Hiroyuki

Links to the same webpage? Edited to add: Feel free to delete this post once you have fixed it.

Would you say that the process is similar to frying curly parsley? ← I, for one, have never deep-fried parsely, but a lot of Japanese have tempura'ed it. Recipes are similar in that they say that the right temperature is around 160 to 170 C. One example (Japanese only). In Japan, tempura-ing is known to be an effective way to remove "aku" (harshness) from certain food items like "fukinoto" (butterbur sprouts), "yomogi" (mugwort leaves), and other "sansai" (edible wild plants).

Once deep-fried, leaves should stay crispy because they have little water left in them. Tempura'ed perilla leaves will stay crispy while other tempura'ed food items will eventually lose their crispness due to the moisture contained in them. I think that low temperatures around 160 C (320 F) should be appropriate for deep-frying leaves. When deep-fried at higher temperatures, they tend to turn bitter and brown.

My son dug out a head of cabbage from one of our SFGs (Square Foot Gardens). Photos here. It was soft and sweet!

My next mission: Make tempura restaurant-style, light and crispy shrimp tempura. Overview of the recipe: Batter: 1.5 cup (= 300 ml) hakurikiko (cake flour) with a gluten content of 6.5 to 9% 1 yolk 2 cup (= 400 ml) cold water at a temperature of about 5 C (41 F) This results in a thin batter. Needless to say, the thinner the batter, the thinner the coating. Also note: The thinner the coating, the less the protection from oil heat, thus the shorter the deep-frying time. Dust shrimp with flour, and shake off excess flour. (Excess flour will result in heavy tempura.) Dip shrimp in the batter and deep-fry in the fryer at high temp. (180 C = 356 F) for less than 1 minute, until the shrimp feels light. The shrimp will be still raw at the core and continue to cook with residual heat. Serve immediately, or crispness will be lost. (Be sure to deep-fry one piece (or two) at a time.) I don't know when I can try this recipe. I'll do it when I can get kuruma ebi or black tiger shrimp cheap. In the meantime, anyone interested in trying my recipe? If you are a novice, I recommend making some attempts using other cheap ingredients like fake crabmeat sticks.

During hiberation, my son successfully harvested one head of cabbage from one of the SFGs. Photos can be found here. So far, we have had much less snow here than in the same period of the previous year.

Uninteresting ozouni. My wife made the same old, soy sauce-based ozouni with salmon (toshitori zakana in Eastern Japan), daikon, hakusai, and chikuwa.

Uninteresting, all store-bought: Kuromame A set of red kamaboko, white kamaboko, and datemaki Seasoned octopus Kombu maki (with salmon inside) My wife made chikuzen ni.

Thank you for all of your great work!! I wouldn't do it, either! Osechi ryori are more or less preserved foods (meant to be eaten on the first three days of the new year) and are heavily seasoned. Besides, as you know, many Japanese dishes are simply seasoned with soy sauce, mirin, sake, sugar, and miso.

Some notes on tempura making: In my tempura and tendon sessions, I used mirin-like seasoning and instant dashi powder. If you find them off-putting, simply replace them with real mirin and real dashi. If you decide to use real mirin, be sure to boil it for some time to remove alcohol. If you find dashi making overwhelming, you may find this simple recipe useful. Here is a nice site that provides videos showing how to prepare shishito and shrimp. Click the 8th photo from the bottom to view how to make holes in a shishito with a bamboo skewer to prevent it from explosion during deep-frying, 7th photo from the bottom to view how to peel a shrimp, 6th to view how to remove water from the tail, 5th to view how to devein a shrimp using a bamboo skewer, 4th to view how to make cuts on the belly of a shrimp, and 3rd to view how to make a batter.

Oops, found a careless mistake. Not tbsp but tsp ← I found another error. The proper amount of sugar is 5 g, which is equivalent to 1 1/2 tsp sugar, not 1 tbsp. Moderators: Could you make the corrections in my initial post and delete this post and post #57 to eliminate clumsiness?

