japanese

How to cook taro root or satoimo

maki — Fri, 09 May 2008 17:17:45 +0200

When I write about some ingredients or vegetables, I am usually quite confident that most people will like them. Lotus root for example may look exotic to western eyes, but is are quite neutral in taste. Taro root, or satoimo （里芋）in Japanese, are a different matter though, because it has a texture that divides people sharply into like and dislike: sliminess.

Japanese people in general, unlike most peoples of the western hemisphere, love foods with slimy textures. Whereas in the American South okra is battered and coated and deep-fried to minimize the slime as much as possible, in Japan the sliminess is even enhanced and celebrated in many okra dishes.

Taro root is not as aggressively slimy as okra innards, but it definitely has it. (It’s the base ingredient in the Hawaiian speciality poi.) In Japan taro root is most often boiled or stewed in liquid, which dissipates the sliminess somewhat. It may however take some getting used to.

On the other hand, taro root is high in fiber, lower in calories by weight than white potatoes, and very filling. It’s a good alternative starch.

Incidentally, the Japanese word for taro root, satoimo （里芋）means “potato (or starch root) of the homeland (sato)”.

Where to buy taro roots and what they look like

Taro roots are eaten all over East and South Asia, so you can find them at Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and South Asian groceries. (I get mine at an Indian grocery store in Zürich.)

Taro root looks rather hairy and intimidating, sort of like Hell’s Angel versions of potatoes.

(The top left one has just started sprouting. This can just be cut off, but try to get ones that aren’t sprouting.)

How to prepare taro root or satoimo (as they are prepared in Japan)

You will usually need to scrub them fairly well - a stiff vegetable brush does this job the best, or a tawashi if you’re in Japan - because little bits of dirt tend to get trapped in the hairy bits.

Once they are scrubbed, you can peel them as-is with a peeler or knife. However, some people with sensitive skin react to the slime of raw taro root and get itchy. (This also happens with yamaimo and nagaimo, as I explained briefly previously.) To avoid this, you can also try this microwave method:

Wash and dry the taro roots. Put on a plate and cover loosely with plastic wrap.
Microwave on HIGH for 4-5 minutes if the taro roots are small or about the size of golf balls, longer if they are bigger.
Peel each root while holding it in a paper towel or kitchen towel, since they’ll be hot. The root inside will firm but cooked through more or less. You can then put them into soups, stews, etc.

The itchy substance goes away once the roots are cooked.

Recipe: Satoimo (taro root) cooked in miso with tofu

This is an extremely simple dish where the taro roots are cooked in a miso sauce, with crumbled tofu. Actually I originally wanted the tofu to stay in neat squares, but it goes crumbled during cooking. It tastes good (if you like taro root’s texture) in any case.

5-6 small to medium taro roots, peeled with the microwave method
1/2 block firm tofu
1 cup dashi stock (traditional or vegan or water
2 Tbs. white miso
1 Tbs. soy sauce
1 Tbs. maple syrup or 1/2 Tbs. sugar

Cut the taro root into bite-size pieces if necessary - for small ones just cut in half. Put into a pan with the dashi stock, mirin and sugar or maple syrup. Crumble in the tofu.

Bring to a boil and cook down until the liquid is almost gone. Add the soy sauce. Thin out the miso with a little water or dashi until liquid rather than a paste, and add to the pan. Let simmer for a few minutes. Serve hot or cold.

Garnish with something green to perk up the beige.

Other ways to enjoy taro root

You can add taro root to stews, soups, and so on. You can also try making taro root chips. They are very nice in a Japanese style curry, instead of white potatoes.

Other slimy foods that Japanese people love

Natto
Nameko - slimy small mushrooms
Okra - even raw! Usually boiled or deep-fried though.
Nagaimo and yamaimo - root vegetables that are slimy when raw. Often eaten grated and raw, with a raw egg for more slimy goodness.
Mekabu, a type of seaweed
Moroheiya, a tropical green vegetable, touted in recent years for its health benefits.

Wagashi are not some sort of magic Japanese diet food

maki — Sat, 03 May 2008 18:42:56 +0200

I have so many things to do that I vowed to stay away from the computers this weekend, but someone alerted me to this entry on the Health.com blog which quotes me. (Health.com is a Time Inc. property.) I just wanted to set some things straight, because a couple of the statements there are just not right.

The writer, Amy O’Connor, contacted me with some questions, based on her premise that wagashi or Japanese sweets were healthier for you because they were low fat (or at least no added fat; there is some fat content in the beans used). She wanted to know if this was a reason why Japanese people were generally thin.

