Mochi

[andiesenji]

I am not sure it is limited to sweet mochi which is the reason I was asking.

I am working on a list and it is proving a lot harder than I thought! and I hadn't even taken into account the non-sweet mochi types....

There are so many varieties of the traditional mochi made in Japan, and then there are the non-traditional varieties that are made in Hawaii, with taro, and even more in the Phillipines.

One friend who was from Okinawa would go back home for a visit every two or three years and would bring back goodies, including a type of mochi filled with sweet potato candy. It had a brown crust that looked like it had been deep fried. Unfortunately I don't remember the name.

I like the savory mochi, wrapped in nori, seasoned with sauces, better than the sweets.

There is a great cookbook for Hawaiian Mochi recipes, by Jean Watanabe.

Hawaii's Best Mochi Recipes, if anyone is interested it is available here:

http://www.janmstore.com/lesyampichaw.html

[Hiroyuki]

Let me limit my talk to mochi sweets.

The following list is based on this site:

http://www.kanshundo.co.jp/museum/yogo/jiten.htm

1st item: Sakura mochi (rice cake wrapped in a salted cherry leaf)

2nd: Warabi mochi/kuzu mochi (made from some kind of starch, not mochi-gome)

7th: Kashiwa mochi (rice cake wrapped in an oak leaf)

9th: Kusa mochi (rice cake mixed with smashed mugwort leaves)

10th: Bota mochi (cooked rice slightly pounded and covered with an, kinako (soybean flour), etc.)

Other types:

Uguisu mochi (rice cake dusted with green soybean flour (or other types of bean flour))

http://www12.plala.or.jp/VanillaBeans/japan_ugui.html

http://www.kaho-fukuoka.co.jp/saijiki/2003-02/uguisumo.html

Kanoko mochi (rice cake containing sweetened azuki beans (or other types of beans)

http://www.curio-city.com/fuwafuku/638/7099.html

Tsubaki mochi (rice cake with a camellia leave on top? I've never seen or eaten one)

http://www.toraya-group.co.jp/gallery/dat02/dat02_004.html

Several types of daifuku:

http://www.iwasaki-dango.co.jp/daifuku.html

Starting with the top and moving clockwise,

Goma (sesame), white, yuzu (type of citrus fruit), mame (bean), tochi no mi (Japanese horse chestnut), and kusa (mugwort leave) daifuku.

Phew! This post is not at all exhaustive, but this is about all I can do about mochi sweets.

***

Gohei mochi is another type of mochi, made from uruchi mai (ordinary rice), not mochi gome (glutinous rice).

Edited June 19, 2004 by Hiroyuki (log)

[GaijinGirl]

Well, actually, I'm interested in any kind of mochi (although I have to confess that it's the sweet mochi that I care about the most).

Hmmmm...I absolutely *have* get a list of all the different types/permutations of mochi that exist. The only things that I've seen in NYC stores are daifuku with sweet bean paste, kinako, and dango. Due to what I've seen on Egullet, I've been experimenting with microwaving up some mochi and dipping the concoction into soy sauce for a homemade savory version. (I've tried mixing the dough and boiling it, but it's way too darned sticky to touch and get into decent shaped mochi balls...)!

[andiesenji]

it's way too darned sticky to touch and get into decent shaped mochi balls...)!

If you portion it out with a #30 scooper, onto a sheet pan in which you have scattered a layer of sweet rice flour. You can then put on a pair of the snug food-handler gloves, pat the gloves in the rice flour and roll the mochi between your palms. With the little scooper you will have portions all the same size and the rice flour makes it easier to handle the mochi.

[torakris]

Yesterday my neighbors were talking about ayu mochi. Ayu, known as sweetfish in English, is a very popular fish in Japan and this is a mochi sweet (I think filled with an) that is shaped like an ayu. I couldn't find too much information about it but did come up with one picture:

http://www.hirutanigaoe.com/shimura/image/Dscf0016.jpg

[torakris]

This question of how many kinds of mochi has really gotten to me I like things perfectly organized, this was wonderful when I was working as a reference librarian, and I am having a really hard time categorizing mochi!! You should see how many pages in my notebook I have gone through with various notes.....

I have come up with 6 main categories:

1. things made with mochi rice in the actual rice form

2. things made with mochi rice that has been steamed, pounded and formed into shapes

3. things made with mochi-ko, mochi rice that has been washed, ground and dried

4. things made with shiratama-ko, mochi rice that has been soaked, smashed, rinsed and dried

5. things made with doumyouji-ko, mochi rice that has been steamed, dried and then cut into tiny pieces

6. things not made with mochi but have mochi in the name

Most of these have both sweet and savory applications and know to break them down one at a time......

[torakris]

I am still working on ways to break these mochi into categories, probably start by breaking eat main category into sweet or savory but then from there you have cooked (usually steamed), pounded, filled, coated, etc...

