Japanese Recipes for Healthy Living

Archive for the ‘Japanese products’ Category

For Japanese food, fish has to be very fresh; specially for sashimi.  Of course, Japanese grocery stores have good sashimi fish and some American grocery stores have decent fish. I live in Los Angeles, California and the Gelson’s Market near my place carries really good Ahi tuna. I recently bought about half a pound of Ahi tuna which is big enough to feed 2 people. You can cut  it about 1/8 inch thick. For salad, cut Daikon radish into 3-inch-long julienne strips , and slice some cucumber and radish, and serve them in a plate. Next, dip it in a soy sauce and put some wasabi, and eat them with rice and miso soup. The cost will be just about $10 for 2 people.

When you buy fish for sashimi, you have to ask the person who is in charge of seafood if it’s fresh enough to be served as sashimi. If the person says “What’s sashimi?”, you had better pass it. When I asked the question at my Gelson’s market, the guy answered “Oh yeah, it’s so fresh and good for sashimi or sushi.” confidently. In the picture below, you can see the ahi tuna is packed individually. I think, since we eat raw, they are extra cautious on how they handle ahi tuna. If it’s not packed right, it may get some kind of bacteria from other fish.

The Ahi tuna was so good. I may go back there again tomorrow.

<how to prepare>

I know, you feel like slicing tuna first, right? But tuna has to be very fresh. So cutting tuna is going to be the last. Let’s prepare other side dishes first.

Daikon radish looks like this.

It’s pretty big. You will need a tiny bit for this dish.  So try to buy a smallest one. Peel it and slice it with a peeler, then julienne it.

Then cut other vegetable. This time, I didn’t have avocado. But avocado goes well with tuna too.

Now, let’s slice the tuna.

Just put it on a plate, and serve it with soy sauce. Don’t forget wasabi! If you’re buying sashimi fish from Japanese grocery stores, usually wasabi comes with it. But if it doesn’t come with it, you can buy it in a tube or in a tin like the picture below. I usually buy powderd one. You probably need just 1 tea spoon of  powder wasabi, and mix it with 1 tea spoon of  cold water. Done!

There are so many little things needed for Japanese cuisine. We use so many little plates and bowls too. By the way, I will show you how to make miso soup soon. It’s so simple.

* A couple of people pointed out that I put the rice bowl on the wrong position in the picture above. Yes… in Japan, there is this rule: Rice bowl on the left and miso soup bowl on the right.  So if you’re serving this to Japanese people, you might as well follow the rule. My picture’s position is wrong according to the Japanese rule.

Ponzu is a very useful sauce. It goes well with sushi, dumpling, fish,  shabu shabu and etc…

Ponzu is made by boiling mirin, rice vinegar, bonito flakes, and kombu over medium heat. Then yuzu, sudachi, daidai,  kabosu or lemon is added. Yuzu, sudachi, daidai and kabosu are Japanese citrus fruits. They’re very similar to lime or lemon. So go ahead and use lemon or lime.

Although I know how to make this, I hardly make it at home. In Japan, we sometimes have a shabu shabu party at home. Everybody eats from one huge pot (called nabe). I don’t know how many times I joined this kind of party, but I’ve never seen anyone  actually making ponzu from scratch, because you can get a really good ponzu at the grocery store.

The best brand is Mizkan.

MIZKAN PONZU, AJIPON

As Japanese food got more popular, I guess the demand for ponzu increased. I started seeing ponzu at American grocery stores like Ralph’s. If they have Mizkan Ajipon, get that. There are some crappy ponzu brands out there. I recommend Mizkan Ajipon.

You can add grated ginger or garlic to ponzu depends on the menu.  For example, I love adding both ginger and garlic to it for seared albacore tuna, and only ginger for fried mackerel (saba). One more good thing about ponzu is it doesn’t contain any oil, so it’s good for a weight-watcher!

Kombu is edible kelp. It is used extensively in Japanese cooking as one of the three main ingredients needed to make dashi, a soup stock. You can get it at Japanese grocery stores, also recently I found it at a Ralph’s! It looks like this.

kombu, kombu, kelp

Since it’s not an animal product, it makes good vegan stock.

If you keep it in a Ziploc bag, it will last at least 1 year. Sometimes you see some white powdery stuff on the surface. It’s not mold or anything toxic. Just wipe the powder lightly with a clean cloth and use it.

For busy people, they sell kombu stock powder.You can just put the powder in hot water, and it makes tasty broth. You can find it at Japanese grocery stores.

I know this is not for everybody, but I love sea urchin. If it’s not expensive, I can eat as much as 10 pieces of sea urchin at a sushi restaurant.

Sea urchin looks like this.

sea urchin, uni

It’s eaten in many parts of the world. In Japan, they eat it as Sashimi or Sushi with soy sauce and wasabi. It is kind of scary looking, so I didn’t try this until I turned 18. But once I tasted it, I totally fell in love with it. It’s so creamy and goes well with soy sauce and wasabi.

At a sushi restaurant, it costs at least $6 for 2 pieces.  It can cost as much as $12 to $15 for 2 pieces. But if you buy it at a Japanese grocery store, you can get it for a very reasonable price.

For example, I got this much for less than $ 4.00!  And I made 4 pieces of sea urchin sushi out of it.

sea urchin, uni

Do you want to make sea urchin sushi? Here is the recipe!

1. Make sushi rice following my recipe.

2. Cut nori (dried seaweed sheet) like the picture below.

Nori, Dried Seaweed Sheet

3. Pick up about 2 tbsp sushi rice in one hand and shape into a oval shape.

Sushi rice oval shape

4. Put nori around the sushi rice. See the picture below.

making sushi rice ball

5. Pick a spoonful of sea urchin and put it on top of the sushi rice.

putting sea urchin

Enjoy your sea urchin sushi! I hope you enjoy this Japanese food recipe.