mirin; sweet cooking rice wine
A sweet, low-alcohol rice wine used exclusively as a cooking ingredient in Japanese cuisine. It adds sweetness, luster, and depth to dishes.
Adding mirin to teriyaki sauce gives it a nice glaze.
Adding mirin to the simmered dish gives the flavor more depth.
For this simmered dish, I use mirin instead of sugar.
I simmered the fish in soy sauce and mirin.
I made a teriyaki sauce with a good amount of mirin for flavor.
酒 refers to alcoholic drinks in general (including drinking sake), whereas みりん is a sweet seasoning made specifically for cooking, not for drinking.
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mirin-dried fish
The word is usually written in kana; this is the most common and learner-friendly spelling.
Ateji kanji spelling; rarely used in modern writing but may appear in traditional contexts or product labels.
Variant ateji spelling; even less common than 味醂.
The word みりん is of uncertain origin. It may be derived from a contraction of 味 (mi, 'taste') and 淋 (rin, possibly related to 'sweet' or 'mellow'), but the exact derivation is unclear. The kanji forms 味醂 and 味淋 are ateji.