Miso soup with sardine stock (Shiro miso no iriko dashijiru) is a simple, delicious dish with lots of flavor and texture. Traditionally served with soft cubes of silken tofu, wakame seaweed and finely chopped green onion, miso soup is one of my favorite breakfast foods. It seems to have the same waking effect as coffee for me. Even the act of preparing miso soup, or “misojiru”, is relaxing and beautiful, easing me into the morning and making the impending day a lot easier to face. Or perhaps maybe I’m an incurable foodie, addicted to the pleasures of taste and smell, and just a little bit crazy. Whatever. This is good food, people, and you’re going to learn how to make it, right now.
*This is miso soup, just to clarify. This is what you make when your miso is done fermenting. Or you can just buy some miso from the store. You also need to start this recipe the night before if you do not already have the iriko dashi handy.
What you need
- Special Equipment
- small mesh strainer (not necessary but very helpful)
- Ingredients for iriko dashi
- 1×4″ of dried konbu (kelp)
- 5 cups water
- 20 dried iriko (the 1-2 inch long tiny sardines)
- Ingredients for miso soup
- 1 (or 1.5) Tbsp white miso (shiromiso) – If you are buying this from a store, which you probably are, make sure there are only 3 ingredients: Soybeans, koji and salt. Sometimes they put alcohol, seaweed, “flavoring”, sugar, etc. and it just messes with the taste.
- 1 Tbsp dried wakame
- 1 scallion, finely chopped (or negi if available)
- 1/6 block silken tofu
- 1 cup iriko dashi
- 1 inch square piece of dried konbu dried konbu (kelp)
- 15-20 dried iriko (the 1-2 inch long tiny sardines)
What to do
Step 1 (First we make iriko dashi) – Put the konbu and iriko into the 5 cups of water and let it sit out on the counter overnight. Some cookbooks tell you to pull the heads off, claiming it will make the dashi bitter, but I’ve never experienced this. The heads are full of flavor, so why waste that? I like to soak them in a pot since we’re just going to be cooking them tomorrow morning.
Step 2 – The next morning, bring the contents of the pot to a boil. As soon as it starts to boil, remove the konbu (or it will make the stock taste all briny). Let it boil for two minutes or so, then turn off the heat. You’ve just made iriko dashi! Now, you can strain out the fish if you want, but I leave them in and eat them whole in my soup. They are delicious and full of protein and calcium. Also, since you only need about a cup of this dashi for your miso recipe, the rest freezes well if you can’t use it within a day or two.
Step 3 – Slice the tofu into cubes. I like to make the cubes tiny, but it’s up to you. Place the tofu in your soup bowl, along with the dried wakame.
Step 4 – Ladle out a cup of the hot iriko dashi into the bowl. Place the strainer over the bowl, partially submerged in the stock, and add the shiromiso. Stir the miso into the strainer with a spoon, mashing it and mixing as you go to remove any graininess and incorporate the miso with the dashi. When the miso has dissolved, remove the strainer. If there are bits of undissolved miso in the strainer I just scoop them right into the soup.
Step 5 – Garnish with green onions and serve! The miso will reconstitute the dried wakame in a few seconds. If you wish to add more cooked iriko from the stock, go right ahead.
Variations
Shiro miso no iriko dashijiru has a ton of variation, but my favorite is to use the konbu, thinly sliced, and the leftover iriko from the dashi. もったいない！(‘Mottainai’ roughly translates to ‘nothing gets wasted’ and is a central concept around traditional Japanese cooking.) As far as other variation, I am fairly certain you can add any meat, veggie, grain and most fruit to miso and it will taste awesome. I like adding sliced tomato, avocado, boiled cabbage, mushrooms – honestly the list is endless.
If you have some “strange” thing you add to your breakfast miso (like Cheerios or Totinos pizza rolls or something) let me know in the comments below! Even if you don’t add any weird stuff, I’d like to know if you try this recipe and like it (or hate it). Enjoy :)
Hi,
Just stumbled upon your entry by chance while enjoying my afternoon bowl of miso with buckwheat (russian kasha) and a handful of shelled edemame – nothing gets wasted, right? :)
I am a huge japanese food fan and there aren’t many well-written things on the subject, so thank you for sharing.
Best,
Mayya
[Reply]
Mathias Purtlebaugh Reply:
September 4th, 2010 at 2:22 pm
Thank you for commenting! Kasha and edamame in miso sounds good, except I am severely allergic to buckwheat, so I would need to substitute another hearty, similar grain. Maybe barley?. I had trouble finding good info on traditional Japanese food for years, which is why I started this blog, so I’m glad you enjoy it :)
[Reply]