🍲 Hittsumi jiru(Hittsumi soup)

The central region of the prefecture has a lot of flat land in the Kitakami River basin, which has long been open to rice paddies, and the scale of rice production has been large. However, there were years when rice could not be harvested due to severe cold weather and cold damage, so barley, wheat, and buckwheat were also produced to stabilize the diet. Therefore, many dishes were prepared using rice, wheat, and buckwheat flours, and the culture of "shitonemono," a dish made by kneading the flour with water, developed. Hittsumi is one of the representative dishes, and was often eaten as an alternative to the staple food in years when the rice harvest was poor. Hittsumi" is said to be a corruption of "hittsumu," a dialect word meaning "to tear by hand," since the dough is kneaded with water and spread into a thin layer, then torn by hand and boiled. Depending on the region, it is also called "tote-nage," "hatto," or "kiribatto. Ingredients and soup stock vary from region to region and from household to household. Jidori chicken, mushrooms, river crabs, river fish, and mokuzu crab are sometimes added depending on the region.