How to make Cold Miso Soup (HIYA-JIRU) 〜冷や汁〜 | easy Japanese home cooking recipe

Welcome to Taiju's Kitchen. Today I'm going to show you how to make Hiyajiru. So in the last two videos I made summer dishes, somen noodle and soba noodle. And as I was talking to my friends, one of them suggested this recipe. So what this Hiyajiru is, it's a cold miso soup. Kind of similar to Lassi Tuuyu from Spain, or Vicious Laws from France. But in Japan we have this cold miso soup. And this is actually more of a regional recipe from Yamaguchi, I think. Western part of Japan. I actually never eaten this myself when I was in Japan. But I knew of it, so I gave it a try. And this is also more of a home recipe, something you make at home. I couldn't really imagine this having served in some kind of restaurants. And I thought it might be very interesting to show you guys, especially in this really hot summer. And depending on what you put inside, you can make this definitely vegetarian or vegan. And for this it requires really no special ingredients. And it's also very easy, and it's just perfect for this hot summer. So I hope you give this a try yourself. Then, let's get started. Here are the ingredients for Hiyajiru. Today I'll be making my own dashi stock using kombu kelp and bonito flakes. Because I want to make it a little more authentic. But if you're going to be lazy and use these dashi powder, that's also fine. Then you don't have to do any cooking. And for the ingredients I have tofu. I personally like the firm tofu, but whatever tofu you can find is fine. And I also canned tuna. Make sure you get these tuna canned not in oil, but instead in water or stock. Because traditionally it'll be made with what's called himono, semi-dried fish. Those are cooked and you'll be using just the meat of that fish. But those are not easy to find outside Japan. But today I'll be using these canned tuna fish as an alternative. Then for the condiments I have scallion or green onion, and a cucumber, and roasted sesame seeds. Traditionally for this Hiyajiru, you also have two other condiments. One is shiso leaves and the other is myoga, which is also known as Japanese ginger flower buds. Those are usually not easy to find outside Japan, so I'm going to be skipping those. But if you can get access to those, then definitely get those. And for the seasoning I have just regular miso. Any miso will do. Then let's start cooking. Let's first cut up the condiments. So scallion, just as usual, I'm going to cut up in thin slices. Then let's cut up the cucumber, also in thin slices. I'm cutting up with a knife, but if you have a slicer, that's also fine. So I'm going to first get rid of this water. And today I'll just probably need a fourth of this. For some reason, for this recipe, Hiyajiru, it's quite common to not cut them up in dices. Just kind of break it apart with your hands. Just like this in bite-sized pieces. So as the last thing, I'm going to grind up the roasted sesame. So make sure you have roasted sesame seeds. If you have just regular sesame seeds, you can look at my other video on Japanese side dishes and show me how to roast it yourself. Please check that out as well. Then I have here a Japanese style mortar, but usually you don't have these. Then what you can do is you can just crush it up with your fingers like this. Or if you have a blender or a food processor, you can grind these in those as well. So probably about a tablespoon or so. So then this is finished. It's a little trivial for the sesame seeds. Sesame seeds have a lot of nutrients in them, but they don't get digested unless you break the seed pods. So if you want to get the nutrients from the sesame seeds, you want to crush it like this or make sure you chew every bite, every seed. Otherwise it'll just come out on the other end undigested. Then all the ingredients and the condiments are finished. Then let's make the dashi stock. If you want to see more in detail of how to make dashi stock, then please watch my other video on that. So today I'm just going to go really quickly on how to make dashi. So this kombu kelp, if you want to get a really good flavor out of it, you want to let it soak in water for at least 12 hours or so. And that's what I have here. I have this kombu kelp soaked in water since last night. And today I have here two cups of water and for that, five grams of kombu kelp. Then I'm going to turn the heat to medium and let this warm up. You want to make sure you don't boil the kombu kelp. Then while we're waiting for this, let's measure the morito flakes. So for about two cups of water, I'm going to use about 10 to 15 grams of morito flakes. So perfectly 15 grams. So as this is kind of, bubbles forming, right before boil, I'm going to take away the kombu kelp. And don't throw away these kombu kelp. These still have a little flavor, you can eat as it is. Or you can also make another small side dish called tsukudani. If you want to know how to make that, please check that as well. Then I'm going to bring this to boil. Then once this comes to a boil, I'm going to turn the heat off. And then here I'm going to put in all the morito flakes. So I'm going to