste
・ebi no yakimono (海老の焼き物) : grilled shrimps
・tai no yakimono (鯛の焼き物) : grilled red sea bream
・kouhaku namasu (紅白なます) : vinegared Japanese radish and carrot
・kombumaki (昆布巻き), kobumaki (こぶまき) : simmered herring wrapped with kelp, kombu
・nishime (煮しめ) : simmered vegetables and konnyaku

Chikuzenni, 筑前煮

New Year's foods are usually pretty expensive in Japan such as kazunoko. In the U.S., it's obviously even more expensive. That's why I only made osechi with affordable ingredients. ;) This year, I cooked chikuzenni (筑前煮), nishime (煮しめ), as one of osechi dishes. You can check out how to cook chikuzenni in my previous entry.