Tag: shiitake mushrooms

Jibuni: Kanazawa-style simmered duck stew
Kanazawa boasts a special regional cuisine called Kaga no aji. In general the taste is mildly sweet, like most Japanese country cooking. Visually, it is not as sophisticated or ornate as Kyoto’s kaiseki haute cuisine, since it’s based on the food of the samurai – substantial and hearty, with taste, not looks, being paramount.

Jibuni is one tasty example, a special regional recipe of duck (or chicken) and vegetable stew eaten not only as a seasonal daily dish in Kanazawa but also served on many special occasions. We don’t know the precise origins of jibu, but ni means “to simmer.” Some people say that jibu jibu is the sound the stew makes while cooking. Others believe that the stew was invented by a samurai named Jibu. Since it is one of the few dishes that uses flour as a thickener, many suspect that it has Portuguese origins from the early days of the Edo period (1603-1867).

Jibuni: Kanazawa-style Duck Stew Recipe

Jibuni is one of my favorite Japanese winter comfort dishes, but please don’t limit yourself to consuming it only during that time of year. Based on the season, there are many variations around. It’s fun to play with the basic recipe, replacing ingredients according to your tastes or what’s available at the market. For example, you can try fresh spinach; dried, reconstituted shiitake mushrooms or other Japanese mushrooms; Japanese parsley (seri); or Japanese leeks (negi).

My variation of jibuni is based on a recipe from Tsubajin, one of Kanazawa’s oldest (two hundred seventy years plus) and most famous restaurants.

The ancient castle town of Kanazawa, located on the Japan Sea side of Honshu in Ishikawa Prefecture, was ruled peacefully for over three centuries by one of the country’s richest daimyo families, the Maedas. It retains a rich cultural heritage and old-world charm, and also remains one of the true gourmet meccas of Japan.

Other Delicacies from Kanazawa

Many of Kanazawa’s delicacies, such as gori (singing bird fish), come from the Saigawa and the Asanogawa – two large rivers running through the center of town.

The Omicho Market, which is at least two hundred and fifty years old and is often referred to as “Kanazawa’s Kitchen”, continues to be one of the most notable food markets in Japan. The market is filled with more than two hundred open stalls selling a variety of fresh seafood and local produce, including game and a small, sweet coldwater shrimp called ama-ebi.

And since Kanazawa produces nearly all of Japan’s gold leaf, it shouldn’t be surprising that a local custom involves drinking green tea, coffee, or sake with edible gold leaf floating on the surface. It remains one of my favorite towns to revisit over and over.

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Jibuni: Kanazawa-style simmered duck stew

Lucy Seligman

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Servings 4

Ingredients

6 cups dashi fish stock
8 tbsp soy sauce
9-10 tbsp mirin (sweet sake)
4 slices bamboo shoot, 2 inches by 1 inch
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stemmed
8 snow peas, trimmed
4 4 Kanazawa-style sudarebu (fresh wheat gluten – may be replaced by broiled tofu or dried wheat gluten) cut into 1-inch squares
4 slices boned & skinless duck breast*, 2 inches by 1 inch each,
All-purpose white flour as needed
Garnish
Freshly grated wasabi horseradish

Instructions

Heat the dashi stock and season it with the soy sauce and mirin. Boil the vegetables until crisp but tender. Turn down the heat to a high simmer and add in the sudarebu or tofu. Add in the duck (or chicken), which should be generously coated in the flour, at the last moment. This flour coating creates a thicker dashi broth and is a key element to the success and tastiness of this dish. It will take less than three minutes to cook each ingredient.

To serve, pile the vegetables and duck (or chicken) separately in small mounds in a shallow bowl, pour a little of the remaining sauce over them, and place a dab of wasabi in the center. Serve immediately.

Notes
Notes:
If you’re using tofu, first press some of the water out by putting it between two plates for 10 minutes. Drain.
You may replaced the duck with boneless, skinless chicken breast.

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Tori no Hikizuri: A Chicken-based Precursor of Sukiyaki
Like many cultures, Japan first used chickens as living alarm clocks. The first record of this dates back to the Kojiki, the country’s first official history book, written in 712. The chicken was considered a sacred bird back then because it told people when morning had come, and apparently no one considered consuming the source of their wake-up calls!

Tori no Hikizuri Recipe – One Pot Chicken Dish

Where did Japan’s first chicken come from? We know that during the Heian era (794 – 1190) Chinese chickens were used in Japan for fortune telling (reportedly by guessing the cock’s song) in addition to announcing the dawn. From the end of the Muromachi era (1338 – 1573) to the early Edo era (1603 – 1867), trading among other Asian countries involved using chickens as currency; they were also sold as pets and matched in cockfights. But eating them (and such animals as horses, monkeys, cows, and boars) was prohibited by Buddhist strictures.

