Japanese Food

[whis4ey]

I love Japanese food and Japanese Restaurants. Has anybody got a particularly good Japanese recipe they would like to share?
Sam

[Haivart]

What are you interested in? I've recently been experimenting with Ika-meshi (stuffed squid) and have a nice (but Westernized) recipe for beef and potato stew (Nikujaga). Just let me know, and I'll "cook" something up for you.

[mike]

ah , i can't wait to go to hakodate where the squid is the best in the world!

[Maciamo]

Not surr you'll find the right ingredients in the UK, but if you can, you can try to cook "kaisendon", which is easy to make :

You just need a big bowl of (Japanese) rice that you'll cover with "nori" (seeweed) sheets. Then add fresh and juicy shrimps on one half and "negitoro" (minced raw tuna mixed with sliced leeks). Actually, it will be difficult to make negitoro yourself if you don't know what it is. In Japan, yo can find it ready to eat in supermarket, so it only takes 2min to cook this dish.

Alternatively, try "katsudon". Just put some "katsu" (battered pork) on your bowl of (warm) rice and break an egg on the top of it. It needs to be warm enough for the egg to cook. Otherwise, put warm it up in the microwave until the egg is half-cooked (like a poached egg). Then eat !

[kirei_na_me]

Yum! Katsudon! One of my all time favorites. I take my pork tenderloins, beat them with a tenderizer, roll them in flour, dip them in egg wash, roll them in panko, and then deep fry them. I then make a mixture of dashi stock, soy sauce, brown sugar, and mirin. I put one of the cutlets in the pan with that mixture, put some onions in there and kind of sautee them together, scramble an egg, pour it in the pan until it sets and put all of that over a bowl of rice. I usually sprinkle green onions on top to give it a little green.

My mouth is watering now... ;)

Another favorite is nikuman. I have all my ingredients ready, I just need to go ahead and try to do it. Have any of you ever made nikuman? If so, let me know what you put in it and how they turned out.

[whis4ey]

Mine too ..... yummy
My favourites are sea food and chicken recipes, but I also like steak or pork
Keep the ideas coming. I can feel a banquet coming on ......

[Iron Chef]

Somebody mention food? Allez cuisine! 8-p

"ah , i can't wait to go to hakodate where the squid is the best in the world!"

Yes, Hakodate has some great seafood although my two personal favorites have to be Otaru for their crab and Sendai for their oysters. Generally speaking though, pretty much anywhere in Japan has at least one good seafood joint if you know where to look, heh. Sapporo is a virtual mecca for different restaurants and the Susukino area alone houses some 4,000+ restaurants, bars, and nightclubs where every imaginable type of cuisine can be found. Nothing beats the winter chill more than sitting down to an all you can eat seafood buffet you grill yourself ala Genghis Khan style imho. 8-) For more info re: Sapporo and the Suskino area, check out the following link:

http://www.global.city.sapporo.jp/co...e/cuisine.html

The following link is a great resource for aspiring chefs and hosts links to all manner of Pan-Asian/Pacific Rim recipes.

http://www.greatworldchefs.com/culinlinks.html

Specifically found within the index above, this link is to a very detailed list of 68 authentic Japanese dishes (complete with step-by-step instructions as well as pictures for every dish and some of the ingredients used).

http://www.sugawara.com/frame/recipe-ef.html

Here's a great link re: recipes you may find useful. It actually contains about 30 or so "reverse-engineered" recipes from the Iron Chef show that seem to be pretty accurate in terms of ingredients as well as thorough yet simple in their directions.

http://www.visi.com/~phantos/icrecipe.html

In addition, here's another little recipe and personal fav of mine courtesy of the man himself (Masahara Morimoto) taken from the food network's archive of recipes.

Nikujaga, Morimoto-Style

Recipe courtesy Masahara Morimoto

Vegetable oil
1 pound beef rib eye
4 potatoes, halved and cut in 1/4-inch slices
1 carrot, peeled and quartered
12 baby onions
1 yellow bell pepper
1 red bell pepper
2 cups sake
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons mirin
2 tablespoons finely chopped chives
Hot chili oil
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In large, ovenproof pan, heat a little oil, then sear beef both sides, until nicely browned. Add potatoes, carrots, baby onions, yellow, and red bell peppers and mix well with beef juices. Place pan in oven for 15 minutes.