What I basically said to Ms. O’Connor was this: no, I don’t think the lack of butter and cream in wagashi have anything to do with the general thinness of Japanese people. As I am quoted as saying, things like smaller portions, more movement and societal pressure are the main causes. I also said that a traditional Japanese meal does not include a dessert course.

So I was not misquoted as such. But the rest of the blog entry goes on to say some rather misleading things, which I am rather surprised by since I gave the writer plenty of information which would have, I thought, logically lead her away from her preconception that wagashi are some magical diet snack.

First and most inaccurate: “The Japanese are not fond of cream, chocolate, butter, or the fattening ingredients that comprise the typical Western dessert.” - As anyone who has spent any time in Japan knows, this is absolutely not true. Japanese people love cakes and gateaus and puddings chocolates and choux buns. Beard Papa, anyone? Pocky? Purin? Cute Sanrio characters named after sweet sticky buns? I would venture to say that Tokyo may have more French-style patisseries per capita than almost any other city except for Paris and Vienna. Those skinny Japanese women love love love Western style pastries. Those pastries may not necessarily be eaten as part of a main meal as dessert, but are eaten between meals for sure.

The blog post also goes onto recommend giving wagashi a try. Of course, why not? You may like them, you may not. (I’ve noticed that non-Asian people have very mixed reactions to Asian sweets in general.) However if anyone thinks that wagashi will aid your weight loss efforts, please think again. They are loaded with highly refined white sugar and often use white rice or wheat flour. They are in that sense about on par with those infamous low-fat cookies, Snackwells. Surely we are beyond the point of thinking that eating low fat but high sugar snacks leads to weight loss?

A point in favor of wagashi is that many are partly made with some kind of bean - though almost always hulled beans, so with a lot less fiber than say, your average baked beans. Also, most wagashi are made in tiny little portions which, because they are so sweet, you can only eat slowly, usually with a cup of green tea. Finally, they may make you feel full simply because you’re not used to the texture and taste. But all this is simply speculation. I for one could probably eat more taiyaki or ichigo daifuku than I could a dense chocolate cake in one sitting.

Comparing apples to oranges, or rather wagashi to Western pastries

Here are some calories for some typical Japanese sweets. The source is the official food nutrient database (五訂食品標準成分表) which is published by the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, the standard reference for all dieticians and health professionals in Japan. Numbers are rounded off for simplicity.

1 daifuku (mochi (beaten white rice) dumpling filled with sweet azuki beans): 160 calories
1 piece of yohkan (a block of azuki bean paste): about 100 calories for a piece approx. 1 cm (less than half an inch) thick
1 dorayaki (two little pancakes with a mound of sweet azuki beans in the middle): 240 calories, most of which comes from refined sugar and white flour

Now here are the calories for single portion sizes of Western style sweets as they are typically sold, and eaten, in Japan:

1 individual serving of purin (caramel custard): 110 calories
1 small choux pastry filled with custard: 150 calories
1 piece strawberry ‘shortcake’ (actually a spongecake filled and frosted with whipped cream, with strawberries in the middle and on top): 350 calories

Not such a huge difference is there? Yes, those typical Japanese cake and pudding portions are quite small. The piece of strawberry shortcake for example is just about the size of the palm of my hand. A choux bun is about 3 inches in diameter.

So we come to same old boring conclusion

Anyway, why are Japanese women generally thin? I’ve addressed this subject in depth a little while ago, but to put it in a nutshell:

They eat less. Portions are much smaller.
They move more.
There’s a lot of societal pressure to remain skinny

Not very novel or cute answers I’m afraid. There is no magic pill, or little sweet.

(Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, nutritionist or health professional. But I would challenge anyone to get a Japanese health professional to come up with the conclusion that eating wagashi in lieu of Western style sweets can help people lose weight.)

Cooking whole dried soybeans

maki — Thu, 01 May 2008 13:53:24 +0200

Until fairly recently I had a blind spot when it came to the humble soybean. I regularly consume soy products like soy milk, tofu and okara, not to mention fermented soybean products like natto and tempeh. And green soybeans or edamame are always a great snack.

But for some reason, I didn’t really get into eating the whole dried (and cooked) soybean. It’s not that they are that much harder to cook than other dried beans either.

In any case, I’ve rectified that situation and now I cook up a batch of soybeans quite regularly and store them in the freezer. Plain boiled soybeans are amazingly delicious, and just packed with nutrition. The cooking liquid is so rich that it can be used as a very nutritious stock or dashi for making soups and such.

