Cook and Drink

A few years ago we were looking for a restaurant in Kyoto. We had difficulty in finding one (due to our lack of understanding of the language and the characters) but finally we found a tempura-beer-bar. Perhaps not ideal, but the menu came with helpful pictures. We enjoyed delicious tempura, fried to perfection, made with vegetables, with mushrooms, prawns and even with chrysanthemum leaves.

Tempura is served with a dipping sauce called Tentsuyu. Just before serving, the sauce is combined with grated daikon. It’s a light, umami rich sauce with subtle presence of soy sauce. We think it’s also a great dipping sauce for sashimi because it will not overpower the fish, something standard soy sauce will do.

Drink Pairing

A beer obviously! We paired our sashimi of tuna with our favourite sake: Junmai Taru Sake as produced by Kiku-Masamune. This elegant sake is matured in barrels made of the finest Yoshino cedar. The aroma has indeed clear hints of cedar. The sake will cleanse your palate, allowing to taste the tuna even better.

What You Need

• 4 parts of Dashi
• 1 part Soy Sauce (preferably with less salt)
• 1 part Mirin

What You Do

1. Prepare dashi
2. Add dashi, soy sauce and mirin to a pan
3. We use less mirin because we prefer the sauce to be less sweet.
4. Bring to nearly boiling
5. Leave for one or two minutes
6. Remove from the heat and allow to cool
7. Store in the refrigerator; it will keep for maximum one week

PS

• Why not combine the ingredients as they are and store immediately you wonder? One reason could be that heating the combination helps the flavours to integrate. Another reason is that Japanese mirin may contain alcohol and it needs to evaporate.
• We serve the tuna with shiso leaves (ohba or perilla leaves), wasabi and pickled ginger. Shiso leaves can be purple or green. Its taste is difficult to describe. It’s vibrant, citrusy, herbaceous and refreshing. It goes very well with the fat in tempura or in salmon and tuna.