On New Year's Eve, I made tempura for dinner, as an accompaniment of soba. It's customary to have soba for dinner (or after dinner) on this special day. Such soba is called "toshikoshi soba" (year-crossing buckwheat noodles). I used the tempura flour I showed upthread. You can use a whisk to stir it! You don't need cold water. You can use tap water! And you can let it sit! What great features! Results: It's hard to tell from the picture, but I succeeded in producing "needle-like, fine flowers" on the pieces, all around for some pieces and unevenly on one side only. It was so difficult to put droplets of batter, turn it upside down, and put droplets again within the initial 20 to 30 seconds of the total frying time of about 1.5 to 2 minutes. Besides, I should have thicken the batter to produce more pronounced "flowers". Renkon (lotus root): Cut in 5-mm (0.2-inch) thick slices, soak in water with a little bit of vinegar to prevent discoloration. Thinly coat with batter and deep-fry at medium temp. (170 C = 338 F) for 2 min. Sweet potato: Can you tell the difference in texture from the ones made with a normal batter? I must say that despite all the great features of that tempura flour, I still prefer the tempura made with the same old batter. The coating with the tempura flour is flimsy and brittle. So, I will make no more attempts to produce better flowers on my tempura.

On Dec. 30, I went to the same supermarket and took some photos of tempura. Shrimp, sweet potato, and kabocha tempura, prepackaged: Kakiage and shrimp tempura: Closeup of shrimp tempura: Apparently, the shrimp tempura was made with a different tempura flour because the "flowers" on the pieces are bigger than the ones on the tempura I posted upthread.

Basic Tendon (Tempura Donburi) Recipe Serves 4 as Main Dish. Here is a basic tendon (tempura donburi) recipe. Tendon sauce 100 ml water 1/2 tsp instant dashi powder 50 ml soy sauce 50 ml mirin-like seasoning 1-1/2 tsp sugar (5 g) Tempura batter 150 ml cold water, 5 C (41 F) or below 1 egg. The total amount of water and egg should be 200 ml. That is, flour:(water + egg) = 1:1. 160 ml cake flour (hakuriki ko), with a gluten content of 6.5 to 9.0% 40 ml starch (such as corn or potato starch). The sum of flour and starch should be 200 ml. The ratio of flour to starch is 8:2. The purpose of adding starch and baking powder is to achieve a crumchy rather than crispy texture. 1 tsp baking powder Tempura ingredients 8 black tiger shrimp 8 slices of sweet potato 8 slices of kabocha 4 Asparagus spears or shishito (type of green pepper) Other Vegetable oil for deep-frying Rice in a donburi (big rice bowl) Tendon sauce: Put all ingredients in a pot, bring to a boil, and turn off heat. Preparations for tempura: 1. Sweet potato: Cut it into 1 cm (0.4 inch) thick slices and soak in water for 5 to 10 minutes (preferably longer) to prevent discoloration. Drain and let them dry. 2. Black tiger shrimp: Shell shrimp, leaving the last segment, and devein using a bamboo skewer. Cut tail end diagonally and force water out using the cutting edge (or back) of the knife to prevent oil splatters. Make four or five cuts on the belly and bend the wrong way until it "snaps" to prevent curling during deep-frying. 3. Kabocha: Cut it into 8 mm (0.3 inch) thick slices. Cut them in halves. 4. Asparagus Peel the lower part. Cut it in half, if you prefer. If you use shishito, be sure to make several holes, by piercing with a tooth pick or bamboo skewer, to prevent explosion. Fryer: Put oil in the fryer about 5 cm (2 inches) deep and turn on heat. Batter: Put 1 egg in a bowl, beat it well, and add cold water. Sift 80% flour/20% starch and 1 tsp baking powder, and add them to the bowl. Use a pair of chopsticks to mix. DON'T OVERMIX. Deep-frying: 1. Asparagus Coat with batter and deep-fry at medium temperature (around 170 C = 338 F) for 2 minutes. 2. Kabocha Coat with batter and deep-fry at medium temperature (around 170 C = 338 F) for 3 minutes. 3. Sweet potato: Coat thickly with batter and deep-fry at medium temperature (around 170 C = 338 F) for 4 to 6 minutes. 4. Black tiger shrimp: Dust with flour, coat with batter, and deep-fry at high temperature (180 C = 356 F) for 2 minutes. Assembly: 1. Sprinkle some sauce on rice in the bowl 2. Put pieces of tempura one by one in the pot of sauce, and place them on top of the rice. 3. Sprinkle additional sauce on the tempura. For more info, please visit the tempura thread in the Cooking Forum. Keywords: Main Dish, Intermediate, Japanese, Deep Fryer ( RG1909 )