There are a couple of points to watch out for when cooking whole soybeans, which are noted below in copious detail.

Step 1: Wash and pick over

Rinse the dried soybeans, rubbing them together gently to remove any surface powdery residue , and pick out any dark or discolored beans. These will not cook properly. If any of the hulls work themselves loose while you’re washing, pick those out too.

Step 2: Soak overnight

Soak the beans in water to cover for several hours or overnight. You may need to soak them a bit longer than other types of beans. Also, the bring to a boil then let sit for an hour method of speeding up bean cooking does’t really work well for some reason.

After soaking, you can optionally split the beans by squeezing them gently. (An alternative is to use a food mill to split the dried beans, but I don’t have such a device so if I want the beans split I do it after they are saturated with water.)

Step 3: Use a big pot

Just like soy milk foams up like crazy while it’s being cooked, soybean cooking liquid will bubble up quite enthusiastically, all over your stovetop if you don’t watch out. So the dried soybeans should not come up to more than 1/4th of the height of your cooking pot, and the cooking water should only come up to about 1/3rd of the height maximum. In other words, use a big pot, or cook less. This is particularly true if you’re using a pressure cooker - the viscous cooking liquid may even clog up the works, so be careful. (My pressure cooker can handle about 3 cups of dried beans.)

Step 4: Bring to a boil, then skim off the grey stuff

Whether you are using a pressure cooker or a regular pot, you should first bring the soybeans to a boil, then skim off the greyish stuff that will rise to the surface of the water.

Step 5a: Using a pressure cooker

After you’ve skimmed off the initial grey stuff, put a heat-safe plate that is a smaller than the circumference of the pot on top of the beans. This plate helps to keep the beans from dancing around, and also prevents any loose hulls from rising up and possibly clogging the pressure valves. Once it’s reached pressure, lower the heat and cook for 20-25 minutes. Turn off and let cool naturally until de-pressurized.

Step 5b: Using a regular pot

Heat up to a boil, then put a heat-safe plate or an otoshibuta on top of the beans. Cooking time is about 3 hours, but don’t worry, you don’t have to watch it continuously for that time. Top up with additional water from time to time if it seems to be cooking off, and skim off any grey stuff. A slow cooker would work too. The beans are done if you press one between your finger and thumb and it’s soft, not crunchy. (Or just eat one!)

Step 6: Draining and removing the hulls

Once the beans are cooked using either method, stir then let them sit a bit - the loose hulls will rise to the surface. Skim these off. Strain the beans, reserving the liquid to use as a vegan stock. (Don’t get too concerned about a few loose hulls left in. Removing those hulls is just a good idea because they tend to end up undigested and loose in your innards, which may cause you to rooty-toot-toot a bit more than you may want to and such.)

Step 7: Optional oven drying

The beans at this stage are pale and rather soft. You can use them as-is, but one thing I like to do to at least half the beans is to slow-dry them in the oven. This makes the beans firmer and meatier, and more suited to use as a meat substitute.

Just spread out the well drained and cooked beans on a baking sheet, and put into your oven at the lowest possible heated setting. On my oven that’s 50°C or 122°F. Leave the sheet of beans in there for about 2 hours, turning occasionally. They will shrink to about 20% and turn a light reddish brown. If you taste one it should be just a bit chewy but not hard.

You can use these dried soybeans coarsely ground in a food processor as a ground meat substitute in pasta sauces and such, or to make soy burgers and so on. (You can dry canned soybeans in this way too.)

Storing and freezing

I store un-dried soybeans in freezer bags with a little bit of the cooking liquid. These are used in stewed dishes, soups and such. The dried beans are stored on their own in freezer bags. The cooking liquid can be frozen too.

So there you have it. It may seem complicated, but it really isn’t once you’ve done it once. And the results are worth it especially if you are a vegan/vegetarian. And it’s wonderfully cheap too.

Now, of course you can turn these boiled soybeans into fun things like tempeh and natto. That’s for another day….

A vegan version of nikujaga (Japanese meat and potatoes), plus how to remake Japanese recipes to make them vegan

maki — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 14:06:17 +0200

Nikujaga, stewed potatoes with meat, is a staple of Japanese home cooking. It’s filling and comforting, and appears quite frequently for dinner at our house. Recently though I’ve been making this vegan version more frequently, which is just as tasty as the meaty version. Thick fried tofu (atsuage) is the protein replacement, but it’s not just there for it’s nutritional benefits - I love the texture in a lot of dishes.

The recipe, plus some ideas on how to reform Japanese non-vegan recipes to make them vegan, after the jump.

