Japanese horseradish is no sweeter than ours!
Legend has it that in the 12th century, the future shogun of Shizuoka liked an unknown hot root. With his light hand, for more than 800 years, first in Japan, and then throughout the world, this plant has been used in the form of a seasoning called “Japanese horseradish,” or Japanese eutrema.
Japanese eutrema is more often called wasabi in everyday life, referring to the seasoning with that name. As a plant, wasabi is a species of eutrema (Eutrema wasabi or Wasabia japonica) with pungently aromatic rhizomes.
Wasabi not only sores the throat, but also has a powerful antimicrobial effect - it’s not for nothing that the Japanese flavor dishes with raw fish with it. In addition, scientists have discovered many beneficial properties of wasabi - from preventing cancer to fighting tooth decay.
All connoisseurs of East Asian cuisine know that sushi is served with spicy Japanese wasabi sauce, but not everyone knows that you can taste real wasabi only in Japan, and even then only in expensive restaurants - its price is very high due to the difficulties of growing it (it is called honwasabi - “real wasabi”).
In other cases, it's just wasabi - an imitation made from horseradish, dye and mustard. So if you want to experience the taste of a spicy root and all the joy of its real spiciness, try cooking it at home. It will turn out no worse than in sushi bars, even better!
Good wasabi
To prepare the seasoning, three- and four-year-old roots are used. It turns out that the criterion for real wasabi is not only the species and life in the “historical homeland”, but also a very complex method of cultivation.
True wasabi is obtained only when it grows in the coastal zone and is washed by cool (10–17 degrees) running water. Such products cost a lot of money. If the plant was cultivated in ordinary beds (which is also practiced), it is no longer considered ideal for making sauce.
For those who decide to personally prepare this sauce, let us say that there are many recipes for making wasabi at home. Wasabi can be prepared from fresh root and special powder. Naturally, the best sauce is made from fresh Japanese horseradish root.
If you become the happy owner of such a root, it is not difficult to prepare a seasoning from it: wash the root, peel it, cut off the protrusions and clean the depressions. After this, grate on a very fine grater.
Actually, the correct way to rub it is to rub it on the skin of a shark, but on a metal grater, according to experts, the result is completely different. It is advisable to eat the seasoning within 20 minutes, since in grated form it quickly deteriorates.
Spicy wasabi with rice vinegar
Ingredients:
- 1 tbsp. l. wasabi powder
- 1/3 tsp. Sahara
- 1/3 tsp. rice vinegar
- 1.5 tbsp. l. cold water
Preparation:
- Pour wasabi powder and sugar into a suitable sized bowl.
- Dilute with water, stirring quickly to avoid lumps.
- After this, add rice vinegar and mix well again.
- Transfer the seasoning into a glass and invert it onto a plate with the main dish or into a separate small saucer. After 10 minutes, serve.
Homemade wasabi with horseradish and lemon juice
Ingredients:
- 1 tsp. wasabi powder
- 1 tsp. cold water
- 1/3 tsp. soy sauce
- 1/2 tsp. grated horseradish
- 3 drops lemon juice
Preparation:
- Add wasabi powder, water, soy sauce to a glass and mix thoroughly.
- Add horseradish to the mixture and add lemon juice. Stir again until smooth.
- Wait 10 minutes for the seasoning to acquire its original aroma and harden a little.
- After this, serve to the table with Japanese cuisine.
Important! Don't even think about stirring wasabi in soy sauce - it's against Japanese tradition. In the Land of the Rising Sun, they do this: they put a drop of wasabi on the sushi, and then dip the side of the fish into soy sauce. Which is what we recommend for you too.
Whatever wasabi recipe you use, the prepared paste cannot be stored for a long time at home, as its pungency and aroma decrease over time. After 2-3 days, the sauce loses much of its taste and is significantly different from freshly prepared.
As a bonus, we will present a recipe that has nothing to do with real wasabi, but received the humorous name “wasabi in Russian” due to its burning taste and emerald hue.
Wasabi in Russian
Ingredients:
- 500 g young garlic arrows
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1.5 tbsp. l. vegetable oil
Preparation:
1. Wash the collected garlic arrows thoroughly and remove their hard part. Next, place the arrows on a paper towel to remove excess moisture. As soon as the arrows are dry, start cutting them randomly.
2. Place the chopped arrows in a blender bowl, add salt, a little vegetable oil and grind it all. A beautiful, emerald-colored paste should form.