Basic Tempura Recipe Serves 4 as Main Dish. Here is a basic tempura recipe. Tempura batter 200 ml cake flour (hakuriki ko), with a gluten content of 6.5 to 9.0% 150 ml cold water (5 C = 41 F) 1 egg. The total amount of water and egg should be 200 ml. That is, flour:(water + egg) = 1:1. Tentsuyu (tempura dipping sauce) 600 ml water 2 tsp instant dashi powder 150 ml soy sauce 150 ml mirin ("mirin-style seasoning", to be exact, which is alcohol-free and less expensive than real mirin) Grated daikon Tendane or simply tane (tempura ingredients) 8 Aojiso aka ooba (perilla leaves) 8 Vannamei shrimp 1 Sweet potato Kakiage ingredients 1/4 Onion 1/2 Carrot (Oinion:carrot = 1:1) 1 pack of dried small shrimp (ko ebi or sakura ebi) Tempura oil Vegetable oil such as "salad" oil, canola oil, cotton oil, or sesame oil Tentsuyu: Put water, mirin, soy sauce, and instant dashi powder in a pot, bring to a boil, and turn off heat. Preparations for tempura: 1. Sweet potato: Cut it into 1 cm (0.4 inch) thick slices and soak in water for 5 to 10 minutes (preferably longer) to prevent discoloration. Drain and let them dry. 2. Aojiso aka ooba (perilla leaves): Wash and let dry on a paper towel. 3. Carrot, onion, and "ko ebi" (small shrimp) kakiage: Cut onion and carrot into julienne, put them in a bowl, and add ko ebi. d. Vannamei shrimp (white shrimp): Shell shrimp, leaving the last segment, and devein using a bamboo skewer. Cut tail end diagonally and force water out using the cutting edge (or back) of the knife to prevent oil splatters. Make four or five cuts on the belly and bend the wrong way until it "snaps" to prevent curling during deep-frying. Fryer: Put oil in the fryer about 5 cm (2 inches) deep and turn on heat. First, set the temperature control to 160 C (320 F), if you have one. Batter: Put 1 egg in a cup and add cold water up to the 200-ml level. (In Japan, 1 cup is equivalent to 200 ml.) Put them in a bowl. Mix well. Sift 1 cup flour and add it to the bowl. Use a pair of chopsticks to mix. DON'T OVERMIX. Deep-frying: 1. Ooba: Dust with flour on the lower side only to ensure adhesion of batter, and coat thinly with batter on the lower side only. Deep-fry at low temperature (around 160 C = 320 F) for 1 minute. If deep-fried longer, the leaves will turn bitter and brown. Remove tenkasu (tempura batter balls) occasionally. Don't throw kenkasu away. Use it to make takoyaki, okonomiyaki, yakisoba, and so on. 2. Sweet potato: Coat thickly with batter and deep-fry at medium temperature (around 170 C = 338 F) for 4 to 6 minutes. 3. Kakiage: Kakiage requires some special steps: a. Add some flour to the bowl containing carrot, onion, and shrimp, and mix to ensure adhesion of batter. b. Add some batter to the bowl. c. Scoop some with a ladle with holes (or with your fingers) and deep-fry at medium temperature for 3 minutes. 4. Vannamei shrimp: Dust with flour, coat thinly with batter, and deep-fry at high temperature (180 C = 356 F) for 1 to 2 minutes. Grate daikon. Serve with cold soba (buckwheat noodles) or hot rice. For more info, please visit the tempura thread in the Cooking Forum Keywords: Main Dish, Intermediate, Japanese, Deep Fryer ( RG1908 )