Recipe: Potatoes stewed with fried tofu and green beans

Makes 4 servings as part of a Japanese meal

4 medium firm boiling type potatoes (not baking potatoes)
1 cup frozen green beans, or the equivalent amount of fresh green beans
1/2 small onion
1 to 2 squares of thick fried tofu (atsuage)
2 Tbs. sake
3 Tbs. soy sauce
2 Tbs. dark (grade B) maple syrup
1 Tbs. sesame oil

Peel and cut up the potatoes into small pieces. If using fresh green beans, cut off the tops and cut into pieces. Slice the onion.

Cover the fried tofu in boiling water, and drain. This gets rid of much of the surface oil.

Heat up a heavy-bottomed pan with the sesame oil. Add the onions and cook until translucent. Add the potato and tofu pieces, and sauté intil the oil coats the pieces well. Add the green beans and toss around some more.

Add just enough water to cover. Add the sake, soy sauce and maple syrup. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to about medium-low, put on a lid and let simmer until the potatoes are tender, about 10-15 minutes. To concentrate the flavors even more, take the lid off and simmer for an additional 10-15 minutes until the liquid is almost evaporated - this step is optional.

Serve hot or cold. The flavors mellow if you let it rest, which makes it very good for bento.

Notes

If you want bright green green beans, just add them in the last few minutes of cooking. I just add it with everything else because they taste better that way. (Sort of like the way green beans are cooked until they are almost falling apart in the South.)

This is even better if you use new potatoes.

Making non-vegan Japanese recipes vegan

If you compare this recipe to the classic nikujaga, the first thing you may notice is that there’s no meat. There is also no dashi stock used. Traditional dashi stock, which forms the basis of the majority of savory Japanese cooking, is not vegan, since one of the key ingredients is dried bonito (fish) flakes or niboshi (dried little sardines). Using a vegan dashi which uses just kombu seaweed and/or dried shiitake is an option. But it’s also possible in some cases to omit the dashi entirely, as in this recipe.

When you omit meat and dashi (or any soup stock), what you lose is a lot of umami. To make up for this, add ingredients that are inherently rich in umami or other flavoring ingredients. In the recipe above for example, the onion, sake, sesame oil, soy sauce and maple syrup add plenty of flavor to the dish - and without dashi the flavor of the potatoes comes through better too.

And about that maple syrup: Since Japanese recipes often call for sugar, using a flavorful sweetener instead of plain white sugar is a way to add some extra oomph. Raw cane sugar, brown sugar, palm sugar, maple syrup and honey are some options. Dark maple syrup goes very well with Japanese flavors.

(Incidentally, if you’re a North American visiting friends elsewhere, maple syrup makes a great gift because it’s really expensive over the pond!)

How to cook lotus root (renkon)

maki — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 18:53:53 +0200

Lotus root (renkon in Japanese) is actually the rhizome of the lotus plant. It’s a popular vegetable throughout southern and eastern Asia, but it’s still not that well known in the west. Lotus root is full of fiber and various vitamins and other nutrients. In Asia it’s believed to have various medicinal qualities, but in macro-nutrient terms it’s best to think of it as a starchy vegetable, like potato. Visually of course, it’s very appealing with all those little holes. Here I’ll explain how it’s prepared and eaten in Japan.

How to prepare lotus root

First off, this is how a raw lotus root looks like. You can buy them at an Asian (South or Eastern) grocery store. More often than not they will be vacuum packed. A nice fresh one is a light orangey-brown. The older the root the browner and darker it is.

Mature lotus root has a sort of slightly bitter or tannic quality, so should not be eaten raw. (Apparently young lotus roots can be eaten raw, but I’ve never encountered them unfortunately.) The bitter/tannic substance is most concentrated in the skin, so you should peel it. Inside, it’s a light flesh color.

(Another way to deal with a raw lotus root is to steam it whole, but peeling and slicing is easier for beginners.)

Raw lotus root will start to darken almost right away, rather like raw potato. To prevent this, put the peeled lotus root in water with a little vinegar in it. If I slice it up, I put the slices in the vinegar water.

If using the slices for a salad, or for any dish that has no further or very little more cooking, they should be boiled for a couple of minutes in vinegared water. This retains the crunchy texture but gets rid of that tannic-ness.

You can also buy lotus root in cans, which can be used straight away. However, many canned lotus roots have been bleached to make then whiter, so I prefer to use raw lotus root if I can find it. (The natural color of lotus root is a very light flesh-orange.)

