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Japanese Foods--sunomono


torakris

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What's the bright yellow pickle that usually comes with chirashi - is it a type of turnip?

I usually order a plate of "oshinko," which comes as a mix of little pickles - eggplant, tiny carrots, yellow thingm cucumber, etc.

Mitch Weinstein aka "weinoo"

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Hate to be the Japanese food police here, but pickles are actually tsukemono ("pickled things") rather than sumono, Jason you are OK with your hitashi becasue it really doesn't fall into any category though no vinegar is used. :biggrin:

there are four main vinegar dressings:

nihaizu (2 flavored vinegar) vinegar, soy, dashi

sanbaizu (3 flavored vinegar) vinegar, soy, dashi, sugar

amazu (sweet vinegar) vinegar, dashi, sugar

ponzu (citrus vinegar) citrus juice (usually yuzu or sudachi), vinegar, soy, mirin, bonito flakes, konbu

then there are variations (usually additions added to either nihaizu or sanbaizu)

tosa-zu with bontio flakes

shoga-zu with ginger

mizore-zu with grtaed daikon

goma-zu with toasted sesame seeds

kimi-zu with egg yolks

bainiku-zu with umeboshi

karashi-zu with Japanese mustard

nanban-zu with red chiles and grilled onions, used for escabeche type dishes

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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No vinegar in Oshitashi? What makes it so acidic, lemon juice?

acidic?

ohitashi is made from

dashi

soy

and sometimes mirin

We're talking about the spinach dish, right?

In japanese restaurants in the US, I can taste the dashi in it, but its got some acidity.

Jason Perlow, Co-Founder eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters

Foodies who Review South Florida (Facebook) | offthebroiler.com - Food Blog (archived) | View my food photos on Instagram

Twittter: @jperlow | Mastodon @jperlow@journa.host

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No vinegar in Oshitashi? What makes it so acidic, lemon juice?

acidic?

ohitashi is made from

dashi

soy

and sometimes mirin

We're talking about the spinach dish, right?

In japanese restaurants in the US, I can taste the dashi in it, but its got some acidity.

spinach is the most common ohitashi, though you can hitashi almost anything.

What I gave you is the traditonal way of preparing it, I never eaten it in a restaurant, it may have been "doctored" up a bit to give it more flavor. I do find it bland normally and haven't prepare it in years.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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So what about Horenso no Goma ae?

that is aemono (dressed things)

salad type dishes dressed with a thick dressing usually based on sesame, tofu, or miso.

that can be the next topic! :biggrin:

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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allright, now I'm totally confused - so I went to my cookbook shelf and found out the following - Torakris - let me know if you agree!!

Sunomono - vinegared things

Aemono - dressed things

Tsukemono - pickled things

And what is/are oshinko then?

BTW, my reference book for all cooking things Japanese is called

"Japanese Cooking - A Simple Art" by Shizuo Tsuji (intro. by M.F.K. Fisher). An excellent resource.

Edited by weinoo (log)

Mitch Weinstein aka "weinoo"

Tasty Travails - My Blog

My eGullet FoodBog - A Tale of Two Boroughs

Was it you baby...or just a Brilliant Disguise?

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Oshinko is a type of pickled radish, its yellow in color. Used as a condiment for rice and sometimes used in sushi.

Jason Perlow, Co-Founder eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters

Foodies who Review South Florida (Facebook) | offthebroiler.com - Food Blog (archived) | View my food photos on Instagram

Twittter: @jperlow | Mastodon @jperlow@journa.host

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oshinko are one type of tsukemono (Japanese pickles), however sometimes the words are used interchangeabley and it makes it confusing.