The taboo of eating chicken

This taboo was lifted by the 1600s, due largely to a lack of food and occasional periods of true famine. Chickens were also being raised on a small scale domestically. As to which was consumed first, the chicken or the egg, in Japan’s case it was undeniably the egg.

Cookbooks from the Edo era show a variety of egg dishes, but no chicken dishes. In 1643, however, the book Ryori monogatari (The Story of Cooking) contained a small section of preparing chicken, but it wasn’t until the end of the Edo era that chicken became a common comestible. In those days, chicken cuisine probably meant Nanban ryori (Western cuisine that originated in Nagasaki) and Shippoku ryori (derived from Chinese cuisine). Both used chicken in their dishes, although it still wasn’t popular among the common people.

One area renowned for chicken production, breeding, and cuisine is central Japan, specifically Aichi and Gifu prefectures. In Aichi, the Owari samurai of Nagoya castle raised chickens as a side business to selling the eggs, they also sold the chickens as pets.

One of the clans was the Kaifu family, who eventually produced Toshiki Kaifu, one of Japan’s prime ministers. During the early Meiji era (1868 – 1912), the Kaifus created a new chicken by cross breeding a Chinese chicken and a regional chicken called Nagoya cochin that had better – tasting meat and could produce more eggs.

Tori no Hikizuri Origin

The origins of this dish, tori no hikizuri, are a bit mysterious. It was first mentioned in 1806 in a book entitled Ukare suzume yugi jima (which translates as “Merry Sparrows Dancing Island”) by Junrei Gohosha. Hikizuri comes from the word “hikizuru,” a verb meaning “to pull or drag,” and was applied because people “pulled” the ingredients from inside the pot. Although many people think this dish is an imitation of sukiyaki, the latter actually mimicked tori no hikizuri.

This is total and yummy comfort food cooked at the dining table! I love to serve this to family and friends. Everyone gets a kick out of it being cooked in front of them and serving themselves! It is also easy, something we can all appreciate, especially now.

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Tori no Hikizuri: A Chicken-based Precursor of Sukiyaki

Lucy Seligman

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Course Main Course
Cuisine Japanese

Servings 4

Ingredients

600 grams (21 ozs) free-range boned chicken, (use breast and or thigh), cut into medium-sized chunks or thick slices
200 grams (7 ozs) chicken liver and gizzards, cut into pieces
1-1/2 blocks yakidofu (grilled tofu), drained and cut into 1-inch slices
200 grams (7 ozs) negi, (Japanese leeks), cut diagonally on the bias into thin slices
225 grams (8 ozs) shirataki (devil's tongue noodles), parboiled for 2 to 3 minutes, drained and cut in half
Broth (Warishita)
2/3 cup 100 % pure mirin (sweet rice wine), or as needed
1/3 cup tamari soy sauce, or as needed
1 cup water, or as needed
Dipping Sauce
4 fresh eggs, optional

Instructions

Pour the mirin into a sukiyaki pan, cast–iron pan, or pot, but do not oil it first as you would for sukiyaki. Bring to a rolling boil for a few minutes to burn off the alcohol. Add the tamari and the chicken, vegetables, and other prepared ingredients a little at a time, and cook until done. Thin out the sauce with water as needed.
To serve, use a beaten egg as your dipping sauce if you want.

Notes
Optional ingredients to add if you want:
1. Shiitake mushrooms, stemmed and cut in half
2. One or two bunches of mitsuba (trefoil), cut off ends, and cut into 2-inch pieces

Keyword chicken

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Matsumae Zoni Soup
Looking for a recipe on Mastumae Zoni soup from Hokkaido? You’ve come to the right place!

New Year has always been an integral part of Japanese society. Osechi is the essence of traditional Japanese home cooking, and consists of all the celebratory dishes prepared at home two or three days prior to New Year’s Day – Japan’s most important festival called Oshogatsu.

Traditionally all the dishes that make up the osechi panoply are precooked and put into special four-tiered lacquerware boxes called jubako by New Year’s Eve. New Year’s festivities run from January 1 to 3. During that time no cooking is done – just more non-perishable food is added to the jubako as family or guests drop by. Instead of rice, mochi, or pounded rice cakes, are eaten. If you are lucky enough to find fresh mochi at the end of the year, by all means try it! This is perhaps the only time of the year when the Japanese housewife isn’t tied to the kitchen.

