Why We Love This
Dashi is the key ingredient to Japanese cuisine! It brings that classic umami flavour without tasting fishy.
What is Dashi?
Dashi is a popular variety of Japanese soup stocks, with the most commonly used being Ichiban Dashi / Awase Dashi – a three ingredient dashi made from water, katsuobushi and kombu.
What is Dashi Powder?
In many places it can be hard to track down the ingredients to make fresh dashi from scratch, which is where dashi powder is becoming very popular to use instead. Dashi powder is great when you’re short on time, travelling or camping, or can’t get the ingredients. It’s now widely found in most big supermarkets or Asian grocers.
Dashi Variations
Ichiban Dashi / Awase Dashi – Full strength dashi made from katsuobushi and kombu. This is the recipe we’re sharing today, and one of the most popular used in Japan!
Ichiban Dashi vs Niban Dashi
Ichiban Dashi means “first stock”, it is the strongest dashi stock and what is used in most Japanese recipes that call for dashi stock.
Quick Dashi Recipe – Japanese Soup Stock
Ichiban Dashi (number one dashi) is the backbone of Japanese cuisine. Dashi brings the umami richness through lightly simmered kombu and bonito flakes. Ready in 30 minutes, this quick soup stock is a Japanese household staple to take your hot pots and soups to the next level!
What is Dashi
The first character 出 is the verb dasu, which means “to take out,” and the second character 汁 means juice or liquid. Read together; dashi literally means that the flavor from one ingredient has been taken out using a liquid. This makes dashi the generic word for soup stock in Japanese.
What is Hondashi?
Hondashi (ほんだし) is a brand name which literally means “real dashi.” It comes in dried granules that look a bit like beige colored coffee crystals and melt almost instantly on contact with water. The irony here is that Hondashi is loaded with MSG and flavorings.
What about Dashi Packs?
Dashi packs are porous satchels holding powdered ingredients for dashi such as konbu and katsuobushi. They’re a relatively recent invention intended to bridge the gap between the ease of using powdered dashi granules and the flavor of making dashi from scratch.
Ingredients for Japanese Dashi
Like any living thing, the taste of konbu is affected by many factors including temperatures, currents, and the nutrients carried in those currents. The harvesting, processing, and curing of konbu can also have an impact on its flavor, and as a result, Japan has 45 types of konbu.
How to make Dashi from scratch
Before I get started, I should mention that there are many ways of making dashi, and what I’m going to share with you is a method I learned from a Japanese chef that I’ve refined over the years.
How to use Dashi
Dashi is a pillar of Japanese food, and is one of the ingredients that gives Japanese food it’s distinct flavor. Here are just a few Japanese Recipes that feature dashi as a primary ingredient:
What Is Japanese Clear Soup?
This simple broth-based soup is primarily made of meat broths and vegetables simmered together over a long period of time to create a deep rich flavor.
Best Japanese Clear Soup Recipe
We feel the very best homemade Japanese Onion Soup is made with 2 parts chicken broth, 1 part beef broth, and extra water to allow for evaporation.
How to Make Japanese Clear Onion Soup
Start by searing large chunks of onions, carrots, ginger, and garlic in a stockpot. This helps release their flavors.
Get the Full (Printable) Japanese Mayabi Clear Soup Recipe Below!
Hibachi Clear Soup is a fun way to bring your favorite restaurant flavors home.
Japanese Clear Soup Recipe
This classic Hibachi restaurant favorite is a light and healthy soup to soothe the soul.
Ingredients
Real tonkotsu soup uses just pork leg bones. But I used chicken carcases and pork soup bones – the neck and back bones cut into smaller pieces. You will need about 1 kg/2.2lb of pork bones and 1-1.25kg/2.2-2.6lb of chicken carcasses to make 4-6 servings of soup.
Keys to A Good Ramen Broth
If you let the bones and the other ingredients simmer for a long time, you will be able to make a soup stock. But it’s not going to be a good and tasty broth because coagulated blood on the bones and other unwanted substances get mixed into the broth making it extremely cloudy and degrading the flavour.
Ramen Soup Flavouring
There are no seasonings added to the soup stock. When you taste it, you only taste the flavour of bones and vegetables.
Simplest Soy Sauce Flavour
I had been experimenting with the ‘tare’ recipes and I am now happy with three basic flavourings. The easiest of my three ‘tare’ is the soy sauce flavour and I have included short instructions to make shōyu ramen in today’s recipe.
What is Katsuo Dashi?
Katsuo Dashi (かつおだし) is made from katsuobushi (かつおぶし, 鰹節), dried and fermented bonito/skipjack tuna that is shaved into thin flakes. In Japanese cooking, the distinct umami taste from katsuobushi plays an important role to help heightening flavors and senses.
How to Make Katsuo Dashi
Just like all types of dashi, Katsuo Dashi is unbelievably easy to make.
Katsuo Dashi (Bonito Stock)
Learn how to make Katsuo Dashi, Japanese soup stock made from dried bonito flakes. This stock enhances your Japanese meal with authentic flavor!
