Kombu

Kombu (from Japanese: , translit. konbu) is edible kelp from the family Laminariaceae and is widely eaten in East Asia. It may also be referred to as, dasima (Korean: 다시마) or haidai (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: Hǎidài). Some edible kelps in the family Laminariaceae are not always called kombu, such as arame, kurome () (Ecklonia kurome) or Macrocystis pyrifera. Most kombu is from the species Saccharina japonica (Laminaria japonica), extensively cultivated on ropes in the seas of Japan and Korea. With the development of cultivation technology, over 90% of Japanese kombu is cultivated, mostly in Hokkaidō, but also as far south as the Seto Inland Sea.

In Old Japanese, edible seaweed was generically called "me" (cf. wakame, arame) and kanji such as "軍布", 海藻 or "和布" were applied to transcribe the word. Especially, kombu was called hirome (from hiroi, wide) or ebisume (from ebisu). Sometime later the names konfu and kofu appeared respectively in two editions of Iroha Jirui Shō in 12th-13th century.

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