Cooking Japanese in Jamaica - The delicious Buri Daikon

 Ai Irasawa-Coney, Contributor

I have an insatiable appetite for seafood. I just love it! So, I have been exploring seafood/fish recipes at home. I created some fusion dishes and I also cooked some traditional Japanese seafood. There are a few great Japanese dishes I cook with all the seafood I can get in Jamaica, which I will eventually share with readers. But today, I would like to introduce buri daikon.

The closest thing to the Buri fish is king fish. If you are lucky to be able to get a hold of freshly caught king fish, use that. If not, you can use the frozen ones you can get in the supermarket, though that's not ideal. I love going to Portmore to buy freshly caught fish, lobsters, conch, shrimp, etc. Alternatively, good supermarkets sell local tuna steak, king fish, grouper, butterfish, and snapper.

Daikon, which is a radish, can be found in a lot of supermarkets across the island these days.

If you have been following my columns, you may have noticed that I do not use artificial seasoning. I believe natural seasoning tastes better and brings out the flavour of each ingredient. It is also healthier for you as artificial seasoning contains a lot of chemicals.

Cooking time for this recipe is 60 minutes, which is rather long, but most of the time is spent waiting for the dish to cook. You can read a book, watch television or drink some tea while you are cooking. Cooking can be very therapeutic.

Cooking time: 60 minutes Serves 2 persons

Ingredients

1lb king fish

1 1/2 lb daikon

1 1/2 cups water

1/4 cup soy sauce (Kikkoman brand recommended)

1/4 cup white wine

2tbs brown sugar

1/2 small ginger (peeled)

1tbs soy sauce

1 stalk scallion (spring onion)

1tbs cooking oil

Cooking Instructions

(1) Peel daikon and cut into thick slices (1 inch thick). Dip uncooked slices of king fish in boiled water for a few minutes then transfer to ice cold water to clean out all the blood that is left (this process helps reduce the fishy smell).

(2) Grill the king fish in frying pan until golden brown.

(3) Put all ingredients except 1 tablespoon of soy sauce and onion in a cooking pan, and cook for 30 minute on medium heat. Make sure to skim the scum from the broth from time to time.

(4) Once the daikon is soft, take it off the heat, and cool so that the daikon and king fish will absorb all the flavour and seasoning.

(5) After it is cooled, return to the heat and reduce the liquid.

(6) Add 1 tablespoon of soy sauce and turn off the heat.

Sprinkle with chopped scallion (spring onion) for garnish.

Itadakimasu!

Ai Irisawa-Coney managed a Japanese restaurant in Soho, London. She is also a founder of Epiphany Media Solutions www.facebook.com/epiphanymediaja and ACI Consultancy www.aci-consultancy.com