Miso soup is a delicious and light Japanese soup that can be found around the world. It’ shard not to argue though, that the best miso soup can often be found in your local Japanese restaurant rather than your own kitchen. This doesn’t have to be the case though.
From a low slow simmer to a rich stock there are many secrets to making the perfect miso soup at home.
Walking around the streets of Valencia will take you on a whirlwind of amazing attractions. You can pass by and admire the incredible Roman, Baroque, and Gothic style architecture, meander through the UNESCO Silk Exchange Market and bargain for some great material, see the famous Valencia Cathedral, and eat Paella until you explode! There’s so much to do, see and eat here, but something sticks out like a sore thumb. Perhaps the last thing you would expect is to see a traditional Japanese building hosting some of the best Japanese food and sushi outside Japan.
Eating out is often difficult for people with celiac disease or a gluten intolerance. Gluten is the protein found in wheat, barley rye and triticale. Triticale is a fairly new hybrid grain grown to mimic wheat.
If washoku is traditional Japanese cuisine, yōshoku is mainly European and American (“Western”) food tweaked by the Japanese and is now considered as Japanese as any other native food. Yōshoku began in the Meiji era (1868-1912) in Western-style restaurants that catered to foreigners. The Japanese cooks who worked in those restaurants then opened their own places all over Japan and propagated yōshoku.
During the Meiji era, Western ingredients were hard to come by, so cooks had to adapt using what they had, and in the process, tailored the food to Japanese tastes. “Pōku katsuretsu” (pork cutlets) became “tonkatsu” which was served with rice and miso soup. On the other hand, some Western-style foods such as macaroni gratin, consomme, potage and beef stew were emulated as they were, using the same cooking methods.
To make omuraisu, mix ketchup, small pieces of chicken, sliced button mushrooms and some peas with cooked rice. Cook an omelette in a pan and wrap the flavored rice in the omelette. It’s ideal that not a single grain of rice should show, and it may take a few tries to do it perfectly without breaking the omelette.
Demi glace sauce is then poured on top of the omelette. Sometimes, omuraisu comes in various iterations such as omukare (omelette curry rice) and omushichū (omelette rice stew). Yakisoba (stir-fried noodles) is sometimes used in place of rice, and the dish is called omusoba.
Hayashiraisu is perfect on a wintry day. There is something comforting about thin slices of meat and onions cooked in butter, red wine and demi glace sauce which is then poured over piping hot rice. The meat can be beef or pork, and other vegetables such as carrots and sliced button, shiitake or shimeji mushrooms are sometimes added. Some restaurants even add tomato puree or tomato ketchup to the demi glace sauce.
If the stew is poured on top of omuraisu, it becomes omuhayashi. It doesn’t have to be a complicated dish made from scratch - there are pre-prepared, home cook-friendly square tablets and bottles of hayashiraisu sauce in stores.
Curry in the UK was imported from India, and from that connection was brought over to Japan through the British in the late 1800s. The name for a Japanese curry dish is called Kareraisu and is popular with people of all ages. It is simply curry poured over cooked rice, and is enjoyed at home, in yōshoku restaurants and karesaisu restaurant chains.
by avlxyz Japanese Curry Katsu
First introduced in a cookbook dated 1872, its ingredients list evolved from having fish and oysters to the modern version consisting of curry roux; chicken, beef or pork; and the “holy trinity” of onions, carrots, potatoes. Like hayashiraisu, kareraisu is made at home using commercial tablet roux, but each household has its secret ingredient like coffee, miso or even cheese for an even more savory curry.
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From the cooking method “deep fry,” furai is basically seafood and vegetables drenched in flour, egg, breadcrumbs and then fried. (Meat cooked this way is called “katsu” such as the “tonkatsu” mentioned above. Click -> More info on the origins of Tonkatsu and Furai.)
The most popular furai is ebi furai or fried shrimp. Not to be confused with shrimp tempura, ebi furai is breaded, but it is said that its roots lie in tempura when cooks during the Meiji era tried to combine the two. The most common sauce to ebi furai is tartar sauce, but others like tonkatsu sauce, lemon juice or ketchup are also favored. Kids especially love this dish, with pre-cooked, frozen ones available for their bento lunch boxes.
From the French word “croquette,” the most basic korokke has potatoes that are mashed and mixed with bechamel sauce; then shaped into a patty; dredged in flour, egg and breadcrumbs and then deep-fried. Korokke may also have ground meat and minced onions mixed in with the potatoes.
by Social Geek
They can be made at home, but they are sold in every supermarket in the deli section, sometimes even put on top of soba or udon noodles, and even made into a sandwich. Lovers of creamy sauces will enjoy kurīmu korokke which is made of a white sauce with bits of crab, shrimp or corn mixed in it. Relatively inexpensive, korokke is a popular afternoon snack among kids that can be bought in the convenience store.
Hambāgu is not your typical McDonald’s burger or the popular western Sushi burger as this is basically a patty without the bread and the condiments. In Japan, ground beef or pork (or both) are kneaded with breadcrumbs, egg, minced onions and seasoning, shaped into ovals and are then cooked in a frying pan.
It is typically served with rice, a salad and a sauce. When stewed in a savory soup, it is called nikomi hambāgu or hambuger stew. It is a very popular dish in “family restaurants” which are similar to the American Denny’s chain, with hambāgu specials with various toppings such as cheese, grated daikon radish and ponzu sauce, demi glace sauce, or pepper sauce featured on the menu.
