Originally, tsukudani was a traditional Japanese method of slowly cooking food in a mixture of soy sauce and sugar (sometimes mixed with mirin or even sake). It was developed during the Edo period as a way of preserving food for longer.
The ingredients that are well suited for tsukudani are most often from the sea: small fish, seaweeds (kombu and wakame) or seafood… And sometimes even insects (although this technique has largely been lost over time) or meat.
Nowadays, the term mainly refers to the delicious condiments produced by this method, which are now kept in a cool place. The deep, delicate flavour of tsukudani goes well with white rice (it is used in onigiri and ochazuke tea rice). They can also be eaten on their own (as an aperitif) or as a garnish for other products: fish, shellfish, eggs, meat, etc.
