Oga Shottsuru Yakisoba — Oga, Japan

Oga Shottsuru Yakisoba is a stir-fried noodle dish built on the standard yakisoba format — steamed wheat noodles tossed in a hot pan with pork, cabbage and other vegetables — but seasoned with shottsuru, a fermented fish sauce made from sailfin sandfish, instead of the usual sweet-savory yakisoba sauce. The result carries a deeper, saltier, faintly fishy note under the familiar noodle-and-vegetable base. It is reported from Oga, a coastal city in Akita Prefecture where shottsuru has long been produced as a way of preserving the local catch, salting and fermenting whole fish over months until only the seasoned liquid remains. Cooks in the area folded the sauce into standard noodle cooking as a way of putting a distinctly local product to everyday use, and it is now served at local eateries and festivals. To prepare it, thin pork belly is browned first, then cabbage, bean sprouts, carrot and scallion are added and stir-fried over high heat until just softened. Pre-steamed yakisoba noodles go in next, loosened and tossed through the vegetables, and shottsuru is poured in toward the end along with a touch of soy sauce, coating the noodles rather than stewing in it. A final toss over high heat concentrates the seasoning. What sets this version apart from standard yakisoba is entirely the seasoning: shottsuru replaces the usual bottled sauce, giving the dish a saltier, more savory backbone with the fermented depth typical of a fish sauce rather than the caramelized sweetness common elsewhere. It is often finished with a scattering of dried bonito flakes or a few strands of pickled ginger, kept light so the shottsuru stays the dominant flavor.