Dashi!

There was one particular season of Top Chef where it seemed like half of the cheftestants (their word, not mine) were using something called dashi in their recipes.  It was that year’s hot ingredient, just as kale had been a couple of years before and sriracha had been a few years back (sriracha ice cream, anyone?).  Because of the frequency of the use of dashi on Top Chef, I was a bit intimidated by it.  It must be something really complicated for it to achieve this kind of status, right?

Wrong.  A couple of years ago, I bought James Peterson’s Splendid Soups and discovered what, exactly, dashi is. On one level, it’s pretty simple.  It’s a Japanese broth/soup base that’s made by mixing water with two, basic Japanese ingredients- konbu and bonito flakes.  Now those ingredients may be basic in Japan, but in the U.S. it’s a little different.

Konbu is dried seaweed, packaged in sheets.  Bonito flakes are a type of tuna, dried, and then shaved into very thin, light, flakes.  A package of konbu can be anywhere from 2 oz to 6 oz.  Every package of bonito flakes I’ve ever found is 2 oz.  But where can you find these packages?

It’s not easy.  I’ve never seen either at the regular supermarket near me.  The Whole Foods near me will often have konbu, but the price can be a bit eye-watering.  It’s useful to know its there in an emergency but still…  I’ve never seen bonito flakes in an American store.  There are two alternatives.

I’ve never really considered Amazon to be a source of food (although that will probably change with their purchase of Whole Foods) but they regularly have ingredients that I’ve needed that are a little too specialized for a regularly grocery.  In addition to konbu and bonito flakes, I’ve also bought Sichuan peppercorns, pomegranate syrup, and preserved lemons from them.  Prices are high but at least you know you can get what you need.

A much better alternative, although one not available to everybody, is an Asian supermarket.  The Philadelphia area has several and two of them are within a five minute ride from my house. They are not without challenges.  Except for the cashiers, it’s my experience that nobody speaks English and none of the signs are in English unless the manufacturers include English in their packaging.  This not only makes buying meat, fish, and produce interesting, it also can drive you nuts when you’re trying to figure out which of the 40 or 50 jars in front of you have the preserved vegetables your recipe needs.

Nevertheless, I visit First Oriental Market regularly and have purchased more than my share of vegetables, hot oil, garlic paste, Chinese cooking wine, Chinese vinegar, noodles, dried shrimp, preserved vegetables, pickled chilis, black bean paste, fish sauce, konbu, and bonito flakes. The prices are much better than Amazon or Whole Foods.

So now that we’ve assembled the pieces, how do you make dashi and what do you do with it? Making it is simple.  In a large saucepan add 5 cups of cold water to 1 oz of konbu.  Turn the heat up to medium low until the water begins to simmer.  It should take about 15 minutes, more or less.  When it does, remove the konbu and bring the water to a boil.  Then turn off the heat and add 1 oz of bonito flakes for one minute.  Then empty the saucepan into a bowl using a fine strainer (or even a strainer lined with cheesecloth).  Press on the strainer with the back of a spoon to extract all the broth. That’s it.

Well, it’s it except that broth on its own isn’t all that interesting.  Dashi does have a distinct flavor of its own, as does consommé or chicken stock but you’d never sit down to a bowl of chicken stock. Like stock, dashi is the canvas for the painting but it’s smoky, deep flavor creates a unique context that it complex, flexible, and delicious.

Now that you have the dashi, you could do what I did the first time I made it and toss in some soy sauce, fish sauce, coriander, cooked shrimp, and julienned ginger for a light shrimp soup with Thai overtones that’s ready in less than 30 minutes. Or you could stir in some miso, cubed tofu, watercress, and julienned carrots and have the standard miso soup that you’d get in any good Japanese sushi restaurant.  Or you could do what I did yesterday – add soy sauce, Chinese vinegar, frozen chopped spinach, julienned ginger, sliced mushrooms, and smoked mussels for a hearty lunch treat. These are all collections of strong flavors emerging from the complex broth that is dashi.

Recipe – Dashi

Ingredients

1 oz konbu

1 oz bonito flakes

5 oz water

Directions

Add water and konbu to a saucepan on medium low heat.  Bring to a simmer (~15 minutes) and then remove konbu.  Bring to a boil and then remove from heat.  Add bonito flakes and stir.  Let sit for 1 minute, then strain through a fine strainer or cheesecloth into a bowl.  If making a soup right away, rinse the saucepan and return the dashi to the saucepan on the stove.