Tokyo Kaikan's Osechi Cuisine

First Tier The first tier is the kuchitori course. It's mostly sweet items — kinton (sweetened chestnut and sweet-potato paste), kumquats, simmered plums, and the like. Fish-paste items such as kamaboko go here too, along with datemaki, the sweet rolled omelet that's a New Year's staple. Since this is a celebratory dish, red-and-white items are common. First Tier Red-and-white kamaboko Shichifuku datemaki (sweet rolled omelet) Celebratory chestnut kinton Ise lobster Noshidori (chicken in auspicious noshi-strip shape) Genpei abalone (red-and-white style) Crab sarasa-yaki (grilled crab in calico pattern) Pine-needle-cut kuwai (arrowhead tuber) Gosanchiku bamboo shoot in nanban marinade Plum-blossom-cut nagaimo (Chinese yam) Akabeko-yaki (red-glazed grilled dish, named for the red-cow folk toy) Squid ōgon-yaki (grilled with a golden egg-yolk glaze) Nishiki tamago (two-tone egg terrine) Yuri-ne kan (lily bulb terrine) Candied kumquats

Second Tier The second tier basically holds grilled dishes. Seafood goes here, and it's kept apart as much as possible so the smell of fish doesn't transfer to other items. It also holds something vinegared — something sour — alongside. Grilled items inevitably turn firm, so you can't cook them more than necessary, which if anything makes them spoil faster; but just one vinegared item, say a single pickled plum, makes a huge difference to how long it keeps. Meats such as duck likewise don't keep well, so I don't think they've been part of the jūbako for very long — probably only since the Shōwa 30s (mid-1950s to mid-1960s). Second Tier Salt-grilled sea bream Sawara kenchin-yaki (grilled Spanish mackerel with a tofu-and-vegetable filling) Butterfish yūan-yaki (marinated in soy, sake, mirin and yuzu, then grilled) Salmon ita-omiki-yaki (grilled with sheet sake lees) Tilefish saikyō-yaki (marinated in sweet white Kyoto miso) Sablefish fūmi-yaki (lightly seasoned and grilled) Yellowtail teriyaki Conger eel yawata-maki (rolled around burdock root) Clam kaiyaki (grilled in the shell) Scallop uni-yaki (grilled with sea urchin) Surume inrō-yaki (dried squid stuffed and grilled, inrō-style) Aigamo duck kuwayaki (seared griddle-style) Knotted burdock in vinegar dressing Hagoita-shaped garnish (New Year's battledore motif) Fude-shōga (brush-cut ginger)

Third Tier The third tier mainly holds vegetables simmered down (nishime-style) with plenty of sugar. Taro varieties high in sugar, like ebi-imo (shrimp taro) and taro root, crack and fall apart easily when simmered, so originally they weren't included — that's one point where this differs from the Kansai version. Originally, osechi is a cuisine of dried goods, so there's no custom of including raw ingredients. All the first-of-the-season vegetables harvested that year were first offered to the gods after the autumn harvest, and the dishes were made from what came back down as an offering, so whether it's fish or taro, what's used has been sun-dried once. Also, unlike today, sugar used to be precious, so what made a good osechi — a good jūbako — really came down to weight: how much sugar had gone into it. Third Tier Yatsugashira taro Kuruma prawn simmered in sake Matsukasa-cut jōbushi Bamboo shoot with the frond tip left on Plum-blossom-cut carrot Crane-shaped nagaimo (Chinese yam) Tortoise-shell-scored shiitake Hiryōzu (deep-fried tofu-and-vegetable fritter) Buta kakuni (simmered pork belly) Daitokuji-fu (wheat gluten, Daitoku-ji style) Temari-fu (ball-shaped wheat gluten) Matsukasa-cut kuwai (arrowhead tuber) Take-fu (bamboo-shaped wheat gluten) Ume-fu (plum-blossom-shaped wheat gluten) Konnyaku bekko-ni (simmered to a glossy amber finish)

Fourth Tier The fourth tier, yo no jū, is the shukō (celebratory nibbles) course. The character normally used for 'four' is avoided here because it's inauspicious (it's read the same way as the word for 'death'), so a different, more auspicious character is used instead. These are the dishes that represent the New Year — kazunoko (herring roe), black beans, tazukuri (candied dried sardines), rolled items like kombu-jime and kombu-maki, namasu, kanroni-style simmered sweets, and other auspicious dishes. It's similar to the kuchitori tier, but leans more toward dried things — smelt, herring, ayu — plus items like kazunoko. Kazunoko today is salt-cured, but originally the dried product was rehydrated in rice-rinsing water before use. Fourth Tier Herring kombu roll Conger eel kombu roll Roe-bearing ayu wrapped in shiraita kamaboko Oura burdock fudō-ni Sockeye salmon gyūhi-maki (wrapped in soft mochi paste) Black beans budō-ni (simmered to a glossy grape-like sheen) Kazunoko fūmi-ni (herring roe lightly seasoned) Tazukuri teri-ni (glazed candied dried sardines) Octopus ume-ni (simmered with plum) Wakasagi (smelt) nanban-zuke Crucian carp ame-ni (syrup-simmered) Goby kanroni (sweet simmered small fish) Karasumi (bottarga) Hizu namasu (vinegared salmon nose cartilage) Genpei namasu (red-and-white vinegared dish)

The Fifth Tier Jūbako layering is most commonly done for New Year, but it is used for all five seasonal festivals. Outside of New Year, a simplified two-tier stack is more common. The number of tiers is said to represent the four seasons, and four tiers is the formal count. With a five-tier stack, the bottom fifth tier serves as a reserve: datemaki (sweet rolled omelette), kombu rolls, and simmered octopus are packed in whole, uncut, and as each tier's contents run low, pieces are cut off and added to replenish them.