The blessing of nature combined with traditional skills to create the state of local products
The large area of Shimonoseki City is blessed with products from the land and sea, and many local specialties are made by processing these products.
The representative taste of the City is blowfish. In Shimonoseki City, people call the fish fuku, which means happiness in Japanese. Although the season for natural blowfish is from the autumn equinox to the spring equinox, the development of cultivation techniques has made it possible to provide blowfish all the year round. The people’s favorite meals are blowfish sashimi, fukuchiri (a pot of blowfish and vegetables), rice gruel with blowfish, deep-fried blowfish, and the milt of blowfish, all taken with a glass of sake with a grilled blowfish fin in it. People associate blowfish with Shimonoseki City.
Processed urchin originated in Shimonoseki City. The production of processed urchin in Yamaguchi Prefecture accounts for about 70% of all the production throughout Japan, and Shimonoseki City boasts excellent techniques and high production. Not only processed urchin but also raw urchin and urchin rice are specialties of the City.
Shimonoseki City was once famous for whale fishing. Even now, people enjoy whale sashimi, whale bacon, deep-fried whale, and other delicious whale dishes.
People enjoy eating fresh fish throughout the year in Shimonoseki City, and the most delicious dish is sashimi. Shimonoseki fish are firm because they grow in a rapid tidal current in the Kanmon Straits. On the other hand, fish caught in Hibikinada and the Inland Sea have their own unique taste.
Specialties of Shimonoseki City, a marine city, include fresh turban shellfish and wakame seaweed as well as processed marine products such as smoked blowfish, kamaboko (steamed fish paste), and mentaiko (salted cod roe spiced with red pepper).