3. Place the resulting mass in a container and place in the freezer. This paste can be stored for a long time and will be a wonderful seasoning for various meat and fish dishes. You can add it to butter.
Now you know how to make wasabi sauce at home. As you can see, there is nothing super complicated about this, the only problem is finding the right ingredients. But it's still quite real.
You can make wasabi sauce at home, adding it to your own Japanese dishes, or even experiment with Russian ones, why not?
Inspiration to you, good luck and, of course, bon appetit!
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Wasabi is a type of horseradish that is used to create a spicy sauce for dishes. We often see this sauce in restaurants serving Chinese cuisine, where it is served with almost any dish. In almost every store you can see ready-made sauce in tubes or jars, but it’s still worth making it yourself. Wasabi root cannot be purchased anywhere except Japan, so we will have to look for wasabi powder.
How to make wasabi from powder?
When buying a powder, you will notice that on some packs it is written that the composition contains only wasabi root, and secondly - the root of ordinary “horseradish”, coloring and flavoring. In fact, the composition will be the same in both packs, the only difference will be in price. And so, to prepare wasabi paste, we will use:
Wasabi powder.
. Boiled water.
. Tea spoon.
. Deep capacity.
Before you start cooking, you should pay attention to the following point - you should not make a lot of paste at once, as it very quickly loses its smell and aroma. Make a small amount - when you use it up, make more.
1. Take a small deep container and pour a small amount of wasabi powder into it.
2. Now you need to add a little boiled water to the powder, cold water at that. Add just a little water.
3. Mix the powder with water with a teaspoon until you get a homogeneous mass. You can add water if there is not enough water, but if there is too much, then add powder. The mass should be like .
4. After mixing, leave the mixture for 10 minutes until the water is completely absorbed and the mixture thickens.
Wasabi is ready! Now you can divide it into portions, or decorate your dishes.
If you love Japanese cuisine, then you just need to know.
Wasabi is a specific Japanese seasoning, very spicy and very healthy.
The Japanese usually grow wasabi in the mountains, passing water from mountain streams through the plant's pungent roots. The wasabi root lengthens by about three centimeters per year. It is precisely because of the slow growth of this plant that its price is quite high.
Despite this, almost no Japanese dish is complete without this unique seasoning.
The Japanese use all parts of this plant for food. They prepare tempura from its flowers and stems, but from the root they prepare a spicy seasoning of the same name. Traditional Japanese seasoning is often replaced with powder, from which you can easily prepare a paste sauce yourself.
So, how to make wasabi powder
?
To prepare the paste you will need one teaspoon of wasabi (powder) and 1-2 teaspoons of water.
Before preparing, pay attention to the packaging in which the powder is located. Check the expiration date and the seal of the packaging. Expired powder cannot be used to make paste.
Take a shot glass, small glass or egg cup. The container in which you are going to cook the pasta should be dry and grease-free.
Pour one teaspoon of wasabi powder into a glass. Pour one teaspoon of boiled water into another glass. Raw water is not suitable for preparing pasta; it will ruin the taste of the seasoning.
Gradually (literally drop by drop) add water to the powder. While adding water, stir the paste thoroughly. As a result, your paste should resemble soft clay in consistency. The amount of wasabi received is enough for two servings.
Then, turn the glass of cooked pasta over onto a flat plate. Leave the wasabi on the plate for ten minutes. During this time, your seasoning will dry out slightly and acquire its characteristic aroma. Freshly prepared wasabi is spicy and very fragrant.
Before serving the pasta, shape it. Wasabi can be placed on a plate in the shape of a leaf, a flower, or even a small tree. You can also put a small ball of paste directly into the soy sauce.
How to make wasabi powder
- you already know. Now let's talk about the unique healing properties of this seasoning.
Wasabi kills pathogenic microbes and helps with anemia and asthma. This seasoning is recommended for cancer patients. Wasabi improves digestion, neutralizes food poisoning, thins the blood, and prevents the accumulation of platelets.
So, the recipe how to make wasabi powder you already have it, all you have to do is try it!
Wasabi is a perennial plant, from the roots of which the seasoning of the same name is made. It is impossible to imagine Japanese cuisine without it, since it was the inhabitants of the Land of the Rising Sun who were the first to come up with such an original and hot-tasting additive more than 600 years ago. Today, you can prepare wasabi yourself by mixing the powder with the necessary ingredients.
Wasabi: how to dilute hot powder?
