In Obi this was made for the lord of the domain. Eggs are beaten with dashi and sugar, poured into a wooden frame, and set over a charcoal brazier. Then more charcoal goes on top of the lid, so heat comes from above and below at once. The cooking is slow and deliberate, and nobody is stirring or rolling anything.

What comes out is set firm enough that a knife passes through it cleanly. Cooled, it is cut into rectangles with straight edges, the way you would portion a cake. Sitting on a plate it looks like confectionery, and the first mistake a visitor makes is assuming it will behave like the rolled omelet served everywhere else in Japan.

It does not. The texture is closer to a custard: dense, cool, faintly sweet, dissolving rather than yielding. I bit down expecting resistance and found none, and spent a confused second wondering what my teeth were supposed to do.

Calling it egg undersells it and calling it dessert misfiles it. It sits in between, which may be why it survived as a formal gift rather than becoming an everyday dish. It is still required at celebrations here, and a handful of shops in the old castle town make it, working the same way with the fire above and the fire below.