Hiroshima’s Green Lemons
By harvesting their famous lemons early, when they are still green, Hiroshima’s lemon farmers have created a uniquely-flavored new type of citrus, which is helping their small businesses and, in turn, the local food makers who have been inspired to create new foods and dishes with them.
Japan grows one of the broadest and most diverse range of citrus in the world, reflecting both the importance of citrus in Japan’s cuisine and diet and the ease with which citrus can be hybridized and self-mutates. Citrus grows nearly everywhere in the country (except for the most northern locations) and especially well in the middle of Japan in a region called Setouchi. Setouchi comprises the many small islands in the Seto Inland Sea and the coastal areas of the three main islands—Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu—that surround the sea. Blessed with mild winters, sunny skies all year round, low yet ample rainfall, and calm breezes and a placid sea, the area is famous for growing some of the finest citrus in Japan.
Within Setouchi specific areas are known for the best examples of certain types of citrus. The best yuzu in Japan is considered to come from Kochi prefecture at the southern tip of Shikoku Island, the best mikan oranges from Ehime prefecture on the west coast of the island, and the best sudachi from the mountain valleys of Tokushima prefecture on the east coast. In addition, the best kabosu in Japan is known to be grown in Oita prefecture on the east coast of Kyushu Island and the best daidai can be found along the Honshu coastline in the middle of Setouchi. Hiroshima prefecture on Honshu Island, in turn, which borders the western end of the Seto Inland Sea, is famous for its lemons. Big, juicy, and mildly sweet because they are less acidic than lemons grown elsewhere, Hiroshima lemons have become a branded product with the tastiest fruit labelled “Aka-shu” lemons.
Lemons are the trickiest citrus to grow. They need lots of sunshine, do not like too much water or wind, and are the least resistant to cold. Hiroshima prefecture not only produces the best lemons in Japan but also more lemons than anywhere else in the country because of the ideal growing conditions of its many small islands. Of the ten prefectures bordering the Seto Inland Sea, Hiroshima has the most islands—142 out of the total 727 islands in the sea. These islands are small and mountainous, and the lemon groves cultivated on them are tiered on steep terraces supported by ishizumi stone-walls. The lemons grown on the terraces benefit from full sunlight coming from all directions, radiating down from the sky, bouncing off of the sea, and reflecting from the stone walls. The terraces also provide excellent drainage as well as a source of retained heat. Lastly, the prefecture’s small archipelago is protected by the high mountains of the three surrounding main islands of Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu, making the area the warmest, driest, and calmest area in Setouchi.
The small size of most of Hiroshima prefecture’s islands limits the scale of lemon farming, and the dedication and expert attentions of the lemon farmers are also an important factor in the quality of Hiroshima lemons. In recent years, Hiroshima’s citrus growers have created a new type of lemon—green lemons—simply by harvesting a portion of their crop early, before the fruit has fully ripened. Green lemons (called ao-lemon 青レモン in Japanese) have an intense fragrance, a spicy flavor, and are more piquant than Hiroshima’s fully-ripened lemons. In addition, their attractive, vivaciously green skin is thicker than more mature lemons. These attributes tick all the boxes to make green lemons very useful as a cooking ingredient and seasoning.
Green lemons are harvested starting in November, a month before yellow lemons are ripe, and their season continues on through March, a month before the end of yellow lemon season. The crop provides a much-needed extra source of income to the area’s small farmers who are challenged by the imports of cheap commercially-grown lemons from abroad (which nearly destroyed lemon farming in Japan during the past fifty years as it did for many countries around the world). Green lemons, in particular, offer a competitive advantage because they need to be used and eaten when freshly picked as they soon lose some of the benefits of their fragrance, color, and spicy flavor. Green lemons have also given a boost to local food makers who have been inspired to use them to create delicious new food products and dishes.
Shintaro Farm
Shintaro Farm is located on Osakishimojima Island, an island in the Tobishima chain of islands that extends from Kure City on the Honshu mainland. A sublimely beautiful island with an illustrious past as an important trading port, the island is where the first lemon in Japan was grown in 1898, followed by the first mikan oranges in 1912. Shintaro Farm is typical of citrus farms in the region. It is small, family-owned, and, instead of being one large farm, consists of a number of orchards scattered across the island, where farmer Takeuchi Shintaro grows lemons and also many other varieties of citrus, including mikan, dekopon, haruka, amanatsu, ponkan, anseikan, and daidai.
The farm is also typical in that it has been in Takeuchi’s family for many generations but was lying fallow until he took it over three years ago, having previously been abandoned by Takeuchi’s grandmother due to her age and the difficulty of maintaining a competitive business. While most local citrus farmers are in their 70s and 80s, Takeuchi is a young man, 30-years-old. He returned to the island because the farm offered a more independent and peaceful way of life after trying his hand at logistics, reflexology, and bartending elsewhere in Japan and also spending a year in Barcelona as a quality checker for a Japanese importer of serrano ham.
