Last weekend Elle invited me round to cook dinner with her before going to a friend's birthday together. To strike the perfect balance between not going out totally stuffed, yet lining our stomachs sensibly, I brought round the ingredients for Japanese pumelled pork.
The best thing about going Japanese is that you can make relatively fast food without it being really starchy or oily. It's perfect for when you get back from work late and don't fancy cooking a full blown meal. With a lot of the recipes, it seems like a massive faff to get all of the ingredients, however if you have the key 5 below, you are basically sorted for most of the simpler recipes:
Soy
Sake
Mirin
Miso paste
Sushi rice
You can get these from a big Waitrose, the Japan Centre, or if you have time to go on a bit of a hunt and save yourself some money, the Japanese sections of China town's New Loon Moon and New Loon Fung.
Sushi Rice (for 4)
Prep and cooking time: 30-45 minutes
Ingredients
320g rice
400ml water OR, ideally, 380ml water and 20ml sake
Method
First wash the rice 3 times by putting it in a bowl of water and rubbing the grains together with your hands so that the water goes all cloudy. Drain and repeat. The water should become clearer by the third time.
Leave to stand in the strainer for 10-15 minutes before using. This step can be skipped but the rice will be slightly compromised
Put the rice in a heavy bottomed saucepan (if not heavy bottomed, some of the rice will burn). Add the cold water (and sake if using), put the lid on and bring it to the boil.
when the water is boiling, turn the heat down and simmer for 12 minutes - do not take the lid off to check it! - once the time is up turn the heat off and leave it, lid on, for 10 minutes.
It should now be ready to serve. I like to mould it into little bowls and then turn it out so it forms a neat shape.
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| sparkly clean washed rice |
Japanese Pummelled Pork (for 4)
Time: 10-20 minutes
Ingredients
420g pork shoulder
1 tablespoon fresh grated ginger
90ml soy sauce
60ml mirin
sunflower / vegetable oil for frying
salt and pepper to season
Side: a big pack of spinach and a couple of tablespoons of dashi fish flakes.
Method
Tenderize the pork a little by bashing with a rolling pin. Then slice the pork into thin pieces before tenderizing more by whacking with a rolling pin - I usually cover it with cling film before doing this but I'd run out. This makes those delicious juicy morsels you get in asian cooking and makes the meat feel like its gone much further.
Mix the soy, mirin and ginger.
It is now ready to cook so wait until the rice is resting before you start. Put a little oil in a frying pan over a high heat. Dip the pork slices in the mix and quickly brown in the hot pan. Sprinkle black pepper over it as it cooks. It should be ready in a few minutes and you can check by cutting into one of the pieces to see if it is no longer pink.
Rest for a minut or 2 while you quickly fry your spinach and sprinkle it with soy and dashi fish flakes. Serve hot.
