Hakone Seiroku Mishima Vegetables cultivates vegetables on an expansive sloping field in the southwestern area of the Hakone Mountains. We believe Vol. 4 gave you a good idea of the factors behind their delicious flavor. The types of vegetables grown by this producer include potatoes (May Queen variety), cabbage, broccoli, carrots, bamboo shoots, spinach, and lettuce. In addition, other farms in the area grow celery, tomatoes, and herbs including lavender and rosemary. As this indicates, a truly wide variety of vegetables are being grown in the area. This may seem surprising, since people generally do not associate Hakone with cultivation of vegetables. We can assure you, however, that Hakone is indeed also a region where delicious vegetables are grown.

As might be expected, the food making the best use of the crops grown with such care by the local producers is salads. We have prepared an assortment of Hakone salads presenting the vegetables harvested by Hakone Seiroku Mishima Vegetables and other sources in the neighborhood, in the Hotel Indigo style. Please sample them with our original truffle dressing. We are certain that you will discover a fresh flavor deriving from the soil of Hakone. Another Indigo-style salad is our beet salad, which we make by slicing and seasoning beets that we first roasted whole. We have also prepared other salads and appetizers made with fresh vegetables in season at the time.

To be continued in Vol. 6