Mountain Potato

[tissue]

I adore this stuff as yamakake or in hot soba. Most of my friends who didn't grow up eating this can't stand the stuff.

I've also frequently heard of it being referred to as Japanese viagra.

[Akiko]

I love it too, with natto, on soba, and in my tonjiru YUM! poured on hot rice with some soy sauce is pretty good too.

I never heard the viagra thing!

[tissue]

You know what's ironic? I can eat it but I can't touch it.

Makes my hands swell up and it itches like crazy.

[Akiko]

This is totally normal! I was taught to grate it with gloves on because its a skin irritant (no idea why it doesn't irritate your mouth)... sometimes I do get an itchy feeling on my lips from it...

there are tricks to neutralizing it... which I've forgotten. do you know of any, Kristin?

[tissue]

I watched a tv show and this sushi chef's egg recipe called for the mountain potato to make it soft and pliable.

Does anyone else add it to their eggs other than sushi chefs?

[torakris]

I love mountain yam!

I still remeber the first time I ate it though, it was part of a kaiseki course at this very exclusive restaurant just on the outskirts of Tokyo. I took one bite and though I was going puke under the table! I looked and tasted like nose snot (I know I know I will never become a professional food writer!)

That hand itching thing is really annoying, I have no idea how to prevent it except wear gloves, maybe I will ask around today.

I have heard of putting it in eggs, but have never tried it myself. I do love putting it in okonomiyaki though.

It is also great deep fried and then simmered in a soy based broth with chicken thighs, or julienned and served "sashimi" style with either wasabi-joyu or a mentaiko sauce.

Of course nothing can beat yamakake, whether on rice or maguro, my 2 favorites.

[tissue]

I love it julienned but can't touch it so I only have it that way in restaurants!

My dad bought me a bowl with striations that I grind it with.

[margaret]

Mountain yam is also delicious grated and mixed into a bowl of mozuku-su (vinegared seaweed) and a bit of wasabi.

Like someone else mentioned, it's also good in okonomiyaki - works as a binding agent, and improves the texture. In fact, many prepackaged okonomiyaki flours and mixes often contain yam powder.

I've found that soaking it in some water and rice vinegar helps to control the itching, although I'm usually lazy and just use a makeshift saran wrap glove.

[torakris]

Mountain yam is also delicious grated and mixed into a bowl of mozuku-su (vinegared seaweed) and a bit of wasabi.

Like someone else mentioned, it's also good in okonomiyaki - works as a binding agent, and improves the texture. In fact, many prepackaged okonomiyaki flours and mixes often contain yam powder.

I've found that soaking it in some water and rice vinegar helps to control the itching, although I'm usually lazy and just use a makeshift saran wrap glove.

Margret, welcome!

I do the saran wrap on the hand thing too!

I don't know what I was thinking when I made yamakake last week though, I kept scratching my hands all though dinner!

I love mozuku too, I onced used it as a topping for the julienned mountain yam, and it was great, maybe I will do it again next week.

[tissue]

I love mozuku too, I onced used it as a topping for the julienned mountain yam, and it was great, maybe I will do it again next week.

I like mozuko also! In the summer when I want a refreshing appetizer, I top those small cubes of silken tofu with follow with a quail yolk.

[margaret]

Thanks for the welcome!

The saran wrap thing never really works for me either, but I keep doing it again and again. Psychological I think. The vinegar, though, does seem to work. If you don't want to soak the imo before dealing with it, try rubbing some vinegar on your hand afterward. Not making any promises, but it might make it a bit easier.

Another favorite way of eating yama-imo: sliced into thick rounds, sauteed in butter and sprinkled with salt. The taste is quite different from raw, but I think it works pretty well. It is, after all, a potato?

I've never tried deep frying it - do you batter it with anything, or just throw it straight in the hot oil? I would imagine something like corn starch would be necessary to cut the slime factor...?

[tissue]

I've had it julienned than wrapped in seaweed in a springroll-ish way and deep fried.

It is very good, not so slimy and it still has the crunch.

[torakris]

Just opened up my Japanese cookbook to look up the recipe for deep fried mountain potato and lo and behold the first step says the peal the poatao and place it into a bowl of vinegared water, then cut it and place it back in the vinegared water. It says that this will remove the aku (skum?), but nothing about itchy hands.

Anyway for deep frying the potato should then be washed and well dried, then coated with katakuriko (cornstarch should work as well) then deep fry until light brown.

I may as well give the rest of the recipe:

after deep frying the nagaimo (mountain yam) then deep fry chicken thigh pieces that have been marinated with a little sake and soy sauce.

In a pan bring to a boil

3 cups dashi

1/2 cup mirin

1/4 cup soy sauce

add the nagaimo and chicken and simmer for3 to 4 minutes

garnish with thinly sliced shishito (Japanese green pepper) or scallions

[Maryada]

Hi Everyone , I am a new poster . I`ve been living in Japan on and off for the last 27 years . I`m very excited to find this food page and surprised and delighted at how knowledgeable you guys are .

