滋賀県の郷土料理のエビ豆に
先日彦根のKさんが久しぶりにカフェにお見えになり、小エビ煮をたくさんお土産にくださいました。釣りの大好きなKさんは例年犬上川で釣った小鮎をご自身で調理してお持ちくださっていましたが、今年は事情あって釣りを断念。その代わり馴染みの業者から買われた琵琶湖の小エビ（スジエビ）をおいしく調理して持ってきてくださいました。Kさんの釣りの腕前は大したものらしいのですが味付けも最高で頂戴できる側としてはこんな幸せなことはありません。
あっという間に食べてしまいそうなのをぐっとこらえて、滋賀県の郷土料理であるエビ豆にしようと大豆を柔らかく煮て小エビと合わせてみました。子供の頃から食卓にあった滋賀県の伝統料理のエビ豆は、エビのように腰が曲がるまで歳をとっても、まめに元気で暮らせるようにと縁起ものとしてお祝いの席に出されることもあるそうです。豊富なカルシウムとタンパク質のエビ豆は琵琶湖と畑の産物を上手に合体させた逸品です。
The other day, Mr. K came to the cafe from Hikone after a long period of time and brought a lot of cooked small shrimp. Mr. K likes fishing and he had been bringing boiled sweetfish which he fished at Inukami river and cooked by himself the past several years, but this year for some reason, he gave up fishing and brought cooked lake shrimp which he bought from a familiar fisherman instead. He is an expert in fishing and a good cook of these sweetfish and lake shrimp as well. They are so good and I am able to finish eating quickly, but I saved my appetite because I wanted to make Ebi-Mame (shrimp bean dish) with it. Ebi-Mame is a local cuisine in Shiga. I boiled soybeans until they were soft and cooked them with the shrimp. Ebi-Mame is a traditional dish in our region and has been very familiar at the dinner table of each family. Since Mame has the double meaning of beans and healthy in Japanese, Ebi-Mame shows the meaning that you will be healthy even when you become old and are bent over like a shrimp. It appears at celebratory meals as a good luck dish. Ebi-Mame is an excellent dish which contains a lot of calcium and protein using products from Lake Biwa and local fields.
2020/07/11
