Deep Flavors and Versatility: The Donabe Hotpot Experience
In the distant past of most cultures there was a time when family groups ate their meals gathered around one central pot, sharing its contents in a communal manner. And while that is no longer a common dining style in many of the world’s cuisines, this dining experience is still a popular way to enjoy a meal in Japan. It is called o-nabe and consists of a variety of ingredients cooked in a traditional broth. It relies on the special qualities of the traditional cookware known as donabe (clay pot), most often used over a portable gas stove in the middle of the table. Diners often share the cooking responsibilities, and then remove cooked items onto their personal plates, to be eaten as is or dipped in various sauces.
A clay donabe pot, filled to the brim with a variety of ingredients ready to be slowly simmered over the flame of a portable gas stove in traditional family style.
From her home in Los Angeles, Naoko Takei-Moore has been on a mission to promote donabe dining for almost two decades, since an epiphany she experienced while traveling to Japan in 2006. She grew up in Japan, where o-nabe dinners were a natural part of home life, and honed her cooking skills at the Cordon Bleu culinary program in L.A. “On my trip, I had rice cooked in a particular donabe rice cooker made in the Iga region of Mie Prefecture,” she says. “I was very much moved by the difference in the taste of such a simple food.”
Naoko Takei-Moore has spent the last 20 years promoting the use of Japan’s donabe to the rest of the world. She teaches cooking classes, imports the clay pots from Japan, and offers recipes in her book and on her website.
While Japanese food was popular in many big U.S. cities, it was mostly limited to sushi, ramen, tempura, and other typical Japanese foods. Takei-Moore felt driven— “selfishly responsible,” she says—to share the joy of the donabe style of home cooking. “I became an avid donabe cook, using this simple, traditional vessel to create great rice and simple dishes.”
She began teaching donabe cooking classes, and later began her own business, Toiro, importing donabe from Japan. In 2015, she co-authored the lavishly illustrated cookbook, Donabe: Classic and Modern Japanese Clay Pot Cooking. With articles on her cooking and donabe products appearing in publications from The New York Times to the Condé Nast Traveler and Bon Appetit, she has succeeded in entering the term donabe into the culinary lexicon.
The variety of available donabe is extensive, ranging from over $1,000 to a fraction of that price. Some of the cheaper versions are made of different materials, though, and Takei-Moore recommends the hand-made ones, particularly those that come from the Iga region. Iga at one time was the bed of Lake Biwa, Japan’s largest, and so the clay contains many fossilized microorganisms. This results in an especially porous clay, which gives the clay pot its remarkable qualities. “Porous clay means it takes longer for the heat to build,” says Takei-Moore. “But once the heat is built, it stays hot for a long time. The slow heating process is essential to develop great flavor, such as umami. Even after you turn off the heat, it goes through a very slow cooling down process.”
Donabe pots made from the fine clay of the Iga region are highly prized for their porosity, which helps hold heat for a long time.
The donabe is frequently used for cooking plain white rice. The slow heating and cooling down process is ideal in giving Japanese rice a really great texture, says Takei-Moore. “We often say, ‘This rice tastes sweet,’ referring to how the flavor develops in multiple layers.”
Some Japanese prefer to cook rice in clay donabe pots, which are said to enhance the sweetness of the flavor.
But Takei-Moore is primarily interested in expanding the possibilities for donabe dishes beyond Japanese rice. The clay pot is equally adept in bringing out the flavors of ingredients through methods such as simmering and steaming. “I often tell people that there are really no rules about how and what to cook in donabe,” she says. “The only thing that you don’t want to do is any deep frying, because the clay is porous and will absorb the oil. Besides that, the sky is the limit.” Fans of donabe make up a diverse community, and she has heard of recipes ranging from Persian saffron rice and a Mexican mole sauce to a Norwegian reindeer dish. “I’ve also seen a lot of Mediterranean-style seafood dishes, which are very bright and colorful.”
Donabe come in a wide range of shapes and sizes. Their unique designs are often characteristic of the maker.
Among traditional Japanese dishes, she recommends the Japanese hotpot dish of yosenabe. The very basic broth of the yosenabe is dashi, the Japanese soup stock, which is simply seasoned by adding mirin and soy sauce. Ingredients include tofu, vegetables such as mushrooms and Napa cabbage, and a choice of protein, such as chicken, pork, or seafood that adds flavor to the broth. “I also recommend that people save the broth at the end for what we call shime, or a kind of ‘wrap up’,” says Takei-Moore. “Rice or noodles is cooked and eaten with the broth, leaving no waste at the end.”
Takei-Moore says that yosenabe dishes like this one are ideal for donabe beginners. “When it comes to yosenabe ingredients, just about anything goes,” she says.
Another popular rice-based dish introduced in her book is salmon hijiki rice. It also follows a simple recipe using cured salmon and hijiki seaweed cooked with rice in dashi. “If you want a more festive look for guests, for example, add a bit of ikura salmon roe on top,” she says. “So you get rice, protein, and seaweed, which makes it even more flavorful.”
Salmon hijiki rice cooked to perfection in a donabe.
Chili beans donabe-style are among Takei-Moore’s recommendations for western dishes. “So are a lot of stews,” she says. “I’ve even done turkey stew—adding lentils, potatoes, and kale to the leftover turkey meat from Thanksgiving and using the broth from the carcass. It turned out very good.”
A festive, post-Thanksgiving turkey stew.
Her YouTube channel features one clip on breaking in a new donabe, so we ask her to share other advice she might have, particularly having to do with cooking rice. She points out that rinsing the rice is important to remove any dust and the effects of oxidization on the surface. “But the most important thing is measuring, if you want to cook the perfect rice,” she says. “With most dishes I don’t measure much, I just eyeball a lot of things. You really need to measure the dry rice and water to get it right. Then you won’t have to worry about charring or burning the rice; just let the donabe do the work.”
In Japan, family donabe hotpots are most often served in the middle of the table, heated on portable gas stoves. According to Takei-Moore, these portable stoves are available from her on-line shop or from most Asian markets. If a stove isn’t available, the slow cooling process means that donabe can be heated over the kitchen stove and plated there, or transported to the family table. “Either way, it’s always fun when the lid is removed to reveal the contents,” she says.
The communal nature of donabe dining makes it ideal for groups of family or friends.
Her determination to spread the word about donabe has had interesting results. Some families have told her, for example, how donabe cooking has changed their lives. “I never expected such comments,” she says. “But I’ve often heard stories about how a donabe meal became like a Sunday ritual, where the family regularly gathered and shared time eating together.” For others interested in this communal experience, Takei-Moore has some simple advice: “Donabe is about making simple food taste better,” she says. “It’s not necessary to take on some complicated recipe. Just be adventurous and start with a few ingredients, maybe some tofu and vegetables. And simply enjoy the cooking.”
