Aonori kibinago no kara-age

kibinago (silver stripe round herring) are these small mini-fish, often to small to cut them. So frying is the way to go. I’ve seen addition of aonori seaweed for frying and retained the idea.

Kara-age :
Rinse the fish. Sprinkle salt and pepper. Heat frying oil. Mix flour, potato starch and aonori (seaweed flakes).
Pass the fish in the mix of flours and fry. Add a little more aonori on top.

Eat them whole, so you intake all the calcium in the bones.

Sides : lettuce with black rice vinegar, sesame carrots, salted goya (bitter squash) and polished germinated rice.

Iwashi no kara-age… healthy fried fish

It’s not too good to eat lots of fried food. But once in a while… And there are tricks to make it healthier.

Not many other ways to prepare those sardines tiny like fingers. They are called “komame” (small beans) on the package. Sardine is a healthy food, with the good omega and they don’t contain toxic elements like the big fish.

Kara-age. Coated in starch and fried.

Then I use paper to take out the excess of oil. And reheat them in the oven-toaster. And put them on more paper. They become really lighter and pleasantly crusty.

The second tip is to balance with raw vegetables. That makes a final dish not too caloric. Then , the raw cabbage is said to make fat easier to digest.
The dark green leaves are radish leaves. Cut and salted 15 minutes before, like the cukes.

That gives this :

A crunchy sand !
The dressing is lemon juice + water * balsamico and a little salt.
It’s really delicious and fresh at the same time.

With sweet chili sauce too.

Or just lemon.

Fish is hot : spicy kara-age sanma

Another Japanese classic.

A sanma.

A fresh sanma, cleaned and cut…

…coated in katakuriko (potato starch), pan-fried in very little oil.

Grate young ginger.

Make a spicy sauce directly in the jar : miso, pasted garlic, pasted ginger, chili flakes. Cook in microwave. Add roast sesame oil.

Wash the dish… Yeah, the dish with starch, wash it with rice vinegar, pour in the pan, heat… and when it’s transparent, add 1/2 ts of spicy sauce. Pass the fish in it.