Donabe earthen pots are Japanese kitchen staples. Some are multifunctional and can be used to cook rice and grains or bake, stew, and steam while others are specially designed to smoke dishes. Bonus: they look beautiful in your kitchen.
“The quality of rice you get from donabe is worlds apart from what you get with an electric rice cooker, says Kyle Connaughton, chef/co-owner of SingleThread Farms in California’s Sonoma County. “The food from a smoking donabe is so much more interesting and refined than what you get with other devices.”
Connaughton prefers the donabe produced by eighth-generation artisans in Iga, Japan, as the fossils found in the clay of this region break down during manufacture to create small holes in the ceramic that allow gentle, even heat distribution over a gas ring or in an oven.