Protein comes from meat, chicken, fish, or tofu. Almost any vegetable works well in chanko-nabe — popular choices including cabbage, onions, green onions, carrots, mushrooms, daikon radish, burdock root, and more!
In recent decades, Americans have become familiar with sushi, tempura, shabu-shabu, and other delicious Japanese dishes. Right now, not many people here know chanko, but Sumo Champions like Yama and Byamba are pioneering the spread of this nutritious Japanese hotpot.
In fact, Yama and Byamba are arguably two of the best chanko chefs in the Western Hemisphere, as they both spent years cooking it daily while in Japanese Pro Sumo. Yum yum …. However, this could not be further from the truth.
Being a sumo wrestler requires long hours of training, technique, a strong sense of discipline, and a total commitment to the lifestyle….
Sumo is a very competitive and physical sport that originated around 1, years ago. A majority of the time the matches only last a few seconds, however, matches can last longer depending on the technique, strength, and skill of the two wrestlers competing.
This seems like a simple task, but a lot of training and proficiency is required to become a successful wrestler. Life as a sumo wrestler is highly structured, with rules laid down by the Sumo Association.
Professional sumo wrestlers are required to live in dormitory-type residences known as sumo training stables. While I had a brief stay at Chuo University, I was able to join the sumo team for practice and observe them train.
When we first walked into the heya, it was warm and humid. We sat down off to the side on a hardwood floor and began to observe the team practice. The sensei instructor sat on a pad, drinking cold ice tea in which you could see the condensation on the outside of the glass.
As the wrestlers trained, they would not speak unless the sensei shouted a brief message to correct their technique. However, there were times when an individual wrestler seemed to be summoned to the sensei and almost reprimanded for making a mistake.
Challenge matches: These matches take place after warming up. They are very similar to the way wrestlers fight in a tournament which is often regarded as the best form of training. This also serves as an opportunity for less experienced wrestlers to challenge the highly skilled wrestlers.
Another exercise involves planting their backside on the ground while they have their knees extended, opening their legs degrees, and leaning forward until their chest touches the ground.
Matawari , as this is called, is used to develop flexibility in the lower body, which is important for a wrestler. Next, the wrestlers engage in what is known as moshiai , in which the winner of a practice match continues to take new challengers, and they also practice butsukari-geiko , in which wrestlers take turns throwing their bodies into each other. The ranked wrestlers are allowed to sleep a bit later, and they join in the training after they get up.
They do much the same training as the younger wrestlers, and they help them as well. Talking with each other is of course not allowed during practice sessions, and the most common sounds that can be heard are those of these large wrestlers throwing their bodies into each other and taking heavy breaths.
Practices get more intense as a tournament approaches, and the stable master watches from in front of the practice ring, occasionally entering the ring to give instructions to his charges. At am, the young wrestlers go to the kitchen to help prepare chanko.
Chanko refers to the food eaten by sumo wrestlers, and it includes stews, Chinese food, sashimi, and deep-fried food.
Stews are the most common dishes, but foods enjoyed by younger people have been included in recent years, such as rice with curry and hamburger steaks. Moving with strength and grace Credit: Matthew Bremner. Sumo is intensely traditional, where everything on display has a deeper meaning and where memories of the past are manifest in physical objects.
The dohyo is representative of the sacred grounds of the shrines where sumo bouts were first fought; topknots are an ode to the hairstyles of the Samurai; and the referees, who dress in the guise of a Shinto priest, carry a dagger to signify the days when they would commit seppuku ritual suicide if they made an error during a contest.
And in this same way, two wrestlers found themselves in the ring, ready to fight. They squatted opposite each other: two heads bobbing gently above clenched muscles and nervous tension; two round sweaty backs, twitching and turning; two chafing loincloths sinking deep into a quicksand of flab. Then, with no more warning than a flick of the wrist, the wrestlers threw themselves at each other and the deep suck of compressed air on loose flesh reverberated around the marquee.
A battle of the mighty Credit: Matthew Bremner. Both men gouged, pounded and pulverised until one lost his balance and was barrelled out of the ring. Back on their feet and gasping for breath, the wrestlers dusted themselves off and politely bowed to one another. There was neither disappointment in loss nor smugness in victory, just a silent, respectful return to their positions.
Soukokurai is Chinese of Mongolian descent, and one of the top ranked wrestlers in the sport, where his bouts broadcast to millions on national television. He even has his own fan club.
Weighing kg, with hands like buckets and a face as flat as a plate, he waded into the marquee as if against a strong current of water and assumed a position in the corner. He wore the crisp white mawashiof a sekitori a high ranked competitor , and looked on calmly, while his juniors were diffident in their respect. In the ring he wrestled with the same ease that he displayed outside of it. While his young, strident opponents flung themselves forward with bone-crunching crudeness, he collected their callowness calmly, and guided it out of the ring.
The harder the young rikishi tried, the more relaxed he seemed to appear. Most new recruits are scouted at the age of 15, straight from high school, and come to sumo in search of glory and wealth.
They want to live the life of a sekitori, with their own fan clubs, mountains of prize money and a retinue of servants. Yet, what they find is an unenviable combination of exhaustion and humiliation. The sekitori are exempt from many chores, are free to marry and live outside of the stable, but the novice rikishi are expected to cook, clean and tend to the needs of their seniors, as well as train many hours every day.
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