Miso Paste and Soup

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miso sommelier

QUOTE
©　Modern Nippon Project com

"Miso no Kyutei", Miyoko Toyonaga,
miso sommelier

The popular female owner of "Miso no Kyutei" founded in 1955.
She is called miso sommelier. There are lots of customers often coming to the shop just because they are attracted by the sommelier's character, who runs the shop wearing a "nejirihachimaki", a twisted towel tied around her head and a "hanten", a traditional Japanese outfit worn by merchants

"Will you make misosoup for me forever?" was at a time the standard phrase among men when proposing. The fact that the word "miso" was used as the beginning of a couple's most important event only shows how deeply rooted it is in Japanese everyday life. Recently miso is getting more and more famous overseas as healthy food from Japan. I find myself is the interview that took place at "Miso no Kyutei", Kameido in Tokyo, a shop which has been selling miso, a major Japanese food culture, for more than 50 years.

"Even if it's just once, I would like people to taste genuine miso"

In Kameido, Tokyo, an area with a unique flavor of "shitamachi" (traditional town area), you can see the signboard of "Miso no Kyutei" as soon as you enter the shopping street. Maybe it's because I'm Japanese that the sweet scent of miso coming from the shop reminds me of the good old days.

"But you know, I heard that miso recently is having a boom overseas, and the other day a person from Ukraine coming to the shop suggested such things as "miso in borsch or together with yogurt on whipped cream", "oh, how interesting!" I thought.

Miyoko Toyonaga said that she wanted people to enjoy miso in their own way, because each country has their own food culture. However, when it comes to Japanese young people, they don't have "their own fashion of eating miso". They don't seem to be too particular about miso itself, not even when eating food flavored with it. Shouldn't they be aware of the attractiveness of miso, which is traditional food handed down from ancient times in Japan?

"Basically, it's strange to be saying, "be aware of it" in the first place. Well, I guess in a way it can't be helped. Shops like ours, specializing in miso, are getting less and less, and if you go to the supermarket you can easily buy instant miso. I'm not saying that it's wrong to eat it. It's just that I don't want people to think that it's all there is to miso.

Due to a slow-food and health boom last year you could say that miso has had a comeback, but still there are not many people visiting the specialty stores. However, enjoying the flavor, tastiness, quality of the ingredients, and talking with a miso sommelier like Miyoko Toyanaga may become a means of giving a revival to Japanese culture.

"There's no other food as deeply rooted in Japanese people's hearts as miso."

Looking back on the history of miso, it is said that it was brought to Japan from China during the Asuka period (end of 6th till mid 7th century) and was for a while a luxury food enjoyed at temples and among the noble class. In the Muromachi period (1392-1573), little by little natural brewing was started among common people, and in the Edo period (1600-1867) it came to be produced commercially.

By steaming and boiling soy beans, rice, wheat, salt and water, then adding yeast and fermenting it, leaving it to ripe in a wooden bucket, miso is made. As it is cultivated by nature, miso has various characters depending on the climate, environment, food culture and taste in the surroundings.

"You see, from old times there have been lots of proverbs and sayings with the word miso, such as "temae miso" (there's nothing like leather), "misokasu" (a child who is excluded), and "soko ga miso nan da yo" (that's the point). This shows how deeply rooted it is in people's everyday life.

Miyoko Toyonaga makes an original blend for each and every person by getting to know the customer's taste, his or her hometown and food lifestyle. She makes the miso that the customer wants, based on the taste of each and every customer visiting the shop and making an order. When a customer makes the next order she keeps in mind their favorite blend. She is really just what we could call a "miso sommelier".

"Really, that's just too flattering. But recently I have become able to see a person's favorite miso just upon looking at his or hers face. Whether it is students or business men coming home from work, I'm always here, so it would be nice if they just stop by once in a while.

Lastly, I asked her thoughts on miso, as a food that has transcended centuries and still is a basis in Japanese food culture today.

"To me, really, the customers are not only buying just miso, but in a way also a part of myself. Thanks to them "Kyutei"'s fans are increasing all over Japan. But I also want people all over the world to know its attractiveness. I can assure you, there is no food as tasty, inexpensive and healthy as miso.

