Untangling My Chopsticks (8 page)

Makes 5 cups

FOR SECOND
/
SECONDARY DASHI

Place the reserved kelp and bonito flakes in 8 cups cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 30 minutes. Strain the broth through a cheesecloth-lined sieve, pushing down on the solids before discarding them.

Makes 6 cups

To grind seeds, nuts, and herbs into a fine paste, the Japanese use a
suribachi,
a ceramic bowl with an unglazed fine-combed interior, and a special wooden stick with a rounded end. A small food processor is a fine substitute (and much less work!).

• ½ cup toasted unhulled white sesame seeds
  

• 2 tablespoons sweet white miso (shiro miso)
  

• 2 tablespoons mirin
  

• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
  

• 2 teaspoons rice vinegar
  

• 1½ teaspoons sugar
  

• ½ cup dashi (
  page 48
  )
  

Place the sesame seeds in a suribachi and grind until very flaky. Alternatively, place in a food processor and process until pasty. Blend in the miso, mirin, soy sauce, vinegar, and sugar until smooth. Blend in the dashi. Transfer the sauce to six small decorative bowls.

Makes enough for 6 sauce bowls

Sansho
is a tongue-tingling spice made from the ground seedpod of the Japanese prickly ash. We have no Western equivalent of this aromatic ingredient, which often pairs with fatty foods, such as beef, to cut the richness.

½ cup soy sauce ¼ cup yuzu (available bottled in Japanese markets), or fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon grated daikon radish

1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil

Pinch hot pepper flakes

Pinch sansho

Combine the soy sauce, yuzu or lemon juice, grated radish, sesame oil, pepper flakes, and sansho in a small bowl. Transfer the sauce to six small decorative bowls.

Makes enough for 6 sauce bowls

5.

oon after arriving, I realized the Tourist Information Center (TIC) in downtown Kyoto was
the
place to find answers to any questions I might have about the city. Run by the Japan National Tourist Organization, the small office had scores of pamphlets and desk clerks to guide visitors to Kyoto's finest
ryokan
(traditional inns), the sake breweries in the southern district of Fushimi, and numerous other delights, including choice places to sample authentic Kyoto cuisine.

This last category, I discovered, consists of four distinct styles of cooking: Buddhist vegetarian food (called
shojin ryori
); tea kaiseki (an offshoot of shojin ryori); restaurant kaiseki (a variant of tea kaiseki); and
Kyo-ryori
(literally, “Kyoto cooking”), known for its delicately seasoned dishes made from local specialties, in
cluding tender wheat gluten, white miso, and
yuba,
the custardy skin that is skimmed off simmering soymilk.

I had stopped by TIC one dry bright November morning to locate the names of several schools where I might teach conversational English and study tea kaiseki. There were two women working behind the office's counter. One was helping a bearded gentleman with an Australian accent find his way to the nearby city of Nara. The other was an attractive woman in her forties. She was on the phone and her black bob was doing just that, bouncing up and down as she chatted into the receiver. I waited for her to hang up and then asked her if she had a list of schools where I might teach English.

“Just a minute, please,” said the woman, then headed over to the back wall lined with thick blue binders. She pulled one down, clicked it open, and returned with a list of English conversation schools in Kyoto and Osaka.

“It's not easy to find work here,” she said, pursing her lips. “Everyone wants to work in Kyoto. And you,” she said, glancing at the door, “are quite late. The Japanese school year begins in April.”

I felt deflated. “Wait until you get to Japan to find a job,” cautioned a friend, who had recently returned from teaching in Tokyo. “Schools in Japan know you want security, so they charge you for that. You'll earn a fraction of what you could if you sign the contract in person.” I took a different tack.

“How about a list of schools where I might study tea kaiseki?”

“Tea kaiseki?” she said, her brows lifting. “Maybe you want to eat kaiseki?”

I paused. “No, actually, I am interested in studying tea kaiseki.”

“Hmmm, tea kaiseki,” said the woman, tapping her fingers on her lips as if to play a little tune. “That is very difficult. Wait a minute, please.” She disappeared into the back office. I could hear cabinets sliding open. People talking. She reappeared.

“You say you want to study tea kaiseki?” she asked again, as if I hadn't answered her correctly the first time.

“Yes, I was told it originated in Kyoto.”

“I see.” She looked at me for a moment before speaking. “Maybe you want to study the tea ceremony?” I knew why she was confused. Most foreigners come to Kyoto to study the tea ceremony, not tea kaiseki. They enroll in full-time programs to study tea, which includes classes on tea kaiseki. I asked her if that was necessary.

