Monday, May 31st, 2010
I came up with this recipe as an alternative recipe for Fuki Gohan since fuki and some of the other ingredients such as nuka and cooking ash are difficult to get in the United States.
At first glance, celery rice doesn’t sound very tasty but don’t be fooled by it’s name. Like, Fuki Gohan, it’s flavored with soy sauce, dashijiru and fried tofu. The only difference is that you won’t need ash or nuka. I still used the itazuri technique so that it’s easier to peel off the fibrous skin.
This recipe takes some planning so be sure to plan accordingly if you're going to make this.
Ingredients
3/4 cups of cooked and prepared celery hearts (roughly 6 stalks)
1(1/2) cups of Japanese rice (medium grain rice)
Dashijiru
2 whole age (fried tofu)
1 teaspoon of sesame seed oil
Ingredients for sauce:
1/2
Dashijiru
2 Tablespoons for soy sauce
1(1/2) Tablespoons of mirin
1 Tablespoon +1 teaspoon of sugar
1) Make the dashijiru. Wash the rice, and drain all the water. Replace the water with ichibandashi and fill up the pot until the dashijiru is just below the 2 line in your electric rice cooker. (This is because you’ll add sauce in later and you don’t want your rice to get mushy)
2) Heat a large pasta pot with hot water and add a tablespoon of salt.
3) In addition to boiling it,
itazuri (see #6) also helps loosen the tough skin. Sprinkle about a teaspoon of salt over the fuki and press down lightly. Make sure you turn it a few times to get all the sides.
4) Cut it so that it fits into the pot that you’re using but try to keep them as long as possible so that it makes it easier to pull off the fibrous skin afterwards.
5) Boil the celery for 3 minutes and drain.
6) At this point you might want to hit the switch for the rice.
7) Drop in a bowl of ice water and drain.
8) Peel off the skin with the edge of a knife. I don’t bother to peel the skin on the curved part of the celery. Peeling the back of the celery should be fine.
9) Cut into 1.5-2 cm pieces.
10) Prepare age. In a small pot boil some water.
11) Add the age and boil for a minute.
12) Drain water and cut the age into thin strips.
13) Heat a frying pan and add the sesame seed oil.
14) Add the celery and stir fry for about 1 minute.
15) Add the sauce ingredients but add the dashijiru first. If you add the sugar and soy sauce to a hot pan it will burn easily.
16) Simmer until the celery is around the same consistency as rice. You don’t want to bite into something that’s a lot harder than the rice and you don’t want it to get mushy. Make sure you don’t let all the sauce simmer away.
17) After the rice switch goes off, let it steam in the rice cooker for an additional 5 minutes. Add the contents of the frying pan and give everything a quick stir and close the lid.
18) Allow everything to steam for an additional 10 minutes. (This will allow the rice to absorb the sauce).
19) Serve rice in bowls and turn off the rice cooker so that the rice doesn’t burn on the bottom of the pot.
Cut celery heart stalks in half. (these will be cut in half again after you peel the skin)
Itazuri. Press down lightly.
Celery is boiled in salt water for three minutes.
Celery skin is pulled off. You’ll pull more off than fuki.
Celery skin is thick.
After peeling, the celery should be slightly translucent.
Cut prepared celery length wise in half and then chop.
You should have 3/4 cup of prepared celery.
Boil your age and drain some of the water.
Chop your age into strips.
Stir fry the celery with sesame seeds.
Add dashijiru first and the rest of the sauce ingredients.
Add the age and simmer.
Can you tell the difference between Celery Gohan and Fuki Gohan?
