Osaka negiyaki, powered up.

ねぎ焼き negiyaki
A fresh blog of the classic popular food of Osaka to replace or complete the old tuto.
Keep it really simple and don’t believe you need many ingredients, as it’s originally poor people cuisine, that was made with what was available that day. It’s easily made plant-based.

Here is a typical list of variations of negiyaki you can order in shops around here :

牛すじねぎ焼き　gyusuji negiyaki (beef tendon)
豚ねぎ焼き buta negiyaki (pork)
イカねぎ焼き ika … (calamari)
えびねぎ焼き ebi … (shrimps)
豚キムチねぎ焼き buta kimchi … (pork kimchi)
牛すじキムチねぎ焼き gyusuji kimchi … (beef tendon kimchi)
牛すじもちねぎ焼き gyusuji mochi … (beef tendon mochi)
牛すじしょうがねぎ焼き gyusuji shoga …(beef tendon ginger)
ミックスねぎ焼き mix negiyaki …(=we’ll open the fridge and push everything there’s in into your dish)

Check list :
–negi leeks and nikomi (or any other)
-batter
-sauces and garnishing powders
-options : egg, tenkasu
-hot plate and oil

Osaka style :
Options and garnishing (negi and nikomi) are added to the batter at the last minute. Each guest chooses additions or not.

Negi, scallions, Spring onions…. that’s the base of the dish. You need lots of negi greens. Cut thinly.

This is konnyaku eringi ginger nikomi (recipe here).
I am probably the only person putting this in negiyaki. The classic version is : konnyaku gyusuji nikomi.
The gyusuji is beef tendon, with the meat that stays around, and that’s a very cheap cut of beef. It is prepared the same way I prepared the eringi. You can make some other meat or mushroom stew as you like.

BATTER, gourmande style :
Grated nagaimo (about 1/2 cup), flour (1 cup), fish flakes. And enough water to get a creamy texture. Whip well.

Grating the yama imo

Veg’ version : skip the fish flakes, replace water by vegan kombu dashi (recipe here).
Gluten free version : replace flour by rice flour.
Imo free version : replace by grated potato or corn starch + a little baking powder.

Options :

They are not necessary for the classic version, but if you feel more hungry or like them, add what you want, that’s the rule of the game (okonomi = what you want). These 2, you read about on many blogs, they are often found in the rest of Japan, not so systematically here in Osaka :

Egg. The reasons to not add to the original batter :
-some people don’t want egg (it’s the biggest allergy in Japan)
– texture, with egg, it would make it a harder pancake. In many shops, they add the egg whole egg onto the rest, already on the hotplate and break it and mix with chopsticks.

Tenkasu. Tempura crumbles.

Others :
beni shoga pickled ginger,
kimchi,
raw meat, raw seafood,
mochi (rice cakes, use the tiny cubes arare, or thin slices),
tofu, cheese,
other veggies, sausage, ham, veggie pickles (tsukemono), salty seafood…

Heat the hot plate (your skillet). Pass oil with a kitchen paper.

MIXING :
In a bowl, put a cup of negi, 1/4 cup of nikomi, other options, a whole egg if you use it, a cup of batter. You can add more fish flakes if you wish. Mix roughly with chopsticks or a fork.

COOKING
Pour everything on the plate, at middle heat. You can cover or not. When it’s all hardened, flip with 2 spatulas. (I cut it in 2 to flip with only one spatula… who cares ?).

TOPPINGS :

All optional, as you like it, if you want some. A bare negiyaki is good too.

Sauce and mayo :

-the sauce is a thickened and sweetened worcester. The original sauce (called Ikari) was a copycat of LeaPerrins, sold to Kobe’s Brit expats.
Here I have a ready sauce, which is plant-based. If you don’t have it, LeaPerrins steak sauce is very similar. Or thicken the liquid classic worcester with corn starch (simmer a little, sweeten to taste) or by mixing with ketchup. Many shops make their sauce that way.Use a brush to paint it on the top.