The first commercial spaghetti was produced in Japan in the 1950s. To demonstrate this new product, the makers decided on making spaghetti napoletana but at the time, tomato puree and meat were hard to come by and relatively expensive, so ketchup and processed meats were used. The dish then evolved to the simple and popular naporitan.
by hirotomo
Adapted from the Italian spaghetti napoletana, naporitan is truly an original pasta dish that developed in Japan. Cooked noodles, bacon, sliced onions and slivered green bell peppers are mixed into ketchup and then heated. While modern Japanese have very sophisticated palates and can reproduce Italian pastas very faithfully, naporitan is still beloved because it hearkens back to a nostalgic, simpler time.
by norio_nomura
Rōru kyabtesu is a boiled cabbage leaf stuffed with ground meat, minced carrots and minced onions and then cooked in a soup. To prevent the stuffing from leaking out, toothpicks are used to secure the edges of the roll. It can be stewed in consomme, tomato soup or even in a white sauce. It is also a popular addition to oden, the steaming hot dish of fishcakes in a dashi broth.
While gratin is a French word that means to brown the surface of a dish in an oven, guratan in Japan refers to a dish that contains macaroni in bechamel sauce, topped with cheese and browned in an oven. With the numerous steps involved in its cooking, from boiling the noodles, making the sauce, assembling the dish to browning it in the oven, frozen guratan and convenience store guratan and very popular yōshoku.
by t-mizo
On the other hand, doria is similar to guratan but features cooked rice in place of noodles. Anything can go into a doria, but the most popular is seafood doria with shrimp and squid and bolognese (meat sauce) doria.
Vinegar-like odor, slimy texture, and bland tasting. These are words that you would hope to never ever use when describing your food. However if you take a trip to Japan, you might find yourself trying natto, a....unique food. Natto is fermented soybean, and is a food that the Japanese enjoy, and really only the Japanese. With the words just used to describe this food, it’s not surprising the rest of the world isn't jumping on the bandwagon to incorporate this food in their diet.
In recent years MSG has received a great deal of attention in the media. While this food additive can certainly provide a great deal of extra flavor it also has its downside as well. From allergies to stomach complaints and severe headaches this additive has been credited with a great deal of problems. Is this food additive really that bad for you though?
A lot has been said about the connection between a healthy lifestyle and a long life. Some say it’s just a bunch of scientific jargon but if the world’s oldest woman Misao Okawa is anything to go by then there might be some truth to the notion.
According to this 116 year-old Japanese woman(Update: Sadly Passed on 1 April 2015) it is no coincidence that she has lived so long, she has actually put some effort into staying alive.
A simple bowl of noodles in broth… While it’s true that this modest staple of Japanese life may have started out with humble beginnings, Ramen, instant ramen to be exact, can now be found in pantries across the globe. How did Japanese noodles come to be so ubiquitous? For those seriously interested in Japanese food, this is a brief history of the meteoric rise of instant noodles.
In recent years green tea has received a great deal of attention throughout the media. Many health claims have been made and some are actually very beneficial to consumers. One such discovery is the ability of Green tea to kill oral cancer cells. While this may seem like an impossible task for an ordinary beverage the research is astounding.
Do you love sushi but have no idea the different types of Sushi? You've probably more than once stared down at a sushi menu and have wondered what words such as maki, nigiri, sashimi, and unagi mean. The most popular question as simply as it sounds from our readers, is what is the difference between a maki and a nigiri?
Maki sushi is also sometimes known as beginner sushi because it is the most popular type of sushi and is not as adventurous as other types of sushi. Maki sushi is made with seaweed on the outside and then rice on the inside, as well as the various fillings which can be raw fish, cooked fish, other cooked meat, as well as different types of vegetables and various sauces.
Maki sushi also has a "inside-out" variation which is extremely popular among sushi lovers called the Uramaki. This inside-out roll has the rice on the outside of the roll rather than the seaweed, which is then wrapped around the fillings inside of the roll.
What is more interesting, since we mentioned Uramaki, is that they are 3 more types of Maki which is explained in our basic guide to Maki Sushi.
As you probably already know, sushi rice is not like normal rice - it is seasoned with rice vinegar which gives it that unique, semi-sweet flavor.
Nigiri sushi, on the other hand, is for more experienced sushi eaters and those who are more comfortable with raw fish. Nigiri sushi consists of two things - fish and rice. They sometimes have seaweed, but most of the time it is just fish and rice.
Nigiri sushi is known for its profound taste and the focus that it puts on the fish. Nigiri sushi contains what looks like a oval-shaped ball of rice with a sliver of raw fish on top of it. Common raw fish includes salmon, yellowtail, tuna, shrimp, and mackerel.
An interesting note to point out is that Nigiri Sushi is commonly eaten with the fingers. You can read more about it by checking out our article on "The Proper Way of Eating Nigiri".
An interesting fact about nigiri sushi is that even though it looks extremely simple, it is not nearly as simple to make. You might think it consists of simply slapping on the fish onto a ball of rice, but the shape must be perfect or else it will not pass as nigiri sushi. The rice must be shaped in the right way and the fish on top must also be shaped by the sushi chef's hands.
This is a very difficult art to master and many aspiring sushi chefs must first wash dishes for years before they are given a chance to make nigiri sushi. The fish must be folded and shaped in just the right way and it takes a large amount of skill and precision.
Now that you know the difference, it's time to go out for some Nigiri and Maki rolls.
