In the old Japanese calendar, February 1 is the first day of spring.
It is actually very cold in February, the most cold month through a year here.
We do Setsubun event on the day, and throw beans wishing happiness and health.
At a Japanese food restaurant around the day, you may see the dish made to look like beans in box called masu of the event.
The box in the dish is made of Japanese white radish boiled with seasoned dashi soup. Soy beans for the event are baked, for dish they are boiled.
The decoration at my house had no sardine this year… I didn’t feel like eating sardine that day(^^;), and I chose saury for dinner. (Following the custom, the decoration should have a head of sardine and we eat sardine for dinner as a result.)
The decoration at my house had no sardine this year… I didn’t feel like eating sardine that day(^^;), and I chose saury for dinner. (Following the custom, the decoration should have a head of sardine and we eat sardine for dinner as a result.)
Many kinds of Fish and seafood are best eaten in this cold season.
Stems of wakame seaweed is one of in-season food now.
We ordinarily eat fronds of wakame seaweed, which are often dried or salted as preserved food.
And we can enjoy raw wakame seaweed and stems of wakame only in spring.
Speaking of food best in this season, blue crab, my special favorite(^^) , is also in season from late fall.
And sweets I recommend in this season is strawberry daifuku to foreign people.
A strawberry is wrapped in sweet white bean jam and very soft mochi (rice cake).
I think you can enjoy it if you are not familiar with the taste of Japanese sweets(wagashi).
