Braised aubergine/ Nasu nibitashi

I think I don’t need to tell you any more how much I love Japanese cuisine. Most of the time when I’m cooking at home I’m trying to stay close to the Japanese diet and cook something tasty and nutritious that is ready in short period of time. In this post I like to show you another favourite aubergine dish of mine, called nasu nibitashi or braised aubergine. It is can be consumed as a starter or as a side dish.

Nasu nibitashi

As the Japanese aubergine is quite difficult to find outside of Japan I’m using ordinary abergines. Try to find small and narrower pieces when you shopping.

This recipe uses fresh homemade dashi, that I shared earlier in my recipes, but for the easier use I will share it again. Really recommend to cook your own as it’s makes a big difference.

For the dashi you will need:

• 6-8 g dried kombu seaweed
• 10-15 g katsuobushi ( bonito shavings )
• 1 liter water

For the rest of the recipe:

• 2 smaller aubergine
• 200ml dashi
• 30 ml mirin
• a level tbsp of cane sugar
• oil for cooking ( 100-150ml, I used sunflower )
• grated ginger
• finely sliced spring onion for garnish

1. First, make the dashi stock. Soak the kombu in a liter of water for at least 1-2 hours, than start warming up until you see small bubbles forming in the bottom of the pan. Take out he kombu and add the katsuobushi. Turn up the heat, but as it’s just start boiling turn off straight away. Let the binito soak for a few  minutes or until it’s sinks to the bottom.
2. Drain the stock through a kitchen paper towel to another pan and here you have the dashi, the Japanese stock.
3. Cut the abergines lengthway half and make about 1 cm deep parallel cuts on the skin 3-4 mm distance from each other ( see pictures above ). Cut them half again for a smaller sizes. On a medium heat warm up the sunflower oil, use a large pan to fit all your aubergines in it.
4. If you prefer you can deep fry them too. This way the skin going to be equally submerged in the oil so you can avoid the “discolouring”. Although I prefer the shallow frying in this recipe.
5. Start on the skin side down, cook them for 3-4minutes than turn them to the other side and continue cooking until they are soft. Mix together 200ml dashi with the soy sauce, mirin, sugar and optionally some grated ginger.
6. Pour over the a aubergines and cook them until they are completely soft and some of the liquid evaporated. They should be soft enough that you can eat them with chopstick too.

Eat them right away hot, warm or chilled. Serve it with freshly grated ginger and some finely sliced spring onion. Any way you choose to eat it, it’s delicious!

Save the leftover dashi stock, you can freez it or keep it in a fridge for 3-4 days. Use it in another Japanese recipe. Have a look around on my blog in the Asian recipe section, you will find your favourites.

Enjoy!