Shinya Shokudo - Butter Rice (深夜食堂 - 牛油拌饭）Season 1 - Episode 5

Shinya Shokudo - Butter Rice 

深夜食堂 - 牛油拌饭 ( Season 1 - Episode 5)

(Butter Rice - Picture Taken from the film Shinya Shokudo)

I was introduced to the Japanese series of Shinya Shokudo by my sister-in-law when I went over to visit her in Australia last December break and took the whole time to finish both season 1 and season 2.  Really liked some of the tips that they gave at the back of each show.

One of the recipes that I have been wanting to try is butter rice.  I really love butter and I do like Japanese rice.  Didn't have a chance to try it as my husband thinks that my love for butter is crazy....(hm....however he doesn't really understand....different recipes call for different styles and texture of butter).

Had a chance to try it today as I am on medical leave and I cooked a pot to Japanese rice for lunch, my rice cooker can take only at least one cup of rice, that leaves me with enough cooked rice for two meals.  Anyway, really really liked it!  I ate it all up and forgot to take photos so will have to use the image clipped from the series.  Next time, I will take it with miso soup and I think it can be my simple breakfast for some days.

Anyway for the rest of the rice, I am going to try to make the tuna rice in the afternoon.

Butter Rice (Recipe)

1 serving of steamed rice (warm from the rice cooker)

1 small knob of cold butter ( salted or unsalted)

A few drips of light soya sauce (Shoyu)

1.  Ladle the warm steam rice, preferably straight from the rice cooker, into a small bowl.

2.  Place a small knob of butter (about 1 tsp - a pinky finger size) onto the rice.

3.  Let the rice warm the butter for about 30 s, use the chopstick to wrap the butter round the rice a little. (Do not microwave !!!).  The butter will melt a little into a creamy texture.  If you microwave, it will turn into oil and separate into the milk solids and oil instead and the taste will be different.

4.  Drip a few drips of shoyu on it.  Stir the butter, rice and shoyu together and serve.

Notes:

• Soya Sauce.  I prefer to use Japanese soya sauce that has been traditionally brewed not Chinese soya sauce.  If you look at the ingredients and compare you will know why. Let us also look at the manufacturing traditional soy sauce and the chemical soya sauce.  (You can skip this part, if you are not interested in the Sciences.)

• Generally,  Japanese soy sauce is made from wheat, soy beans and salt and goes through two fermentation phases of a few months.  During the first fermentation phase, the Aspergillus mold produces enzymes that will break down wheat starch into sugars, wheat and soy proteins into amino acids and seed oils into fatty acids. Salt brine, yeasts and lactic bacteria is added before the second fermentation phase and in the second phase, the bacterial and enzymes work together and react with each other to produce sugars and ammino acids forming roasty-smelling pyrazines, acids and alcohols which combine together to form fruity esters.  The raw sauce then goes through high-temperature pasteurisation which further encourages browing reactions between amino acids and sugars.  (McGee, 2004) What results is a naturally brewed soya sauce which nutrients have been broken down properly for absorption by the body that is also concentrated, mouth-filling and full of unami.

• In contrast, most of the Chinese soya sauce I find the supermarkets seemed to be the industrially produced chemical soy sauce containing sodium benzoate which I read somewhere is carcinogenic.  (Ok, I am not sure about it, but the sodium benzoate makes me uncomfortable)   According McGee (2004), these soy sauce are produced by using concentrated hydrochloric acid to break down defatted soy meal. The caustic mixture is then neutralised with sodium carbonate, and flavoured and coloured with corn syrup, caramel, water and salt.  This results in a flat taste compared with the traditionally brewed soya sauce.  

• Somehow, I do not feel comfortable taking in so much chemicals for the industrially produced soy sauce so I always make sure I get those traditionally brewed, organically grown soy beans and I make sure I read the label.

• Butter.  Somehow different brands of butter produce different taste.  For me, I personally stick to Lurpark butter, the flavour carries a lot more depth and is less salty.  The aroma in baking is great too. On the down side, the price is usually about more than 20% more than the other butter.  So when there is sale I tend to stock up.  I usually keep in the fridge, but I read somewhere recently they can be kept in a freezer for a longer period.

How to Cook Traditional Sweet Potato Teochew Porridge

  My son is down with flu.  At times like these, he has very little appetite and would only want something simple and not too oily for him to stomach.  So he decided he wanted to have some Teochew porridge.

  Teochew porridge is a simple dish which you can have a variety of side dishes to accompany.  This is a relatively simple dish to cook and is one of my staples for lunch when I was younger.  It is such a staple for many in the older generation that my father-in-law still has it for breakfast every morning with a lightly steamed fish or some pickled vegetables.

  Teochew porridge is different from the Cantonese congee, as the grain are still suppose to be very distinctive when cooked. When I was younger, I would simply have it with a little bit of light soya sauce (shoyu), a small piece of fermented beancurd or when times allowed a small piece of fried salted fish...and that to me is bliss....it always warms my heart after having a bowl of the porridge. 
 
