Since time immemorial, people have racked their brains contemplating how to get adequate nutrition for living. They obtained foods through hunting and agriculture and found ways to preserve the foods for times of shortage. The oldest method of preserving foods was drying. By exposing foods to the sun to remove water, they were able to inhibit the growth of bacteria that causes decomposition, thereby preserving foods for the long-term.
Grains and legumes, including rice, wheat/barley, corn, beans have been preserved throughout the world by drying since early times. Accordingly, dried meat was made in the regions where people mainly ate meat, while dried fish and seafood were made in coastal areas.
In Japan, there are a lot of different varieties of dried foods and many of them are the traditional foods essential to our daily meal. We collectively call these traditional dried foods kanbutsu. Examples of kanbutsu include: seafood such as dried abalones and scallops, katsuobushi (dried bonito) and surume (dried squid), seaweeds such as kombu, hijiki, nori, grains like soba and udon, vegetables such as dried shiitake mushroom, kanpyo (dried gourd strips), kiriboshi daikon (dried radish strips), and many more. They are all blessings of the sun, the mountain, and the sea.
For the Japanese, kanbutsu provide benefits beyond just preserved foods. Firstly, they are premium food items, some of which are essential for special ceremonial occasions. Secondly, they work as magic seasonings that enhance the flavor of your dish. And further, they are considered natural supplements with nutrients that are essential for health and whose value is found to be increasing.
Long ago, Japanese people who believed in countless kami (gods) built shrines all over the country where they conducted Shinto rituals including festivals and misogi and harai purifications. Making an offering to the kami is an essential part of the rituals. In Shinto, the offerings are referred to as shinsen (or mike) and many such items are kanbutsu. Items included in the offering vary by shrine, and usually foods in season in the region and local specialties were chosen. Shinsen, offered to the kami during the ritual, are consumed by all participants with the offered sacred sake during the ceremony called naorai, which means feast. Naturally, since foods that kept well were chosen as shinsen, many of them were kanbutsu dried foods. After the Kofun period (250 to 600 AD), processed dried foods, especially dried bonito and kombu, were highly valued as tributes to the Emperor. As premium foods, many kanbutsu later were developed to be used for trading with foreign countries.
On the other hand, Japanese people hadn’t eaten meats for a long time. Meats contain a lot of inosinic acid, which produces the taste of umami, but the Japanese as non-meat eaters extracted alternative umami tastes mainly from kanbutsu. Kombu, katsuobushi, niboshi, dried shiitake mushrooms are examples and they are also known as dashi stock ingredients. The Japanese word umami is now used worldwide. Because those who found the fifth taste after sweetness, sourness, saltiness and bitterness were Japanese researchers – they found umami constituents such as glutamic acid, inosinic acid, and guanylic acid from kombu, katsuobushi and shiitake mushrooms, respectively. Restaurants in many cities of Japan now receive outstanding evaluation marks from Michelin Guide. Could this be because the Japanese have a sense of mastering umami? I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that kanbutsu play a part in such an excellent reputation.
Since kanbutsu fully absorb sunlight and their water is removed, their nutrients are highly concentrated and enriched compared to raw ingredients. For example, seaweeds such as kombu, hijiki and nori contain plenty of minerals including calcium, potassium and iron. Dried shiitake mushrooms contain ten times as much vitamin D as raw ones. Kiriboshi daikon contains rich amounts of dietary fiber as well as vitamins and minerals. For contemporary Japanese whose dietary habits have been largely Westernized and who live a busy life, kanbutsu is the ideal food ingredient for receiving the nutrients they need. Kanbutsu are absolutely natural supplements.
I would like to show you some of the Japanese kanbutsu, each of which has its history and episodes, in the next few blogs.
Reported by Yukari Aoike, Sugahara Institute