Summer is synonymous with many interesting and exciting festivals and entertainment activities. To fully enjoy this summer trip, attractive summer dishes to dispel the hot air are indispensable. Let’s check out the dishes that bring a cool, modern feeling to summer in Japan!
1. Water Drop Mochi (Mizu Shingen Mochi)
Mochi is a particularly cute Japanese candy. Mizu Shingen Mochi is made in a transparent shape, glowing like water droplets, looking extremely beautiful. This is an indispensable dish in the Japanese summer culinary tradition.
Perhaps someone thought that Mizu Shingen Mochi is made from flour or jelly? However, it is made entirely from water. It is the pinnacle of Japanese culinary art. When eaten, it gives you a cool feeling and a subtle sweet taste. The water used to make Mochi must be pure water taken from Mount Kaikoma in the Alps in Southern Japan.
2 Cool off this summer with Kakigori shaved ice
The most important ingredient of Kakigori is shaved ice, but the flavors are diverse, including syrup, fruit, or condensed milk. You can try cherry, green tea, grape, melon Kakigori… or multiple flavors at once. You can even add toppings like ice cream, purple beans, and tapioca pearls if you like. Kakigori can also be eaten with shiratama – a small Japanese mochi.
Compared to Vietnamese shaved ice, Kakigori is much smoother, it really looks like snow. The warm feeling of summer will disappear as soon as you enjoy this dish. You will easily find Kakigori in Japan, in restaurants and many eateries because it is considered a symbol of summer here.
3 Spicy Somen Noodles
Cold Somen noodles are the perfect Japanese summer food to refuel after battling the heat. Somen are very thin noodles that are carefully and repeatedly pulled. After being soaked in ice cold water, they can be served with vegetables, meat and dipped in a light dipping sauce (tsuju). These side dishes are very refreshing and can definitely be a great choice. Great for those who are tired of other greasy, heavy dishes.
Along with cold Somen noodles, in Japan there are also Udon and Soba noodles that can be cooled down with attractive, delicious flavors. These are truly dishes that help “cool down” life this summer!
4 Cool off this summer with delicious fruits for kids
One “nine-one-ten” competitor to shaved ice that we want to point out right here is ice cream. When entering a supermarket or convenience store in Japan, many foreigners will probably be impressed by the amount of ice cream there. It will not even be strange for those who have passed by an ice cream vending machine at a train station or in a Japanese park.
To create novelty and variety, ice cream can also be combined with cool summer fruits such as watermelon, avocado, strawberry,… or nuts such as green beans, purple beans,… to create cool, unique ice creams to help you cool down.
In this hot summer, there is nothing better than sitting down and enjoying a cool fruit ice cream to cool down. This is also one of the many sweet dishes that many Ussina customers love.
5 Grilled Unagi Eel
During the summer, Japanese people often have the habit of eating eel, especially on Doyo no ushi no hello (土用丑の日) – the most popular day of the year. Depending on the year, this day will change, usually falling around July – August of the year. This is one of the religious dishes in the summer of the people of the cherry blossom country. According to Japanese customs, eating eel on Doyo Ushi No Hello will help you stay healthy and flexible all year round. Eel has extremely high nutritional and mineral content, is very good for health, helps improve blood pressure, reduce cholesterol, strengthen bones…
Certainly, eel has many vitamins that can be good for your health. Sometimes vitamin B1, vitamin A, rich in EPA (a substance that reduces blood cholesterol levels), DHA and omega-3. Supplementing these vitamins regardless of summer or winter is very good for your body.
6 Cool off this summer with the cool dad Hiyayakko
Hiyayakko cold tofu is a famous dish that is indispensable in Japanese summer meals. Although it is just cold tofu mixed with spices such as shoyu soy sauce, ginger, chopped green onions and just a little bit of dried fish, Hiyayakko can stimulate the taste buds very well. You can absolutely enjoy cold tofu as a snack or eat it with rice.
Tofu is considered a healthy meal because it combines a large amount of vegetable fat and protein. Vegetable fat is a type of unsaturated fatty acid, which has the function of reducing blood ldl cholesterol. The protein in tofu has the effect of supplementing the liver diet, which is very good for people who regularly consume alcoholic beverages. Surely, tofu will not only be a dish but it seems to have become a “remedy” for the summer, right?