Remove from oven. Remove beef and vegetables from pan. Stem and seed the peppers. Cut the meat and vegetables into bite size pieces and set aside, keeping warm. Deglaze pan with sake. Add soy sauce and mirin. Thicken, if necessary, with cornstarch and water. Cover meat and vegetables with gravy. Sprinkle chive on top and drizzle chili oil on top, to taste.

Yield: 4 servings
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Difficulty: Medium

[ghettocities]

Originally posted by Iron Chef
In addition, here's another little recipe and personal fav of mine courtesy of the man himself (Masahara Morimoto).

Hahahahhahahahaha... your a charecter, wow.... (scrolls up and looks for where anyone within the topic had asked, "Hey Iron Chef, I want to read your two pages of pointlessness.")

Ghettocities

[whis4ey]

Whao
Thanks Iron Chef.. .... loads of info there.
I DEFINITELY feel a banquet coming on now
Sam

[Haivart]

I'll see your Morimoto and raise you a Kandagawa squid recipe.

Mince and fry 1 T. of onion in 1 T. of butter. Add 1 c. of washed short grain rice and cook until almost transparent. Dissolve 1 chicken bouillon cube in 300 ml of boiling water (or use stock) and add to the pan. Put everything in a rice cooker and steam the usual way.
Clean, skin and dry 2 squid. Mince 1 green and 1/4 red bell pepper (I used only red).
Stir-fry peppers in 1 T. oil and season with salt & pepper. Add the rice and some parsley. Stuff squid and secure the ends with toothpicks.
Place the squid in a saucepan, and add 70 ml white wine (Italian or French is best). Cook over high heat, then reduce to simmer.
In a pan, saute 2 T. minced garlic and 2 T. minced onion. Add 4-6 T. of tomato puree (or ketchup) and salt & pepper.
Slice the squid into 2 cm widths and arrange on a platter. Add sauce as desired.
An excellent recipe, as is the Japanese version.

[Iron Chef]

That sounds really good! Unfortunately, good quality fresh Ika is hard to come by in these parts, although I suppose I can make do with the frozen variety that's available. 8-( I'll definitely try out it out sometime though. 8-)

[den4]

not exactly a recipe, but it is on food:

JAPAN LITE

Food displays and questions best unasked

By AMY CHAVEZ

Japan is very creative when it comes to the presentation of food. Indeed, much time and effort goes into making food look so good, you'll pay big bucks for it. Here are just some of the ways food is displayed in Japanese restaurants.

Stuff in the window: It starts with the plastic models of food in the front windows of restaurants so you can pick and choose your entree before you enter. (Reportedly, these fake food replicas started appearing just after World War II to help foreigners order food in Japanese restaurants). I often marvel at the groups of Japanese people crowded in front of restaurant windows pointing to plastic saying, "Oishiso!" ("That looks delicious!") Unfortunately, employees often neglect to dust off the plastic models, so the food doesn't always look so "oishii." When I first came to Japan, I dragged the waitress outside and pointed to the plastic tempura and ordered, "Tempura, no dust please."

Stuff in the tank: Some restaurants will offer a presentation of their food still in the aquarium. Nothing like bringing the sea inside the restaurant. I'm glad they don't do that with beef. Can you imagine a small corral with some cows grazing in it in the middle of the restaurant?

But many people enjoy the aquarium as a visual appetizer. They also enjoy picking out their food while it's still alive. Many people like their fish so fresh it's still twitching. I've often wondered what exactly people are doing when they survey those fish in the tank. Asking if it has any last words? Getting some quotes? A restaurant near my house has an entire aquarium of sea slugs. How do you choose among sea slugs that all look exactly the same -- like oversize pieces of lint from Godzilla's washing machine? The real test is knowing which sea slugs have a pulse. I mean, for the layman, it's very hard to tell if that sea slug is alive or whether it died two years ago. The taste gives no indication either.

Stuff under glass: If you're at a sushi bar, you'll see the raw filleted fish sitting on ice under the glass. At this point, you'll have to distinguish the fish by the color of their flesh. The types of fish will vary from the pedestrian red-colored tuna and the mildly threatening orange salmon roe to things you might have previously considered nonfood items, since you've only seen them on Jacques Cousteau films. This would include the potentially poisonous blowfish with its translucent flesh.

