Our Planet

Text : Saeko Imai

It had been a month and a half since the seeds of Daikon has been sowed on the garden beds, made in October. There became a field of daikons! For J-kun, pulling out daikons is a fun activity. He pulls them out, cuts and boils them and makes daikon-nabe by himself.

 

“Hey! Don’t cook them! We are saving some for takuan (pickled daikons)”, said K-chan. That’s right, we are starting a nukazuke project in Akebi.
*nukazuke is a type of Japanese preserved food, made by fermenting vegetables in rice bran (nuka).
The daikons that were left were dried outside of Akebi window. Eventually, all the water in the vegetable dried out and the daikons became much smaller. Children observed and said “It is very wrinkly, like a grandma”, “why did they become so small?”. The daikons that looked significantly different from the day they were dried eventually came down in the middle of January.

Y‐chan , A‐chan, K‐chan and E‐chan then went to Kopia to purchase the ingredients for nukazuke. “Salt, kombu, bonito, and pepper. Salt, kombu, bonito and pepper”, they said as if it were a spell on their way to the supermarket. They all looked very excited.
On the very morning of making Nukadoko, we talked about microbes during the morning gathering. “Microbes and fungi exist everywhere. They are very very small and you can’t’ always see them but they make the vegetable very delicious!”, I said as children listened closely. “Just like miso!”, said K-chan.
S-kun, K‐chan, M‐chan and R-kun mixed the rice bran and the ingredients we have purchased from Kopia. The way folded their sleeves made them look so reliable! For two weeks, each person mixed the bran and the ingredients very well. The takuans we made from scratch, they were a bit salty but were certainly delicious!