Café RIMSE’s Ohaw, Pene Emo and Venison Dishes

Ohaw is a traditional Ainu soup, also known as sanpei-jiru in Japanese. The staff at the Ainu Museum (the forerunner of Upopoy) taught me how to make it. At Café RIMSE we serve cep ohaw, which is made with salmon, and kina ohaw, which is a vegetarian version.

To make our konpu sito, we use a method that we have learned from Ainu people in the Hidaka region. Kelp is deep fried, shredded, and then mixed with a thick sauce made with ingredients like brown sugar and soy sauce.

Pene emo is an Ainu dish that contains dumplings made from frozen potatoes.

It is served with wild grass tea and pickles.

I’m glad to hear it!
Like other dishes, our pene emo is based on the methods I learned from the staff at the old Ainu Museum.

Pene emo is less sweet when it’s served without the red bean soup.

Some people may be surprised by the black color. This is because we freeze the potatoes many times in order to ferment them.
Pene emo used to be a hallmark of spring because our ancestors would make them as the snow melted.

We make our yuk (venison) curry with venison from Shiraoi.
It’s served with salad, pickles and wild grass tea.

Our amazake is healthy as it is only made with two ingredients―Japanese millet and malted rice.
To stay true to Ainu food culture, we don’t use additives or sugar.

The sweetness comes naturally from the Japanese millet and the malted rice.
Japanese millet is known as Piyapa in the Ainu language.
The amazake we serve was developed by Tanaka Sake Brewing in Otaru based on Ainu food culture, with the cooperation of the National Ainu Museum.

Tonoto is sake that is given as an offering to kamuy and Ainu ancestors, and is an integral part of Ainu rituals.
As part of a project to revitalize traditional Ainu sake, Tanaka Sake Brewing modernized tonoto under the supervision of the National Ainu Museum.

These were made by Kyodai Patchwork no Kai, a group that aimed to bring people together by creating a giant patchwork.

Yes, that’s right. Originally, Café RIMSE was managed directly by Porotokotan, but in 2014 Hope Frontier Social Welfare Corporation took over the reins.

Based on everything we had learned, our head cook tweaked the traditional recipe and created an ohaw to suit a variety of palates, which can be enjoyed at Café RIMSE today.

We want to recreate the traditional flavors, but we also want to create dishes that anyone can easily enjoy. So, it’s often a struggle to find the right balance between those two factors.