Shio Koji Salmon Flakes 塩麹鮭フレーク

Have you ever seen jars of salmon flakes being sold at a Japanese supermarket? They are delicious and convenient ingredients to use as a rice topping or further made into rice balls, fried rice, or other dishes.

If you ever happen to have some salmon fillets on hand, maybe give it a try and turn them into flakes. The entire process is not hard at all, and you can easily get store-bought quality salmon flakes being made at home, all natural style too. 

Shio koji salmon flakes 塩麹鮭フレーク - 

Ingredients?

• 550 grams salmon fillets
• Some salt
• 2 tablespoons shio koji
• 1 1/2 tablespoons Japanese sake 
• 1 1/2 tablespoons mirin
• 1 tablespoon toasted white sesame seeds

How?

Personally I prefer to cook salmon without the skin unless it's like searing or frying. The choice is yours. Once decided to keep or remove the skin, sprinkle all sides with some salt and let it sit for 10 to 15 minutes. 

After that, wipe out excess liquid that has been drawn out by the salt. Have a pot of water ready and switch to medium heat. Add in the salmon when the water is still lukewarm. Keep cooking the fish using such medium heat till fully cooked-through.

Once cooked-through, remove the fish and set aside to let cool. When it's fine to handle the fish by hand, break the fish into medium chunks, also discard the skin too. Meanwhile, touch and feel the fish chunks, making sure there are no bones remain. Aim to pick out any bones inside if any. After all we are aiming to enjoy the fish "flakes" without worrying about getting pierced by it.

Have a pan ready. There is no need to drizzle any oil there. Just add in the salmon pieces along with 2 tablespoons of shio koji, 1 1/2 tablespoons Japanese sake, and 1 1/2 tablespoons of mirin.

Use medium heat to cook the salmon chunks. Mix and break the salmon into even smaller pieces. Continue to cook and break the salmon till some moisture has been removed and appear flaky. Mine took about 10 minutes.

Mix in about 1 tablespoon of toasted white sesame seeds towards the end. That's about it. You'll get salmon flakes that taste just as close as the store-bought version. And we even boosted up the flavor with the help of shio koji. 

Some people simply use the salmon flakes as a topping, more so like a side dish with rice. Sometimes I'd like to use it as the main protein ingredient for fried rice. 

These flakes are especially good when used in fried rice, paired with some chopped veggies and a touch of white pepper powder. If you can make the fried rice using basmati rice, the final result will make you even happier. 

Other salmon recipes:

• Miso crunch salad with seared salmon
• Soupy version simmered salmon and daikon in miso broth
• Salmon and dashi takikomi gohan using brown rice 炊き込みご飯
• Salmon and quinoa rice stuffed fried tofu pouches

No Deep Fry Needed Pineapple Pork 酸甜鳳梨豬梅花

One of the ideal cuts for this recipe, in my opinion, is the pork butt. I mean the upper shoulder kind of pork butt, not the rear end butt. 

It's always a bit confusing as to why the shoulder cut has been called pork butt. After a little research online I found out that back then a specific cut of pork used to store and ship in barrels known as "butts." So as time passes by, that special cut of meat has gradually be known as "pork butt."

No Deep fry needed pineapple pork  酸甜鳳梨豬梅花 -

Ingredients?

• 630 grams pork (I used pork butt, pork shoulder works too)
• 1 canned pineapple (total 227 grams but solids 135 grams)
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• Some potato starch
• Some olive oil
• 1 garlic clove
• 3 tablespoons ketchup
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1 teaspoon granulated sugar
• Some toasted white sesame seeds

How?

Use pork with some thickness to it, not the sliced shabu pork version used for hot pot. We need that full hearty bite for this recipe. I picked pork butt (upper shoulder cut) here, but any other tender cut will do.

First slice the pork into medium large pieces with some thickness to it. Use the back of the knife to pound the meat, and do that for both directions like lengthwise and crosswise, also do that for both sides of the meat. 

So after some pounding work, the meat pieces will further flatten out. However, it doesn't have to be paper thin, our goal is to break the tissue in order to have an even more tender texture in the end. Try to aim to keep some of that thickness but also able to pound the meat half way through. Once that's checked, this is the actual time to do the final sizing job by slicing the meat to medium bite size pieces.

Marinate the prepped meat pieces with 1 tablespoon of soy sauce, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, 1/4 teaspoon of black pepper, 1 tablespoon of potato starch, and 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Set aside for 15 minutes.

Peel and grate the garlic clove, we will need about 1 teaspoon of grated garlic in the end. Mix that together with 1 1/2 tablespoons of pineapple juice from the can and 1 teaspoon of potato starch. This will be our pre-mixed sauce.

Slice the canned pineapple to medium pieces if needed. By the way, the canned pineapple I got came with a tiny plastic fork. That's because some people actually buy it and enjoy the canned pineapple as a sweet snack, so the fork was conveniently provided.

Drizzle 1 tablespoon of olive oil to the pan. Switch to medium heat and wait till the oil gets warm. Add in the pork along with the marinade. Sear till the bottom part turns slightly browned. Flip and sear the other side till slightly browned also. Scoop out the pork first.

Still using the same pan, add in pineapple and sear a little. The heat will help further drawing out that fruity aroma. It'll be hard to get the char on pineapple especially we are not grilling the fruit, so just a couple minutes in contact with heat should do the trick.

Add back the pork, mix till evenly blended. Pour in premixed sauce and stir till evenly blended again. This time, cook till reduced a bit. Plate and sprinkle some toasted white sesame seeds on top.

This is a more family-friendly way of making pineapple pork. At the restaurants, sometimes they'll deep-fry the pork first to get that even crunchier coating. It's completely up to you, but to me it's just not that convenient to use up so much frying oil in a small family setting. 

And even without the deep-frying process, I was still pretty happy with the result. The sweet and sour fruity touch can really cut away any greasy feeling from the pork, yielding this well-balanced meaty dish in the end.

Extended reading:

• Cucumber and pineapple juice with a touch of mint leaves