Changing textures

Depending on how long it’s cooked, the texture of lotus root varies from crunchy to very starchy and a little sticky. I like it either way. Here are two ways of using lotus root in its crunchy stage.

Recipe: Lotus root, cucumber and Serrano ham salad

1/2 lotus root, sliced very thinly and the slices cut into halves
1/2 English or seedless cucumber, de-seeded and sliced thin
1-2 slices of Serrano or other dried ham, cut into thin slivers
1/2 Tbs. rice vinegar plus additional for cooking
Dash salt
1 tsp. sugar
1 Tbs. mayonnaise

Put the sliced lotus root into vinegar water as you slice it, as described above. Bring a pot of water to a boil, and add a little vinegar. Boil the lotus root for a couple of minutes. Drain and cool under running water; drain well.

Mix the vegetables and seasonings except the mayonnaise together well with your hands, scrunching them a bit to let the flavors penetrate. Add the mayonnaise and ham and mix well. Serve immediately, or cool in the refrigerator until dinner time.

Recipe: Stir-fried lotus root with sesame and green onions

1/2 lotus root, sliced very thinly
1 piece of fresh ginger about 1 inch / 2 cm or so long, peeled and chopped
2 garlic cloved, peeled and chopped
1 1/2 cups of roughly chopped green onions
2 Tbs. hot red chili pepper, finely chopped
Oil
Vinegar for the lotus root water
1 Tbs. sesame seeds
Pepper
1 1/2 Tbs. soy sauce
1 tsp. sesame oil

Put the sliced lotus root into vinegar water as you slice it, as described above. Drain well just before cooking.

Heat up a large frying pan with the oil. Add ginger and garlic, and stir fry until the oil is very fragrant. Add the drained lotus root slices in a single layer. Cook until the lotus root slices start to change color - they turn a bit translucent looking. Turn over and cook a couple more minutes.

Add the chili pepper and green onions, and stir-fry. Add the sesame seeds, pepper, soy sauce and sesame oil. The lotus roots should get a bit caramelized from the soy sauce. Serve hot or cold. This is very nice for bento.

Other ways to eat lotus root

Lotus root mini-cakes with sweet chili sauce. This uses the starchy, sticky quality of grated cooked lotus root.
Lotus root slices poached in dashi and vinegar - a very traditional Japanese dish
Cut up and put into soups or stews - the longer it’s cooked, the more starchy it gets
Deep-fried or baked as chips (these baked ones on jugalbandi look great)
With a batter as tempura
Sandwich some meaty filling inside and pan-fry (hasami-age)

Spaghetti Napolitan

maki — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 10:44:34 +0200

Continuing my yohshoku mini-marathon, here’s the infamous Japan-ized pasta dish called Napolitan or Naporitan. (Japanese doesn’t have an L or R sound, which is why Japanese people often mix them up when speaking Western languages.) As far as I know, there’s nothing remotely Neapolitan about Napolitan, except for the use of spaghetti. It is made with a creamy ketchup-based sauce, and has the salty-sweet flavors that Japanese people love.

According to Wikipedia Japan (Japanese link), Spaghetti Napolitan was invented shortly after World War II, by the head chef of the hotel in Yokohama that was used as the U.S. military headquarters by General Douglas MacArthur. He allegedly got the idea from the spaghetti and tomato sauce eaten by the U.S. troops. Over the years the recipe was tweaked, using ketchup instead of the tomato puree in the original recipe for example, since the latter was hard to come by for most Japanese people at the time. There are some Napolitan recipes calling for crushed tomatoes or tomato puree, but using ketchup is, as odd as it may sound, the more ‘authentic’ way.

To make Spaghetti Napolitan that is as ‘authentic’ as you might get in Japan, you’ll want to cook the spaghetti a minute or two over the al dente stage. Up until pretty recently (say the last 20-30 years or so), Japanese people preferred their pasta to be soft, like other noodles they were used to like soba, udon or Chinese style noodles (and as Chinalily commented here, the ‘soft pasta’ preference is seen in other Asian countries too.) You can even cook the noodles in advance and then re-heat them in the pan, something that purist Italian cooks would gasp in horror at but is the standard way of dealing with Japanese style noodles. Do remember that this is an adaptation by one culture of the food of another to suit existing tastes.

I have to admit, I hadn’t made Napolitan in years. I’m more used to the Italian style al dente pasta now. But I made this for Sunday lunch, and found it surprisingly tasty - it brought back all kinds of memories of my childhood.

