Deep-fried Tofu in Dashi Sauce (Agedashi Tofu)

In Perth it’s getting really cold, especially at night time.  I need a heater and blanket every night…

Why not warm up with this Japanese tofu dish?  Enjoy while tofu is hot and crispy ♪

<Agedashi Tofu>

• Tofu
• corn flour
• 1/2 tsp dashi powder
• 1 cup water
• 1 tbs sake (or white wine)
• 2 tsp soy sauce
• 1/4 tsp grated ginger

1. Heat up water and add dashi powder.  Turn down the heat, and add sake and soy sauce.  Keep warm.
2. Cut tofu into about 5cm cubes.  Coat with corn flour and shake off any excess flour.  Deep fry until nicely crispy.
3. Immerse the tofu into the sauce and eat immediately.

Simmered Tofu Broth

After continuous eating-out at Chinese restaurants, a steak house and a smorgasbord restaurant, I really really needed to rest my stomach with some hearty Japanese food.  In traditional Japanese cuisine we don’t use much oil, fat and meat.  That’s why Japanese food’s known as healthy, good diet among the world.

Some people think they are too bland and plain.  Even some Japanese people (especially men) prefer Western style food such as pizza, burgers and chips to the traditional Japanese food.  Nowadays, however, Japanese diet has been changed and we don’t get to see traditional Japanese food at the dinning table anymore.  We eat more Youshoku - Japanized Western dish everyday.  Some of the dish you know, such as Japanese curry, omu-rice, gyoza are not traditional Japanese food.  In Japan, gyoza, fried rice, ramen and char siu pows etc are considered as Chinese food, not Japanese food.  In Perth there are some Japanrese restaurants which sell sushi and dim sums together.  For me, the combination is really weird!  Dim sums are not supposed to be Japanese :p

Japanese cuisine doesn’t use garlic either.  They are really natural, plain flavor.  And, I love the bland food. 

Tonight I cooked a broth with Chinese cabbage, shiitake mushroom and tofu.  I wanted to add enoki and shimeji mushroom but they are really expensive in Perth…  I love mushroom!

< Tofu and Shiitake Mushroom Broth >

• 2 cups water
• 1 tsp dashi powder (powdered fish stock)
• 2 shiitake mushroom
• 80g tofu
• 1~2 leaves Chinese cabbage
• 1 tbs sake
• 1~2 tsp soy sauce
• salt

1. Bring the water to boil.  Add dashi powder and stir.  Add sake, soy sauce and salt.
2. Place cut tofu, Chinese cabbage and mushroom to the pan.  Simmer for 10~15 minutes.
3. Sprinkle ichimi-togarashi (one spiced chilli powder) if you like.

If the soup is really bland, you can add more soy sauce or salt. Or, you can use ponzu as dipping sauce.  Ponzu is commonly used for Japanese steamboard dish and simmered broth.

Chunky Miso Soup

It’s been very cold lately…(><)  To warm up, I cooked miso soup!  You know, miso soup is not always with just wakame(seaweed) and tofu.

Dashi Powder

Dissolve this Dashi powder (stock) into water.  The amount is about 4g of Dashi : 600ml water.

You can put lots of things into miso soup, like root veges, tofu, potatoes, konnyaku, legume, fish, clam etc…  In Japan we also put pork meat into miso soup too, the dish is called “buta-jiru”.  It’s really really nice and I can eat just this with rice.

From left:Konnyaku, Tofu, Wakame

Today I put some root veges (like daikon radish, gobou (burdock), carrots…), tofu, konnyaku, abura-age(deep-fried bean curd), shiitake mushroom, onion, wakame and satoimo taro potatoes.  See, from just with one bowl of miso soup you can get lots of nutrition:)

You can also use like this frozen veges.  You don’t need to cut, peel or wash, just chuck into the soup:p

Turn off the heat, and then dissolve miso paste.  Do not boil the soup after putting the miso paste as it will kill the flavor.

You can actually EAT miso soup, not DRINK