As a general rule, I advise you to not ask what things are before you eat them. Especially food suspiciously wrapped in seaweed and tied with an edible string. I suspect inside is some of that furniture from the fish tank. If you know this, you surely won't eat it. But then you'll miss out on the satisfaction of telling your friends later that you not only ate Charlie the Tuna but also his sofa.

If you don't want to worry about pulses, blood types or surprise muscle twitches, I suggest ordering "tempura, no dust." These fried vegetables are the Westerner's "comfort food," named so because it is a comfort to see a familiar vegetable on the plate rather than an exotic "nice to meet you" fish with baked white eyes. Most vegetables in tempura you'll recognize, and even those you don't you'll at least have seen previously in the Encyclopedia Britannica.

If you're still not so sure about Japanese food, you can become more familiar with it by simply watching the numerous cooking shows aired on TV every day in Japan. I assure you that there is not one food prepared on TV that is not met with multiple squeals of delight and gasps of "Oishii!"

Check out Amy Chavez's new column, "Parents Do the Strangest Things," at www.amychavez.com.

[Iron Chef]

Heheh, great editorial. Yeah, i've found that I really like the whole idea of window dressing using replicas to showcase an establishment's most popular or specialty dishes. I was kind of taken aback at first when I saw them not really knowing what to think, but after awhile I really developed an appreciation for some of the meticulous detail that goes into them. That an they really do serve to stimulate one's appetite.

I've seen them all too, from the dusty and neglected aforementioned presentations to the really elaborate backlit ones that literally take your breath away with their realism. The worst one though had to be when a friend and I were looking for a good place to grab some lunch and as I casually admired one such window, I couldn't help but notice an extremely agile cockroach about the size of my thumb casually weaving in and out from behind the replicas... Needless to say, we did NOT dine there... ever. 8-p

[alfred183]

I think onigiri is an awesome invention. You can eat it almost anytime. Well, at least I do. Its so simple too. Just make rice, mix with some furikake and make into a ball. Fun for everyone. Although, I've had them with a plum inside, and I could never decide if I liked that or not...

[eimik]

Originally posted by alfred183
I think onigiri is an awesome invention. You can eat it almost anytime. Well, at least I do. Its so simple too. Just make rice, mix with some furikake and make into a ball. Fun for everyone. Although, I've had them with a plum inside, and I could never decide if I liked that or not...

not really...

its the samething, as having a bowl of rice, with fuirkake, tsukemono etc. its just more of a convience factor, since its shaped. But nothing fancy,

[Iron Chef]

I loves me some Onigiri. 8-p Slap a couple in the microwave for a fast and healthy lunch that's just filling enough to make your hunger go away when you're on the go. Benisake, Maguro, Umeboshi, you name it--it's all good. 8-)


In another food-related topic, has anyone ever tried "Tokyo X" brand pork? This hybrid hog was recently showcased on the "King of Iron Chef Battle Tourney" (Iron Chef vs. Iron Chef) here in the States and is a result of cross-breeding the American Duroc, British Berkshire, and Beijing black pig by the Tokyo government in order to create the perfect pork chop so to speak.

Unfortunately, the breed was successfully introduced in 1997 by the Tokyo Metropolitan Livestock Experimentation Station (TMLES) but it took some time before it actually hit the commercial market and hence I was unable to savor the meat for myself (left Japan in '98). I'd be interested in hearing the comments of those who have had a chance to try it though (bacon anyone?). From my understanding, both the flavor and texture are considerably richer making the meat tender and succulent and this is reflected in the cost (twice as much as commercial brands of pork).

For those interested in learning more about Tokyo X, check out the following 2002 story as reported by Reuters and carried by the Environmental News Network (ENN):

http://www.enn.com/news/wire-stories.../reu_48888.asp

[bezz]

Originally Posted by Haivart

I've recently been experimenting with Ika-meshi (stuffed squid) and have a nice (but Westernized) recipe for beef and potato stew (Nikujaga).

ikameshi



nikujaga

[tropicalfish]

are any of you guys interested in organic japanese food? i've just been inspired by this uk based japanese farmer to start growing my own. go to the organic farmer section on this site: www.foundintranslation.co.uk . enjoy!

[Thingamabob]

Man I keep looking at all these recipe posts and the seem so good. I'm going to print them out and put them in my recipe book. The only other thing in a my recipe book is homemade green tea and cookies....




*Afro Gunso 3,2,1, fire!*

[bezz]

Originally Posted by kirei_na_me

Another favorite is nikuman.

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