Recipe: Spaghetti Napolitan

For two rather generous servings:

150g / about 5 oz. dry spaghetti (no. 8 thickness)
4 wiener sausages or frankfurters
1 large sweet pepper (here I used 1/3rd each of red, yellow and green pepper for color)
5-6 button mushrooms
2 Tbs. butter or light cooking oil
1 medium onion
Salt and pepper
1/2 cup ketchup (Heinz is what I used)
2 Tbs. Bulldog tonkatsu sauce
2 Tbs. heavy cream

Boil the spaghetti while you’re cooking the other ingredients in plenty of salted water. Cook it a minute or two beyond the al dente stage for authenticity, or stop at the al dente stage if this bothers you.

Slice the onion, pepper and mushrooms thinly. Slice the sausages in thin, diagonal slices (you can cut them into octopus shapes and the like if you’re entertaining the kids).

Heat up a wok or large frying pan with the butter or oil or a combination. (Using lard here would make it closer to the original version.) Sauté the onion until transclucent, then add the peppers and mushrooms and sauté until it’s all limp. Add the sausage slices and sauté until lightly browned. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

In the meantime, combine the ketchup, Bulldog sauce and cream in a small bowl.

Drain the spaghetti once it’s cooked. Add to the pan. Add the sauce mixture and toss well to combine.

Serve immediately, optionally topped with plenty of grated cheese, and/or a dash of Tabasco.

Kids love this - at least, Japanese kids do.

Notes

If you don’t have Bulldog sauce, use steak sauce and add about a teaspoon or so of honey.

You can use ham or bacon instead of the wieners (or in addition to).

Canned mushrooms are often used in this, but that’s where I draw the line.

Napolitan, the original Wafuu pasta

I’ve written here previously about wafuu pasta, pasta with Japanese ingredients and flavors. I think it’s safe to say Napolitan was the original wafuu pasta - even though it uses Western ingredients, the dish as a whole was adapted to Japanese tastes of the time. (The kind of wafuu pasta that are on this page were developed much later, probably in the 1970s, and use actual Japanese ingredients such as tarako (salted cod roe) and natto (fermented soy beans).

Menchikatsu

maki — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 19:35:36 +0100

While I make Japanese style hamburgers all the time, I rarely make menchikatsu, its breaded and deep-fried cousin. I guess it’s the breading and deep frying that deters me - it’s a messy process, and I’m not sure it’s worth the effort. So I made these ones for the blog! Fortunately they were consumed very eagerly.

The name is a combination of menchi or minchi, which comes from mince(d meat), and katsu, which comes from cutlet. So it’s a minced meat cutlet.

The recipe for the meat mixture is the same as for the hamburgers, though you may want to moisten the breadcrumbs a bit more to give it a quite loose texture. You will also want to make each ‘cutlet’ smaller than the hamburgers. I made size little ones out of the same amount of meat that I made 4 hamburgers from. After dipping in flour, beaten egg and then breadcrumbs (panko are preferable here), it helps to let them firm up a bit in the refrigerator before frying.

Then deep fry them in cooking oil (here I used peanut oil) at a medium-high temperature, about 150°C / 300°F, turning several times, until golden brown on the outside. If you put a discreet hold in the center with a skewer or chopstick and the juice that runs out is clear, it’s done.

The best sauce to put on these is plain old Bulldog tonkatsu sauce, sparingly. They’re best freshly made and piping hot, but are also not bad cooled, so they are popular for bentos.

Making these brought back memories of growing up in suburban Tokyo. Menchikatsu and korokke (potato croquettes that are similarly breaded and deep fried) were commonly available at a butchers; I think the menchikatsu were 100 yen each, and the korokke 80 yen each. They were my mother’s fall-back okazu, when she was too busy to make something else. I remember being sent on emergency early-evening runs to the butcher for menchikatsu and korokke for dinner. My mother never liked to resort to them, but us kids loved them. Nowadays local independent butchers are quite scarce in suburban Tokyo, but menchikatsu and korokke are easily available at convenience stores (kombini) and supermarkets, readymade or in pre-fried, frozen form.

Hambaagu or hambaagaa: Japanese hamburgers

maki — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 14:38:29 +0100

As promised, here is my recipe for making Japanese style hamburgers or hamburger steaks, one of the quintessential yohshoku or Japanese Western-style dishes. They are called hanbaagaa or hanbaagu in Japan, and are very popular for lunch or dinner, and are eaten as a side dish to rice (okazu) in Japanese homes. In fancier restaurants that specialize in yohshoku, they might be eaten with a knife and fork, but at home they’re eaten with chopsticks. Whenever Japanese food magazines have a poll about popular okazu, hamburgers are always in the top three, especially amongst kids.

