Chicken & Daikon in Vinegar Soy Sauce Soup

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Tonight my wife made me corned beef with cabbage and potatoes, and of course, I had some Guinness as well. That was tasty.

During cold winter months, I made chicken and daikon boiled in soy sauce, mirin and sake numerous times. A couple of months ago when I held a potluck party, a friend of mine made chicken and egg boiled in soy sauce and vinegar (and mirin and sake), which tasted quite similar to my chicken and daikon (which I never had the chance to post here). My friend told me that using vinegar makes it healthier and it also makes the meat very tender. He also added that even though there are quite a bit of vinegar in it, you don't really taste the sourness. So, I had to give it a try myself.

IN JAPANESE: Tori to Daikon su nikomi
CATEGORY: Meat
COOKING METHOD: Boiling
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 4 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 1.25 hr

INGREDIENTS:
2.5 lb Chicken thighs, drumsticks or wings with bones in it
1 whole daikon (cut in about 1/2 inch thickness)
1 package of Tofu (optional)
2 boiled eggs (optional)
6 cups of water
1 TBsp of Dashi powder (about 6 shakes)
8 TBsp of Soy Sauce
6 TBsp of Vinegar
6 TBsp of Mirin
6 TBsp of Sake
1 clove of garlic chopped in half

HOW TO:
Place the chicken in a large pot and cover that with water and set the burner to medium high. I measured about 6 cups of water, but if you are using smaller chicken pieces or larger pieces, the water you put in should cover most of the chicken. Add the dashi powder (I would say about 1 shake per cup of water you use).

While that pot is starting to cook, wash the daikon, slice it about 1/2 inch thickness. Peel the skin from each of the slices, and cut those in half (so each pieces look like half a circle). This really depends on how big of a daikon you got, but for 4 servings, you should have total of 12-18 of half circle daikon pieces. When you are done cutting them, the water should be boiling, and add the daikon to the pot and lower the heat to low.

Also peel one clove of garlic, and chop that in half and throw that in the pot as well.

By this time there should be some foamy stuff on the top. Be sure to take those out with spoon and throw it out (but try not to take out the oily part as that gives the rich flavor!).

When most of the foamy stuff is taken out (as you continue to cook, more will appear, which you can take out) add the soy sauce, mirin, sake and vinegar. For every cup of water you used, use 1 TBsp of everything, except soy sauce use about 1.25 TBsp. And like I said before, you can hardly taste any vinegar when everything is cooked.

If you want to make this dinner more filling, you can put in some tofu and boiled egg, which I ended up doing.

Put on the lid, make sure the heat is still set to low, and let it simmer for about an hour. Some of the chicken or daikon or anything else you put in may be above the soup, so occasionally stir the pot around so everything can get even amount of flavor soaking.

Crab Lettuce Fried Rice

Wow. It's been over a year now since the last blog entry. I hadn't updated this blog or answered people's comments, but recently I've noticed a sudden surge of traffic to this blog and some nice comments from people that have tried my recipe. Thanks!

So, I decided to start this blog again. Not sure how often I can update it, maybe once a week, but realistically let's say at least a couple of times a month. And to celebrate this re-start of this blog, I wanted to do something fancy, but I knew that would delay my start again, so I'm going with another easy recipe. I guess this is why this blog is called Easy Japanese recipes.

IN JAPANESE: Kani Lettuce Cha-han
CATEGORY: Rice/Noodles
COOKING METHOD: Stir-fry
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 2 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 15 min


INGREDIENTS:
2 bowls of rice
1 can of crab meat (or shrimp for cheaper alternative)
4-5 Finely chopped shrimp (optional)
1/2 onion
1 egg (beaten with 1 TBsp of crab juice from the can)
1/2 TBsp vegetable oil
1/2 TBsp sesame oil
1 half inch piece of ginger (see TIP: Ginger)
1 green onion finely chopped
1 TBsp mayonaise
2 handful of lettuce leaves
some salt
some pepper

HOW TO:
This is another great thing to cook when you have some leftover rice. On a heated wok, pour both vegetable and sesame oil. When the oil is well heated, saute the onion until it is well cooked, and add the chopped shrimp now if they are raw (if they are pre-cooked ones, add it when you add the crab later).

