Japanese Food Blog - What to cover

[Ochazuke]

I run a Japanese market and I'm thinking of starting a blog on Japanese groceries. The idea is this: you can find resources for Japanese recipes everywhere, but they often call for ingredients that many people don't keep on hand. So often I have customers come in with a recipe to buy ingredients, but then I'll hear later that they throw out whatever they didn't use because they didn't want to keep it around and didn't know what else to do with it.

I plan on having two big sections:

1.) I want to write about ingredients in an organized fashion and link to different recipes so that it's easily navigable and people can hopefully find some inspiration. An example would be to write about Tuna and talk about the different types - hon maguro, mebachi, kihada, bincho, etc. and link to example of recipes like tataki, akamizuke, onigiri fillings, sashimi, and others. Or an example for miso: have subcategories about shiro, aka, gennen, awase, hatcho, saikyo, etc. and provide recipes that go beyond just soup or some sort of a marinade.

2.) I also just want to put some general knowledge out there and clear up misconceptions about some Japanese food and cooking in general - i.e. what fish is good for sashimi or how different home cooking is from restaurant cooking. I also want to write a big section on how to make Japanese style meals when you don't have access to Japanese ingredients.

I'd love to hear some other ideas or critiques of concept before I invest a bunch of time in to it. What would you like to see? Any reasons why I should or shouldn't do this? Any thoughts at all!

 

[ian]

No ideas or critiques here, but I'm psyched to read it.

 

[aboynamedsuita]

…I have customers come in with a recipe to buy ingredients, but then I'll hear later that they throw out whatever they didn't use because they didn't want to keep it around and didn't know what else to do with it.

Sounds interesting, and thank you for doing your part to help reduce food waste.

 

[Michi]

I’d love to read your blog!

 

[madmotts]

Might be interested in contributing some design services. I have limited time but it sounds cool. Hit me on PM.

 

[rickbern]

I like this idea a lot. I can see that here’s a basic starting basket of staples, now you can make these twelve different recipes.

add a few more things, your horizon expands.

I’m only beginning to become familiar with cooking Japanese food, I’m learning, but I’ve found justonecookbook.com to be a valuable resource to learn some new ingredients and techniques. I’ve also found Morimotos book about Japanese home cooking to be useful

and seriously, tell me how to use miso! I know the stuff has potential to be transformative but I haven’t really gotten around to understanding it yet.

 

[Boynutman]

Great idea! And +1 for the miso, love it but struggling to use it more often.
As a suggestion, a shortlist of Japanese cookbooks you find good/useful. Especially basic ones. Don't have to be super traditional, they just need to yield nice food.

 

[Shavely Manden]

I would absolutely love to read the blog you're proposing! I do go through a lot of Japanese ingredients, but usually that's because I'm making the same few recipes. Having a list to just look up something like "I've got a ton of miso, what would be other tasty things to do with it?" would be really handy. It'd be especially useful for vegetables and other things with limited shelf life...one time I got a massive burdock root for one recipe, and never could figure out what to do with the rest before it went bad.

Please keep us informed, and best of luck!

 

[Michi]

one time I got a massive burdock root for one recipe, and never could figure out what to do with the rest before it went bad.

Cut burdock into matchstick-sized batons. Soak in water for a few minutes. Cut up carrot into matchstick-sized batons, roughly the same amount as the burdock. Fry in toasted sesame oil, and add a splash of mirin, sake, and soy sauce. Fry until tender. Sprinkle with some shichimi, or add some chilli flakes or chopped dried chilli. Sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds and serve as a side dish, or over a bowl of rice.

 

[Grayswandir]

I don't have any mind-blowing ideas or anything, but I hope you throw in a section about Japanese rice, both for sushi and for other dishes. Particularly the best domestic short grain brand rice for sushi-making.

I started out using Nishiki brand rice, a popular medium grain rice grown in California, but just recently bought something called Sunshine Moonlight Koshihikari rice. It's a Korean brand of short grain Japanese rice grown in California. Sunshine Moonlight also claims to use a new milling process where the rice grains polish each other, but without the use of water or brushes (kapika process). This process is supposed to be superior to the old method, but sounds like clever marketing to me, who knows. It seems like Nishiki and Kokuho Rose are the two most popular inexpensive sushi rices sold in America, but there's got to be some better choices for sushi, but without breaking the bank and buying something like Tamaki Gold.

Good luck!

 

[Ochazuke]

I don't have any mind-blowing ideas or anything, but I hope you throw in a section about Japanese rice, both for sushi and for other dishes. Particularly the best domestic short grain brand rice for sushi-making.

I started out using Nishiki brand rice, a popular medium grain rice grown in California, but just recently bought something called Sunshine Moonlight Koshihikari rice. It's a Korean brand of short grain Japanese rice grown in California. Sunshine Moonlight also claims to use a new milling process where the rice grains polish each other, but without the use of water or brushes (kapika process). This process is supposed to be superior to the old method, but sounds like clever marketing to me, who knows. It seems like Nishiki and Kokuho Rose are the two most popular inexpensive sushi rices sold in America, but there's got to be some better choices for sushi, but without breaking the bank and buying something like Tamaki Gold.

Good luck!

Thanks! Yeah, Nishiki and Kokuho Rose are both pretty mediocre....
I think Kagayaki and Tamanishiki are both decent mid-tier choices that are readily available. One heads up is that cost of commercial shipping from Japan has dramatically shot up over the past month (like over 100%) and continues to increase. If you haven't seen price increases lately, you surely will sometime very soon.

Strangely, even domestically produced items have seen a similarly large price increase. I think it may be due to the widely-touted labor shortage.

 

[Ochazuke]

I would absolutely love to read the blog you're proposing! I do go through a lot of Japanese ingredients, but usually that's because I'm making the same few recipes. Having a list to just look up something like "I've got a ton of miso, what would be other tasty things to do with it?" would be really handy. It'd be especially useful for vegetables and other things with limited shelf life...one time I got a massive burdock root for one recipe, and never could figure out what to do with the rest before it went bad.

Please keep us informed, and best of luck!

Kinpira Gobo (as referenced by @Michi ) is great! You can also cut rangiri style for use in soups and stews.

It's delightful as a pickle too. Any brine will work, but using rice vinegar as your base will add a nice "brightness" to the flavor.

 

[Grayswandir]

Thanks! Yeah, Nishiki and Kokuho Rose are both pretty mediocre....
I think Kagayaki and Tamanishiki are both decent mid-tier choices that are readily available. One heads up is that cost of commercial shipping from Japan has dramatically shot up over the past month (like over 100%) and continues to increase. If you haven't seen price increases lately, you surely will sometime very soon.

Strangely, even domestically produced items have seen a similarly large price increase. I think it may be due to the widely-touted labor shortage.

Thanks man, I'll give those brands a try. I guess I'll buy a bag before the price skyrockets. Everything is more expensive now, it sucks.

 

[zizirex]

Any guide on Whole Katsuobushi?