#1 Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art

Buy@Amazon Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art by Shizuo TSUJI

Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art
by Shizuo TSUJI (1980)
Introduction by M.F.K. Fisher, Foreword by Ruth Reichl.

Ratings: Learn more about cookbook ratings
Quality: 5/5 – Best possible
Importance: 5/5 – Bible of Japanese Cuisine
Difficulty: 3/5 – Involved
Rarity: 2/5 – Specialty Shops

Japan’s culinary Bible, in English
This is my desert island book. If I were stranded on an island and received this book in a bottle, I could learn to make authentic Japanese food pretty reliably (if I had access to good seaweed).

This book is way more than the best Japanese cookbook available- it’s a textbook of authentic theory and recipes providing an overview of the unified cuisines of Japan.

Shizuo TSUJI, a culinary father of Japan, was head of the Tsuji Culinary Academy and has been largely held responsible for codifying Japanese cuisine for the West (with this very book!). His style of teaching is lots of diagrams and descriptions of the various grades of food and variants of techniques. There is a lot reading before you actually end up attempting a “simple” recipe like rice, dashi or tempura.

How to prepare octopus

There are Japanese names for techniques and foods, in both roman and kana/kanji script, making this cookbook an indispensible tool to learning kitchen Japanese.

Creating a Kaiseki Menu
The book is organized like a kaiseki menu and encourages construction of menus that balance proper dishes. Exploring Japanese menu concepts like fresh-before-cooked, “soup and three”, and seasonality. Starting with dashi stocks and soups, the book organizes courses into a taxonomy of common japanese techniques (“mono” as “things”)- grilling (yakimono), steaming (mushimono), dressing (sunomono), deep-frying (agemono), pickling (tsukemono), one-pot (nabemono) and of course production of rice, noodles and sweets. The first part of the book covers each technique in theory and with recipes- the second part of the book contains advanced recipes for each of the techniques.

Primary and Secondary Dashi Recipes
The key to authentic Japanese food is homemade stock, “dashi”, made from seaweed and dried bonito flakes. After some pages dedicated to describing the best dashi production technique and the quality tradeoff of using instant dashi or even pre-shaved bonito flakes, the killer recipes of the book reveal themselves, abbreviated here:

Primary Dashi (Ichiban Dashi)
1 quart cold water
1 ounce giant kelp (konbu)
1 ounce dried bonito flakes (hana-katsuo)

1. Heat konbu + water in medium pot.
2. Reach boiling point in 10 minutes, heating uncovered- do not boil konbu.
3. Remove konbu when it is soft enough to pierce with a thumbnail (about 10 minutes).
4. Bring stock to boil, add 1/4 cup cold water and all bonito flakes. Do not stir.
5. Bring to a full boil and remove from heat. Allow flakes to settle 1 minute.
6. Filter through cheesecloth, reserve the kelp + bonito flakes for secondary dashi

Secondary Dashi (Niban Dashi)
bonito flakes + konbu reserved from primary dashi
1.5 quarts cold water
1/2 ounce dried bonito flakes

1. Cover reserved bonito flakes + konbu with water in medium pot.
2. Bring to just before boiling point, allow to simmer until reduced by half (15-20 minutes).
3. Add fresh bonito flakes and remove from heat. Allow flakes to settle 1 minute.
4. Filter stock through cheesecloth.

Tsuji explains that Primary Dashi is a clear, delicately flavored base for a soup while Secondary Dashi is best used as a stronger, darker soup base or for braising and flavoring vegetables. The first time I read this book (which I still consult regularly), the most important takeaway I got was that making my own dashi, like making my own chicken stock- from scratch, was the number one thing I could do to make all of my other Japanese dishes taste flavorful and authentic. I make dashi often and I mix up my recipes+techniques, freezing it in cubes and using it to flavor dipping sauces, but Tsuji’s recipes are the ones I studied first.

Shioyaki, Nabemono, Agemono, etc
This book has many helpful diagrams for preparing and grilling seafood, and I have benefitted immensely from studying the section on shioyaki technique (salt-grilling), especially the skewering techniques shown here:

Wave skewering a saltwater fish

This is “uneri-gushi” wave skewering, used on saltwater fish, which is of course different from “nobori-gushi” climbing skewering and “odori-gushi” dancing skewering (which are of course used only for freshwater fish).

Nabemono, or Japanese hot pot, has its own chapters covering the varieties of seafood and vegetables that are often used, with an eye towards encouraging the reader to experiment as long as you use common Japanese vegetables, of which there are color plates and a glossary in the front of the book. Nabemono is one of the best Japanese dishes in my opinion, when done right, and my main takeaway here was to use authentic herbs and homemade dashi.

Agemono frying chapters include such variety as a description of all of the types of frying (kara-age, koromo-age, su-age) but also the different types of fry coatings, which helps me improvise things like almond tempura batters. A diagram is provided showing how to set up your tempura station to maximize economy of movement and space, reproduced here:

How to set up a tempura fry station

Tsukemono, or Japanese pickled goods, are briefly touched on with one master recipe per fermentation type. The rice preparation chapter is mostly theory and history which was helpful for perfecting my rice technique (which is far from perfect). Sushi is covered as well as knife types and techniques.

The book is rounded out with extensive coverage on tea and sake, all the grades and methods of preparation.

Final Caveats
There is not a lot of color art, but there are a ton of helpful diagrams. There is an overload of Japanese culinary information. The recipes seem simple, but they require a reading investment and study to execute properly, so I would not recommend this book for beginners.

This cookbook is THE ONE if you just need ONE go-to Japanese cookbook for understanding and practicing authentic techniques- oh yes, and it’s CRACK for learning Kitchen Japanese!