While that is being cooked, beat the egg with some crab juice from the can (about 1 table spoon) in a separate bowl. When the onion (and raw shrimp) are mostly cooked push them to one side of the wok, and scramble the egg on the open side of the wok.

When the egg is fully cooked, add the rice, chopped green onion, crab meat (and cooked shrimp if you are adding) and a tablespoon of mayo and mix well. Don't worry you won't taste this mayo. It's mostly in there to give it a bit of shine. When all that is mostly mixed, add the lettuce. How much lettuce? I normally tear a few leaves to be about a little larger than a bite size (they shrink), and I add one handful of that per serving (so in this case, two handfuls, which is about 1/4 of the whole lettuce).

Right after the lettuce is added, shred the ginger, shake some salt and pepper to your liking and serve. I tried to serve it by putting it in a bowl first and flipping that out onto a plate to make it look like regular fried rice presentation, but for this one with lettuce in it, it's better to just scoop and serve on a plate.

Seared Tuna Salad

For this year's Thanksgiving, held at my brother's, we were asked to bring a salad, mashed potato and beer. My wife took on the mashed potato responsiblity and I got the salad. I didn't want to bring a plain tossed salad, so I decided to try the seared tuna salad that I enjoy at restaurants.

A friend of ours from Japan was visiting over the Thanksgiving as well, and this was going to be his first turkey ever. Needless to say, he loved the whole Thanksving meal, especially the gravy, which he's never had before. For the rest of his stay, he requested leftover mashed potato and gravy for breakfast every day. He even bought packets of powder gravy as souvenir.

IN JAPANESE: Maguro Tataki Salad
CATEGORY: Seafood
COOKING METHOD: Fresh
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 4 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 10 min

INGREDIENTS:
Seared tuna (1/4 lb)
4-8 leaves of leafy lettuce
1/8 onion thinly sliced
2-3 shiso leaves
1 half inch piece of ginger (see TIP: Ginger)
2 TBsp Japanese pickles - purple kind (optional)
4 TBsp of Ponzu dressing

HOW TO:
First, rinse enough lettuce for four people. If the leaves are huge, one leaf per person should do it. Otherwise, maybe 1 and half leaf per person. Rinse, pat them dry with a paper towel, and tear them into bite size with your hands and evenly spread on a plate or serving dish.

Slice some onions really thin and soak them in ice cold water to make them slightly more crispy. Place them evenly on top of the lettuce.

Recently a lot of supermarkets (at least in Seattle area) are carrying seared tuna in the seafood section. The only problem is that a lot of times, those are heavily flavored (with salt and pepper stuck to the tuna). If you like those kind, use those, if not, look for unflavored seared tuna or make one yourself.

The most difficult thing about making this salad is cutting the tuna. It's cooked on the outside and raw in the inside, so if you cut with jagged edged knife (like a steak knife) you could crumble a nice piece of fish. The key is to cut the fish in one pulling motion instead of going back and forth with your knife. Each slice should be about 1/4 inch side (or if you prefer a thicker cut, by all means go for it). Neatly place them on top of the salad.

If you can get purple Japanese pickles, spread those around on the salad. Also, cut the shiso leaves into small pieces and spread those around. Shred a piece of ginger on top of the salad (make sure you do it evenly so you don't have one area covered in shredded ginger!)

Pour about 4 TBsp (about 1 TBsp per serving) over the salad, and you are ready to serve!

Daikon Salad

This past weekend we already started shopping for Halloween. Every year my wife and I try to get our friends to dress up in the similar theme we come up with. Last year we pulled off The Simpsons, and this year we are going to try for fast food chain characters such as Ronald McDonald, Burger King King, Jack from Jack In The Box, and Colonel Sanders, just to name a few.

Last year there were six people doing the Simpsons, but this year we may have up to twelve people doing the fast food thing with us (are there that many characters?) We went to some used clothing stores and dollar stores to pick out some stuff. Last year my wife sewed Marge and Lisa Simpson's dresses, but this year we may not need to sew anything.

IN JAPANESE: Daikon Salad
CATEGORY: Vegetable
COOKING METHOD: Fresh
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 2 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 10 min

INGREDIENTS:
Daikon (1/2 lb should do it)
1 umeboshi (sour plum)
2 shiso leaves
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sake
2 tsp mirin

HOW TO:
The only tough thing about making daikon salad is shredding the daikon into super thin slices. The easiest way to do that is to use the vegetable peeler (but be sure to wash the daikon and peel off the outside skin off first!)