This porridge can be found at most stalls at the hawkers or coffee shops in Singapore selling economical rice, though theirs do not come with sweet potatoes.  For shops that specialise in Teochew porridge, the price is always quite expensive, coming up to about $10++ for a meal for two with only about 3 side dishes, so I usually do not patronise those stalls as I find that I can easily whip up a meal on my own.

Traditional Sweet Potato Teochew Porridge

Serving : 2 - 3 people
Preparation time : 20 min (for brown rice it may take an additional 10 min)

Ingredients :

• 1 cup of long-grained jasmine white rice ( you can use brown rice here as well, the cooking time is only a little longer)
• water
• 1 -2 sweet potato (depending on how much you can finish)

Procedure:

 Step 1  

Put the rice into a pot of sufficient size.  The pot should be sufficient large so that that uncooked rice only takes up about 1/3 the size of the pot.  I like to use claypot here,  as I find the flavour of the sweet potatoes can infuse into the porridge better.  But you can use any pot of sufficient size.

Step 2  

Wash the rice about 2 to 3 times, to remove any impurities from the rice.  The water should still be murky (like milk diluted many times) when the rice is washed.

 Step 3                                                                                       Add water till the pot is approximately 2/3 full.  Do not fill to the brim else the water will bubble over when boiled.

Step 4
Put the pot over a stove over a large flame.  Cover with a lid leaving a small gap and let it boil, you will need to stir once or twice during the boiling to losen any grains that may get stucked at the bottom, else those grains will char.




Step 5
Peel the sweet potato(es) with a potato peeler and but into bite size.  Note that the size will get smaller the sides will break off and infuse in the porridge when cooked.  You can use any variety of sweet potato here.  My favourites are the orange-fleshed ones (usually from Australia) and the Japanese sweet potatoes.  If you can get organic ones, You can just scrub the sweet potatoes and cook it with the skin on and eat it.  It is suppose to be more nutritious.

Step 6

I soak the sweet potatoes in water while waiting for the porridge to boil so that they do not discolour.

Step 7

When the porridge boils, you will need to remove the lid.

Step 8

Add in the sweet potato at this junction.  And wait for the mixture to boil again.  When it boils, lower the flame till the mixture just boils but not over the pot.







Step 9

Continue cooking till the grains are cooked through, (that happens when the grain is of uniform colouration) and the grains start to fluff and split.  (In Chinese, we say that the grains just "opened").   Off the flame at this junction.

 Step 10

Put back the lid, and let the grains cotinue to cook in its own heat while you prepare the side dishes.

When you are ready, you can serve the porridge with its side dishes.

Dishes that can goes well with Teochew Porridge:

• 
  
  Fried Luncheon Meat Cubes (my kids favourite, though not entirely healthy, but I occasionally indulge them.
• 
  
  Sliced Steamed Squid with Orange Sauce Dip
• 
  
  Pickled Vegetables
• 
  
  Stir Fried Beansprouts with Beancurd
• 
  
  Onion Omelette

How Can I Live Without My Rice Cooker.

  My colleagues are always amazed how I am able to bring home-cooked lunch to work.  Simple, when I cook, there is usually more than enough to last me and my husband to more than one meal.  But what truly motivates me is that School Canteen food does not appeal to me and I do not always have the luxury of eating out.  So yes, that will sometime motivate me  to wake up at 5 am in the morning (I usually wake up at 5:30 am if there is no need to prepare lunch) to make bento for me and my husband's lunch. 

  One appliance I cannot do without is my rice cooker, which isZojirushi 3 cup rice cooker which I bought in 2004 during my chemotherapy when I switched to eating brown rice.  It is really an amazing device.

  It has a timer function that allows me to put in my rice and water one night beforehand, so that it can be ready at 5 am in the morning when I wake up to assemble the bento.  It is a great cooker as it is able to take small portions, there are times when my husband needs to meet clients and will not be able to have lunch bento.....so it always me to cook 1/2 cup of raw rice (which yields about a bowl of rice for my bento).  There are gradations at the side of the pot that tells you exactly how much water you need to put without using your finger to measure...that is a traditional way my mother taught me to measure how much water to use for rice.  It cooks brown rice extremely well, sufficient cooked so that is soft but yet every rice grain is well defined and the texture is sufficient chewy. 

  My kids are growing older now,  and their appetite has grown bigger.  But the rice-cooker is still sufficient, as I usually need to cook 2 and a quarter cups of (raw) rice to sufficiently feed my family of four.  However, I am secretly hoping that my rice cooker will break down....as I like to entertain, so during times like these I have to cook twice at maximum capacity.  I am trying now very hard to convince my husband I need 5 1/2 cup rice cooker, though my next one will still be a Zojirushi one. :>