# Imobota ｜ Our Regional Cuisines

**Cuisine Name**: Imobota

**Region**: Our Regional Cuisines

## Main Lore Areas
Entire prefecture

## Main Ingredients Used
Rice, taro, adzuki bean

## History, Origin, and Related Events
"Imobota" refers to botamochi (adzuki-bean covered glutinous rice balls) with taro inside. Glutinous rice was valuable, so taro was instead added to Rice flour, and its stickiness was used to make botamochi resembling that made with glutinous rice. It originates from the lifelong wisdom of farmers who value rice. It can be easily digested without feeling heavy, even if you eat a lot. In other prefectures, "Imobota" is made with potato or sweet potato, but "Imobota" in Nara is distinguished by its use of taro. There are many rice paddies in Nara and a flourishing taro cultivation, thus it was thought to use the familiar taro.

## Opportunities and Times of Eating Habits
It is said that eating mochi on the "Day of the Boar" at the end of harvest in November will ward off various sicknesses. It is also called "Inokomochi" (boar mochi), and since boars give birth to five or more offspring at a time, it is said to increase fertility in women. In addition to the "Day of the Boar," "Imobota" are offered at gravesites and Buddhist altars during celebratory days such as the equinoctial week and autumn festivals in the flat part of the Nara Basin. On the "Day of the Boar,” some regions also eat walnut mochi wrapped in bean paste made from soybeans and green soybeans.

## How to Eat
Because it is made with Rice flour rice and taro, the texture remains delightfully soft and chewy, even when cold.

## Efforts for Preservation and Succession
Even today, it is frequently made at home and passed down from parents to children. It is also sold in farm shops as a regional cuisine.

## Ingredients
- Rice: 2 cups
- Taro: 200 to 250g
- Water: 2.4 cups
- Salt: 1 teaspoon
- Adzuki beans: 200g
- Sugar (for adzuki beans): 200g
- Salt (for adzuki beans): A pinch

## Recipe
1. 1. Peel and cut the taro into bite-sized pieces, then cook with the washed rice, salt, and water. Put the cooked rice in a mortar and mash with a pestle until the taro loses its shape.
2. 2. Shape the mashed rice into balls and wrap in adzuki bean paste.
3. 3. [How to make adzuki bean paste]Wash the adzuki beans, put in about 5 to 6 times the amount of water, bring to a boil, remove from heat and drain the water (to reduce the bitterness). Add the water again and simmer until soft, then add 200g of sugar and a pinch of salt, and knead thoroughly to make a coarse adzuki bean paste.

## Provider Information
provider : Recipe source: Nara prefecture

![Image](Not found)