Takeuchi’s focus is on growing high-quality, all-natural lemons. His lemon orchard is on the western end of the island where it gets the long, strong sunshine of the summer months and also captures the warmed afternoon air during the winter. Takeuchi says that the breathtaking view from the slopes of the orchard makes him feel peaceful and his efforts worthwhile. He replanted the orchard with new trees as one of his efforts to farm organically. He uses no pesticides, and weeds run ragged through the orchard. The fertilizer he uses is 100% organic. Organically grown lemons are not only important to Takeuchi philosophically but also because it makes the peel safe to eat. This is especially important for green lemons because their chief attributes are the color and aroma of their skin and the use of the entire lemon for cooking and eating.
Other than needing just the right climate and environment, lemons are fairly easy to grow. Takeuchi’s biggest challenge has been educating consumers and building their trust to accept lemons that do not look as perfect as commercially-grown fruit. He has also been an advocate on how to use green lemons in cooking. His recommendations include using it as a refreshing accent to drinks and sauces, squeezed on okonomiyaki pancakes (a regional specialty) or baked into pies and used in other confections.
Maruya Cafe
A few islands over from Osakishimojima Island on Shimokamagari Island is Maruya Cafe. The food creator and proprietor of the cafe, Anna Hamashita, was an early adopter of green lemons, and the house specialty of green lemon ramen is so popular that the cafe is packed with customers during the months from November to March when it is on the menu. It is a rich and deeply flavored chicken broth-based ramen filled with thin tender noodles, succulent pieces of chicken, and slices of mildly sweet Japanese naga-negi leeks. Green lemons are served as a seasoning and condiment for the ramen. A juicer and grater are provided so that diners can first add some green lemon juice to balance and brighten the ramen’s flavor and then grate zest over it to add an appetizing aroma and spicy taste.
Anna grew up on the island and returned to it six years ago with her husband who is now a chef in another local restaurant. Together they renovated her grandmother’s former home to create the cafe and invented a number of unique seasonings and condiments based on local ingredients, which Anna makes by hand in the cafe’s kitchen during weekdays when the cafe is closed. These include “Hijiki Dressing,” a salad dressing that mixes whole pieces of the brown sea vegetable hijiki, which grows offshore Shimokamagari Island, with olive oil made from olives grown by Anna’s uncle on the island, and locally-produced soy sauce. The high fiber dressing is loaded with minerals such as calcium, iron, and magnesium and can also be used as a healthy and delicious condiment on steamed vegetables and tofu and as a seasoning for stir-fries. Another unique product is “Kara-Age ni Kakeru Tare,” a spicy lemon sauce for fried foods, especially the crunchy fried chicken served at the cafe. Anna also makes two different kinds of ponzu sauce with citrus grown on the island: one with daidai and the other with sudachi; a mikan orange dressing; and lemon sushi-zu for making vinegared sushi rice.
Cosakuu
In 2017, Yuka Uesugi and her husband bought an abandoned property on Mukaijima Island in eastern Hiroshima prefecture that had once been the seaside country villa of a local company chairman, moved there with their children, and created a professional home kitchen where Yuka started making marmalades. Marmalade making has a long and influential history in Setouchi. In 1932, in the small port and fishing village of Tadanoumi about an hour’s drive west of Mukaijima, Toichiro Nakashima started making marmalade for the first time in Japan after having enjoyed it while a student in England. It was a new use for the region’s exceptional citrus, and the company he formed, Aohata, quickly became successful, initially exporting half of its marmalades abroad. Today Aohata is Japan’s leading producer of marmalades, jams, and other preserves (and is also famous for having introduced mayonnaise to Japan in 1925 under the Kewpie brand).
Yuka named her business “Cosakuu,” which is an informal word in the local dialect that means “to cook and eat the harvest.” It is a relatable, home-spun way of describing one’s artisanal food business. But in this case, it is also whole-heartedly true, and Yuka makes marmalades and other foods, like jams, syrups, and caramels, out of nearly everything grown or made in her region, including fruits, vegetables, tea leaves, nuts, herbs, spices, flower blossoms, wine, honey, and artisanal chocolate, which is produced by Ushio Chocolatl at a factory on the mountain behind her workshop. The only requirements she has for ingredients are that they be fresh and organically and ethically produced.
Yuka is very good at what she does. In her first year of making marmalade she won a Gold Award in the Artisan & Small Producers Class at the “World’s Original Marmalade Awards” held annually at Dalemain Mansion & Historic Gardens in Cumbria, England for her “Citrus Preserve with Interesting Additions — Kumquat & Houjicha Tea.” That year she also won a Silver Award for her “Marmalade To Go With Savory Food – Iyokan Orange & Laurier” and a Bronze Award for her “Any Citrus Marmalade — Daidai, Orange & Kumquat.” In the following year, 2018, she won another Gold Award for her “Marmalade With Chocolate, Kumquat & Cacao Nib” and a Bronze Award for “Marmalade with Interesting Additions — Yuzu & Mint.” In 2019, Yuka won three Bronze Awards for “Hassaku, Lemon and Cardamom Preserve,” “Yuzu and Ginger Preserve,” and “Yuzu and Mint Preserve.”