Zoni is a regional soup with pounded toasted rice cakes (mochi), chicken or fish, and vegetables served separately after gorging on the many foods in the jubako. It is usually the only hot dish served. Matsumae Zoni is a specialty of Hokkaido, and one of my absolute favorites to make for Osechi, aka Japanese New Year’s. I explored Kyoto-style Zoni in the past so be sure to check that one out, too!

The Wonderful World of Osechi: Japanese New Year’s Recipes

New Year’s is one of the best times in Japan, at least for eating and relaxing. Get Lucy’s Osechi cookbook, full of recipes that are fast to make, easy, and quite delicious for your New Year celebrations (along with the history and traditions and little tidbits Lucy always includes). Get the book!

Makes a great gift too! Did you know on the Amazon page there’s an option to give it as a gift?

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Matsumae Zoni Soup Recipe
Matsumae Zoni Soup

Lucy Seligman

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Servings 4

Ingredients

4 pieces fresh salmon fillet, 2” by 1”
4 tbsps red salmon roe
6 cups konbu dashi* stock (see Notes)
4 thick slices peeled daikon radish
8 thick slices carrot, peeled
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stemmed
4 rice cakes (mochi)
4 tbsps low-sodium soy sauce, or to taste
2 tbsps sake
1 tsp salt
Garnish
A few sprigs of trefoil (mitsuba)
grated yuzu peel or meyer lemon peel

Instructions

Make fish stock according to the directions in the Notes section. Flavor stock with soy sauce, sake and salt. Add daikon radish, carrot, shiitake mushrooms and salmon. Boil until soft (roughly five minutes).
Meanwhile, toast rice cakes until they puff up and brown. It takes about six to seven minutes. They should look like oversized marshmallows.
In each deep soup bowl, lay one rice cake on the bottom and arrange other ingredients against it. Add stock and top with salmon roe and a few sprigs of trefoil and or yuzu peel. Serve immediately.

Notes
How to make Konbu Dashi Stock:
Take a 6-inch piece of kelp (konbu), wipe lightly with a damp cloth and put into a pot with 6 cups water. Bring to a boil and remove kelp. Add a generous 3/4 cup of dried bonito shavings (katsuobushi) and boil for one minute. Turn off heat and after 2 minutes, strain.

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A Review of Kokoro Care Packages

I was thrilled when I heard about Kokoro Care Packages, who offers monthly and or seasonal Japanese care packages. I love that more companies are introducing Japanese foods and other products here in the U.S., and to other countries outside of Japan. So, I reached out to them and introduced them to Thanks for the Meal’s blog.

Kokoro Care Package Review

Here is what Kokoro says about their products:

“Every month and season, we curate unique care packages filled with premium-quality, all-natural Japanese food and deliver them straight from Japan to your home. Each item is carefully selected for its quality, purity, ease of use and of course, taste!”

In exchange for this review, I received the August Nourishing Essentials Care Package mailed directly from Japan. It was filled with seasonal summer foods and I invited my friend Nancy to come over for a taste test a few weeks ago on a very hot and sultry day.

Kokoro Care Package Recipes

First, I used the Izumo Soba and made Hiyashi Chuka. I used baby shrimp, simmered and sliced shiitake mushrooms, sliced Japanese cucumber, and tomato slices as our toppings. Sprinkled toasted sesame seeds over the top. These noodles were a big hit. Generous 2 person portion was included and we both loved the sprightly lemon soy sauce.

Izumo Soba

Hiyashi Chuka made with the Izumo Soba

Mixed Seaweed Salad

Next was the Mixed Seaweed Salad. I love seaweed salads, so was looking forward to tasting this mix which has five different seaweeds from Hokkaido. After soaking in water and rinsing, I added thinly sliced Japanese cucumbers, and mixed in Ponzu sauce and toasted sesame seeds. Another hit!

Japanese Summer Tonic

Japanese Summer Tonic using Yamanashi’s 5-year Aged Red Wine Vinegar

I’m a big fan of Japanese inspired cocktails, but even non-alcoholic drinks are a hit around my house! Because of the heat on our taste testing day, I made a summer tonic using Yamanashi’s 5 year Aged Red Wine Vinegar, sparkling water, and a touch of honey. Be sure to melt the honey before mixing in, otherwise you end up with a clump of it at the bottom of the drink which doesn’t dissolve.

We both loved this tangy, thirst-quenching and refreshing drink so much, that I made it again this week during the heat wave that the Bay area has been experiencing. It was wonderful!

Cooking with Furikake

I served freshly cooked Japanese white rice and we topped it with a sprinkling of Unagi Sansho Furikake. Of course Unagi (eel) is a summer favorite and I love it.

Nancy had never had Furikake, and we both really enjoyed this slightly sweet mixture with different textures, which included various seasonings such as sansho pepper and ginger along with unagi bits.

