Oshiruko: Easy Authentic Japanese Red Bean Soup Recipe

We Japanese often eat the food called “Oshiruko (お汁粉)” or “Shiruko (汁粉)” during the cold winter months.

But what is Oshiruko?

Oshiruko (お汁粉)

Oshiruko, or Shiruko, is a traditional Japanese soup dish typically served with plain rice cake called “Mochi (餅)“.

It is a simple red bean soup made from Azuki red beans and water sweetened with sugar.

After preparing the soup, we often add toasted or steamed Mochi rice cakes to the bowl and eat them together.

The origin of the soup can be traced back to about 400 years ago when the original form was called “Susuri Dango (すすりだんご)”.

In modern times, some sweets parlors called “Kanmidokoro (甘味処)” offer Oshiruko soup, but we usually cook it from scratch at home.

As mentioned above, Japanese people often eat Oshiruko in the winter.

One primary reason is that we have a tradition of displaying “Kagami Mochi (鏡餅)” in the house during the New Year holiday season.

Kagami Mochi is a traditional round rice cake offered to the deities, considered an auspicious good luck decoration for the new year.

When the New Year holiday ends, the lucky Mochi is broken into bite-size pieces and served in Oshiruko or other dishes.

While eating the dish, we wish for a peaceful life for the year.

Recipe

Oshiruko is basically quite easy to make, like this.

If you prepare canned Azuki beans in advance, you can more effortlessly make it. Therefore last, let me introduce the recipe.

Note that cooked Mochi is chewy, stretchy, and very sticky, so please be cautious not to choke on it.

1. Bake the Mochi rice cakes in the toaster oven until they puff up.
2. While toasting the Mochi, put the Ogura An and water in a pot and heat it to a slow simmer.
3. After adding a pinch of salt and stirring the soup lightly, turn off the heat.
4. Place the toasted Mochi cakes in bowls and pour the Azuki red bean soup.
5. Now it’s ready to eat. Enjoy!