Dongara means the parts of a fish that are left over. The head, the frame, the innards. In winter a cod goes into the pot with all of that still on it, and nothing is set aside for a tidier dish later.

The fish is Pacific cod, which spawns out in the rough winter water of the Japan Sea and has been the cold-weather taste of the Shonai district for as long as anyone records. Fishermen on the Shonai coast are said to have made this on the boat or on the beach, which is where a soup built entirely from offcuts would naturally begin. Bone and head both give up a great deal, and the broth in the bowl comes out clouded and pale.

Rock nori is scattered over it at the end, torn up between the fingers, and the smell of the shore sits on top of the fish oil. Sometimes there is milt floating in there as well, soft enough to collapse against the spoon before you have decided what to do with it.

When winter comes, towns along that coast hold cod festivals, and some are held inland in the Murayama district too, a long way from any boat. A soup named after the parts you would throw away has become the thing a town organises its January around. That looks like the wrong way round until you have spent a February up there.