A Local Kind Of Potato Handed Down From Samurai Era Attracts Tourists In Hinohara Village

I'd like to go back to the topics about Hinohara Village in West Tokyo which I have introduced on this blog and my another blog. As I wrote previously, Hinohara Village is a hidden great nature spot even though it is located in Tokyo, and it had been a famous product place for timber. The village still keeps old-fashioned views of Japanese country-side as shown in the upper left hand side photo. People grow vegetables and rice on small flat land between mountains. 

Then, what are their current local specialties? When I stopped by a cafe in the village I found a unique local ice cream which is shown in the upper right hand side photo. the ice cream was made from potatoes! It might sound strange, but apparently potatoes are one of the major products in the village, therefore local people created the potato ice cream. It indeed has a hint of potato taste and flavor but it fits well into ice cream.

Moreover, at local shops I even found a native potato which has been planted since Samurai era. The kind is called "Oine-no-tsuruimo (means Oine's potatoes)". Nowadays potatoes we can find at shops are usually improved breeds. So it is very rare to see native one. An old lady who run a local products shop told me an episode about the "Oine-no-tsuruimo". 

According to her story, initially people in this village didn't have the native potato, but once during the Samurai era a young woman from another village over mountains came to marry to a local man in the village. Her name is "Oine" and she brought the native potatoes which was planted in her village. Since then the potatoes started to be planted in Hinohara Village and people still keep it today. It is now called  "Oine-no-tsuruimo" named after her. 

It was a nice historical episode, but funnily at the end of the story the old lady added "I know it's a rare kind but it's not so popular among local people and I also don't prefer this potato. I like improved bleed because the texture is softer and the size is bigger." As you can see in the lower photos, the "Oine-no-tsuruimo" potatoes are not big, and the texture is in fact much harder than common kinds. The potato pieces keep the shape even when it is cooked in a rice cooker. 

Well, it would be the reason people have improved potatoes. However, interestingly these disadvantages of  "Oine-no-tsuruimo" turned into advantages to create a new local dish. It is a rice dish cooked with small pieces of the "Oine-no-tsuruimo" potatoes. In recent years some of the local restaurants in the village started to serve the dish "Oine-no-tsuruimo Rice" and it is becoming a popular local food among tourists. 

By the way, the local lady also told me that wild monkeys there love the "Oine-no-tsuruimo" potatoes. Somehow whenever they sneak in vegetable field they always take "Oine-no-tsuruimo" potatoes first and eat them up right away. Perhaps monkeys value native vegetables more than human being?