We drop the temperature in the room to 28☌ to keep the grains from overheating, and we return the racks to allow the kōji to continue growing. The small kitchen space grows fragrant with kōji’s smells: flowers, ripe tropical fruits, raw mushroom. We mix the kōji to redistribute the growing mycelia and dissipate the heat produced by the fungus’s growth and metabolism. Tiny filaments of fluffy white mycelia have begun to sprout and hold the grains together. The following day we pull back the linen cloth. We set the room to 32☌ and 75% relative humidity. We pack these grains into perforated steel trays lined with damp-wrung linen cloths, slide them into a wheeled rack, and place them in one of the three kōji rooms that are outfitted with temperature and humidity controls and sensors to maintain a warm, humid environment. At Noma, White and his team in the fermentation lab ( fig. Yet this fungus has found a home in restaurant kitchens across Copenhagen. For this reason, the Brewing Society of Japan designated kōji the country’s “national fungus” (Lee 2019).Īspergillus oryzae is closely associated with the rice plant ( Oryza sativa), and as rice does not grow in Scandinavia, it is unlikely there are any indigenous populations of A. Kōji is a cornerstone of Japanese cuisine, used to produce sake, soy sauce, and many other traditional products including miso.
2 The kōji fungus produces many enzymes that break down larger molecules, facilitating microbial metabolism that enhances the flavor, healthfulness, and preservation of many foodstuffs. 1 Kōji describes these organisms and the ecology formed when they are grown on rice, barley, soybeans, or other starchy or proteinous substrates for use in fermentation. Making miso starts with making kōji-the Japanese word for the filamentous fungus Aspergillus oryzae. It is rich in umami (discussed later) and has been used for centuries in Japanese cuisine as a savory base for soups, sauces, glazes, and other applications. It is high summer in Copenhagen, July 2018, and Jason White, deputy head of fermentation at a renowned restaurant called Noma, is showing Evans how they make their yellow pea miso, or “peaso.” Miso is a fermented paste consisting of soybeans, rice or other grains, and salt. The conclusion reflects on how this nascent microbiology of desire revises prevalent understandings of domestication.įermentation is domesticated decomposition-rot rehoused. The analysis traces the natural history of kōji’s taste-shaping powers through the biogeographical, ecological, and evolutionary consequences of New Nordic fermentation experiments. We situate the rise of kōji’s allure in the context of New Nordic Cuisine, framed as a high-end response to anxieties about globalization and subsequent nationalisms, a reworking of the scientism of molecular gastronomy, and a postpastoral mobilization of different natures for the reconstruction of regional identity.
Focusing on novel misos made with the kōji fungus ( Aspergillus oryzae), we illustrate how chefs sense their microbes through smell and taste, and identify the sources of kōji’s exceptional microbial charisma. Here, chefs combine Japanese microbes and fermentation techniques with Scandinavian substrates to create new products and flavors. In this paper we develop the concept of “taste-shaping-natures”-natures shaping and shaped by taste-to highlight these multispecies interactions, based on practices of translated fermentation in the New Nordic Cuisine. Yet anthropological accounts of evolution and domestication have given little consideration to taste, microbes, or fermentation.
Taste shapes evolution, microbes make tasty food, and humans and microbes have been shaping each other for a long while.