They don’t have much in common with the American style of hamburger, except for the fact that they both start off with ground meat. A Japanese hamburger has more in common with meatloaf, and a rather similar texture. They are similar to the old TV dinner standby, Salisbury steak, but I think a lot better.

Recipe: Japanese style hamburger (Hambaagu or hambaagaa)

This makes 4 small hamburgers, serving 2 to 4 people depending on what else you are serving.

200g/ about 7 oz. ground beef (from a cut that has a fair amount of fat in it - very lean beef will not work.)
100g / about 3 1/2 oz. ground pork
1/2 medium onion
3/4 tsp. salt
About 1/2 tsp. ground black pepper
About 1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1 cup soft white breadcrumbs (Make the breadcrumbs from regular white bread slices with the crusts off. The crumb of a baguette is really good for this.)
2-3 Tbs. milk
1 egg
Oil for cooking

For the sauce:

1/2 cup dry red wine
1/3 cup ketchup
1/3 cup Japanese tonkatsu sauce such as Bulldog brand

Chop the onion very finely. Sauté the onion in a little oil until translucent. Let cool.

Moisten the breadcrumbs with the milk. Combine the meat, cooled onions, moistened milk, egg, salt, ground pepper and nutmeg. Your hands are the best tools for this. Combine well until everything is amalgamated.

Divide into 4 portions. Form into patties, slapping each with your palms until the surface is smooth. Indent the middle with your thumb - this makes sure the middle gets cooked evenly. It should look like this:

Notice that the texture is not crumbly.

From the side:

Heat up a large frying pan with some oil over high heat. Place the hamburgers well apart in the hot pan, and fry until browned. Turn over and turn the heat down to low. Put a tight fitting lid on the pan and steam-cook the hamburgers for about 10 minutes until the middle bounces back if you press down on it. Take out and keep warm.

Pour out any excess oil from the pan and turn the heat up to high again. Add the red wine and deglaze the pan with it (scrape off the brown bits and blend). Add the ketchup and the Bulldog sauce and blend. Pour over the hamburgers.

They are best served piping hot, but they are also very popular for bento boxes.

What to serve with hambaagu

As I’ve noted above, hamburgers in Japan are eaten with plain white rice. So it’s fine to serve them just so on their own plate, maybe with a garnish. A popular side to them is glazed carrots (boiled carrots which are glazed with butter and a little bit of sugar). Another popular side is kofukiimo, boiled pototoes that are dried out in a hot pan, and tossed with a little butter, salt and pepper and chopped parsley.

You could also serve some plain boiled broccoli and so on with them too. As part of a typical Japanese meal, you’d serve some soup, salad and/or pickle, and perhaps one more side dish besides the hamburgers. (See Anatomy of a Japanese meal.)

Sauce variations

The sauce I’ve used here is very easy to make and fits perfectly with the hamburgers. Other sauces that are often used include demiglace (most often seen at yohshoku restaurants, though home cooks can buy canned demiglace), teriyaki-style sauce, or just a little soy sauce and grated daikon radish.

Yohshoku in the New York Times (but it's not Hambagoo!!!!!)

maki — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 19:05:32 +0100

The New York Times has an article today about yohshoku, Japanese-style western food. Long time readers of Just Hungry will know that I’ve been slowly introducing you all to yohshoku for some years now. Here’s the original article where I explained what it is back in 2004, which links to all the yohshoku style recipes on the site, such as omuraisu (omu rice or rice omelette) and hayashi rice. Unless I missed listing something, the number of recipes is pretty small yet. This is because most yohshoku dishes are pretty high in calories, especially from fat, and in recent times I’m a bit more into rather healthier eating. But I’ll try to increase the number, yes yes I will.

A couple of things about the New York Times article: first of all, it isn’t hambagoo (which I think most people would pronounce as ham-Ba-GOO….wtf), it would be correctly pronounced hambaagu - though I would dispute their assertion that hambaagaa is reserved for the Golden Arches meat-on-a-bun variety and hambaagu for the Japanese kind. Both terms are used for either kind really. As several readers over the years have pointed out, a Japanese style hamburger is very much like a “hamburger steak” or a Salisbury steak. Given that we do actually have hambaagu for dinner quite often, it shames me that I still haven’t put up a recipe. I’ll remedy that ASAP.