I have found the most wonderful place, where you can enjoy a traditional shop's taste of miso, a Japanese culture inherited from ancient days.

Miso no Kyutei
Tokyo Koto-ku, Kameido 3-60-18 Tel. 03-3682-5437
Text: Kenji Tsutsui Photo: Katsumi Hirabayashi


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quote
source : 　Japan Times, January 9, 2009

Tokyo's miso soup: quality, variety and style
By ROBBIE SWINNERTON

Traditionally in Japan, miso shiru soup represented the taste of home cooking. Each family would have its own recipes, prepared using local or homemade miso but served up with favorite combinations of ingredients. Vegetables, seafood, mushrooms, tofu, seaweed and even small quantities of meat all find their place in miso soup, according to taste and seasonal availability.

Countless cookbooks have been published catering to this deep-seated love of miso shiru. But we prefer to gain our inspiration from the menus of specialist restaurants. Whenever we are in Ikebukuro, we make a point of dropping by the food section of Tobu department store — not just because it is one of the largest in the city (with an excellent sake section) but also to visit Misogen.

This is a small counter run by a miso retailer that serves freshly prepared miso shiru, either on its own or along with simple rice dishes. There are four or five styles of soup to choose from; our favorite is prepared with fresh yuba (soy-milk skin), mushrooms, spinach greens and sliced okra. Simple, warming, revivifying and with no artificial additives, it calms and satisfies the parts that Starbucks can never reach.

Thanks to the depth of savory flavor components — in Japanese the word umami is often used — hot miso shiru is sometimes offered as an appetizer at restaurants and even drinking establishments. At the chic, upmarket Bar 1chido (pronounced "Ichido") near Hiroo, miso shiru is an essential item on the menu alongside the aged rums and single-malt whiskies.

It's also become a selling point in and of itself at an izakaya (Japanese-style pub) called Misoshiruya (literally, Miso Soup House), which recently opened a branch among the ritzy boutiques of Ginza. Clearly a trend is brewing, so we had to check it out.

Like so many bars in this high-color district, Misoshiruya is tucked away in the basement of a building. But any anxiety that it might be exclusive and expensive was allayed by the sidewalk signboard at the entrance and the stream of young (and casually dressed) people making their way down the narrow stairs.

Sliding open the heavy door, we found ourselves in a compact dining room that is modern, cheerful and idiosyncratic. The furniture is simple and the only decor is the display of colorful labels on the magnums of sake, shochu and umeshu along the counter that runs the length of the narrow, semi-open kitchen.

Miso features prominently throughout the menu. We started with a selection of vegetable sticks with dips of light-orange miso and of basil in olive oil. We followed this with a carpaccio of thinly sliced scallops in a savory sauce that was richly flavored with uni (sea urchin) and miso, and garnished with gleaming-fresh ikura (salmon roe) like jewels.

There are plenty of other izakaya staples, from agedashi-dofu, deep-fried tofu squares topped with a rich sauce of buckwheat grain and ground meat, to yaki-onigiri, triangular rice balls smeared with miso and grilled crisp.

And then there is the miso soup. There are 45 varieties to choose from, ranging from simple and classic (featuring tofu and wakame seaweed in a broth seasoned with yellow Shinshu miso) to nouveau style (avocado and shrimp with Hatcho miso) to the luxurious ("Wild Tiger" prawns in a blend of miso).

The miso theme even extends to the drinks list. We had to try the microbrewed beer from Aichi Prefecture that incorporates Hatcho miso. Although the flavor was not especially distinctive, it certainly scored big in terms of novelty value.

A similar quirkiness inhabits the sake selection. If the name Mohikan Musume (Mohican Girl) were not enough to pique the interest, the graphics — a woman in kimono sporting a punk hairdo against a rising-sun background — demanded our attention. In fact this sake, produced in Aomori Prefecture, turned out to be an orthodox and enjoyable junmaishu sake. But the idiosyncratic label (in summer the same brewery produces a sake called Bikini Musume) is an indication of the informal, easy-going style of the friendly staff at Misoshiruya.

© The Japan Times

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