There were a few items that weren’t luminary, at least to us: The Blueberry Amazake, the Sweet Corn Rice Porridge, and the Ayu Furikake. We found them overall not as interesting or as tasty as the other products. But I have no doubt that Kokoro Cares, a company less than one year old will continue to improve and expand their offerings in terms of tastes and variety.

Would I try Kokoro’s Care Packages again? Absolutely. I am especially interested in The Seasonal Delights Care Package, which includes 7+ healthy and delicious Japanese foods. It also comes with a special artisanal gift made locally in Japan and is shipped once every three months to coincide with the four seasons.

Kokoro Care Package Discount

If you’re interested in trying a Kokoro care package, take advantage of a special offer! Use discount code THANKSFORTHEMEAL_10 and you’ll get 10% off your first order through the end of September. Order your care package today and be sure to comment below about which product you’re most excited to check out!

Description from the August 2019 Kokoro Care Package

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Uosuki: Fish Sukiyaki
Ask anyone about sukiyaki, and most will nod knowledgeably and say, “Ah, yes, a famous Japanese dish.” Mention Uosuki, though, and even most Japanese will react with a blank look. Uosuki is a form of fish sukiyaki, a famous regional dish from the Osaka area that originated on fishing boats in the Inland Sea. Fresh catch was quickly cut up and added to a nabe (iron pot) of simmering stock that was sweet and salty (amakara); the stock was said to hide the fishy smell. Vegetables were also thrown in the pot, and a beaten egg was used as a dipping sauce. At the very end, udon noodles were added instead of rice.

Maruman Honke, an Osaka restaurant that opened in 1862, claims to be the only establishment to offer authentic uosuki. Located in the theater district until World War II, Maruman Honke became a favorite post-performance hangout for theatergoers. The restaurant’s huge communal room was raucous, convivial place where friends and strangers alike shared the large tables.

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Today the restaurant is in a different area, and has the standard setup of a counter, tables, and small rooms for private parties. The uosuki hasn’t changed, though.

Here is my version of uosuki. I use a variety of ultrafresh fish and other seafood – oysters and squid, for example – for a more complex taste. Vary the vegetables as desired: Chinese cabbage, shungiku (chrysanthemum leaves), daikon radish, and various Japanese mushrooms all blend in well. The addition of sansho pepper into the marinade for the fish also adds an elegant and additional subtle layer of flavor to this dish.

For extra authenticity, try making Uosuki or Beef Sukiyaki (recipe) in a cast-iron sukiyaki pan.

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Leave a note in the comments section if you make this dish!
Uosuki: Fish Sukiyaki

Lucy Seligman

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Course Main Course
Cuisine Japanese

Servings 4

Ingredients

2 lb to 2 ¼ lb assorted white-meat fish fillets, such as sea bream, yellowtail, or cod, cut into 1-inch pieces
4 medium or large shrimp, shelled and deveined, with tail left intact
4 hamaguri clams, soaked in cold water for about an hour to cleanse them, then drained and rinsed
3 cups cold dashi fish stock
1/2 teaspoon sansho pepper
1 ½ blocks grilled tofu, cut into 1-inch cubes
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stems removed and a crisscross incision made on the caps
7 oz. negi (Japanese leeks), cut diagonally into 1-inch slices* Use white part only
1 large bunch of mitsuba, trefoil, slightly stemmed, washed, and cut into 2-inch pieces
½ lb shirataki (noodles made from devil’s tongue jelly), parboiled for 2 to 3 minutes, then drained and cut into thirds
10 ½ oz dried udon noodles, slightly undercooked, drained and then rinsed in cold water
Cold water as needed
Sauce:
¾ cup low-sodium soy sauce
¼ cup white sugar
½ cup sake
½ cup mirin (sweet sake)
¾ cup cold dashi stock
Dipping sauce:
4 to 8 eggs

Instructions

Marinate the fish and shellfish in the cold dashi-sansho mixture in a shallow container for one hour in the refrigerator before cooking. Drain and place the marinated seafood in a serving bowl.
Arrange the rest of the ingredients on a serving platter and place the platter on the dining table. Put all the sauce ingredients in a saucepan and simmer until the sugar dissolves and it’s hot. Adjust the taste as desired, adding more sugar or mirin for a sweeter taste, or more soy sauce for a saltier taste.
Pour half the sauce into the sukiyaki pan (or cast-iron pan), and then place the pan over a heating source and bring to a boil. Start adding a little of each ingredient to the pot and let cook over high heat until done. Dip each morsel into beaten egg and eat immediately. Continue adding the ingredients and sauce as needed. Add noodles to the pot toward the end of the meal, cooking only to reheat and eat.
If the sauce becomes too thick, add cold water as needed to thin it out.

