Have you ever felt like you are sort of hungry at night, but not ready for a heavy meal? You look in the fridge and hunt for something that’s easy on your stomach and calorie intake.
Ochazuke is perfect for such occasion. A small portion of left-over rice and a small piece of salmon are all you need. The cool trick in this video is browning the rice before pouring tea over the rice. This adds a bit of crunchy texture to otherwise the tea-softened rice. A bowl of Ochazuke fills you up, yet it’s less than a snack size bag of potato chips in calories. So, if you are worried about late-night calorie consumption, you can eat Ochazuke guilt-free.

I stumbled on this great video presented by Aimless Cook and I’m really impressed with the creative rendition of eggs benedict. Just the idea of using sake and wasabi to make hollandaise sauce turned me on. And with onigiri and salmon? Wow! Jay really knows his stuff. This is not something you can order off the menu at a restaurant, yet truly fine cuisine. Watching the video, I know this is going to be an awesome palatal pleasure.

So you want to cook tempura like you had at your favorite Japanese restaurant. Chef Yoshinori Ishii shows you all the tricks for cooking restaurant quality tempura. The key is to produce crispy finish. Here are the takeaways from this video. First, keep the ingredients cold to contain the moisture within.

Secondly, when mixing egg yolk, flower and water, do not whisk too much. You do not want the batter to be creamy. It will turn out too heavy when it’s cooked. It’s OK if the batter is lumpy. When a drop of batter bounces back to the surface, that’s the optimum temperature for cooking oil, which about 320 F. Remove the tempura from the oil when the bubbling settles.

If you want to give turkey a break, quail may serve as a great substitute with a subtle twist on your palate, if available at your local grocery store. Croquettes are a common Japanese comfort food. This panko-coated mashed potato is so good, I don’t know why it’s not popular in the US. If you like regular mashed potato, you would love croquettes. It’s like mashed potato taken to the next level.

I decided to feature this video because the tofu dish looks so delicious. The host must have used a firm tofu because a soft tofu would have fallen apart as when stir-fried. Looking at all the ingredients used for the recipe, I know it’s going to taste delightful. Browning the tofu to make it crispy outside while keeping it soft inside is a major takeaway.