Uchida Tsukemono

The storefront features a low wooden counter piled with colorful, salt-cured vegetables in shallow baskets. This is Uchida Tsukemono, a shop that has specialized in traditional Kyoto pickles for over one hundred years. While the city modernizes, the family here keeps using the same fermentation methods passed down since the early twentieth century. They focus entirely on seasonal produce, curing daikon radish and eggplant in rice bran until the vegetables lose their crunch and take on a deep, savory, umami flavor.