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Have you made any of the other regional Japanese recipes from our collection yet?
Oden: Japanese Hodgepodge Stew
When I was a college student in Tokyo, I would often pass mobile food stalls, called yatai, late on blustery winter nights and be completely overwhelmed by the powerful aroma of oden, or Japanese hodgepodge stew. Oden’s pungent smell and taste have made it a perennial favorite with drinkers, no matter the season. It is definitely a comfort food in Japan and can be enjoyed anytime by everyone.

The oden is derived from dengaku–grilled, skewered tofu topped with miso. The dish got its start in the late Edo era (1603-1867) when the people of old Edo (now Tokyo) began cooking many ingredients stuck on bamboo skewers in one pot. They used soy sauce as a base, which accounts for the murky darkness of the stock and the uniformly brownish color of the ingredients. Called Kanto-daki (Kanto-style oden), this dish was passed down to the Kansai area. There the people of Osaka changed the stock, taking out the soy sauce and substituting salt and kelp, or sometimes chicken stock or even white soy sauce, to create a clearer, more delicate broth. The variation, known as Kansai-daki, reached Tokyo and influenced the original oden. In fact, traditional soy sauce-based oden has become a rarity, even in Tokyo.

My version of Kanto-style Oden is slightly unorthodox, as it includes a relatively small amount of processed fish paste products. You are welcome to add as much as you like. The secret to making a great oden? Time (it definitely improves with age), a variety of ingredients, and the all-important condiment, karashi, spicy Japanese mustard. This Kanto-style recipe is just one of the collection of regional dishes featured on Thanks for the Meal.
Kanto-Style Oden

Lucy Seligman

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Course Main Course
Cuisine Japanese

Servings 4 persons

Ingredients

24 ounces (685 grams) daikon radish, unpeeled, cut into 1-inch (2-1/2 cm) rounds, simmered over low heat in water for one hour
5-1/4 ounces (150 grams) fresh shiitake mushrooms, washed, stemmed, and placed on bamboo skewers (three per skewer)
1-1/4 lb. (600 grams) white potato, peeled, and cut in half, simmered in water for 30 minutes and drained
To make Fukuro (stuffed, deep-fried tofu):
5 large pieces abura-age (deep-fried tofu), dipped in boiling water for 2 minutes to get rid of excess oil, squeezed to remove excess water, cut in half, then opened to create little sacks
3-1/2 ounces (100 grams) mochi (pounded rice cakes, cut into 3/4 ounce (approx. 20g) slices
8 ounces (225 grams) shirataki (devil’s tongue noodles), cut in half, parboiled, and drained
3 raw eggs
10 8-inch (20cm) long kampyo (dried gourd strips), washed and drained, to tie up the sacks
8 ounces (225 grams) konnyaku (devil’s tongue jelly) cut into triangles, parboiled, and drained
2 chikuwa (fish paste rolls) cut on the bias into thick slices
1 cake tofu, drained and cut into 8 thick squares
4-6 chicken drumsticks
Assorted cut-up fish paste products such as kamaboko and satsuma-age, optional
Dashi Fish Stock:
1 ounce (30 grams) konbu (kelp) wiped with a damp cloth and lightly slashed
8 cups water to soak the kelp in for 30 minutes; retain the water
2 small packets (1/5 ounce or 6g) katsuobushi (dried bonito shavings)
Prepared Dashi Stock:
2 tbsps sake
1/4 cup light soy sauce or to taste
2 tbsps mirin (sweet sake) or to taste
2 tsps salt or to taste
Condiment:
spicy Japanese mustard (karashi) to taste

Instructions

Place the kelp and water into a soup pot over medium heat. Just before it boils, take out the kelp (which can be cut up and added to the oden) and add the bonito shavings. Boil for a minute or two, then strain. Return the stock to a clean soup pot. Add the remaining stock ingredients, adding salt little by little until the flavor is to your liking. Keep the pot simmering.
To make fukuro, carefully stuff each pocket with either shirataki, pounded rice cake, or a shelled raw egg. Tie each pocket up with a dried gourd strip.
To make oden, place all the ingredients into the simmering prepared stock and cook for at least one hour. Bring the pot to the table and serve communally. Place a selection of the cooked ingredients in shallow bowls, serving the fiery mustard separately. If refrigerated, oden will be even tastier the second day. Reheat, adding more ingredients if desired, and serve.