Tsukemono (tsuke= pickle mono=thing) is the broad category of pickles, encompassing the following:

shio-zuke-- salt pickling,these are usually quick pickles made with just salt, takuan the yellow colored radish is te most wll known of these, it can also be cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, eggplant, etc (these are what is usually meant by oshinko)

nuka-zuke--rice bran pickles, vegetables are placed in tubs of rice bran for hours to days depending on the type

miso-zuke--vegetables pickled in miso

su-zuke-- pickled in vinegar

umeboshi--pickled plums

senmai-zuke--a special turnip pickle made with konbu

Oshinko is just the generic name for the pickles that you receive with your rice bowl, usually of the shio-zuke variety but occasionally nuka-zuke.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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Oshinko is a type of pickled radish, its yellow in color. Used as a condiment for rice and sometimes used in sushi.

According to other sources, that's takuan. And when I order oshinko at my sushi place, I get a plate of assorted tsukemono. as torakris explains above.

Thanks, torakris.

Edited by weinoo (log)

Mitch Weinstein aka "weinoo"

Tasty Travails - My Blog

My eGullet FoodBog - A Tale of Two Boroughs

Was it you baby...or just a Brilliant Disguise?

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Here is a recipe for a pork and cucumber salad with a wasabi dressing that is sort of a twist on the traditional sunomono:

http://recipes.egullet.com/recipes/r336.html

It is styled in the fashion of the recently popular rei-shabu salad (rei- meaning cold and shabu because it uses the shabu shabu cut of meat)

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

here is another twist on a traditional sunomono:

Japanese spinach salad (sorry, I am not very creative with names)

Boil until tender

1 bunch of spinach

rinse under cold water, drain sqeezing out excess water, and season with

a sprinkling of mirin, soy sauce, and dashi (if you don't have the mirin or dashi don't worry about it.)

remove the seeds (and skin if you like), then dice

1 tomato

grate enough daikon to equal 1 cup (about 1/3 to 1/2 a daikon)

this should be a very fine grating, similar to grated ginger

drain off the excess liquid, I place it into a cheesecloth and wring it out gently.

In a bowl stir together

3 Tablespoons rice vinegar

1 Tablespoon sugar

stir until dissolved, then add the chopped tomato and grated daikon and mix gently.

Place the spinach into a shallow bowl or a dish with sloping sides and place the daikon, tomato mixture on top.

Serve.

now to figure out how to get that in the archive with out retyping everything...............

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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  • 1 year later...

In this hot weather sometimes there is nothing more refreshing than a nice vinegared dish.... :biggrin:

last night I thinly sliced up some boiled octopus and some just barely boiled okra then tossed it with a very simple ama-zu (2:1 vinegar and sugar plus a little salt) and garnished it with some fine slivers of ginger. wonderful! :biggrin:

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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  • 1 year later...

a nice refreshing sunomono made with mozoku (type of seaweed) and kinkan (kumquats) taken from my garden

I don't know why I don't make sunomono more often....

gallery_6134_1960_3487.jpg

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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a nice refreshing sunomono made with mozoku (type of seaweed) and kinkan (kumquats) taken from my garden

I don't know why I don't make sunomono more often....

Torakris...usually i love looking at the food pics you post, but this looks....odd... :blink:

Can you describe the taste? Im so curious :raz:

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a nice refreshing sunomono made with mozoku (type of seaweed) and kinkan (kumquats) taken from my garden

I don't know why I don't make sunomono more often....

Torakris...usually i love looking at the food pics you post, but this looks....odd... :blink:

Can you describe the taste? Im so curious :raz:

Do you want the flavor of the whole dish? the mozoku? or the kinkan?

The sunomono part was perfect, I used 3/4 cup (200ml) dashi with 1 1/2 Tablespoons each of soy sauce and rice vinegar and 1 Tablespoon sugar.

Mozoku is pretty flavorless but it has a touch of slimy-ness, you need to sort of slurp it up. The kinkans were a last minute addition as my daughter's friends pulled them off the tree and I wanted to do something with them. I have never actually seen kinkans used in anyway like this but I really enjoyed it. It added a sort of sweet bitter note to the dish.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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  • 10 months later...

I bought some banana vinegar the other day that was on sale. Japan seems to be having a vinegar boom at the moment with lots of vinegar products appearing recently. I bought it just to see what it tasted like and now I have a whole mini carton of it. Any ideas for using banana vinegar?

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