Photo by Shutterstock
A simple recipe for making wasabi
Before you start preparing the seasoning, make sure that the seal of the container with wasabi powder is not broken. Otherwise, the dish may turn out tasteless and even hazardous to health. Also pay attention to the expiration date of the powder. If all conditions are met, start cooking. To prepare wasabi for this recipe you will need: - 1 tbsp. l. wasabi powder; - 2 tbsp. l. cold water.
Pour wasabi powder into a small cup, such as a bowl. Add cold purified or boiled water to it and stir thoroughly until smooth. Transfer the mixture into a glass, which you then invert onto a plate. This is done so that the seasoning looks neat on the dish. Remove the glass, wait 10 minutes until the wasabi dries a little, and then serve with sushi, meat, fish or just boiled rice.
Wasabi is not prepared for future use, as after some time the seasoning loses its taste and aroma.
Spicy wasabi with rice vinegar
Ingredients: - 1 tbsp. l. wasabi powder; - 1.5 tbsp. l. cold water; - 1/3 tsp. Sahara; - 1/3 tsp. rice vinegar.
Pour wasabi powder and sugar into a suitable sized bowl, dilute with water, stirring quickly and thoroughly to avoid lumps. The consistency of the seasoning should be similar to clay. After this, add rice vinegar and mix well again. Transfer to a glass and turn it over onto a plate for the main course or onto a separate small saucer. After 10 minutes, serve.
Wasabi prevents tooth decay. The isothiocyanates contained in this seasoning inhibit bacteria that cause tooth decay. Wasabi is also known to prevent blood clots.
How to dilute wasabi powder to make a real Japanese paste. Fans of Japanese cuisine are well acquainted with the fiery wasabi paste, which gives such an extraordinary taste to dishes.
The classic paste is made from the dried root of a plant similar to horseradish. Real wasabi is very expensive because it grows in mountain running water in a very limited area of Japan. In stores, Japanese horseradish is sold in powder form, which must be diluted with water.
And it often happens that, having tried hot paste in a good Japanese restaurant, an amateur tries to dilute the paste from powder himself, but what he ends up with is something completely different.
Alas, most often the method indicated on the powder packaging still does not lead to the desired result. This is due to the fact that wasabi powder does not contain completely natural wasabi. Due to the high cost of the original product (the cost of 1 kg of root before drying reaches, in rubles, 15 thousand), retail chains in most cases receive a powder consisting of mustard powder, dyes and flavorings.
In inexpensive restaurants, pasta is made from the same powder, so many people do not even realize that they have never tried real pasta. It is clear that you can dilute wasabi from such powder without any special tricks: you just need to add the same volume of cold water and stir.
It’s another matter if you managed to buy powder from natural Japanese horseradish. Such packages do not come in large volumes, they are expensive and must indicate that the contents are made from real raw materials (Real Wasabi or Pure Wasabi). Good brands of powder are often sold in pharmacy-style packaging, like the well-known Namida brand.
As a rule, counterfeit mustard powder is sold in plastic bags. High-quality powder from real Japanese horseradish does not have a pronounced green color: this is a sign that either dyes have been added, or there are too many leaves in the product, although the classic product is made only from the root.
Therefore, if you managed to buy natural wasabi, then you need to use it as carefully as possible, and here the method of how to properly dilute Japanese horseradish powder begins to play an important role.
First of all, you should not prepare pasta for future use. Each time you need to dilute as much powder as you need for one meal. However, there is no point in storing Japanese horseradish powder itself for a long time, since volatile substances evaporate and the product loses its unique aroma. Therefore, it is better to buy wasabi powder in small packages.
The second important condition for obtaining high-quality paste is the use of very cold, clean water, preferably ice. The fact is that after drying and grinding the root, all substances are in a sublimated state. When wasabi powder is diluted with water, the substances combine and quickly form an aroma.
Ice water slows down this process and gives the pasta time to develop its natural flavor. Warm water, even at room temperature, separates substances into fractions and some of them evaporate before combining into a whole. Therefore, it is advisable to add ice to the water and cool it before diluting the powder.
So, in order to properly dilute the powder into a paste, you need to perform the following steps:
- Prepare a small glass or ceramic bowl.
- Cool clean water with ice.
- Measure one heaped teaspoon of natural wasabi powder and pour it into a bowl.
- Add one teaspoon of ice water.
- Mix quickly until a homogeneous paste is obtained.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate the pasta for 5 minutes.
And, of course, the powder itself must be stored in a dark, cool place so that the volatile substances remain in their original form longer.
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