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Photo © Pelican

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Delicious Tenpura Recipe (Tempura)
With a light, crispy, oil-free coating enveloping a perfectly cooked and succulent piece of seafood or vegetable, tenpura (also written tempura) is considered a quintessentially Japanese food. Both the word and the dish, however, are almost certainly of foreign origin. The source: Spanish and Portuguese missionaries called nanbanjin (southern barbarians) who came to Japan to convert the heathen masses toward the close of the sixteenth century. Prohibited from consuming meat on Fridays, they substituted batter-fried fish.

There are several theories on where the name came from. Templo, meaning temple or church in Spanish, and tempero, which in Portuguese means cooking, are two possible roots. The Chinese characters can also be read as follows: ten meaning up, pu for flour, and ra for thin silk, the latter most likely a reference to the thin coating of batter.

By the middle of the Edo era (1603-1867), tenpura, inexpensive and considered relatively low-class, was a popular offering at open-air food stalls. Only in recent years has the dish risen in both price and public esteem to its exalted culinary status in high-class establishments. With a little preparation and practice, it is surprisingly easy to make equally good tenpura at home. Keep the oil at a constant temperature; use ice-cold water to make the batter; and, perhaps most important of all, leave the batter lumpy.
Tenpura

Lucy Seligman

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Course Main Course
Cuisine Japanese

Servings 4

Ingredients

8 medium or 4 large shrimp washed, shelled, and deveined, with tails slightly trimmed
4 small kisu Japanese whiting fillets (or other small white-fleshed fish), washed and with tails left intact
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms trimmed
4 thick rounds of sweet potato peeled
4 shiso perilla leaves, washed and patted dry
2 Japanese eggplants trimmed and halved lengthwise, with skin lightly scored for quicker frying
4 string beans trimmed and halved lengthwise
Sesame oil and vegetable oil for deep-frying half and half is best
Dipping Sauce:
1 cup dashi fish stock
¼ cup low-sodium soy sauce
¼ cup mirin sweet sake
¼ cup sake
Dash of salt
1 cup daikon radish peeled, grated, and drained
4 teaspoons fresh ginger peeled & grated
Lemon wedges & coarse salt optional
Batter: Double quantity if necessary
1 large egg
1 cup ice water
1 cup all-purpose white flour sifted

Instructions

Prepare the shrimp and other items as instructed above, then place them on a large plate. Bring the dipping sauce ingredients to a boil in a pan, stirring well; remove from heat and pour into four small serving bowls. Let cool. Put the daikon radish, ginger, and lemon (if used) in separate bowls. Prepare a rack for draining the tenpura, and line your serving plates with paper napkins.
While you are heating the oil in a wok or other large large, deep-sided pot, lightly mix the egg and ice water in a bowl. Add the flour all at once, stirring only briefly with chopsticks or a fork to create a lumpy, nonsticky batter. Place the bowl of batter in a large bowl filled with ice water near the stove. When a dab of batter is dropped into the oil and rises to the surface and sizzles, the oil is ready.
Fry the fish first. Dip them briefly in the batter and then drop into the oil, use
cooking chopsticks to turn them rapidly.
(To preserve their delicate flavor, the perilla leaves should be dipped on their "back" side only.) Then proceed with the other items. If space permits, fry all similar items together. The tenpura is ready when it turns golden brown and floats. I like to drain tenpura using a cooling rack placed over a cookie sheet for easy clean up.
Remove any excess fried batter with a slotted spoon.
Tenpura should be served immediately and eaten piping hot. It could also be made at the dining room table by the guests, using fondue pots. Dip into the sauce, add grated radish and ginger as desired, or sprinkle with lemon and dip lightly in salt.

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Festive Fare: Traditional Treats for New Year’s
NEW YEAR’S IS ONE OF THE BEST TIMES IN JAPAN – at least for eating. Shogatsu, the New Year’s holiday, is celebrated from midnight on December 31 until January 3 or 4, or even longer by diehards.

No New Year’s banquet would be complete without a bowl of zoni, soup with toasted mochi (pounded rice cakes). While most Japanese dishes differ from region to region, zoni varies virtually from house to house. This zoni, a variation of the Kyoto-style, uses sweet white miso paste, and is one of my favorites..

Although I live in the States, I continue to celebrate Japanese New Year’s to this day with my daughter, albeit in a less traditional and fancy way. We look forward to it every year. It is a welcome ritual to closing out the year. And yes, a lot, okay, way too much mochi is consumed!

The Wonderful World of Osechi: Japanese New Year’s Recipes

New Year’s is one of the best times in Japan, at least for eating and relaxing. Get Lucy’s Osechi cookbook, full of recipes that are fast to make, easy, and quite delicious for your New Year celebrations (along with the history and traditions and little tidbits Lucy always includes). Get the book!

