Unpasteurised Living Miso

Miso paste is what you get when cooked beans, a grain inoculated with koji (the culture Aspergillus oryzae), sea salt and water are left together long enough to ferment. The koji breaks the starches and proteins down, the salt keeps everything in order, and time does the rest. What comes out is a thick, savoury paste with a depth of flavour that nothing else in the kitchen quite matches: the taste people call umami. In Japan it has been made this way for well over a thousand years, first in temples and farmhouses, then in every home. A little goes a long way. A teaspoon in warm water is soup. A spoon stirred into a dressing, a stew or a glaze changes the whole dish.

It depends on what you are making, and on how you like your salt. Ours run from light and gentle to dark and deep.

White miso (shiro). Our mildest. Made with more rice koji than beans and less salt, and fermented for a shorter time, so it comes out sweet and gentle. Customers describe it as "not too salty" and "light and gentle", and several drink it on its own as a late-morning cup. Lovely in light soups, dressings and anything you would rather not overpower.

Japanese-style miso. Our deepest. Aged in wooden vats for at least a year, then folded through with five seaweeds (nori, dulse, kombu, Ulvaceae and Fucales) and three organic mushrooms (shiitake, maitake and reishi). Dark, rich and savoury, with a flavour of the sea. The one customers call "the best miso I have tasted", and the quickest instant soup in the cupboard.

Rice & soy miso. The classic. Organic soybeans, organic rice, sea salt and spring water, fermented for at least a year. Deep and rounded, "not too salty, just tasty", and the most versatile of the four: soups, sauces, marinades, even a kimchi base.

Chickpea miso (soy free). Made with whole organic chickpeas in place of soybeans, so it is completely soy free, with a rich, sweet flavour. One customer calls it the lowest-salt miso they have found; another has bought it for years "to fill the umami gap". Made for dips, spreads, soups and dressings.

Alongside them sits our Miso Damari, the original tamari: the liquid that gathers in miso as it ages, drawn from these very misos.

Most miso on the supermarket shelf has been pasteurised, heated to stop it changing. Ours is not. The cultures that made it are still alive in the jar, which is why we ask you to keep it refrigerated before and after opening, and why a jar that has travelled in warm weather may arrive with a little miso weeping at the rim. That is the fermentation waking up again, not a fault; the cold puts it back to sleep. It is also why we pack every jar in dark amber glass, to keep the light off. Living miso is fine out of the fridge for the journey to you, and best kept cold from then on.

Gently, and late. Heat undoes what makes it living, so stir it in once the pan is off the boil. The simplest thing in the world: a teaspoon in a cup of hot (not boiling) water is a bowl of soup in under a minute. From there:

• Whisk a spoon into a dressing with tahini, grated ginger, lemon and olive oil, and pour it over brown rice or roasted vegetables.
• Stir into pea soup, stews and broths at the end, warmed through rather than cooked.
• Spread thinly on toast or crackers.
• Rub into cabbage or onions before roasting, for depth.

A jar goes a long way; customers tell us one lasts them months. Begin with our white miso if you like things gentle, or the Japanese-style if you want depth. Or read how our Miso Damari is drawn from the ageing miso.

Honestly, nothing quite replaces it; that rounded, savoury depth is what the months in the vat are for. If you have run out and need umami in a hurry, a good tamari comes closest, and our Miso Damari is the original form of it. A little sea salt and a spoon of nut butter will give body to a dressing. But if you find yourself reaching for substitutes often, it may simply be time for another jar.

Our misos are made in small batches by artisan producers in the USA who follow the traditional Japanese method rather than the modern shortcuts: whole organic beans, rice koji, sea salt, natural spring water, wooden vats and time. No accelerants, no added yeasts, nothing to hurry it along. Every ingredient is certified organic and non-GM, with no fillers or preservatives. When the miso is ready it comes to us, and we pack it into dark amber glass jars at our own organically certified premises. If you would like to know how we choose the people we work with, our sourcing policy is here.

Beans, rice, salt, water, and months of patience. That is all miso has ever been. It is good to have it in the house.