vegetables in season are flavored with soy sauce and cooked with the rice. Shiitake, carrot, burdock, konnyaku, and abura-age are often used.
gomokuzushi ごもくずし 五目鮨、 五目寿司 See Appendix 11.
gyokairui ぎょかいるい 魚介類 seafood; fish and shellfish.
gyokuro ぎょくろ 玉露 highest-quality green tea. See also Appendix 12.
gyoshō ぎょしよう 魚醤 See uoshōyu.
gyōza ギョーザ 餃子 a kind of Chinese dumpling (dim sum). A filling, usually of pork, cabbage, and nira minced to a fine paste, is used to fill circles of thin flour pastry shells with a scalloped join at the top. They are steam-fried or deep-fried or may be boiled in soup or nabemono. They are extremely popular and are often served at home as part of a regular Japanese meal.
gyūdon ぎゅうどん 牛丼 donburi dish featuring slices of beef.
gyū niku ぎゅうにく 牛肉 beef Bos taurus. After a long period in which the eating of beef was unthinkable, Emperor Meiji did his best to get the Japanese to eat beef, issuing a statement of approval in 1873. Gyūnabe, now called sukiyaki, had already appeared in the 1850s. Shabu shabu has also become a popular way of eating beef, as has yakiniku. Most of the Western ways of eating beef are also popular.
—H—
hachimitsu はちみつ 蜂蜜 honey. It is sometimes used to sweeten such things as umeshu but has little place in Japanese cuisine.
hadakamugi はだかむぎ 裸麦 naked barley, a variety of Hordeum vulgare. A species of barley particularly grown in western Japan. The grains closely resemble those of wheat.
hage はげ See kawahagi.
hajikami はじかみ 薑、 椒 See shōga.
hakkō はっこう 発酵、 醗酵 fermentation. The making of such products as saké, shiokara, and nattō involves a process of fermentation.
hakobe, hakobera はこべ、 はこべら 繁縷 chickweed Stellaria media. See also nanakusagayu.
hakumai はくまい 白米 white (polished, or rather, milled) rice Oryza sativa. The short-grained subspecies japonica is the staple food of the Japanese. Milling reduces the grain to 90 to 92% of its unmilled size. The rice polishings (nuka) are used as a pickling base for a type of pickle called nukazuke. The normal cooking method is to steam-boil the rice in a tightly closed pot containing just the amount of water that will be absorbed by the time the rice is cooked. Automatic rice cookers remove all doubts and guesswork, the latest models being programmed with “neuro” and “fuzzy” chips, but they do not produce the crisp outer crust (o-koge 御焦げ), which is a great treat.
hakusai はくさい 白菜 Chinese cabbage Brassica campestris var. amplexicaulis. From autumn to spring, this large cabbage is used in all kinds of dishes, but especially in nabemono and tsukemono.
hama bōfu はまぼうふう 浜防風 Glehnia littoralis. A plant of the same family as seri, with a similar appearance except that it has red stems, it grows in the sands by the seashore. In spring the young shoots are eaten raw with sashimi and as a garnish for sunomono of fish. For summer use in aemono it is blanched both to remove the bitterness and to cook it.
hamachi はまち See inada.
hamaguri はまぐり 蛤、 文蛤、 蚌 Venus clam, hard clam Meretrix lusoria. These clams, about 8.5 cm long, 4 cm wide, and 6.5 cm high, gathered from the foreshores throughout Japan, are at their best from winter to spring. In the shell, they are served in suimono, barbecued, or steamed with saké. The flesh is used for sushi and clam rice and can be grilled on skewers.
hamo はも 鱧 pike conger Muraenesox cinereus. This sharp-toothed, 2-m-long eel comes mostly from the warm waters off central and western Japan, especially the Inland Sea. Its small bones are so prolific that a special knife (hamokiri bōchō) is used to bone it. At its best in summer, it is served as kabayaki, teriyaki, tempura, the special kind of pressed sushi called oshizushi, and sunomono.
hanami はなみ 花見 cherry-blossom viewing. Since ancient times the Japanese have taken great delight in the fleeting blossoms of the cherry tree. On Japan’s four main islands, the trees bloom first in Kyushu, from the middle of March, and the blossoming follows the progress of spring, finally reaching the northernmost parts of the country in May. Parties are held day and night under the flowering trees, picnic foods are eaten, a lot of saké, beer, and other alcohol is drunk, and there is much singing, revelry, and enjoyment.
hanasakigani はなさきがに 花咲蟹 hanasaki crab, blue king crab Paralithodes brevipes. Similar to but smaller than the tara-bagani, this delicious crab is prolific in the waters off the Nemuro Peninsula of northeastern Hokkaido. See also kani.
hangō はんごう 飯盒 outdoor rice cooker. A container, usually made of aluminum, in which sufficient rice for one or two people can be carried with the water necessary for cooking it. The rice and water are combined and the hangō is set over a fire until all the water is absorbed and the rice is ready.
hanpen はんぺん 半片 fish-paste cake. Whitefish such as shark is made into a paste with yamanoimo, spread into molds, and boiled till set. It can be eaten as it is with ginger-flavored soy sauce, but is most commonly served in o-den.
harusame はるさめ 春雨 “spring rain” noodles. The best quality, from China, are made from mung-bean starch. The Japanese ones are made from potato starch or sweet-potato starch. They are transparent, less than 1 mm thick, and from 20 to 30 cm long. As well as being used in nabemono and sunomono, they can be deep-fried, puffing up and becoming white.
hashi はし 箸 chopsticks. See also Appendix 1.
hassaku はっさく 八朔 hassaku orange Citrus hassaku. A very firm-fleshed, non-juicy, orange-type citrus fruit mostly grown in Wakayama, Ehime, and Hiroshima prefectures, where it originated. In season from December to April.
hasu はす 蓮、 藕 lotus. See also renkon.
hasunomi はすのみ 蓮の実 lotus seed. In autumn these seeds can be eaten raw, having a mild sweetness, but usually they are preserved by boiling and drying. A paste made from lotus seeds is used as a filling for wagashi.
hata はた 羽太 grouper Epinephelus septemfasciatus (ma-hata). Reaching up to 90 cm in length, ma-hata is eaten from midsummer to early autumn as sashimi, shioyaki, and nitsuke. The much smaller kijihata, at around 40 cm, is particularly tasty.
hatahata はたはた 鰰、 燭魚 sandfish Arctoscopus japonicus. A northern sea fish of about 15 to 25 cm in length, it is especially plentiful around Akita and Yamagata prefectures. It is a fairly fatty, white-fleshed fish and is eaten as tempura, sushi, shioyaki, and nitsuke. It is also dried, preserved as shiokara, and used as the basis for Akita’s well-known shottsuru.
hatchō miso はっちょうみそ 八丁味噌 100% soybean miso. See
