For nearly a year I have been waiting for this recipe to finish. Last August I made my first batch of miso and set it in the pantry to age. I meant to wait until August, but now that it almost mid July, my curiosity got the best of me. I brought the crock out of the panty.

Lifting the lid, it certainly smelled like miso. I made my miso with soy beans, brown rice, barley and salt. What transforms this mixture into miso is koji, or Aspergillus oryzae, a fungus used to ferment a number of food products. Humans have been using Aspergillus oryzae for some 2,000 years.

Lifting the parchment paper I used to seal the fermenting miso, I am face to face with my home made miso.

Opening it a few weeks early was worth it. My impatience was rewarded with some of the best miso I’ve ever had. There really is something to making some foods yourself in small batches. Now I can start making a batch every three months. One of the places I researched said that if you let it ferment for two years, it tastes even better. If I make enough batches, I will have the patience to let some ferment that long.

• Miso ~ Wikipedia
• Miso ~ The World’s Healthiest Foods
• Miso Basics: A Japanese miso primer, looking at different types of miso ~ Just Hungry
• Mastering Miso’s Mysteries ~ NPR
• Rice and Miso Every Day
• 手作り味噌の作り方 ~ Youtube video on making miso – in Japanese but worth watching
• 味噌屋が教える手作り味噌の作り方 ~ Youtube video on making miso – in Japanese but the enthusiasm of the miso maker will make your day