The whole plant goes into the barrel. Nothing is chopped. In the field the root is cut away, and the leaves and stems, still full length, go straight into a large wooden vat.

The washing is done in the village bathhouse. It has a name of its own, onai-arai, the washing of the greens, and it is done in hot spring water — which is not a picturesque detail but the reason the work is bearable at all in December. This happens between October and December, ahead of the snow.

The lightly pickled version stays green and is eaten within weeks. Left to ferment properly, lactic acid turns it a deep amber and the flavour goes sour and considerably deeper. It is the same vegetable at both ends; only the time in the barrel differs. Because the village is cold, the fermentation is slow and the smell never gets strong.

In 1756 the priest of Kenmeiji, the temple in Nozawa Onsen, is said to have gone to Kyoto to study and to have come home with the seed of a turnip grown near Osaka, at Tennoji. What descended from that seed became nozawana. The vegetable is named for the village, and the village is named for its hot spring, and a story about one packet of seed still ties the three of them together.