Miyagi

A rice-cake soup unique to Sendai, with roasted and dried haze broth, perfected by full flavours of vegetables

Sendai Zouni

The soup of Sendai Zouni is based on the broth of haze gobioid fish from Matsushima Bay. A few pieces of roasted and dried haze are bundled with straw and put at store fronts as it gets closer to the end of a year. It is customary in Miyagi to hang them under eaves before cooking. The traditional recipe is to cut daikon radish, carrots and gobo burdock into strips, boil them, and leave them outside overnight so that they are frozen and dried. Put a piece of haze in a pot of water, slowly simmer to make broth, and carefully take the fish out of the soup as it is an important decoration to the dish. Then add to the broth the vegetables and dried karatori taro roots (hydrated and cut into pieces), and finish off by seasoning it with soy sauce. Put a grilled rice cake and haze in a bowl, add the vegetables and soup, and garnish it with salmon roe and Japanese parsley.