Jomon cuisine: What went into the Jomon pots?

Archaeologists have tried to recreate the Jomon cooking scene and some of the dishes and foods, after examining the remains of the kitchen dumps or middens in excavated sites.

  Jomon shell midden from Kawasaki City

Jomon people who lived on the coasts liked hearty seafood stews, made up of various fish, clams and other shellfish catches of the day. The ingredients would have varied with the seasons. The food was cooked in large conical or rounded pots with tapered or pointy bottoms that sat well in the soil and ash of the bonfire or hearth.

 Reconstructed scene of Jomon pot of stew by the Kawasaki City Museum 

Wooden frames in which burnt cobble stones, burnt shell fragments and charcoal have been found in shell midden sites. Scientists think these indicate the Jomon people were in the habit of steaming oysters (Crassostrea gigas) and oriental clams (Meretrix lusoria).

One of the main dishes of the Jomon meal is thought to be a humble dish of acorn flour dumplings boiled in a herb and root vegetable soup flavored with rock salt or other ingredients boiled with wheat, millet or other available cereals.

 Ground acorn flour 

(Kawasaki City Museum)  

All were boiled in ceramic vessels that had been handmade and low-fired in bonfires or pits.

From food remains found in the ceramic pots, it was possible for archaeologists to know that the Jomon chef spent a long time finely chopping his or her herb or root vegetable ingredients on a flat stone, then throwing them all into the large Jomon pot and letting them boil extremely slowly over the fire.  

Another food popular with the Jomon was the chestnut or other kinds of cookie made from nut-dough. One particular discovery, at the Ondashi site, Yamagata prefecture, was of a cookie or biscuit-like food with beautiful patterns applied on the surface. The cookie was made of chestnut, walnut flour, meat and blood of wild boar, deer, and wild bird eggs.

The Jomon had already mastered techniques of leaching tannin (which makes the nuts bitter and inedible) from certain kinds of nuts, and preserving them in wet pits. Later, they processed the nuts using mortars and pestles to make dough which would then be made into breads (like Idojiri bread or koppepan), cookies or patty like dishes.

 Chestnut cookies

Egoma oil may have been used to coat or flavor the cookies. Shiso beefsteak herb (Perilla frutescens) was used to season and garnish raw fish dishes. 

Many of the pit houses were equipped with a firepit with a smoke tunnel that may have been used to smoke meat.

 Smoking pit can be seen beside the entrance to pit house

 (Tokoro Archaeological site) 

Archaeologists also believe that the many shell middens are evidence that the Jomon people must have dried or smoked a lot of fish and shellfish (and perhaps whale and sea-mammal meat in certain coastal areas), some for storage or for trading.

By early Jomon times, some of the Jomon tribes had learnt how to ferment and brew fruit wine from elderberries, mulberries and wild grapes. A black wooden pitcher from a site in the Kitakanbara Kurokawa village in Niigata prefecture which was unearthed. It was found to have contained a lot of elderberry. The pitcher was lacquered with sculpted patterns. Scholars believe the pitcher was likely used for some kind of religious ceremony.

Obviously, the Jomon diet varied from place to place. The Jomon era spanned 10,000 years and the Japanese archipelago stretches out over thousands of kilometres. Over that much time and space, you’d expect the food and diet to vary considerably from tribe to tribe, region to region.

Find out what else the Jomon ate.