Oden is a classic
Japanese fish stew much beloved in the wintertime, when
little
street stalls ladle out bowls of
goodness. In entertainment
districts, around dusk, blue tents pop up out of nowhere to serve
oden and
beer,
only to disappear again by dawn. The name is
obscure: originally named after a
type of classical dance called
dengaku (why? beats me...), the name first acquired the honorific
o-
and then dropped the
-gaku, resulting in just plain
oden.
To the uninitiated, the taste may also be a little obscure at first, since oden
consists of various mysterious fish products boiled for hours on end in a
very Japanese-flavored broth. It is also notoriously difficult to eat with
chopsticks; just try picking up a slippery whole boiled egg!
Ingredients
The easiest way to prepare oden is to go to your friendly neighborhood
Japanese food shop and buy an "oden set", which contains all the bits you would
have trouble procuring otherwise. The real way, though, is to mix and match
the stuff you like, more probably than not including a few of these:
Chikuwa: Hollow, tubular cakes of processed fish. Looks scarily like a squid
tentacle due to the odd suction-cup-ish bits on the surface, but tastes like fish.
Daikon: Japanese giant white radish. To prepare, peel and cut into slices
2-3 cm thick. Score gently with a knife tip, drawing an X on both sides.
Boil until soft and translucent; you can add a handful of rice to the water to
absorb some of the bitterness.
Eggs: Shelled hard-boiled eggs are excellent (for chopstick practice too).
Quail's eggs (uzura no tamago) can also be used, but outside Japan they
are not really worth the extravagant price difference.
Kamaboko: Thin white slices of fish sausage.
Kombu: Kelp. To prepare, soak until wet, slice into 2x10 cm bits, fold once and
tie into a knot.
Konnyaku: Bizarre, very firm, almost tasteless jelly. Slice into matchbox-sized
chunks to prepare. Not one of my favorites,
and hard to find outside Japan anyway.
Satsuma-age: Deep-fried kamaboko.
Taro: A type of sweet potato. You can substitute almost any tuber, including
but not limited to plain old potato, yam, turnip, even rutabaga.
To prepare, boil until almost cooked.
Tofu: Many types of tofu can be used in oden. Just plain raw momen-type
(hard) tofu cut into large cubes is great for absorbing the broth. Deep-fried
tofu and vegetable cakes (ganmodoki) are also frequently spotted.
Tsumire: Fish balls (as in "spherical objects", not "testicles").
You can make your own by substituting ground fish into your favorite meatball
recipe.
The above are all orthodox oden ingredients, but almost anything goes;
the one criterion is that it should retain its shape and not dissolve into the broth.
Also note that, unlike most Japanese food, the chunks in oden are considerably
bigger than bite-size; this allows some flavor to be retained despite the long cooking
time.
Broth
If you bought an oden set, it more likely than not included a little baggie of
concentrated oden broth. If not, try this for approximately 4
servings:
6 cups water or weak dashi
1/2 cup sake or very dry white wine
3 tbsps mirin
3 tbsps soy sauce
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
Instructions
Bring broth to boil, stirring well. Add the prepared ingredients of your choice
and simmer over a low heat for a bare minimum of one hour, during which time the
broth should be reduced by about one-third.
When done, place the pot on the table and let diners serve themselves. The usual
accompaniment is a dash of the strongest mustard you can find and large
quantities of beer. Itadakimasu!
Oden keeps well for about two days and is generally judged to be tastier
on the second day.