“Just a minute, please.” She stepped into the back office again. I heard more talking. Someone dialed a phone. Several minutes passed and then the woman emerged.

“There is a school called Mushanokoji that offers just tea kaiseki classes. But you'll need an introduction and classes are very expensive.” Her eyes narrowed. “They are also taught in Japanese. Do you speak Japanese?”

“
Sukoshi
(a little),” I said, squeezing my index finger and thumb together in the air. She was hardly impressed. Nor should she have been, really. I had only gotten to page ten in my
Japanese for Beginners
book and tape set I had bought three weeks before leaving for Japan.

I jotted down the name of the tea school and slid it into my knapsack, along with the list of language schools. The woman reached for the phone.

“Thank you for all your help,” I said with a little bow. The woman's hand hovered over the receiver.

“Is there anything else?”

“No, thank you so much for all your time.” She bobbed her head, then began to dial, while I helped myself to a map of Kyoto and left the office.

Back on the sidewalk I stood in the sun for several seconds gathering my thoughts. Then, swinging my knapsack over my shoulders, I headed uptown with a renewed sense of purpose. I had a list of English conversation schools. I had the name of a tea kaiseki school. Now all I needed was an introduction.

It was Florence Harada who helped provide me with the introduction. The wife of one of my father's college roommates, she was a wealthy urbane Japanese woman married to an American diplomat and living in Kyoto. In addition to speaking perfect English, she understood the American culture and the art of networking.

I met her for tea one fall afternoon toward the end of November in her modern ranch-style home, surrounded by
bonsai,
with huge picture windows that looked out over the city. I had just come from my first Japanese language lesson at Nihongo Gakko, where my professor, Mr. Hideo, had filled my head with basic vocabulary words, such as
taberu
(eat),
sensei
(teacher), and
kamera
(camera). I was learning there were three types of Japanese words: indigenous, Chinese-derived, and those borrowed from modern foreign languages. The indigenous and Chinese-derived ones were words like taberu and sensei, which had no Latin roots and therefore needed to be memorized. The borrowed ones, however, were often taken from English and thus easy to remember, like kamera.

Because I was hoping to ask Florence for an
onegai,
or “favor” (indigenous word with no Latin root), I had brought her a tin of
Danish butter
kukki,
or “cookie” (borrowed English word). I also figured the sugar-topped knots and swirls would make a nice hostess gift, which Florence, in a distinctly non-Japanese manner, promptly opened and set out for us to enjoy with our brewed green tea. After polishing off a few knots, I asked her where I might study tea kaiseki.

It turned out Florence had an English-speaking Japanese friend, Mrs. Hisa, who was taking tea kaiseki classes at Mushanokoji, the same tea school the woman in the tourist office had mentioned.

The famous tea master, Sen no Rikyu—the one who had helped transform the tea ceremony in the sixteenth century—had three grandsons, each of whom established a Kyoto tea school to carry on Rikyu's unique art of tea.

Grandson Sen no Sosa established Omote Senke (
senke
means “school”); Sen no Soshitsu established Ura Senke (written Urasenke, which has branches all over the world, including New York City); and Sen no Soshu founded Mushanokoji Senke. These three schools became and still are the leading tea schools in Kyoto, if not all of Japan.

Since the Heian period in the ninth century, art forms preserved their purity by being handed down through a highly skilled family, referred to simply as an
ie
(family). Over time, the term's definition changed slightly to mean the male head of a particular house (or school) of traditional arts. In turn, the term for that person became
iemoto.

Florence told me she would call her friend to see if she would be willing to introduce me to Mushanokoji's iemoto at his earliest convenience. To my surprise and delight, later that evening Florence called back with the plan: Mrs. Hisa would meet me at
Mushanokoji on Friday at noon. She would show me the school, then present me to the iemoto, also called the Grand Tea Master.

For some schools of traditional arts, a person's lineage is often more highly regarded than the quality of his skills. But the Grand Tea Masters of the big three Kyoto tea schools are also heralded for their capabilities. They must train for decades to learn the art of the tea ceremony so perfectly it appears all but encoded in their genes.

Nowadays, men and women can study tea for a year or a lifetime, depending upon their level of commitment. As they progress up the tea ladder, they attain higher levels of expertise until they reach the topmost status of a tea master. But a male tea master, regardless of his expertise, will never become a Grand Tea Master, or iemoto, unless he is a descendant of Rikyu, or marries into the “house.”