After the daikon is sliced into thin slices, place them into a bowl. Take the seed out of umeboshi (I normally get the honey flavored since they are not as sour) and finely chop that into tiny pieces. Also slice the shiso leaves into tiny pieces as well and mix all of those in a bowl.

Add salt, sake and mirin into the bowl as well and mix well. After that put it in the fridge for a few minutes to let the flavor soak in, and it's ready to serve!

Kimchee Pork

August and September were really busy for me. Since I started working in June, and I come home late around 8pm, my wife has been cooking 90% of the time, and on the weekend, we were out on BBQ or outdoor festivals. There were also lots of weddings and we were traveled to Las Vegas, Vancouver and Detroit.

Finally things have slowed down, and we are ready to get back to our normal life. After all those traveling, my wife and I were a bit worn out, so I decided to make some kimchee (kimchi) pork. While I was in Japan, a lot of people told me that if I was feeling weak, I should eat kimchee pork. I never really found out why, but I assumed kimchee gave more energy. Now that I think about it, I recall reading some article about some university in Korea was doing a research feeding kimchee to mice (I'm serious). The study found that mice that ate kimchee on a regular basis were healthier and had much smoother skin. Has anyone else heard about this?

IN JAPANESE: Buta Kimuchi
CATEGORY: Meat
COOKING METHOD: Stir-fry
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 2 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 20 min

INGREDIENTS:
5-6 thin sliced pork
Half a container of kimchee (about 7 oz/200g)
5-7 leaves of lettuce (iceberg or leafy, your choice)
1/2 TBsp sesame oil
1/2 TBsp vegetable oil
1 TBsp sake

HOW TO:
Warm up your wok and pour 1/2 table spoon of sesame oil and vegetable oil. I like to mix oils like that since that gives better flavor. Keep the heat to medium-high.

After the oil is well heated, cook the thinly sliced pork until mostly cooked (when not much pink is seen), and then add a tablespoon of sake. This will keep the pork from becoming too tough.

While the sake is still evaporating, add kimchee to the wok. If you have the kind that came with a lot of juice, pour some of those in for more flavor.

When the kimchee is mostly heated, add leaves of lettuce teared into size of your palm (remember they shrink a lot, so you don't need to tear them too small!). Lettuce only needs abuot a minute to cook, so mix well quickly so the kimchee flavoring is spread throughout the wok.

Serve with a bowl of rice and get energized! But remember to have some gum or Altoids afterwards since it can leave quite a stench in your mouth!

Grilled Sanma

Recently for my job, I was asked to design advertisement for "shape up goods" for a client in Japan. I used colorful small vinyl dumbbells as a key visual for the ad, since I thought they looked cute (ad was targeted mostly for dieting women) and made you think about excercising. But when I showed my design to the Japanese business team, they didn't seem to understand why I used dumbbells for the shape up ad. They thought that the ad represented more for excercise, and not for diet shape up.

I was confused as to why they were confused. After several minutes of trying to clear up each other, I learned that a lot of Japanese people don't necessarily consider exercising as a main source of diet. For them, dieting was drinking nasty green vegetable drinks or vinegars, or taking a hot bath, wearing some weird ring around your toes to make you look slimmer. It turns out that they were thinking more of massage creams and bath powders and nothing about exercising. Then I remembered that all my Japanese friends that were dieting weren't particularly working out, but instead trying out all these weird methods (I don't think any of them were losing weights).

One of the other popular method of losing weight amongst my Japanese friends were eating less meat and more fish. One of my coworkers who didn't particularly like fish, started eating sushi once a week instead of beef bowl. I think sushi can be quite high in cholestrol, especially when they are fatty.

Speaking of fish, one of the most traditional grilled fish you could get in Japanese restaurants (in Japan) was sanma (Pacific saury in English), especially in the Fall. It can be a bit of pain to eat, if you are not used to it as you need to semi-disect the fish as you eat, but they are also quite tasty so I think it's worth the time.

