Today is Setsubun (節分), the last day of winter according to the traditional lunar calendar in Japan. So as has been a custom for several hundred years on this day, I did mamemaki (豆撒き), which consists of throwing dried or roasted soy beans out of each window and outside door of one’s house while saying “oni ha soto, fuku wa uchi!,” meaning something like “demons out, fortune in!” before eating one bean for each year of your age, plus one. By the time I was finished eating the beans I was quite full and was a good twenty-minutes behind schedule. Another downside to getting old.

At lunch time I walked over to a sushi restaurant my wife and I ate at last night (first time visit to Ningyōchō Dan Sushi–人形町団鮨) to pick up a ehōmaki roll I had ordered the night before. Ehōmaki (恵方巻) are a type of futomaki, or fat sushi roll eaten on Setsubun. The name means something like “directional” sushi roll, as you are supposed to eat it facing the current year’s lucky direction. Not just eat it, but eat it in one continuous bite, something that originated in the Kansai region, perhaps as a game to play with geisha. I ate mine in bites, as with normal sushi rolls. Only this was a big one, filled with uni, tamago, cucumber, ikura, and a few other things, plus, of course, sushi rice. At ¥1,900 for half a roll it was more than I normally spend on lunch, but tasty and filling, and something I only do once a year.

Not all ehōmaki are filled with rice and fish. Ningyōchō Imahan was selling two versions with meat today, a sukiyaki ehōmaki and a yakiniku ehōmaki. One local takeout sushi place had four or five different versions filled with fish and vegetables at differing prices, and of course the konbini and super markets have their own to sell.

I am looking forward to tomorrow, the first day of spring, or Risshun (立春), according to the traditional calendar. I’m sure the weather will soon be warmer, and then the sakura in bloom, and a season of corona-free hanami parties!