Wednesday 29th of June 2005
Tonkatsu
Here´s another one of my favorites, and a real easy one. Tonkatsu (豚カツ) is made with pork fillets cut thinly, but you can also make it with chicken (chicken-katsu or チキンカツ) if you like. I usually make a little of both, as both happen to be very tasty. A good thing to accompany this with is some sticky rice, but we’ll learn how to make that some other time (or buy a japanese rice cooker like I did).
I like to use a mixture of regular flour (grain) and corn flour, but it´s really not neccesary. This is just me being wierd. So, here we go:
What need you?
- 1 to 2 slices of pork or chicken fillets per person, cut about half an inch thick.
- 1 egg (possibly more if you´re making a lot of meat).
- Panko, found in japanese stores, or bread crumps if you can´t find it.
- Flour.
- Corn flour, optionally.
- Vegetable or sunflower oil.
- Salt & pepper.
- Tonkatsu sauce (トンカツソース) and/or japanese mustard, both also found in japanese stores
- Cabbage, optionally (to serve the meat on).
What do you?
- Make sure the meat is around half an inch think. If it´s not, fix it. Set the meat on a cutting board, set your palm on top of it, and slice through it. Having a good knife helps a lot here.
- Sprinkle some salt and pepper on the pork. Sprinkle the salt with your fingers for a more dramatic effect (just don´t say bam!, please), and if possible, use freshly ground pepper.
- Take a plate, and mix half a cup of flour (grain) and half of corn flour in it, otherwise, just use flour. Use more as needed.
- Beat the egg in a deep plate. Savagely of course. Use more eggs as needed.
- Grab yet another plate, and put the panko or bread crumps on it.
- Now, just like in a production chain, first coat the meat thoroughly with the flour. Leave no crevice alone. Then, dip the coated meat in the beaten egg, both sides, and finally, coat it again with the panko or bread crumps this time. Feel the thrill Henry Ford experienced.
- If you like, leave the breaded meat in the refrigerator for 20ish minutes. It makes it easier to fry later on.
- If you decided to go with the cabbage, shred it very thinly in long strips, soak the strips in iced water for around 20ish minutes so that they become nice and crisp, then drain it and make a “bed” on a plate in which to set the meat.
- Heat up the oil in a deep pan. Moderately high heat.
- Shove the meat in, let it fry slowly until golden brown.
- When done, take it out of the pan and set it on some paper towels for a minute as to dry off the oil. After that, i find that cutting it in strips makes it easier to eat with chopsticks. And you want to eat it with chopstick. So, do it.
- Done! serve it on a plate, or in the cabbage bed, with tonkatsu sauce or japanese mustard if you prefer.
Itadakimas!
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