-the mayonnaise. It is made more liquid by adding either milk, white wine or lemon juice. (to make easy egg mayo /// to make tofunaise).
To make nice drizzles, put the sauce and mayo in some plastic bottles with a tubular top. I don’t have that.

Variations :
-ketchup
–shoyu (soy sauce, thickened)
–ponzu (soy sauce + citrus juice)
-steak sauces

Powders (found in Japanese grocery stores) :
–kezuribushi fish flakes, or fish powder
–aonori seaweed
–shichimi togarashi, 7 spice mix

SERVING
When it’s cooked, put the heat on minimum, decorate.
Let on the plate while eating. Cut small wedges that you push toward guests that can heat directly from the plate, or on a small plate, while the rest stays hot.

I heart skewers

Mini yakitori lunch with skewers of chicken hearts. But let’s start with veggies :

Red sweet pepper.

Summer kabocha.

Chilled cream :
I put in the blender boiled kabocha, a raw red pepper, a few steamed shimeji mushrooms, a little miso and 2 tbs of roast sesame.
Served very cold with freshly ground black pepper on top.
It’s sweet, feeling and refreshing.

Chicken hearts and green sweet pepper skewers. To grill in the oven-toaster.

I’ve painted a few times the hearts with this so-su ( Worscester-style sauce).

Konnyaku noodles and sweet chili sauce.

Veg veg burgers, and Bulldog

Veg burgers again, but new ones. They are never the same.

The carrot and romaine are the byproduct of juicing. I have added a little potato starch as a binder, and spicing is very light, salt, black pepper, a pinch of curry spices.

They had to be “lightly flavored”, because I have put some Bulldog sauce on them…

Bulldog sauces
That’s a brand of Worcester-like Japanese sauces, that is relatively classic now as they started in 1905 it seems. Click here and follow the arrows. It’s in Japanese but thanks to the photos, you can see the ingredients of the sauce, fruits, veggies and spices, plus vinegar and salt. The 3 sauces are relatively similar but more or less liquid. I have the 中濃 (chuno) which is medium thick.
Well, I should make mine someday. They are usually called “so-su” (sauce) in Japanese conversation, as that’s the sauce by default.

Heated rounds of bread to make sands.

Buri teriyaki, lacquered fish

Buri (yellowtail, Japanese amberjack) is a common fish here. I cooked it teriyaki , which means sunshine-cooked. The bottle sauce you may know is an homonym.

recipe of Japanese teriyaki

With baked kabocha pumpkin and radish sprouts.

Brown rice, with sansho peppercorns, the Japanese Sichuan pepper. It’s lemony taste is perfect with fish.

And a miso soup garnished with daikon radish, daikon greens and wakame seaweed. All that makes a light meal :
Cal 452 F18.7g C49.5g P26.9g

Soft and white inside. Delicious.

same recipe in daylight photos (click on text)

Just a sauce changes it all. Yuzu-kosho kimizu.

Steaming is a convenient way to cook your food. Then you just need a sauce. Something that would go with meat, with veggies…
A mayonnaise, maybe. Or a kimizu.
It’s a classic Japanese sauce, the name means “vinegar and egg yolk”. It’s Japan’s mayonnaise or hollandaise, but there is a difference, you will see.
Recipes vary, the principle is always the same : egg yolk and vinegar, but no oil nor butter.

Kimizu sauce, recipe

Basic :
1 egg yolk, 1 tbs of rice vinegar, 3 tbs of liquid. A little sugar and salt.
What I call liquid can be water, dashi stock, a mix of both. This time :
I have added 1 ts of mirin to 3 tbs of water.
I have not used salt nor soy sauce because the yuzu-koshio is very salty.

It’s very simple, like a sabayon.
Mix the ingredients in a bowl, put on pot of hot (not boiling) water, whisk until it doubles of volume and becomes thick.
You can serve it room temperature or chilled.

I have added 1 ts of yuzu-kosho paste at the end. You can buy this condiment in a Japanese grocery store or make it (click here to see how).
That brings a taste of green, citrus and some heat.