The Japanese celebrate Christmas as Western people do, but put more importance on New Year’s days.
Usually (but not this year), families and relatives get together and eat “osechi” and “zouni”, the New Year’s dishes. Each ingredients have some auspicious meaning.
In the image the tiny yellow piece in zouni is yuzu.
The yuzu is a kind of citrus fruit and its peel is used for many kinds of dishes and sweets. Only a small piece of the peel can improve the taste and flavor of foods dramatically.
At the winter solstice the whole fruit or a piece of it is floated in the hot bath water. Taking the bath prevent you from catching cold and make your skin smooth.
When we say yuzu, it usually indicates the fruit of Citrus junos, while in my garden another kind of yuzu, Citrus hanayu, a garden plant, has fruits.
A legend says that Katsushika Hokusai, the famous Ukiyo-e painter, had had a stroke in his middle age but survived to enjoy longevity. It is said that after the stroke he ate great amount of processed yuzu, which contained a lot of vitamin K that prevented him from another attack.
Another citrus fruit essential for Japanese winter is mikan, Citrus unshu.
The mikan is easy to eat and it has few seeds in it. It tastes sweet and is very juicy, inexpensive and loved by every Japanese.
When I was a high school student I ate so much mikan at a time that my skin became yellow. That year I didn’t catch cold. It contains a lot of vitamin C, and the peel of mikan, called Chinpi, is used as an ingredient for Chinese medicine.
It is said that Citrus fruits strengthen your immunity and surely help you to defeat the Virus.
