🍱 Koayu-no-sanshoni

“Koayu-no-sanshoni” is a dish that has been handed down since ancient times. Koayu, a specialty of Lake Biwa which can be caught from May to early August, is used to make a sweet and salty tsukudani. Koayu, moroko, gori, and other fish are used for lake fish tsukudani. Freshwater fish have a unique odor, so ginger and Japanese pepper are often boiled together to eliminate that odor. In addition, care has been taken to prevent it from falling apart while simmering, such as using starch syrup and not turning the pot over. The method of cooking this lake fish tsukudani differs depending on the region and household, so each family can bring its own tsukudani and enjoy the taste of each family's version. In 1998, lake fish tsukudani was selected as a “property of Shiga's food culture,” an intangible folk cultural property of Shiga Prefecture. The ayu that live in Lake Biwa grow only to about 7 cm in length due to the food they eat, so they are called koayu. The texture is also soft, making it an easy-to-eat fish. When koayu in Lake Biwa go upstream, they eat sphagnum moss and grow to a size of about 20 cm, so from long ago, fry have been shipped all over the country and released into rivers.