Japanese Vegan Soup (Kenchinjiru). Kenchinjiru is a flavorful vegan soup created originally as a Buddhist temple cuisine (精進料理) with root vegetables and shiitake and kombu stock. Kenjinjiru or sometimes spelled as Kenchin-jiru ("jiru" means soup in Japanese) derived its name "Kenchin" from "Kencho" - the Zen. Kenchinjiru (けんちん汁) is a hearty plant-based Japanese soup that's made with a vegan shiitake mushroom and konbu stock.

Japanese Vegetable Soup (Kenchinjiru) was originally a Buddhist dish that is vegetarian. Root vegetables and tofu are sautéed and cooked in flavoured dashi broth. Kenchinjiru (けんちん汁) is a Vegan Japanese Soup recipe that's made with a plant-based shiitake and konbu dashi stock. You can cook Japanese Vegan Soup (Kenchinjiru) using 11 ingredients and 9 steps. Here is how you achieve it.

Ingredients of Japanese Vegan Soup (Kenchinjiru)

Prepare 200 g of taros or potatoes.
You need 100 g of carrot.
Prepare 100 g of daikon raddish.
It's 100 g of gobo.
It's 1 stick of green onion.
It's 1 sheet of konnyaku.
You need 1 of tofu.
Prepare 1 tbsp of sesame oil.
You need 1000 mL of komb kelp dashi soup stock.
Prepare 3 tbsp of Sake.
You need 2 tbsp of soy sauce.

This savory vegan dashi is loaded with. This classic Japanese soup is hearty yet low in calories, full of fiber, and just all around good for you. It helps to counteract all the cookies and sweets you might be indulging in at this time of year. Since kenchinjiru is a shojin ryouri or temple cuisine dish, the basic version given here is vegan.

Japanese Vegan Soup (Kenchinjiru) step by step

Cut the carrot and the daikon radish into 5 mm thick quarter slice..
Peel the taro skin and cut into bite-size chunks..
Wash the gobo to remove the soil and cut it into random chunks..
Cut the green onion into small pieces..
Cut the konnyaku into half and slice into about 5 mm thick. Boil them for about 3 minutes, then drain the water..
Cut the tofu into dices..
Heat the sesame oil in a pot add the carrot, the daikon radish, the taro, and the gobo and stir-fry over medium-high heat for one minute..
Add the konnyaku, the tofu, and the green onion to stir-fry for a few minutes..
Pour the dashi broth and sake. Keep heating and simmer until the ingredients are cooked..

While we certainly don't expect all our readers to become vegan—if you already are, we applaud you—eating even a few meatless meals per week can help make a difference. Kenchinjiru traditionally is vegan, but I've seen many recipes that use a fish-based dashi or even add chicken to the soup. She calls it "Lazy Mama's Kenchinjiru" because normally when you make kenchinjiru you first prepare dashi (Japanese stock) that you then use as the liquid base of the soup. Kenchin jiru (けんちん汁, 巻繊汁 kenchinjiru), also spelled kenchin-jiru, and sometimes referred to simply as kenchin, is a Japanese vegetable soup prepared using root vegetables and tofu. It is a popular dish in Japan and is prepared in various manners using myriad ingredients.