Donabe

A donabe goes straight from the flame to the table, and keeps cooking quietly for a minute after you set it down.

The glazes are tenmoku, shino and kiseto, three that Japanese potters have been refining for four hundred years. Five go of rice feeds a table. You lift the lid once, at the end, and the steam that comes up decides how the room smells for the next hour.

Shino is the thick white feldspar glaze that blushes scarlet where it thins. Kiseto is the yellow one with its oil-skin surface and green copper bleeds. Tenmoku is the deep black. Five go is about 750g of uncooked rice, enough for four to six servings. The base is bare clay, so let it cool before washing and dry it fully. The rest of the care is here.