Miso mixed with mustard is packed into the holes of a lotus root. The root is coated in a batter of wheat flour, broad bean flour and egg yolk, then deep-fried, which is why the cut face is yellow with paler circles where the filling sits.

The story attached to it dates from 1632. The lord of Higo was in poor health, and a priest at a nearby temple looked for something strengthening. Lotus root was known in the medical writing of the time as good for the blood. The lord refused it, on the grounds that it grew in mud and was therefore unclean, so the priest hid it inside a batter and sent it back up looking like something else. The frying is done at a middle heat for about six minutes, until the crust is the colour of straw.

Sliced across, the pattern of holes resembled the crest of the Hosokawa house. The method was kept as a household secret and, it is said, did not leave the domain until the end of the shogunate.

Bite into it and the mustard goes up the back of the nose a moment later, without warning. It is better to know this beforehand. It is better to know this beforehand. In any group there is usually one person who does not, and everyone else waits for it.