Simmered Kabocha and Pork Soboro with HOT SPICE "Umakara"

Kabocha squash, minced pork, ginger, leek.

Those four become a simmered dish with a soboro sauce, in one pot. The kabocha takes 12 minutes to cook through, and during those minutes there is almost nothing for your hands to do.

The HOT SPICE "Umakara" goes onto the sweet squash in two goes. Half dissolves into the broth and works its way in; the rest goes on after the heat is off. What escapes during simmering is not the heat but the aroma, so that second dusting brings back the citrus of dried mandarin peel and the scent of long pepper.

Total time: about 20 min

Add about an hour on top if you want to eat it chilled.

Ingredients (Serves 4)

• HOT SPICE "Umakara" about 1 tsp (a guide — used in two halves; adjust to the heat you like)
• Kabocha squash 1/2 (about 600 g)
• Minced pork 200 g
• Ginger 1 piece
• Leek 1/2
• Okra (optional) 6 pods
• Dashi 200 ml
• Soy sauce 4 tbsp
• Mirin 2 tbsp
• Sake 1 tbsp
• Sugar 1 tbsp
• Potato starch 2 tsp
• Water 1 tbsp
• Oil 2 tsp

Preparation

1. Scoop out the seeds and fibres of the kabocha with a spoon and cut it, skin on, into 3 cm cubes. If it is hard enough that the blade stops halfway, warm it for about 2 minutes at 600 W first, uncovered, then cut. Keep clear of the stem, set the middle of the blade against the squash, and then put your weight behind it. Paring a few patches of green off the skin lets the broth in faster.
2. Peel the ginger and cut it into fine matchsticks.
3. Slice the white part of the leek into thin rounds.
4. If you are adding okra, pare the ridge around the caps, rub them with salt on the board, rinse, boil for 1 minute and cut them in half on the diagonal.
5. Mix the potato starch with the 1 tbsp of water.

Instructions

1. Put 2 tsp of oil in the pot over medium heat, add the minced pork and ginger, and fry for about 3 minutes, breaking the meat up, until it changes colour. Spread it out at the start and leave it alone for a moment — the grains separate instead of clumping.
2. Add 200 ml dashi, 1 tbsp sake, 2 tbsp mirin and 1 tbsp sugar. Bring to the boil, then lay in the kabocha skin side down. Broth coming halfway up the squash is enough.
3. Add half the HOT SPICE "Umakara" and stir it in, cover with a drop lid and simmer gently for 12 minutes. A bamboo skewer sliding straight through means it is done.
4. Add 4 tbsp of soy sauce and simmer for a further 3 minutes with the drop lid on. Holding the soy sauce back until the second half leaves the orange of the cut faces where it is, and lets only the flavour travel inwards.
5. Take off the drop lid, turn off the heat, and pour in the starch slurry. Turn the heat back to medium and tilt the pot in circles so the sauce thickens around the mince. Do not stir the kabocha — move the sauce with the pot alone.
6. Turn off the heat, add the rest of the HOT SPICE "Umakara" and tilt the pot once more.
7. Serve, and scatter the leek over. Add okra if you like.

Once the steam has died down, move it into a container, sauce and all. It keeps 4 to 5 days in the fridge. Left sitting in a thin broth, kabocha drinks water and goes vague at the edges; a sauce thickened with potato starch stays on the surface instead, so the corners are still there the next day.

Tastes for heat differ around one table. You can keep the amount dissolved into the broth light and let people add a dusting to their own bowl instead. On days you are eating with young children, that is the reliable way.

HOT SPICE "Umakara" is a six-spice blend whose heat comes from four of them — chilli, ginger, red Sichuan pepper and long pepper. The heat is distinct, so if it is your first time, start light and add more at the table.