PicoBlog

I’ve just done the first weekend of events of my book tour and my first book tour in Sydney in nearly five years — it was so wonderful to be celebrating this book with a room full of warm, food-loving, cookbook-loving, Japan-loving, Italy-loving people! Thank you to all of you who came out to the workshop and the book launch to hear me talk about making this “out of the box” cookbook, as Barbara Sweeney (aka Food and Words) called it.

We had a special masterclass revolving around my very favourite meal — Japanese breakfast — and while this dish isn’t usually considered a breakfast dish, I decided to add it in at the last minute because it is just SO delicious, I’ve never known someone to not gush over it when they taste it and I think if there is one dish in this book that you’d like to make someone you want to win over, it should be this one. It’s the first Japanese dish I ever made Marco — and it remains his stedfast favourite.

Dengaku is the name of this umami-packed miso sauce and you can use it really on anything, it’s particularly good on plain things: smeared on top of grilled tofu or thick medallions of boiled daikon, even simply roasted white fish. But it seems to be best known as a topping for eggplant (nasu in Japanese), which you can roast or fry (frying, for me, is always the way to go for the silkiest eggplant though).

You can eat nasu dengaku as a side dish, in which case this is enough for four to share, or turn it into a meal on its own with a crunchy, zingy cabbage salad. In either case, you need a bowl of freshly steamed rice nearby as a foil for the richness of this wonderful dish.

Nasu Dengaku (Miso eggplant) from Gohan: Everyday Japanese Cooking
Photo above by Yuki Sugiura

• 1 large eggplant or 2 smaller ones

• vegetable oil, for frying

• 2 tbsp brown miso

• 1 tbsp soy sauce

• 1 tbsp mirin

• 2 tsp sugar (I like raw demerara/turbinado sugar here)

• Sesame seeds or finely chopped spring onion (or both!) to garnish

Cut the aubergine in half lengthways, then score the flesh in a criss-cross pattern about 2cm wide to make it easier to eat with chopsticks. I also like to trim a small (5mm) section of the skin on the bottom so that the aubergine doesn't wobble, and sits flat.

Heat a 1-2cm depth of vegetable oil in a frying pan and fry the aubergine halves until they become deep brown and tender, about 3 minutes on each side. Frying is the secret to the silky texture. Remove carefully from the oil and let drain on a wire rack.

Heat the grill element of your oven (or heat the oven to 220°C/430°F/gas 8 and just roast it if you don't have this function).

Mix the miso, soy sauce, mirin and sugar together to make a smooth paste and warm in a small saucepan to dissolve the sugar. If it is too thick, add a splash of water to loosen a little and mix until smooth, then remove from the heat. You want this to be a spreadable consistency — a peanut butter-like consistency would be too thick so a little looser than that.

Place the aubergine, with the criss-cross sides up, on a baking tray and cover with a thick coating of the miso mixture, about 1-2 tablespoons. Place under the grill until the miso paste is bubbling around the edges, about 2-3 minutes (if using the oven to roast, place the tray on the top shelf and bake for several minutes or until the miso paste begins to bubble and brown slightly).

Serve sprinkled with the toasted sesame seeds or finely chopped spring onions.

The Gohan Book Tour

Some of the events have already sold out, but these are the following events where you can still grab tickets!

Melbourne

November 28 — author lunch at Ima Project in conversation with Julia Busuttil Nishimura. Tickets available here (head to “booking” and select November 28 on the calendar)

November 30 — Evening 2 hour cooking class at The Fermentary.

Franklin, Tasmania

December 1 — Drinks and Q&A at The Bowmont

Sydney

December 5 — Noodle cooking demonstration and tasting (and gin and tonics!) at the Sydney Seafood School! Tickets here.

Robertson, NSW

December 9 — Gohan cooking workshop (4 hours) at the wonderful Moonacres Cooking School

Canberra

December 7 — Demonstration and book signing at Essential Ingredient. More information coming soon.

December 10 — Book launch event! Drinks, snacks and Q&A with the fabulous Joanna Savill at the Edith Room at the Dear Prudence bar. Register here.

December 11 — Evening author talk (together with my mum!) at the Asia Bookroom with Dianne Fitzpatrick (president of the Australia Japan Society) moderating, 6:00pm

Virtual Online Cooking Class Alert!

I’ll also be doing a small virtual class with Milk Street on January 21st so you can join me from your own kitchen! We will be making udon noodles, vegetable tempura fritters and greens with sesame dressing. Just for my newsletter subscribers, I have a special deal for you:

• 50% off (this is limited to the first 20 users): COOKWITHEMIKO

  (and if you miss out, you can still get 15% off using the code: GOHAN)

You can also buy this as a gift for someone, for more about that go to this page. 

Gohan Giveaway

Just a heads up to keep your eye out tomorrow for a giveaway I’ll be hosting on Instagram together with these beautiful artisanal ingredients from Kokoro Cares in Japan!

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