Some others that are probably their own category are mochi made by being mixed with another food stuff, like kusamochi (mugwort), others include, kurumi mochi (walnut), awamochi (millet), and tochimochi (horse chestnut). a picture is here:

http://www.gokayama-gt.com/menu/aji/Tochimochi.html

[torakris]

still making no headway in the catefories department, but I just finished eating some zunda-mochi, a ball of mochi surrounded with sweetened edamame paste.

These are really popular now and will be for the rest of summer as it is edamame season.

In the store today I saw an interesting daifuku, it was called cheese daifuku and it didn't say what kind of cheese it was filled with but it also had rum raisins inside.....

I don't like rum raisins or sweetened cheese things so I passed on it.

[melonpan]

komochi image

i have seen the above sold at the grocery market. it is labeled as komochi. what is it and how is it served?

[Hiroyuki]

Tokyo (where I was born and bred) and Niigata (where I live at present) are both in the kakumochi (rectangular mochi) culture area. On the other hand, Osaka and Kyoto are in the marumochi (round mochi) culture area.

I have never heard of, seen, or eaten komochi (lit. small mochi).

Some sites use the terms komochi and marumochi interchangeably. One site says that komochi were given away to family members and servants on New Year's Day.

Some sites like this one

http://www.betterhome.jp/shop/oishi03huyuharu/106/106.html

make a distinction between marumochi and maru komochi (round, small mochi), but I can't tell their difference from the pictures.

So, I can't really tell you what komochi are, but I guess that they can be used just like maru mochi (grill, boil, etc.).

[Hiroyuki]

If anyone is interested,

Chart showing zouni culture areas in Japan

http://www.konishi.co.jp/html/fujiyama/zou.../zouni_map.html

Explanation of symbols (from top to right):

Kakumochi, grilled

Kakumochi, boiled

Marumochi, grilled

Marumochi, boiled

An mochi (mochi with anko in it), boiled

Red miso soup

Sumashi (light soup)

White miso soup

Azuki bean soup

Zouni is a type of soup with mochi in in, eaten on New Year's Holidays.

[v. gautam]

Have 2 very ignorant questions:

1) helenjp speaks of mochi-grade millet and awa-mochi: could you please explain what mochi-grade millet would be, and elaborate a little on this particular dish, which sounds wonderful. Could it be made from ingredients available in the US?

2 a) our local markets stock refrigerated, rectangular packages of mochi that look grayish and seem to be pretty hard. How would one go about using this form in sweet and savory dishes?

2b) our local asian grocery stocks what they call cantonese shao bing, which is a mochi cake filled with sweet bean paste, probably pan-fried; to eat, one needs to heat it up a bit. if left too long in the microwave oven, it baloons up and collapses. i would like to learn some more about making these, that are quite different to another sweet called beijing shao bing sold at he same place, but made of flour and whatnot.

[torakris]

2 a) our local markets stock refrigerated, rectangular packages of mochi that look grayish and seem to be pretty hard.  How would one go about using this form in sweet and savory dishes?

←

I can help with this one, those are probably dried mochi cakes and best way to serve them is either grilled or deep fried, there are many variations but teh most common being soy sauce and nori for savory and either anko (red bean paste) or kinako (ground roasted soy bean powder).

here are some pictures and recipes:

http://www.bob-an.com/recipe/dailyjc/ref/mochi/mochi.html

[dougery]

Ahhh Mochi! One of my most favorite foods of all time!!

roasted with shoyu and nori is my favorite way to eat it.

roasted in hot water with salt OR w/hot water and ochazuke

I can eat mochi all day long!

My cousin owns a mochi factory in Japan and he knows I am quite fond of mochi. My mother thinks it is hillarious that at Christmas time he sends me a box of mochi.

[Kiem Hwa]

Recently, on a trip to Japan (in Nara), I discovered the heaven that is freshly pounded mochi. It was warm and delicately soft, with tsubushian (red beans) inside, colored green with yomogi, and dipped in Kinako.

Then I realized that my fiance's mother has a large stone usu (pounding bowl) and heavy wooden mallet (kine) in the garage that hasn't been used in years (last user...probably my fiance's grandmother).

So Ive decided Im going to inherit these items and teach myself how to do mochi pounding, since my fiance and his mother dont know how. Has anyone done this and any suggestions?? Is it really as simple as it sounds (see weblink below)?

My usu and kine look just like the one in this picture:

http://web-japan.org/kidsweb/cook/feature/occ_12.html

[Palladion]

I pounded a bit of the old mochi at a festival at my school a month and a half ago. They had quite a setup:

First: a few outdoor rice steamers, sort of like kama pots, with wood burning beneath them. This was, obviously, to steam the mochi rice.

After steaming, the cooked rice was unloaded into a large, blender-like contraption. It ran through the machine for a while, and the small spinning blade did the initially work of

After that, the rice glob was transfered to the usu to be pounded. This was a two person task: one to swing the mallet, the other to turn the rice after each blow. They had to work up a good rhythm -- you definitely do not want your hand to get whacked by the mallet. Every once in a while, they would stop to feel the rice, sometimes adding a little water. This would continue until they judged the rice thouroughly pounded.

