Category: JAPANESE INGREDIENTS

What Is Shojin Dashi? Shojin dashi is the soup stock made from only plant-based materials. That is why it especially matches well with vegetable ingredients. And, you can make the dish bringing out the full flavor of the ingredients by…

What Is Niboshi? Niboshi can be translated into “dried small sardines” or “dried anchovy” in English.In Japanese, it literally refers to processed marine product made by boiling in salt water and drying. But, speaking of niboshi in Japan, it usually…

What Is Atsu-age? Atsu-age is a type of deep-fried tofu, and made by thickly cutting tofu and frying in oil. “Atsu” is Japanese term for “thick”, by the way. Unlike abura-age (thin fried tofu), you don’t fry it all the…

Tofu is excellent food contains abundant nutrients such as protein and calcium. You can have a hearty meal using tofu even though there is no meat. It’s delicious yet low in calories compared to meat and fish! Buying some tofu…

Soybeans are very nutritious, excellent foods loved by people all over the world. Japan has actually so many soybean products, and a lot of them are indispensable for Japanese meal. Here, I would like to introduce different types of soybeans…

Tofu is made by adding coagulant to soy milk. The representative coagulant when making tofu is nigari, but there are several other types of coagulant. The flavor of the resulting tofu will differ depending on the coagulant used. Here, I…

Do Japanese eat a lot of soy? Tofu, miso, soy sauce, etc… When I make a list of soybean products, there are so many of them in Japan. Those products are very nutritious, and absolutely necessary in Japanese diet. And…

What Is Abura-age? Abura-age is sometimes translated into fried tofu in English. To be accurate it’s thin deep-fried tofu, and people call like this to distinguish it from the similar processed tofu product called “atsu-age“. Abura-age is made by deep-frying…