How Osaka became ‘the kitchen of Japan’ with its dashi culture

The Japanese city of Osaka is best known for its street food culture. In Japan, there’s a saying known as kuidaore, meaning “eat in Osaka until you drop or go bankrupt”. In this episode of Eat Drink Asia, Post reporter Lisa Cam visits Osaka and explores how dashi, the Japanese soup-stock, helped establish the city’s reputation as a culinary capital as well as how dashi is used in Osaka street food and Japanese fine dining cuisine. She also learns how dashi gave rise to the culinary concept of umami and the invention of the controversial flavour enhancer monosodium glutamate (MSG). This episode of Eat Drink Asia is made with support from Hilton.