Photo: MaedaAkihiko · CC0
Karashi Renkon (Lotus Root Filled with Mustard Miso and Fried)
A Kumamoto dish: lotus root with every hole packed with mustard miso, coated in a turmeric-yellow batter and fried. Sliced 5-10mm thick, each round shows the filling set in the holes like a flower.
Ingredients
- lotus root · thick and straight, about 300g1 section
- vinegar · for the blanching water1 tbsp
- Mustard miso
- Japanese mustard powder (wagarashi)2 tbsp
- lukewarm water · about 40°C2 tbsp
- miso (barley or rice miso)150 g
- broad bean flour · optional, but without it the filling hardens as it stands1 tbsp
- Batter
- plain flour60 g
- ground turmeric1 tsp
- water80 ml
- rapeseed or neutral oil · for frying1 L
Steps
- ⏲ 5 min
Peel the lotus root and trim both ends so the holes run straight through. Blanch 5 minutes in boiling water with the vinegar and drain.
Stand it on end so the water drains out of the holes, and let it cool completely.
- ⏲ 10 min
Stir the mustard powder into the lukewarm water, leave it 10 minutes, then mix in the miso and broad bean flour.
Heap the mustard miso into a mound in a wide dish. Press the cut end of the lotus root down into it again and again until the paste comes out of the holes at the other end. Repeat from the other end.
Wipe the outside clean, wrap, and refrigerate for at least 5 hours.
Mix the flour, turmeric and water until it turns sticky. Coat the whole root, ends included, thickly and evenly.
- ⏲ 3 min 30 sec
Fry at 180°C, rolling it, until the batter sets and turns yellow.
Lift out, let it cool a little and slice 5-10mm thick. Eat as it is, or with soy sauce or mayonnaise.
Variations
- Mentaiko renkon. In Fukuoka the holes are filled with spicy cod roe instead of mustard miso.
- Karashi renkon chips. Thin slices fried a second time.
- Croquettes and sandwiches. In Kumamoto it also goes, crushed, into croquettes, or between bread.
Tips
- Mix the mustard with water and give it ten minutes. The heat takes time to develop (blooming spices).
- Fill it by pressing the root into a mound of paste. When it pushes out at the far end, the holes are full.
- Rest it at least five hours before frying.
- Batter it thickly and evenly, ends included.
- Rapeseed oil makes the yellow brighter. Together with the turmeric in the batter it fries a clear yellow.
- Do not vacuum-pack it. Wrap it, keep it in the fridge and eat it within two or three days.
- This dish has a food-poisoning history. In June 1984 vacuum-packed karashi renkon caused an outbreak of botulism: 36 people were poisoned and 11 died. The toxin was found in the mustard powder the factory had been using. Kumamoto's karashi renkon cooperative afterwards set a rule of making no vacuum-packed products. At home, do not seal it airless; keep it in the fridge and eat it soon.
More detail and the reasons why (1)
- The broad bean flour keeps it from setting hard. Japanese Wikipedia says the method has hardly changed since the Edo period, and that broad bean flour goes into the mustard miso to stop it hardening as it stands. The mustard itself was put in because of an old belief that oily food brings on a flush of heat. The batter is flour, turmeric and water worked until sticky, put on thickly and fried at around 180°C (deep-frying). For another dish that makes something of the lotus root's holes, a sweet one, see yeongeun-jeonggwa.
The basics behind this dish
- Blanching: Keeping Vegetables GreenBlanched vegetables go dull because of acid and heat. Why the pot should be large, why the lid stays off, and what the ice bath is really for.
- Salt: When You Add It Matters More Than How MuchThe same amount of salt either draws water out or seasons all the way through, depending on when it goes in. Osmosis, seasoning in layers, and why salt types are not interchangeable by volume.
- Knife Skills: Grip, Cuts, and Why Size MattersHow you hold the knife matters more than how fast you cut. The pinch grip, the claw hand, and why uniform size is a cooking decision rather than a cosmetic one.
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