Tempura
Prawns and vegetables in an ultra-light batter, fried in a flash. The Portuguese brought it, but it was in the street stalls of Edo, old Tokyo, that it became a classic.
Ingredients
- 12 peeled king prawns (tails on)
- Vegetables: sweet potato, courgette, aubergine, shiitake mushrooms, green pepper
- 100 g soft (cake) flour
- 1 egg yolk
- 200 ml iced water
- Sunflower oil for frying
- For the sauce: 200 ml dashi, 50 ml soy sauce, 50 ml mirin and grated daikon radish
How to make it at home
- Make a few cuts on the underside of the prawns so they don’t curl up. Slice the vegetables.
- Heat the oil to 175 °C.
- Mix the yolk with the iced water and add the flour all at once, stirring with chopsticks for just a few seconds. It should stay lumpy.
- Dust each piece in flour, then dip in the batter, and fry in small batches for 1 or 2 minutes.
- Heat the dashi with the soy sauce and mirin and serve the sauce with the grated daikon.
The trick: Keep the batter ice-cold and don’t overmix it: the lumps are what make it crisp.