After a late New Year’s Eve watching NHK’s Kōhaku song contest and a midnight trip to a neighbourhood shrine or temple, Japan’s New Year’s Day’s osechi ryōri – an annual feast of auspicious foods that ring in the new year – is a sight for the bleary-eyed countrywide.
Spread across the New Year’s Day table are the elegant trays of a decorative lacquer box called a jūbako, all packed with myriad dishes, from sweet black beans (kuromame) and salted herring roe (kazunoko), to candied Japanese anchovies (tazukuri), kelp rolls and julienned daikon-and-carrot namasu. There is sea bream, yellowtail and prawns, and an entire tray of simmered vegetables (nishime), that includes lotus root, shiitake mushrooms and konnyaku (Devil’s tongue).
Every element of osechi ryōri is carefully chosen for flavour and visual delight but also symbolism. From the kuromame that denote hard work, to the herring roe that symbolises fertility, and the kelp rolls that represent happiness and longevity, the meal bestows felicitations on eaters, as has been customary since the Heian period (794-1185). Some elements may be home-made, while department store depachika (food halls) and kombini (convenience stores) sell osechi ryōri supplies and boxed sets catering for households of all sizes, with prices ranging from £20–100.
‘The point of osechi ryōri is to enjoy it with the extended family,’ explains Nancy Singleton Hachisu, author of Japan: The Cookbook (Phaidon, April 2018) and a resident of rural Saitama for 37 years. ‘Young people who do not still live with their parents typically go home for the New Year holiday, while young families will either go home to their parents’ house or will cobble together something traditional for the sake of the children and the spirit of the holiday.’
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Seasonal favourites
Children dive eagerly into the kurikinton – mashed sweet potato studded with chestnuts – whose golden hue signifies prosperity. Popular too are Kōhaku kamaboko, pink and white semicircular fish cakes that symbolise the first sunrise of the New Year, and thick slices of datemaki – a rolled omelette of eggs and whitefish, sweetened with sugar and mirin – which represents academic success.
‘My favourite food in our osechi ryōri was always the kuromame,’ says PR producer Kuribayashi Shoko, recalling her childhood in Saga prefecture. ‘My grandmother would start preparing them two days before New Year’s Day, sometimes using black soybeans she had grown herself. The glossy black beans always stood out in the centre of the jūbako, and I loved them not just for the flavour but also the feeling that they carried my grandmother’s affection.’
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Beautifully boxed
The jūbako is as important as its contents, and these graceful, practical boxes – that allow leftovers to be packed up easily for the next day – are often passed down through families. ‘Since the foods inside carry auspicious meanings, the jūbako decorations follow the same cultural symbolism,’ explains Ohmukai Masahiro of Wajima, Ishikawa, whose company Kōsyūdō Japan promotes the region’s revered Wajima-nuri artisans. ‘Traditional patterns, family crests and motifs symbolising prosperity and longevity are commonly used.’
Creating a formal, custom-made Wajima-nuri New Year’s jūbako may take an artisan more than a year to complete and cost upwards of ¥200,000 (around £1,000). Inevitably, production is in decline. However, Ohmukai adds: ‘In recent years, jūbako are not only used for New Year celebrations; more craftspeople are creating pieces that can be used in everyday life, taking advantage of the practical structure of stacking boxes.’
Ozōni: the taste of home
While the central elements of osechi ryōri are largely common countrywide, New Year’s Day tables differ widely in the ozōni soup that has accompanied the festive meal since Edo times (1603-1868). According to chef Tsuji Shizuo, in his seminal book Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art (Kōdansha 1990), ‘Ozōni is to Japanese New Year what turkey is to American Christmas and Thanksgiving’. This filling soup evokes nostalgia, as every household proudly prepares its unique version, with broth, fillings and mochi shape differing widely across Japan.
Broadly speaking, in Kanto (Eastern Japan) ozōni broth is clear sumashi-jiru, made from kelp and bonito flakes, while in Kansai (Western Japan) it is miso based. This broth is poured over vegetables, chicken or fish, with infinite variety, from distinctive white miso in Kyoto to daimyō-zōni in Fukuoka, a clear broth made from dried flying-fish dashi.
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Must-have mochi
No bowl of ozōni is complete without a mochi rice cake. Typically, square and grilled in Kanto, and round and boiled in Kansai, mochi is a ubiquitous feature of New Year celebrations, with kagami mochi displayed until 11 January as offerings to the gods.
‘Every year, the most important constant at the Hachisu farmhouse is pounding mochi on December 30,’ explains Hachisu. ‘My husband and sons steam glutinous rice over a fire in the garden and friends come to help pound and shape the mochi into plump kagami mochi. Some is rolled out and slightly dried before being cut into squares that are eaten throughout the holiday including New Year’s Day, when it is added to our konbu dashi-based, root vegetable ozōni.’
Ozōni is typically served in a lidded, lacquer soup bowl of the kind crafted by Kishū lacquerware artist Tanioka Kumiko of Kainan, Wakayama, using the negoro-nuri technique (rubbing the red lacquer layer to reveal the black beneath) decorated with gold and silver powder.
‘I paint a lot of “Ichi Fuji, ni taka, san nasubi” (“First Fuji, second hawk, third eggplant”) motifs on soup bowls,’ Tanioka explains. ‘It is an old Japanese proverb that says it is auspicious if you dream of these things as the first dream of the new year.’
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