Umami = Delicious

The base soup stock in Japanese cuisine is dashi. It is the soup broth used for the famous miso soup usually served at the beginning of a Japanese meal.

Dashi is made from two ingredients which are key to Japanese cuisine: kombu and bonito flakes. Kombu is dried seaweed. As shown in the picture on the left, kombu is grayish-black sea “vegetable” that is sun-dried and cut into sheets. Kombu has a natural white-powder residue that has a lot of flavour.

It is interesting to note that kombu was the reason for the discovery of man’s fifth “taste.” Much like the apple is to the discovery of gravity.

Food tastes salty, sweet, bitter, and/or sour—the four tastes that everyone is familiar with. The fifth “taste” was discovered by Dr. Kikunae Ikeda who in 1908 wondered why dashi flavoured with kombu tasted so good. The taste didn’t fall into any of the four tastes. He set out to find out why.

After conducting experiments, he found that the high concentrations of glutamate in kombu was the reason. This new taste was called umami—which means delicious or yummy in Japanese.

Published 30 November 07 · Up Next: Japanese Food Ingredients · Previously: Rice, A Japanese Staple

Umami = Delicious

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