Marmalade season kicks off for Yuka in November when she switches from making apple, pear, fig, and ginger jams and nut, chocolate, and fermented butter caramels to making green lemon marmalade. She makes it, as she makes all her marmalades, by hand in a traditional manner, finely chopping the peel into delicate green spears, adding kibi-sato (raw cane sugar), and boiling everything in copper pans. The nuances of her marmalade are cooking it so that the peel has an extra firm and chewy texture and using less sugar, not for dietary reasons but to achieve a distinct and harmonious balance of sweet, sour, bitter, and spicy flavors. Yuka’s green lemon marmalade is designed to be used for both sweet applications and with savory foods. To make a savory green marmalade sauce that can accompany fish, poultry, and pork, she recommends mixing the marmalade with a little soy sauce. She says that green lemon marmalade is also an excellent addition to salad dressings.
Story & Photos: Tom Schiller
Shintaro Farm
If you would like to buy some of Takeuchi’s green lemons or other citrus, contact him at:
Takeuchi Shintaro
591 Kubi, Yutakamachi, Osakishimojima Island, Kure City, Hiroshima Prefecture 734-0304
Tel: 090-2869-7492
Email: shintarofarm@outlook.jp
Takeuchi is a busy man given that he largely tends his orchards by himself. But if you get him at the right time, he will show you around his orchards, including giving you a ride on the motorized carts he uses to haul fruit and materials up and down the orchard’s steep slopes.
Osaskishimojima Island is connected by a series of bridges and other small islands to Kure City on the Honshu Island mainland. Kure City is a stop on the Kure Line, a local train that runs between Mihara City and Higashi-Hiroshima City, both of which are stops on the main Sanyo Shinskansen bullet train that runs along the southern coast of Honshu Island. You can also get to the island by ferry from Takehara City on Honshu Island or from Imabari City on Shikoku Island.
Maruya Cafe
2229-9 Sannose, Shimokamagari Island, Kure City, Hiroshima 737-0301
Tel: +81 (070) 4175 6427
Email: maruyacafe20160330@gmail.com
Web: www.facebook.com/maruyacafe20160330
Shimokamagari Island is the first island of the Tobishima Island chain linked by the Akinada Bridge, which starts at Kure City on Honshu Island. Open from 11:30 to 14:30 on Saturdays and Sundays, Maruya Cafe offers eat-in meals and take-out food, making it an excellent stop for lunch if you are visiting the island and the fascinating Shoto-en museum and garden complex located just around the bend from the cafe or in need of some delicious snacks for later in the day as you journey through the islands. You can also buy Anna Hamashita’s home-made seasonings and sauces at the cafe. These are also available at specialty food stores across Hiroshima prefecture.
Cosakuu コサクウ
287-1 Tachibana, Mukaijima Island, Onomichi, Hiroshima 722-0071
Tel: +81 (0848) 36 5661
Web: www.facebook.com/cosakuu539/
Mukaijima Island is either the first island you cross if you are traveling the Shimanami Kaido bridge and roadway starting in the port town of Onomichi on Honshu Island or the last island you come to if you are starting from the other end at the city of Imabari on Shikoku Island. Either way, it is often overlooked by travelers, who tend to focus on the many beautiful islands in between. That’s a mistake because Mukaijima is one of the most languorously tropical islands in the area due its long stretches of sand beaches, swaying palm trees and the lazy shadows beneath them, and wide views of the Seto Inland Sea and offshore islands. If for no other reason you should stop there to taste and buy Cosakuu’s jams, marmalades, other preserves, and caramels. They constantly vary with the season, the ingredients available from Yuka Uesugi’s friends and neighbors, and Yuka’s inspired ideas for new recipes. For example, during the summer once marmalade making is over, Yuka may be making a tomato, sour ume plum, beet, and mikan honey jam, a sour Yoshiwa rhubarb and elderflower jam, blueberry nut jam, roasted banana jam, or what she calls her Summer Jewelry Box Jam, which combines seasonal berries, apricots, and loquats. In the fall there are jams made with roasted green tea, Earl Grey tea, and puer tea leaves and caramels made with walnuts, hazelnuts, cacao bits, and fermented butter. The varieties of Cosakuu’s preserves are endless, especially once you take into account all the many possible combinations of citrus Yuka has at her disposable to make winter marmalades, including amanatsu, banpeiyu, dekopon, green lemon, haruka, harumi, hassaku, iyokan, kabosu, kinkan, lemon, lime, mikan, oni-yuzu, yuzu and so on. While Cosakuu’s foods are sold at leading hotels and specialty food stores in the region, the widest range is only available at Yuka’s shop. Cosakuu is open every day except Tuesday from 10:00 to 17:00.