Makes a great gift too! Did you know on the Amazon page there’s an option to give it as a gift?

My recipes may include affiliate links, so without costing you anything extra, I’ll earn a small percentage of the sales if you purchase these items through these links. Thank you for your support!
Kyoto-Style Zoni

Lucy Seligman

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Course Soup
Cuisine Japanese

Servings 4

Ingredients

10 ½ oz. small taro satoimo, peeled, rubbed with salt, rinsed, and kept in a bowl of water to prevent discoloration until ready to cook
3 ½ oz. carrots peeled and cut into thick rounds
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms optional, stems cut, with a criss-cross incision made on the cap
4 ½ cups dashi fish stock*
2 tablespoons white miso fermented soybean paste, or more if you like it very sweet
8 mochi cakes
Fresh trefoil or parboiled spinach optional
To garnish:
A few slivers of yuzu Japanese citron peel
A handful of dried bonito flakes

Instructions

Boil the taro, carrots, and mushrooms (if you decide to use them) in the dashi stock for roughly 10 minutes, until soft enough to be pierced with a toothpick.
Take a few tablespoons of the hot stock out of the pot and combine with the miso in a small bowl. When thoroughly blended, incorporate back into the soup.
Meanwhile toast the mochi until they begin to swell. Then add them to the soup, swirl around until warmed, and turn off the heat.
To serve, pour the soup into four deep bowls, making sure there are two mochi in the middle of each bowl. At the last moment, add any greens, and top with a sliver or two of yuzu peel and a sprinkling of bonito flakes. Serve immediately.

Notes
How to make Konbu Dashi Stock:
Take a 6-inch piece of kelp (konbu), wipe lightly with a damp cloth and put into a pot with 6 cups water. Bring to a boil and remove kelp. Add a generous 3/4 cup of dried bonito shavings (katsuobushi) and boil for one minute. Turn off heat and after 2 minutes, strain.

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Soba Celebrations for a Happy New Year!
IN JAPANESE CULTURE, soba (buckwheat) noodles have always been seen as a “happiness” food, served on special occasions. It is traditional, too, when moving into a new house to greet your neighbors with hikoshi soba (moving soba). This involves a play on words, as soba also means “close” or “near” – like neighbors.

Another soba custom is toshikoshi soba (year’s-passing soba), supposed to be the last food to touch your lips on New Year’s Eve. The tradition is so established nationwide that often reservations are needed even for buying the freshly made soba to cook up at home. One year I attempted to make my own: working with fresh buckwheat flour proved extremely hard, but my toshikoshi noodles won nods of approval from the family even though, without the special chef’s knife used by soba cutters, they were a trifle thick.

According to a diary written by a samurai named Watanabe Hyotaro between 1839 and 1848, it was common in those days to go out and eat soba on the last day of the year. An even older story, from the Kamakura period (1185-1333), relates how in Hakata, Kyushu, a businessman from China named Shakokumei used to distribute buckwheat flour to poor people on the last day of the year, telling them how it was to erase the year of poverty and welcome in a good new year.

Perhaps the most persuasive explanation for the tradition, however, is that in the Edo era (1603-1867) merchants used to clean factory floors with soba dumplings to pick up any gold filaments. So it became a superstition that soba “collected gold”. Eventually factory workmen started to make toshikoshi noodles, and ordinary people copied them – all in the hope of having a prosperous new year.

The Wonderful World of Osechi: Japanese New Year’s Recipes

New Year’s is one of the best times in Japan, at least for eating and relaxing. Get Lucy’s Osechi cookbook, full of recipes that are fast to make, easy, and quite delicious for your New Year celebrations (along with the history and traditions and little tidbits Lucy always includes). Get the book!

Makes a great gift too! Did you know on the Amazon page there’s an option to give it as a gift?

My recipes may include affiliate links, so without costing you anything extra, I’ll earn a small percentage of the sales if you purchase these items through these links. Thank you for your support!
TOSHIKOSHI SOBA

Lucy Seligman

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Ingredients

6 ¼ cups water
A 3-inch by 3-inch piece of kombu kelp wiped with a damp cloth and lightly slashed to release the flavor
2 oz. katsuobushi dried bonito flakes
4 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon mirin sweet sake
1 teaspoon salt or to taste
1 lb. dried or 1 ¼ lbs. fresh soba noodles
4 dried or fresh shiitake mushrooms stemmed (reconstitute dried ones by soaking in warm water with a dash of sugar for 30 minutes – reserve 2 tablespoons of liquid to add to broth)
½ lb. chicken breast cut into thin slices
2 large Japanese leeks white part only, cut diagonally into thin slices
5 ¼ oz. spinach trimmed, parboiled, and drained
Seven-spice pepper to taste for garnish