(mochihead: This is Suzy's foodblog, not mine!) Azuki pie is not at all unusual in Japan, it's a nice East-West fusion, don't you think? But I must say that mochi in pie is a little too much. Besides, commercial anko is usually too sweet for my taste. I prefer home-made, less sweetened anko.

Since you asked, They hope to create new types of distribution like Don Quixote, who does not succumb to existing concepts or authorities. from here (JAPANESE ONLY). Edited to add: The authentic citrus fruit to be placed on top of kagami mochi is daidai (橙), which is homophonic to daidai (代々) (from generation to generation), as in "prosper from generation to generation". A mikan (mandarin, tangerine, satsuma, ...) is a cheap substitute.

The flannel filter must be put in a container with water in it and stored in the fridge. (You mean the cloth called "neru" in Japanese, right?) Are you sure you can't get a new one? Have you considered purchasing one from an Internet source like this?

THANKS FOR ALL THE PHOTOS, SuzuSushi! Fascinating! Although some characters are too blurry to read, I can tell that at leat two of the sake on display are from Niigata: Kubota 久保田 and Kikusui 菊水 First, the hiragana: いきいき (ikiiki), roughly "fresh, fresh" Second, the kanji: 鮮魚大特売 (sengyo dai tokubai) 鮮魚 Fresh fish 大　Big, great 特売 Special sale

I made butadon, simply by substitituting pork for beef in my gyudon recipe. It wasn't bad at all, but I prefer gyudon. My wife said it was good, better than gyudon, probably because she likes sukini, a local dish here, which is quite similar to sukiyaki, but is made with pork not beef.

Oops, found a careless mistake. Not tbsp but tsp

Thank you for sharing your personal life with us, SuzySushi. It's much more like the New Year's holidays rather than the Christmas in Japan. One item in your freezer caught my eye: Spumoni ice cream! Could you explain what it is? Is it popular in Hawaii?

and with a better tempura flour: I'm going to make some tempura again on December 31, as an accompaniment to soba. (It's customary in Japan to have soba for dinner (or after dinner) on New Year's Eve.) The tempura flour shown above contains wheat flour, starch, yolk powder, baking powder, emulsifier(!), and coloring agents. I didn't know this, but I googled and learned from one site that an emulsifier is required to produce "needle-like, fine flowers" on tempura. I hope that my shrimp tempura will turn out OK this time.

*** Just in case someone is wondering, sasabune means bamboo leaf boat.

I googled butadon (豚丼 to be exact) today, and I immediately realized that there were actually two types: A specialty of Hokkaido, which is said to have originated in Obihiro, Tokachi district. A dish that was put on the menu of Yoshinoya after the BSE problem in Japan. I checked some recipes for tare (sauce) for Hokkaido butadon. One example: 150 ml mirin 150 ml sake Put them in a pot and boil until alcohol is fully evaporated. Add 150 ml soy sauce and 50 g sugar. Boil for another few minutes. This results in a very amakara sauce, probably too sweet for my taste. (I would leave out all sugar.) I think that Hokkaido butadon is essentially the same as "yakiniku (grilled meat" don". I have never tasted Hokkaido butadon, but it's kind of off-putting to me because it consists almost entirely of rice and meat, with little or no vegetables. I think I much prefer Yoshinoya-style butadon because it contains onions. I think I'll make butadon based on my gyudon recipe and report back. Butadon-like dishes are called differently by different restaurant chains: Yoshinoya: Butadon 豚丼 Matsuya: Buta meshi 豚めし Sukiya: Ton don 豚丼 Naka u: Buta donburi 豚どんぶり from here