Mochi will bind your family together
By Will Hoover
Advertiser Staff Writer
Gail Nakamura and her husband, Carl Williams of Manoa, like their New Year's mochi the old-fashioned way — hand-pounded.
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It is far superior to store-bought mochi, Williams insists, "because you occasionally bite into a splinter and then you know you're eating the real thing."
Megan Miyasaki watches Ed Abdul press his mallet into the usu to mash rice before it is pounded into mochi.
The splinters were flying fast and furious yesterday as Nakamura and Williams were joined by Aokis, Miyasakis and four dozen assorted other relatives, in-laws and friends in the annual backyard New Year's mochi-pounding ritual.
It was a three-mallet affair.
Mochi pounding dates back to ancient Japan. Short-grain sweet rice being a highly prized food, it was the perfect offering to the gods for luck — preferably good — in the coming year.
The rice was steamed, dumped into a stone mortar called an usu, mashed and pounded to a pulp with heavy wooden mallets. The gooey mass was dusted with rice flour and formed into rounded cakes filled with tasty treats, such as sweet red azuki beans.
These days, of course, it's easier to simply buy the stuff ready-made, or to use an automatic mochi-making machine. All of which misses the point of the mochi-pounding exercise.
"It's a pretty cool excuse to have a party," said Williams. "Although, maybe we should be drinking sake instead of beer."
Members of the family decided to return to the mochi-pounding custom 12 years ago as a way to reacquaint themselves with fading Japanese traditions. Alison Miyasaki says it was her cousin Craig Nakamura's idea. He says it was hers.
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"Nobody really wants to take the blame," said Craif Nakamura.
Manabu Nakamura pulls a steaming rice off a burner in preparation for making mochi.
Meanwhile, Uncle Kreanch — Kenzo Miyasaki, 79 — produced a family heirloom: a near-century-old stone usu that was owned by his father before Kenzo was born.
Older family members taught the uninitiated all they knew about mochi methods.
"Now, we all have our own jobs," said Williams. "I set up the yard, Bryce Miyasaki starts the fire, Uncle Mana is in charge of the rice — he prepares it, puts it in cheesecloth, times it while it's cooking. He's quality control."
Uncle Mana — Manabu Nakamura, 72, a retired aerospace engineer — says he does the rice so he won't have to pound. Darryl Nakamura, who flies in from Sammamish, Wash., each year, says pounding isn't as painful as the palm-blistering process of mashing the steamed rice with a edge of the mallet.
"We're mostly accountants, lawyers and engineers, so we've got soft hands," said Nakamura. "I wear gloves now. I learned that after the first year."
The most dangerous detail is reaching into the usu and turning the rice by hand between thundering pounds of the heavy mallet. Master turner Uncle Kreanch is so adroit, he's able to turn rice and delicately pinch out splinters at the same time. In a dozen years, he's never taken a hit.
While the men pound, mash and turn, the women fashion small round mochi cakes, fill them (this family's favorite is peanut butter mochi), drink beer and critique the pounders. That includes the junior pounders.
"The first rule, don't hit Uncle Kreanch," yelled Rhonda Chong, even as the future pounders — 13 boys and two girls, ages 4 to 16 — lined up to take five whacks apiece at the mochi. "The second rule, hit the usu in the middle."
After 12 years of pounding, the family now qualifies for another favorite mochi tradition: swearing that they won't go to the trouble next year.
Which, in turn, leads to the most popular mochi-pounding tradition of them all: showing up to do it again anyway.
