Kamaboko, the Star of Year-End and New Year's Feasting

In the last column of the year for The Japan Times, I’ve written about the symbolic meaning of the many items in osechi ryouri, the traditional New Year’s feast eaten in Japan: Savor the symbolism at New Year’s.

I’ve written about osechi on this site previously also - Everything in osechi ryouri, where I also confess that I don’t actually like most of the items in osechi that much personally! I’ve also written about toshikoshi soba or year-ending (or year-bridging) soba, which is eaten on New Year’s Eve.

One item that’s often included in both toshikoshi soba and osechi ryouri is kamaboko (?? or ????), a rubbery and firm fish cake that also makes its appearance year-round in everything from ramen to bentos. While in its natural state it’s a creamy white in color, it often comes dyed, pink being the most common coloring. It’s also the forerunner of other types of food that have become more famous around the world.

Since red and white (kohaku) is a very lucky color combination in Japan, alternating pink and white slices of kamaboko are seen often in osechi.

This is an ad from a high-end kamaboko maker, which puts gold leaf on their special occasion kamaboko. The brown color comes from lightly grilling the outside of a formed kamaboko cake.

Many regions of Japan has their version of kamaboko. It used to be made with white freshwater fish as well as sea fish, but nowadays it’s mainly made with white sea fish such as cod and various cod substitutes, together with some kind of starch - usually potato starch, but sometimes other starches from corn or wheat are used too. Here’s a type of kamaboko made in Toyama prefecture on the Japan Sea coast, which combines the white paste (called surimi) with konbu seaweed. The green coloring is pretty unusual too.

Most kamaboko has shaped like a half-moon or demi-circle on top of a small piece of wood. As a child I used to collect these bits of woods (called kamaboko-ita) and use them for school projects. I even once made a small bookshelf out of kamaboko-ita for my desk, although it and the desk are long gone now. Kamaboko comes in many other shapes too.

When red and white kamaboko are formed into a rolled spiral shape before steaming, it’s called naruto or narutomaki. You may have seen slices of naruto floating on top of a bowl of ramen. Some instant cup noodles even include freezedried versions. This page has a good picture of naruto. I don’t think the anime Naruto comes from narutomaki though - naruto also means ‘whirling water’.

Kamaboko is also the forerunner of crab sticks or fake crab meat, which is called kanikama or “crab kamaboko” in Japan. The same type of surimi or fish paste is flavored to ressemble crab, extruded into crabmeat like strands, dyed and formed into sticks. Kanikama was first made by a fish processing company in Ishikawa prefecture, which neighbors Toyama prefecture on the Japan Sea coast, in 1973. Apparently it was never meant to be faux crab meat, but a different kind of kamaboko. I think that as long as you think of it as a kind of fish sausage and not as well, imitation crab, it’s fine. But since it’s become so popular worldwide there’s a lot of really bad crab stick out there, so you need to shop around.

Getting back to kamaboko: Since it is so flexible and rubbery in texture, it can be cut into all kinds of decorative forms. This image is from the Kibun site. (Kibun is a major kamaboko and other processed foods manufacturer.)

Indeed, decorative cutting of kamaboko is the forerunner of another kind of decorative food cutting that has become known worldwide these days - the decoratively cut weiner sausage.

The simplest ways to enjoy kamaboko are to just drop a slice or two on top of a bowl of hot noodle soup, or to enjoy slices like sashimi with plain rice. It is not something you can make easily at home (believe me, I’ve tried) so if you have a Japanese grocery store, buy a half-moon pack, slice it up and enjoy!

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Toshikoshi Soba (year-end soba) article in The Japan Times, plus a bit about my niece and nephew

I’ve had an article with recipe in The Japan Times every month since August. Writing for them is a bit different than writing for my blogs; I try to focus more on the story behind the food, and I also write for English speaking people living in Japan, who are the main audience for the paper. It’s an interesting challenge every month! Anyway, for this month I have an article about Toshikoshi soba, or year-end soba. It goes into a lot more of the historical background and origins of the custom of eating soba noodles on New Year’s Eve than my old toshikoshi soba post from back in 2003. The recipe is also a bit different; instead of using pre-made kaeshi or storebought mentsuyu, I give instructions for making the soup totally from scratch using konbu seaweed, bonito flakes, soy sauce, mirin and sugar. Again I’m assuming that most of the readers have ready access to these ingredients, as well as the kamaboko topping. Anyway, I hope you’ll take a look!

I’ve used my favorite eating-model again for the top photo accompanying the article, my 9 year old niece Lena. (I’ve spelled her name phonetically as “Rena” on these pages before, but she apparently favors the spelling “Lena”. Her name in kanji is ??.) I love my nephew Lyoh, her older brother, just as much of course, but he tends to pull awful/funny faces when I point the lens at him, as boys will do. Lena-chan is a great model; she loves to pose for the camera when she’s aware of it, and when she’s not she has the most adorable, intent look on her face. Here she is eating some sushi. She’s checking under the fish for wasabi, since she doesn’t like it.

Lena and Lyoh are both great kids, though I may be biased as their aunt. They are quite rambunctious and can start a wrestling match in the back seat of their dad’s SUV at the drop of a hat, but they’re definitely not kids that their parents are afraid to take out to a restaurant at any time. Even when they were younger, they knew how to behave themselves. Here’s Lena-chan eating soba again when she was just 6 years old, with my mother looking on fondly. Even when she was little, she had great table manners.

I spent a weekend with my sister, her husband and the kids at Hakone, a popular resort area at the foot of Mount Fuji, in November. We ate out a lot of course, and wherever we went the kids behaved themselves impeccably. When we went to a kaiten-zushi (conveyor belt sushi) restaurant, Lyoh even ordered some special items directly to the waitress just like his dad. (Tip: if you want to be ensured of freshly made sushi at a kaiten-zushi place rather than sushi that may have been around the track several times, just put your order in for something directly.) I don’t think they are necessarily unusual - most kids in restaurants are quite well behaved, especially in Japan. But I was reminded of how jarring kids in restaurants can be the other day when I was at a cafe, where a set of parents were ignoring the fact that their kids were running around rampant. It happens in all countries, and I really think it’s all up to how the parents react. Lyoh happens to have ADD and some other problems, so he can get a bit agitated sometimes, but when that happens one of his parents talk him down quietly so that he breathes and calms down.

I love this photo of the kids that I took at Tokyo Disney. It really shows their personalities. Lena-chan is trying to pose cutely for the camera, and there’s Lyoh-kun totally ignoring it and jumping up and down, full of beans.

Another fun thing about my niece and nephew is that they both prefer washoku or Japanese food most of the time over Western food. Sure, they do beg for a Makku (Japanese slang for McDonald’s) visit sometimes as all kids do, but not that much. When we went out for breakfast at a diner-type place, the adults all ordered “morning sets” with toast, eggs, and so on, but the kids both ordered traditional Japanese style sets with rice, miso soup, pickles and fish or chicken. When I took them to Tokyo Disney back in the spring, they grew tired of eating things like Mickey Mouse shaped pastries, so their mother went out to get them some bentos, which they tucked into happily. Lena is especially fond of Japanese food. Here she’s eating some mitarashi dango.

I really miss seeing the kids at this time of year, so please excuse my rambling on about them. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours!

View the original article here