【Reading】たれ

【English Name】Tare (glaze/sauce)

Familiar at the sushi counter is nitsume (reduced simmering sauce), brushed lightly over simmered conger eel to add a sweet-savory sheen. The same kind of sweet-savory sauce is also indispensable for kanpyo rolls and simmered clams.

Tare in the first place is a general term for a thick, viscous liquid seasoning made by simmering together several ingredients such as soy sauce, mirin, and miso. Its characteristic lies in a mouthfeel that combines both sweetness and viscosity; the name is not applied to a liquid composed of just a single seasoning.

The origin of the name goes back to a time before soy sauce had become widespread. After kneading miso with water and heating it until it was fully reduced, it was transferred into a cloth bag and hung up high, whereupon the liquid dripped down little by little from the bottom. People named this liquid "tare-miso" (dripping miso), which became the starting point of the word tare.

For grilled eel (kabayaki), the practice took hold of sinking the grilled flesh directly into a vessel filled with tare to let the flavor spread throughout. In the case of yakitori, the common method is to brush it on repeatedly, one skewer at a time, with a dedicated brush.

The type that each person adjusts and dips their food into at the table is called "tsuke-dare," and it is customarily distinguished from the tare prepared during the cooking stage.