Are you interested in winter root vegetables? Find a gobo burdock at your neighbor farmers market or food stores. You can make delicious kinpira dish at home. In Japan gobo is a long (20 inch), thin (1 ½ -inch in diameter at the thicker end), brown root vegetable. Locally grown gobo from the farmers market in my neighborhood is short and plump. Gobo in general has a pleasant crispiness and earthy taste. The flavor of this American cousin is much richer and tastier than the...
Read MoreShun and Burdock gobo
Suddenly in the past couple of days in NYC we are enjoying (with a big ?; we did not have a real cold usual winter) spring like weather. Some people are already switching sweater and coat to tank top and summer dress. Now I am eagerly waiting for lamps at our local Union Square farmers market. Lamps has become my shun favorite at early spring after moving to NYC 13 years ago. Here is a part of shun description, an excerpt from my upcoming book, Hiroko’s American...
Read MoreTraditional burdock, gobo, dish, Yanagawa Nabe
Yanagawa Nabe is a dish which is served in a shallow, small-sized hot pot, in which fresh water fish called dojyo and thinly shredded burdock are cooked together with egg. The dish is locally famous and there are some specialty restaurants in Tokyo. I tasted the dish with my parents several times when I was little, but was not excited about the flavor of the fish – a kind of muddy taste. Dojyo (a kind of loach) is about 7 inch long and has distinctive 10 short whisks...
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