Miso Soup (Tofu and Wakame)
Cuisine: Japanese
Region: 日本各地
Servings: 2〜3人分
Miso Soup (Tofu and Wakame) is a home-style soup. Boiling miso drives off its aroma. Ingredients and step-by-step instructions are below, with notes for home cooking.
Ingredients
- Water 500 ml
- Kombu 1 piece about 5 cm square (approx. 5 g)
- Katsuobushi (bonito flakes) 10 g
- Silken tofu 1/2 block (approx. 150 g)
- Dried wakame 2 teaspoons (approx. 2 g)
- Negi (Japanese green onion) 5 cm piece (or 2 scallions)
- Miso (awase miso or similar) 2–2½ tablespoons (36–45 g)
Steps
- Put the water and kombu in a pot and let stand about 30 minutes (you can skip this if short on time). Heat over medium-low; when small bubbles rise from the bottom, remove the kombu just before the water boils.
- Once it boils, turn off the heat, add the katsuobushi, and let sit about 2 minutes. When the flakes sink, strain the dashi through a sieve lined with kitchen paper. Press gently—squeezing hard brings out bitterness.
- Soak the dried wakame in water for about 5 minutes to rehydrate, then squeeze out excess water. Cut the tofu into 1.5 cm cubes and thinly slice the negi into rounds.
- Return the dashi to the pot and heat over medium. When warm, add the tofu and simmer 1–2 minutes.
- Lower the heat. Scoop the miso into a ladle and dissolve it into the dashi with chopsticks as you add it. Taste and adjust to your preferred strength.
- Add the wakame and turn off the heat just before it boils (at the first simmer). Ladle into bowls and scatter the negi on top.
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Notes
Boiling miso drives off its aroma. After dissolving the miso, do not let the soup boil—turn off the heat at the first simmer.
Saltiness varies by miso type. Start with less and add more to taste so you do not overseason.
When you have no time to make dashi from scratch, granulated dashi used as directed still makes a tasty soup with little effort.
Fillings can change with the season. Daikon with aburaage, potato with onion, nameko mushrooms, and clams are all favorites. Harder root vegetables go into the cold dashi so they can cook through.
When reheating, avoid a full boil. Freshly made soup tastes most fragrant.
Origin and history
Miso soup is a basic Japanese soup of ingredients simmered in dashi and seasoned with miso. Alongside rice and side dishes, it is the “one soup” in the washoku pattern of ichiju-sansai, and a daily fixture at Japanese tables.
Miso is a seasoning of soybeans fermented with koji and salt. It is said to have grown from Chinese jiang (hishio) into a distinctly Japanese form. Drinking it widely as soup is dated roughly to the Kamakura period; by the Muromachi period it had settled into common people’s meals.
The miso used differs by region—rice, barley, and soybean miso each carry a local taste. Tofu and wakame are among the best-loved pairings, a classic bowl that lets the aroma of dashi and the umami of miso come through plainly.