Authentic Japanese Cooking: Early Summer Tempura

Overview

Our theme this episode is deep-frying. We’ll be making tempura, an iconic Japanese dish, using ingredients that come into season in spring and early summer. The keys to great tempura are a light, crispy batter, and using fresh ingredients. The great flavors of the ingredients are emphasized by deep-frying them in batter, for a delicious result. We’ll also be making aka-dashi red miso soup with shijimi clams, which goes wonderfully with tempura. The shijimi clams give the soup a great flavor along with the red miso, for the perfect palate cleanser after eating tempura. We hope you’ll join us and learn how to make tempura, usually found only at specialty restaurants, at home!