When I lived in Nagano/Japan, friends took me to a restaurant within the compound of Zenkoji, a majestic and famous Buddhist temple from the 7th century. The food being served there was prepared and cooked in the style of Zen monks, known as Shojin Ryori, a vegan/vegetarian cuisine characterized not only by its list of ingredients, but also by the humble and reverent attitude of the cook, by beauty and devotion.
Ryori (料理 ) means “cooking”, “cuisine”, as in Cajun cooking or French cuisine. Shojin consists of Sho (精) meaning to refine, to focus, purification; and Jin, (進) meaning advance, to go forward. Shojin Ryori can be translated as Cooking in Pursuit of Mindfulness, or Devotional Cuisine. It is based on the Buddhist belief of non-violence toward living beings which forbids the killing of animals.
Ingredients, preparation, taste, appearance, and eating are all based on the meditative, mindful lifestyle of a Zen Buddhist monk. Every step of the food preparation is done deliberately and with care. The ingredients have to be in season — such as bamboo shoots in spring, leafy greens in summer, nuts and fruit in the fall, and root vegetables in winter. Nothing gets thrown away: the green tops of carrots or of daikon roots are used as well. Cooking, taste, and presentation follow a rule of Five: stewing, boiling, steaming, roasting, and leaving the food raw; sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory (umami); green, yellow, red, black, and white. The use of Gokun (五葷), the five pungent roots of garlic, chives, onions, leeks, and scallions, is not allowed because they’re thought to excite body and mind.
In general, Japanese meals are presented in such an aesthetically pleasing manner that one hardly wants to eat it out of fear of destroying the balance of color and shape on one’s plate. This was particularly true at the Zen restaurant in Nagano: numerous small or tiny dishes were arranged to offer a feast for the eyes as well. Somehow, the care and attention that so obviously went into the preparation of the various components of the repast was almost palatable.
I don’t remember anything in particular of what I ate; after all, this was over 40 years ago. Except for one item: a small amount of a paste-like substance, two tablespoon-fulls at most, shaped like a ball. It had a pleasant, nut-like taste and almost melted in your mouth. Trying to find out what it was posed some challenge: neither I nor my friends spoke more than rudimentary Japanese. Something like a mushroom or fungus maybe, and it grows on rocks — must be some lichen, although I had never heard that this was edible.
What made this dish so unforgettable wasn’t so much the taste but its after-effects. All through the next day I wasn’t hungry at all, didn’t eat, and yet had plenty of energy. It seemed like the ideal food for hiking trips or any other occasions where it would be useful to have little weight and bulk combined with high energy output. However, it was impossible to identify what I had eaten, and I left Japan with a strong, but vague memory.
Well, Google finally came to the rescue. I often told friends about this mysterious stuff probably made from lichen, and I finally decided to look it up. Lo and behold, I found out what it is: iwatake in Japanese, meaning rock mushroom, is a lichen that's being harvested from dangerously high cliff faces and is valued for its associations with longevity. In addition, I discovered several websites — here is one — with scientific studies about the anti-cancer and anti-tumor qualities of lichen, iwatake being among them.
One other misconception got cleared up: due to my relatively poor language skills, I had understood that whatever I was eating had to be preserved for about 100 years in order to fully develop its taste and qualities. Not so; what the restaurant staff tried to explain was that the lichen had to be almost 100 years old before it was big enough to be harvested…
Here is another picture:
I live in northern New Mexico, one-and-a-half hours north-west of Santa Fe. Lichens are abundant and grow on trees and rocks everywhere. While I don’t think any of them are edible, they have fascinating colors and patterns: rust, orange, sage, beige, light and dark greys grow in intricate formations from filigree-like, lacy ornamentation to bolder, larger forms like spirals and concentric circles. An article about lichens in the recent edition of our online local newsletter, The Abiquiu News, reminded me of my culinary experience in Nagano.
And here is a National Geographic video about a fairly recent discovery concerning lichens, with lots of gorgeous photographs. Enjoy!