I’d also dispute the claim that spaghetti for napolitan is cooked and then left for a while. Restaurants may do that but home cooks don’t (and I would say good restaurants don’t either). The key difference between Japanese style spaghetti and Italian style spaghetti is simply that Japanese people prefer their noodles to be a tad softer than al dente. This is because traditional noodles like udon and soba are a tad on the soft side. Until fairly recently, even so-called Italian restaurants in Japan would cook their pasta a few more minutes beyond the al dente stage to suit their customers.

As I noted in my original article about yohshoku, the main reason why it’s become newly popular and hip in recent years is because of nostalgia. Japanese ‘gourmet’ magazines (food mags that focus on eating out more than cooking, aimed at a mainly male audience) like dancyu and Shokuraku frequently have features about ‘Showa retro’ yohshoku cooking. This nostalgia is a little like the one for ’50s diner food in the U.S., or ‘good plain British food’ in the UK. (I explained a bit about ‘Show retro’, a dewy eyed nostalgia for the good old times of the former emperor Hirohito’s reign,
on Just Bento recently.)

And for me, a Japanese person who’s lived so long outside of Japan, yohshoku still has a special place in my food life. Even if it is damn fattening.

Time-tested vegan proteins

maki — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 16:57:49 +0100

More and more these days I’m getting requests for vegan and vegetarian recipes. While I’m not a vegetarian as I’ve stated here before, I like to eat a daily menu that’s light on meat, and am always interested in vegan and vegetarian protein options.

There are several what I’d call factory-manufactured vegan or vegetarian protein products out there, from TVP to quorn. I’m sure (or fairly sure) they are safe and wholesome to eat, but I’m more interested in traditional, or time-tested, vegan/vegetarian protein alternatives.

This is the list I’ve come up with so far. They are Japanese-centric, since that’s what I’m most familiar with. Do you have any others to add?

Soy bean products:
- Boiled soy beans
- Green boiled soy beans (edamame)
- Fermented soybeans (natto)
- Fermented black soy beans (mostly Chinese)
- Fermented soy bean paste (miso and related products; Japanese, Chinese, Korean)
- Tofu and tofu variations - fried, etc.
- Soy milk
- Yuba (skimmed soy milk sheets)
- Tempeh (Southeast Asian)
- Okara (soy bean bran left over from making soy milk or tofu (thx for the reminder toontz!)
- Kinako (toasted and ground soy bean powder)
Chickpeas and chickpea products:
- Hummus
- Chickpea flour
- Cooked whole chickpeas
Other beans and legumes (also often available ground)
- Lentils/ Dal
- Azuki beans (also called red beans)
- White beans or navy beans
- Black beans
- Kidney beans
- Lots of other beans
Whole grains
- Brown rice and other whole-grain rices (black rice, red rice, etc.)
- Whole wheat and products made from whole wheat flour (bread, pasta, couscous, etc)
- Quinoa (particularly high in protein)
- Millet
- Whole oats
- Buckwheat
- Amaranth
Seeds and nuts and products made from them
- Sesame seeds
- Tahini
- Flax seeds
- Peanuts
- Peanut butter
- Almonds
- Cashew nuts
- Walnuts
- Hazelnuts
- All kinds of other nuts
Other whole foods
- Chestnuts
- Chestnut flour
- Coconut
- coconut milk
- Avocado
Traditional processed proteins (other than soy bean based ones)
- Fu (toasted and dried wheat gluten, 25-30g of protein per 100g, see more)
- Seitan (also wheat gluten - since the 1960s anyway)
- Kanpyou (dried gourd strips, 7.1g protein per 100g)
Protein-rich sweets
- An or anko (sweet azuki or white bean paste)
- Annin dofu (almond jelly, made with agar-agar)
- Many Indian sweets and Persian sweets are bean, chickpea based
- Ice cream! (well it is lacto-ovo-vegetarian :))

And you also have the lacto-ovo proteins if you loosen up your rules to extend to milk and eggs:

Lacto-ovo/non-vegan proteins:
- All kinds of eggs - chicken duck, quail, ostrich…
- All kinds of milk - cow, goat, sheep, etc.
- All kinds of cheeses - from cow, goat, sheep, buffalo, etc. milk
- Other milk products: butter, yogurt/yoghurt, kefir, cream, buttermilk….

Not a good protein source

Mushrooms are not a protein source, even though they are often used in vegetarian dishes as a sort of meat substitute. They may taste meaty, especially the heartier ones like portobellos (which are just overgrown brown button mushrooms) but are basically just fiber and water with small quantities of Vitamin B1 (thiamin) and B2 (riboflavin), calcium, Vitamin C and iron. They are on the other hand tasty and very low in calories. You’re getting a lot more protein from the bun part of a portobello burger than from the ‘burger’.