GIFU, Jan. 13 — Farmers in the Yamanomura district of Kamioka in Hida, Gifu Prefecture, are busy working on producing Okuhida Yamanomura Kanboshi Daikon, a local specialty made by drying daikon radishes.
It is a traditional preserved food handed down in the district, an area with heavy snowfall located at an altitude of around 1,000 meters.
Thick, boiled slices of radish are hung up outside where temperatures go down below minus 10 degrees Celsius and are dehydrated by going through the repeated cycles of being frozen at nights and thawed during daytime, developing their unique chewiness and sweetness.
“It is a local winter task that has continued for over 100 years,” said a member of Suzushiro Group, a team of eight dried daikon producers. “We can’t do the work unless it gets cold, so we are worried about the impact of climate change, but I want to continue (making dried daikon) while I still have the energy to do so.”
Producers of dried daikon check the slices of radish hanging in the cold in Hida, Takayama Prefecture.