Instructions

Heat the water with the kelp in a deep saucepan. Just before it boils, remove the kelp and pour in the dried bonito flakes. Boil, stirring, for about three minutes, then strain into a clean saucepan. Add the soy sauce, mirin, salt, and mushroom liquid. Bring to a boil again; taste, adjust seasoning if necessary and cook over medium heat for a few minutes.
Five minutes before serving, heat up the chicken and leeks in the broth. In another pan, cook the noodles according to instructions on the package, then drain and rinse to get rid of the starch.
To serve, place a mound of noodles in each deep soup bowl. Top with one mushroom and separate mounds of chicken, Japanese leeks, and spinach. Gently ladle on the broth and serve immediately. Pass the seven-spice pepper separately.

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Chanko Nabe: A One-Pot Dish for a Pot Belly
A little unknown fact about me is that I love sumo! It is one of the few sports I’ll watch. When I lived in Japan, you couldn’t tear me away from the television whenever sumo was on. I even went to a live Sumo tournament in Tokyo with my then father-in-law and it was sublime! We dined on elegant and yummy bento boxes, drank a lot of beer! and watched sumo for hours. I’ve never had so much fun at a sports event in my life. To this day whenever I think of Sumo wrestlers I still giggle over their appearance and antics, but don’t be deceived, they are true athletes.

YOU’VE PROBABLY SEEN SUMO WRESTLERS in action – remarkably fat, semi-naked, they spend a lot of time hitting themselves on the posterior and prancing around doing what appears to be a rain dance in a dirt ring, trying to knock each other down. At first it looks pretty ludicrous, but after a while you begin to find them rather endearing.

The secret of sumo wrestlers’ rotund figures lies in enormous helpings of chanko nabe, a one-pot dish that is their staple fare. It can, in fact, be just about any form of nabe (one-pot) cooking, but traditionally it is chicken-based.

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One story has it that during the Edo era (1603-1867) a group of wrestlers visiting Nagasaki learned to cook meals in a Chinese wok, or chanko – and brought the habit back to Edo (now Tokyo). Another theory holds that Hidekatsu Watanabe, a former wrestler who owned a restaurant in Tokyo, named the stew in honor of sumo stable masters, or “fathers” (chan), and their “sons” (ko), the wrestlers. But the most likely origin of the dish, although not the name, is that it was invented in the Meiji period (1868-1912) by former yokozuna (grand champion) Hitachiyama. On retiring he opened his own stable where, to save time, he introduced a simple one-dish meal.

The reason behind the preference for chicken is that chickens have two legs, like sumo wrestlers standing in a dohyo (sumo ring). For a wrestler to be on all fours means losing a bout, so it is considered unlucky to eat anything with four legs.

Chanko nabe stock can be flavored with salt, soy sauce, kelp, dried bonito shavings, or a combination of these. Each stable has its own special flavor: some add mirin (sweet sake), others butter. Since the stock is so flavored – good enough to enjoy on its own as a soup – a dipping sauce isn’t necessary. Many sumo wrestlers are diabetic, so chefs are careful about sugar, but otherwise almost anything can be added. The current fad is to add spicy Korean kimchi (pickled cabbage).

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Chanko Nabe: A One-Pot Dish for a Pot Belly

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Ingredients

1 ¾ lbs. chicken parts with bones
3 quarts water
A 6-inch piece of kombu kelp, wiped with a damp cloth and lightly slashed to release flavor
1 teaspoon salt or to taste
8 fresh shiitake mushrooms trimmed
12 oz. shirataki fine white konnyaku [devil’s tongue] noodles
7 oz. spring onion white part only, cut into 2-inch pieces
4 oz. mitsuba trefoil, trimmed and cut into 2-inch pieces
1 block of grilled tofu drained and cut into 1-inch squares

Instructions

Pour boiling water over the chicken parts to get rid of the odor. Place the chicken, kelp, water, and salt in a Donabe pot or deep soup pot over high heat. When nearly boiling, discard the kelp, turn heat down to a simmer, and cook, covered, for about 20 minutes. Skim off any scum. Remove the chicken to a bowl with a little stock to keep it moist; strain the rest of the stock and, if you prefer, let cool to room temperature and skim off excess fat.
Arrange all the ingredients on a large platter. Half-fill a deep casserole with stock and heat to boiling. Prepare a heat source at the dining table, transfer the casserole to it, and add some chicken, vegetables, and tofu. When just cooked through, allow guests to help themselves to a selection from the pot. Continue adding more ingredients as needed.

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