let this sit untouched for about a minute or so. And let this flavor out in the stock. So about a minute has passed, I'm going to drain this. So using a colander like this. And I'm also going to use a clean kitchen paper. And then drain this here. And you want to drain like this on its own weight. Then this is finished for the dashi stock. So today I'm going to use this cold. So I'm going to put it in a separate container. Then I'm going to put this aside and let it cool off. Once it got cooled down to room temperature, I'm going to put it in the fridge. And make it really cold. So the next step, you don't necessarily really have to do this. But it's something we do only for the hiyajiro somehow. And that is to roast the miso paste. So to do that, traditionally we put on the miso paste on a spatula like this. Make sure you don't use a plastic spatula. And then you roast it and open fire. But I don't want to burn this. So I'm going to first coat it with aluminum foil. And just wrap around like this. I'm going to put the miso on the surface of this. So today I'm going to be using one tablespoon. So I'm just going to let this spread on the surface of this spatula. So just like this is fine. And then you have a burner like this. Then you can use that as well of course. So you can burn it on the surface like this. But if you don't have a burner and instead you have a gas stove like this. Then you can just roast this here as well. So then this is finished. Oh it smells so good. The roasted miso has a really good smoky aroma to it. So if you want to give this little smoky flavor to it. Then I suggest you give it a try. When you have neither the burner or the open flame gas stove. You can just spread out the miso on a flat aluminum foil. And roast it in just a regular oven for like 5 to 10 minutes. That'll also do the job. Then let's put everything together. So in a pot I'm going to put in one cup of dashi stock. If you're not going to make your own dashi stock. Then you can just put one cup of water and 2.5 grams of dashi powder instead. Then this I'm going to put in about 40 to 50 grams of canned tuna. So like I said make sure you get the tuna not in oil but instead in water. So it doesn't say anything on the can itself. But this is an 80 gram can so I'm going to put in half of this. And I'm also going to put a little bit of juice of this as well. Then there's all the tofu. And here also the cucumbers. Probably half of this. And this I'm going to put this roasted miso. To make sure it'll be dissolved everything. I'm going to use a small colander like this. And I'm going to try to scrape everything out. So in this way you can also take out this black burnt part. Because supposedly the burnt part is not very healthy. But these are crushed beans so these part I'm going to put in. And this black part I can take it out. Then here all the ground up roasted sesame seeds. And then probably also half of this scallion. And this is the finish for the hiju. Let's put it in a bowl. So any bowl like this is fine. And here I'm going to put some ice cubes just to make it extra cold. Add a little scallion in the middle just to make it look good. And this is finished for the hiju. Let's eat. Okay let's eat. So with a miso soup like this I will have to slurp. Unless you're using a spoon. So in Japanese culture it's very typical to slurp the soup. So I warn you beforehand. And if the sound of slurping really bothers you please skip to the end. Oh this dashi stock is so totally great. Okay let's try to get everything. Oh it's so very delicious. And in a hot summer you don't really have a big appetite for something really hot or something. So this cold miso soup is just really perfect for the hot summer. And now I'm going to show you something that is actually against the Japanese table manner. And considered kind of low class or B grade. But at the same time many people do. My grandmother actually loved this when she was still alive. And that is putting the miso soup in the rice. This is kind of considered really low class. But it actually tastes good. And especially for the hiju it's also a common way to eat this. So I'm gonna put in here like this. And then we're just gonna mix it up like this. So in your eyes this may not look good at all. But it's actually very delicious. Yeah let's put everything in. And if you like it spicy you can put a little chili in it. It'll give a little kick to it. So with a little bit chili. Also good flavor. Oh that was so totally delicious. That was really tasty. So as you saw making this hiju is actually quite very easy. Especially if you don't make the dashi yourself. And even if you did it'll take just about 10-15 minutes more at the most. And except for the dashi there's no really special ingredients for this. So in this hot summer have give this a try yourself. If you enjoyed what you saw. I'd love it if you could hit the like button for me. So this video can be spread out to many people. And if you have any questions or any feedback. Love it if you could write anything in the comments below. I always always really enjoy reading them. Otherwise I look forward to see you in the next video. Bye.