Nabe Warms You Within and Without
Now that the weather is getting colder, you may wish to try your hand at cooking some warm winter dishes such as nabe. Nabe would arguably have to be one of the easiest Japanese dishes to make!
For those of you embarking on your first winter experience in Japan, nabe is a dish made of a variety of vegetables, tofu, noodles, and meat. These ingredients are boiled in a stock made of "dashi", fish stock, "konbu" kelp, and other various condiments. Normally, nabe is cooked in a ceramic pot on a portable gas element that's placed on your dining table or kotatsu. While there is much debate about the process of making nabe, everyone agrees that you can put virtually anything into it! The cooking utensils required to make nabe are a ceramic nabe pot and a "cassette konro," a portable gas device that allows you to cook the nabe on your kotatsu or dining table. Both of these items can be purchased relatively cheaply at your local department store.
Although I make nabe regularly during the cold months, I thought I had better review my cooking methods with a group of natives before writing this article, and who better to ask than my colleagues? Well, I learned that everyone has a different idea for making nabe.
Two general schools of thought emerged regarding when you season the ingredients. Do you add kelp or dashi and season the nabe with a condiment called "ponzu" after it is cooked, or do you make a strongly flavored soup at the outset using soy sauce, rice vinegar, and rice wine? Japanese people usually follow the tradition they grew up in. In my humble opinion, the difference in approach is roughly equivalent to whether you butter your sandwiches all the way to the edge or just in the middle. However, having said that, a colleague advises that, if you are making a seafood nabe and would like to season the food while it is cooking, go easy on the condiments because a lot of flavor will come from the seafood itself as it cooks. Remember, dashi is fish stock!
The order in which you add ingredients to the bubbling stock matters. Ingredients that take longer to cook should go in first. These include fungi, meat, carrots, and cabbage. Put delicate ingredients such as tofu and chrysanthemum leaves in last so they don't fall apart. You can poke the ingredients around a bit while they cook. Use a wooden scoop to remove any froth from the pot.
Once you have finished eating nearly all of the ingredients, tradition has it that you cook udon in the remaining stock. This can be rather tasty, but be sure not to overcook the udon or, in the words of our previous editor Taku, it will taste like "insipid marshmallows." If you prefer rice to udon, check out the recipe below to make a porridge called "Zozui" with the leftover stock. If you are like me and can't fit another thing in after a meal of nabe, "Zozui" makes a great breakfast the next day!
The final essential ingredient for a good nabe is a group of friends to enjoy it with. What follows are a few fail-proof recipes that even the worst cook can't stuff up, so what are you waiting for? Gather a group of your mates, haul out the nabe gear, grab some ingredients from your local supermarket, and have a nabe party! What better way is there to enjoy a cold winter evening?