I took a few pictures at the event. I'll look through them tomorrow and see if there are any of particular interest.

-------

Alex Parker

[Kiem Hwa]

Cool....did you have to do anything to the usu to keep the mochi from sticking to it?

The guys I saw pounding mochi in Nara had 3 guys pounding in a rhythm, they'd pound for a few rounds, then turn the mochi.

Cant wait to see the pics:)

[MomOfLittleFoodies]

The Buddhist temple that my mother's family attends does mochitsuki every year. The first batch and last batch of the day are always pounded by hand, using improvised usu (big metal mixing bowls set in concrete inside galvanized steel wash tubs) and traditional kine. All of the batches between get the usu/kine treatment, then get run though machines and hand rolled.

The Buddhist temple my husbands family goes to sometimes has a mochitsuki demonstration for the Sunday school a couple of weeks after New Years, using my in-laws stone usu and another family's kine.

[Hiroyuki]

Assuming that your fiance can read Japanese, I think that the following two links will provide all the necessary information for mochi making. Mochi making is roughly divided into steaming, kneading, and pounding processes, of which the kneading process is the most strenuous and is often neglected. Without sufficient kneading, grains of rice will scatter around as you pound it.

http://www.octv.ne.jp/~fly_fly/omake2/december.html

http://aosuji.hp.infoseek.co.jp/motitsuki.htm

I think that store-bought mochi can be as good as just pounded mochi if you just put it in a container, add a small amount of water, wrap it, and heat it in a microwave.

[Palladion]

Errm, I guess I didn't take any pictures of the pounding process. I thought I had...

Sorry. But I did take this picture of the rice steaming setup that they had:

Mochi making is roughly divided into steaming, kneading, and pounding processes, of which the kneading process is the most strenuous and is often neglected.  Without sufficient kneading, grains of rice will scatter around as you pound it.

←

That blender-like device that I had mentioned earlier (it was bigger and heavy, with a small, high-powered spinner in the middle) was used to knead the rice at the festival I attended.

-------

Alex Parker

[torakris]

I don't know anyone who pounds rice at home....

I see it normally at schools and festivals, most people use these:

http://www.toshiba.co.jp/webcata/cooker/pfc_20fk.htm

nowadays.

a mochitsuki machine that will do all the work for you! it also doubles as a bread machine.

[Kiem Hwa]

Hiroyuki,

Thank you so much for those links above, unfortunately, my fiance is yon-sei (4th generation Japanese raised in Hawaii) and he and his mother can only read hiragana, and Ive forgotten most of my Kanji, but the pics are really helpful anyways.

One question though, on the website it has a picture of the usu and kine...soaking in water from the day before?

木臼の場合は、前日から水をはっておく。（石臼の場合は、必要なし）

当日、始まる前から湯を貯めておき臼を暖める。（もちがさめないように）

Well, this weekend I am going to go for it! Ill post pics if it works out!

Edited November 25, 2004 by Kiem Hwa (log)

[Hiroyuki]

木臼の場合は、前日から水をはっておく。（石臼の場合は、必要なし）

当日、始まる前から湯を貯めておき臼を暖める。（もちがさめないように）

←

The Japanese is translated as follows:

For a wooden usu, you must put water (in the concave portion) the day before. (For a stone usu, you need not.)

On the day (of mochi pounding), put in hot water to warm the usu before you begin (so that the mochi doesn't get cool).

How much mochi rice are you going to use? The standard amount of mochi rice for one batch is 2 shou, i.e., approximately 2.8 kg, as one of the sites says. Maybe you may want to start with a smaller amount, say, 1 shou (1.4 kg).

[Kiem Hwa]

So I did it...pounded mochi for my first time, that is. Actually, my MIL told her cousin about our plans, and it turns out one of his friends pounds mochi every New Years (and now that we have been talking about it, we have found ALOT of people around here who do it every New Years).

Well, my MIL's cousin's friend was so excited about it, he loaded up his truck with his burner and drove over here to give us a demo. Well, even though he ended up doing all the pounding, I learned alot, also that the first try is never very successful...

I have to say, the most difficult part was getting it all pounded to the desired consistency before it cooled off too much.

Also, our kine (pounder) splintered whenever we hit the stone and not the mochi ball, so we ended up with some very "fibrous and....nutritious" mochi. Well, I did put my dried yomogi into the second batch to make it green, and we stuffed them with tsubushian, and dipped them into kinako....

So in the end, I cant say it was anywhere near the wonderful mochi I had in Nara, but its a start and we will do it again on New Years!

Mochi..the final product

Steaming the rice on the stove in an old wooden steamer:

Inside the wooden steamer

Edited December 1, 2004 by slkinsey (log)

[Hiroyuki]

In Japan, we have this saying, mochi wa mochi-ya.

●餅は餅屋

[英訳] For rice cakes, go to a rice-cake maker.

From here

http://www8.plala.or.jp/y-naka/kotowaza-mo.html