Just my 2 cents about mountain potato . I think when you cook it it`s a bit like Natto the heat seems to destroy the stickiness . When you soak it you do get rid of the Aku , skum or bitter tase but it remains sticky .

I love it in salad , sliced into matchsticks ,put it in a little pile on your plate and top it with Katsuoboshi , bonito flakes and add a little soy sauce , very simple but good .

I also love it in Okonomiyaki as some of you have already mentioned and find it`s hardly necessary t add any water to the mixture , it makes the pancake more springy (?) another one who could never be a food writer .

I went to a very famous restaurant in Akasaka the first time I had it ,the variety they use is slightly different , if my memory serves me correctly it was rounder in shape and I was told it was firmer and stickier . It was served over Mugi gohan , Barley mixed with white rice .

[smallworld]

I saw a trick on TV about avoiding the itchiness when grating mountain yam. Just freeze it! It doesn't destroy the texture, and frozen yam has an added bonus of not turning brown after grating, even if left for hours.

I tried it and it works- just keep it in the freezer whole with the peel still on, when you need it peel the amount you need and grate. No itchiness. But there is one major drawback- it gets rock-hard and takes forever to grate. I don't have arms of steel so I've given this up. But stronger people might have no problems!

So these days I wrap it it two layers of paper towel (prevents slipping) and don't handle the scraps with my bare hands. Seems to work OK.

About the viagra- I've heard the same thing about mountain yam and any other of the slimy foods (like okra and natto). Then again I've heard the same thing about plenty of other foods- garlic, unagi, oysters etc. Anyone ever, um, tested these out?

[tissue]

So these days I wrap it it two layers of paper towel (prevents slipping) and don't handle the scraps with my bare hands. Seems to work OK.

I thought I was the only one that did this!

The paper towel slipped once and I cut my finger with the knife.

[tissue]

I made soup with this 2 days ago. Cooked, it has none of the slimy quality and the texture was rather like taro.

[torakris]

I made soup with this 2 days ago. Cooked, it has none of the slimy quality and the texture was rather like taro.

what kind of soup, just mountain potato?

sliced? pureed?

other flavorings?

[tissue]

I made soup with this 2 days ago. Cooked, it has none of the slimy quality and the texture was rather like taro.

what kind of soup, just mountain potato?

sliced? pureed?

other flavorings?

No I cut it into chunks like I would daikon. And it was slowly simmered on the lowest heat for 7 hours with pork back bones and half a cornish hen. I added a little bit of rice wine and kosher salt in the end to flavor.

Note: I blanched the bones and hen with ginger to get rid of the blood and rinsed everything clean. I was going for a clear broth.

This recipe isn't exactly Japanese, even though it is using the mountain potato.

[torakris]

does it hold its shape for that long of cooking, or does it turn to mush?

[tissue]

You know, I thought it would end up like tororo/slushy/viscous in my soup. But it held it's shape very well and didn't cloud my soup at all. It looks actually a lot like daikon when it's cooked, but it has that taro mealiness to it. I thought it tasted more like taro after that long cooking.

It was surprising.

It was a very good soup, nutritious.

[torakris]

this stuff grates beautifully on a microplane!

[DVSDave]

I'm not sure if it's "mountain potato," but my intrepid bro ordered a bowl of yamaimo (sp?) on the same night as I had some funky kazunoko.

Yamaimo was served shredded off a porcelin grater, topped with soy sauce, green onions and yuzu juice.

I dunno. Maybe if you grew up with this stuff, fine. Nonetheless I'd rather have a bowl of yamaimo than one sliver of kazunoko.

[torakris]

mountain potato in Japanese is yamaimo (yama= mountain imo= potato)

This is actually a category heading referring to quite a few different types of potato, these are the main types (though there are plenty more) that you will see in a Japanese market

長いも　nagaimo, this one is long and tube shaped, and often a little "hairy" and light brown in color

picture: http://www.towada.or.jp/muraokosi/dscf1162_Small.jpg

山芋　this one is sort of paddle shaped and and very light in color, this is most popular in the Kanto area (Tokyo region) and it is not uncommon to see it sold under the name just yamaimo or even yamato- imo

大和芋　the true yamato-imo is actually from the Kansai (Osaka region) and is a dark or light brown mishapen, lumpy thing, occasionally referred to as tsukune-imo

自然薯 jinenjo, very long and quite thing sort of a medium brown in color (this one is normally wild while the other types are cultivated)

found a picture showing all of them in the order described here:

http://www.vegefund.com/panfu/yam/yam.htm

It shows two types of yamato-imo

[tissue]

Most of the stuff sold in the U.S. is nagaimo I think.

It's quite expensive. Like $6-7 a pound.