EASY Japanese Stew | Perfect for Winter

Hey guys! Happy new year! It’s still really cold here in Japan so I thought I’d kick off the new year with a video introducing Japanese NIMONO, a type of stew that is a great dish to warm you up in the winter!

This nimono I’ll be using chicken thigh but feel free to mix things up and try whatever ingredients you want!
00:00 Intro
00:53 Make the Dashi Stock
02:40 Prepare the Chicken Thigh
03:07 Prepare the Vegetables
04:44 Put our Stew Together
07:20 Let's Eat!

Ingredients:

Home-made Dashi:

- 700ml Water
- Dried Kombu (Kelp), one piece
- 15g Katsuo-Bushi (Bonito Flakes)

Nimono Stew:
- 350g Chicken
- 1 Burdock Root
- ½ Carrot
- ¼ Japanese Daikon Radish
- 2 Shiitake Mushrooms
- Green Beans (handful, in pod)
- One Block of Konnyaku (This is called devil’s tongue in english!)

How to make:
- Your Nimono Stew will taste better if you prepare a dashi stock beforehand, you can use water or store-bought packet dashi but if you want to make your own follow these steps:
- Soak a piece of Kombu (dried kelp) in a saucepan with 700ml of water for 30 minutes
- Turn on the heat and when the water starts to boil, remove the kombu or else your dashi may turn a bit bitter - also remove any foam from the liquid if you notice any.
- Add 15g of katsuo-bushi (bonito flakes) to the water and then bring back to a boil - let that boil for 2-3 minutes
- Then using a colander and kitchen towel/a clean kitchen cloth - drain your dashi stock and set aside

- For the stew:
- Remove any moisture from your chicken thigh with a paper towel and cut off any sinew or fatty parts of the chicken
- Then heat a pan to a medium heat (you can use oil but if the chicken still has it’s skin it will crisp up just fine) and place you chicken skin-side down
- Cook until the skin of your chicken turns a nice golden color and remove - (you don’t want to cook the chicken just give the skin a nice texture and render off some of the fat in the skin)
- Now prepare your vegetables, (you can use anything you want in your nimono but I used the following)
- ¼ Daikon peeled and then cut into bite sized chunks, ½ carrot peeled and cut into chunks, 2 shiitake mushrooms with stalks removed and cut into chunks
- For the burdock - scrape off the skin with your knife, cut off the hard end parts and wash - then cut diagonally so it absorbs more of your nimono stew
- Cut the hard ends off the green beans
- Now in a sauce-pan add your dashi stock from before (it probably evaporated a little to about 600ml at this stage), 2 tbsp sugar, 3 tbsp of mirin, 3 tbsp of soy sauce
and bring to a boil
- Then add your chicken and all the vegetables except the green beans
- For the konnyaku, tear it up by hand and add it in - the rough edges help it better absorb the flavor
- Use aluminum foil to create a ‘lid’ for your sauce-pan just a bit smaller than the pan - this will evaporate some of the liquid and help concentrate the flavor or your nimono as well as spread the flavors more evenly throughout all the ingredients
- Let that sit for 20-30 minutes until the vegetables are soft (poke them with a skewer or chopstick to test)
- Finally, add the green beans for 2-3 minutes with the foil lid back on and then take them out so they don’t over-cook
- Plate up your delicious and warm winter Nimono Stew

Видео EASY Japanese Stew | Perfect for Winter канала Champ's Japanese Kitchen