IN JAPANESE: Sanma no shioyaki
CATEGORY: Fish
COOKING METHOD: Grilled
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 2 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 20 min

INGREDIENTS:
A pack of sanma (Pacific saury), which usually comes in a pack of 4
salt
4-inch piece of daikon shredded (optional)
soy sauce or ponzu

HOW TO:
I've yet to see fresh sanma sold in the States. I get them in either Japanese or Korean markets, but they are always frozen. Since it's a small narrow fish, I would say one fish per person. If there are two of you, defrost two in the fridge for a few hours.

After the fish is fully defrosted, take them out of the fridge, and sprinkle salt all over on both sides of the fish and set aside for about 10 minutes (let the salt soak into the fish)

Set your oven to broil and place the fish on a rack with a pan underneath to catch drips (there will be a lot of drips!) Broil for about 7 minutes until the top is golden brown.

While the fish is being grilled, grate some radish (which I highly recommend for this fish). Squeeze the water out of the grated daikon and serve next to the fish. Pour some soy sauce over the daikon, and eat that with the fish.

The easiest way to dissect this particular fish is to cut it open in half from the top (using your chopsticks of course), and take the bones out. Now you are ready to eat!

Japanese Hamburger

There was another food festival this past weekend; Ballard Seafood Fest. It was similar to Bite of Seattle with similar food stands, but at a much smaller scale. I enjoyed BBQ shrimp, crab clam chowder, and grilled salmon. I didn't see any raw oyster though. My wife told me that people have been getting sick from oysters from Puget Sound this season. The warmer weather is causing virus to grow inside oysters, apparently. That's too bad.

Last week, I introduced Italian fried rice, so this weekend I thought I would make Japanese hamburger. The photo didn't turn out that appetizing, but this is probably my wife's favorite dish.

IN JAPANESE: Hamburg
CATEGORY: Meat
COOKING METHOD: Grilled
DIFFICULTY: Difficult
SERVES: 4 people
LENGTH OF TIME: 45 min

INGREDIENTS:
[burgers]
3/4 lb beef
1/4 lb pork
1/2 onion chopped
1 egg (mixed with a pinch of salt)
1 cup bread crumbs
1 tsp soy sauce
1/4 tsp pepper
1 clove of garlic chopped
1 half inch piece of ginger (see TIP: Ginger)

[sauce]
1/2 cup of ketchup
2 TBsp Bulldog Sauce
2 TBsp sake or white wine
1 TBsp butter
3 mushrooms sliced
1 clove of garlic chopped

HOW TO:
Chop half an onion and a clove of garlic into tiny pieces and add that into a bowl along with all the ingredients listed on the [hamburger] list, EXCEPT for the breadcrumbs. Mix well with your hands (be sure they are clean!) I use the mixture of beef and pork since that creates more fluffy juicy burger. But if you don't eat pork, then you can omit using it.

After everything is mixed well together, add a cup of breadcrumbs. This time, mix gently so the breadcrumbs will stay as fluffy as they can without mashing everything up.

Grab about half of tennis ball in your hand, and toss it back and forth from one hand to the other to make sure the air escapes from the mixture. After a few tosses, make it flat into burger shapes. Depending on your preference, you could make four fairly big patties or six tiny pieces (my wife prefers small ones, so she can eat two instead of one big one).

Set the pan on medium high with a table spoon of vegetable oil. Once the oil is hot, place the burgers on the pan, let them cook for a few minutes until one side turns brown. Lower the temperature to low, flip your burgers, and place the lid, and let them cook for about 10-15 minutes or until the burgers are fully cooked.

If you are in a hurry, after flipping the burgers, you can pour hot boiling water about half way full on the pan, and place a lid. That would steam the burgers and cook them faster. When most of the water has evaporated, your burgers should be done.

SAUCE:
Set your burgers aside, and on the same pan (if there are leftover grease and meat pieces, even better), add butter and diced up garlic on medium heat. After the garlic pieces tunr slightly brown, add sliced mushroom, and let it cook for a few minutes until they look cooked.

Lower the heat to low, and add the rest of the ingredients (ketchup, Bulldog sauce and sake) and stir until everything is well mixed.

Place the bugers back in the pan. If you want cheese over them (I recommend chedder), put a slice on top of burgers, and cook with the sauce on low heat until the cheese melt.