Recipe
Chicken and Summer Vegetable Nanban-zuke, Made with HOT SPICE Umakara
A nanban-zuke that is pan-fried rather than deep-fried. The chicken thigh is seasoned with Dish Symphony No.3, and the heat goes into the nanban vinegar rather than into the chicken — HOT SPICE Umakara (the savoury heat), dissolved in.
The moment that matters is sinking the chicken into the vinegar while it is still hot. Put it in once it has cooled and the flavour stops at the surface. Leave it in the fridge overnight and one hot evening’s dinner is already dealt with.
Time needed: about 40 minutes
Ingredients (serves 4)
- HOT SPICE Umakara: 1/2 tsp (about 1.5 g)
- Dish Symphony No.3: 1/2 tsp (about 1.5 g)
- Chicken thigh: 400 g
- Onion: 1/2
- Carrot: 1/3
- Red sweet pepper: 1/2
- Green peppers: 2
- Lemon: 1/2
- Potato starch (katakuriko): 3 tbsp
- Salt: 1/3 tsp
- Oil: 4 tbsp
- Vinegar: 100 ml
- Soy sauce: 3 tbsp
- Sugar: 2 tbsp
- Water: 100 ml
Preparation
- Cut the chicken thigh into bite-sized pieces, coat them with the salt and the Dish Symphony No.3, and leave for 10 minutes.
- Slice the onion thinly. Cut the carrot into fine strips, and the sweet pepper and green peppers into fine strips as well.
- Cut the lemon into thin half-moons.
- In a shallow tray, mix the vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and water, and stir the HOT SPICE Umakara into it.
Method
- Put the onion, carrot, sweet pepper and green peppers into the tray of nanban vinegar, stir once, and set it aside.
- Pat the surface of the chicken thigh lightly dry and dust it thinly with potato starch (katakuriko). Too thick a coating comes away and clouds the nanban vinegar.
- Put the oil into a frying pan over a medium heat and lay the chicken in skin side down. Leave it alone for about 4 minutes, and once it is well browned turn it and cook for 3 minutes.
- Once it is cooked through, move it while still hot into the tray from step 1, sinking it into the nanban vinegar along with the vegetables.
- Add the lemon and leave for about 20 minutes, until it has cooled. An hour or more in the fridge lets the flavours settle together.
- Taste at the end, and if the sourness is strong, adjust it with sugar, a pinch at a time.
HOT SPICE Umakara is a blend built around chilli. On a day when children are at the table, do not dissolve it into the nanban vinegar — serve their portions first, then shake it over the bowls.
The Inspice used in this recipe
Uses 2 of them together. No measuring, and dispatched in one to two business days.
A six-spice blend built around chili. The brick-red powder dissolves into the nanban vinegar sauce, rounding the sharp edge of the acidity with heat. Just before the chilled chicken fat coats the tongue, a slow-building warmth cuts in, and the next bite feels lighter.
A twelve-spice blend built around pepper caviar from Madagascar. Salt-free, so tossing it over the chicken together with salt never shifts the seasoning. The pepper aroma stays in the seared skin and holds on even after the chicken is soaked in the nanban vinegar.
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Other recipes you can make with HOT SPICE — Savoury Heat
With just one of them, these dishes are open to you.
Other recipes you can make with Dish Symphony No.3
With just one of them, these dishes are open to you.
