Kijoyu Soy Sauce 200ml

This is kijoyu – a pure, unblended soy sauce, genuinely brewed (honjōzō) from nothing but whole soybeans, wheat and salt. There's no dashi, no sweetener, no additives, and neither its umami nor its salt is adjusted after pressing. It's essentially soy sauce in its most honest form: clean and crisp on the palate, with a lively edge of acidity and the natural sweetness of good raw ingredients carrying it through.

That brightness makes it a wonderful match for richly flavoured sashimi like tuna, and for umami-heavy meat and seafood where a softer sauce would get lost. It's just as happy as an everyday all-rounder, though – over gyoza, stirred into a bowl of ramen, alongside pork, or mixed with a little mustard for a quick dip.

The wooden sign still hanging over Ando's shop in Kakunodate reads "Hitachi-den kishoyu" – a nod to the founder travelling to Hitachi province to learn the craft back in the 1850s, and to this exact sauce. The family has brewed under the Marujō mark here since 1853, by hand and in batches small enough that most of it never leaves Akita. The kijoyu is the most stripped-back thing they make – and the one with nowhere to hide.

Product Details:

• Size: 200ml
  
• Type: Kijoyu – raw soy sauce, genuinely brewed (honjōzō) with whole soybeans
  
• Ingredients: Water, soybeans, wheat, salt
• Origin: Kakunodate, Akita, Japan

Recommended for:

• Sashimi (especially tuna) & sushi
• Gyoza, ramen & pork
• Everyday all-round soy sauce