July 16, 2011

Lightly Pickled Eggplants/なすの浅漬け

One of the reasons why I have decided to freeze the nukadoko (rice bran pickling bed) is that my family, including me, are not great fans of nukazuke. It's not that we hate it; it's simply that we are satisfied with having a few slices of nukazuke a meal. Because of the high sodium content of nukazuke, I prefer suzuke (vinegar pickles) to nukazuke, and I can have as many slices of suzuke as I want because of the relatively low sodium content.
ぬか床を冷凍することにした理由の一つは、私を含め、家族全員、ぬか漬けがそれ程好きではないからです。嫌いなわけではないですが、一食に数切れ食べれば満足です。ぬか漬けは塩分が高いので、酢漬けのほうが好きです。それに塩分が比較的少ないので、酢漬けは食べたいだけ食べれます。

Here is another type of pickle, light pickle:
違う種類の漬物(浅漬け)です:
Put 300-400 g eggplants in an I-wrap bag, add one bag of powder, and add 300 ml water. Put the I-wrap bag in the fridge.
なすを300~400 g、アイラップに入れて、粉を一袋入れ、水を300 ml入れます。冷蔵庫に入れます。
You can have lightly pickled eggplants in half a day to a day.
なすの浅漬けが半日~1日で食べられます。

20 comments:

fred said...

A whole pickled eggplant?
does it why called "lightly pickled"?

Hiroyuki said...

fred: Asazuke (light pickle) means something pickled in liquid for a short period of time, for example, overnight.

They were small eggplants (ko nasu), so I pickled them whole.

Sissi said...

What kind of powder do you use to pickle the eggplants? I have just bought white small eggplants yesterday on the market. They look very funny. It would be nice to try pickling them!

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: As you can see, a store-bought premade powder. The ingredient label lists salt, decomposed starch(?), lactose, and hydrolyzed protein, among others.
Probably such products are hard to come by outside of Japan.

You can make a simple asazuke without using such a product.

Sissi said...

Thank you, Hiroyuki!

fred said...

Oh, I see. I never made pickled eggplant!
The only one I ever made just pickled cucumber!(笑)
You know, pickled cucumber here using cucumber, carrot, shallot, & chili!!

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, could you give me some advice? I have seen somewhere someone talking about aubergine pickles with shiso leaves. I have beautiful, red shiso leaves and still my white aubergines. Do you think salting them and combining with chopped shiso will be enough?
(By the way, I looked for eggplant pickling recipes in Shizuo Tsuji's book and stumbled upon such a sentence "Do not give eggplant to your daughter-in-law" or something like this ;-) In Europe sayings go in general the other way round: the daughter in law is an angel, while mother-in-law is supposed to be awful. There is even a cactus called "mother-in-law's chair. It is particularly prickly of course...

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: I'm no expert on pickles.
Here's one recipe that sounds good:
http://darling.jpn.org/article/17115927.html
Japanese only

2 cucumbers
1 eggplant
3 myouga (Japanese ginger)
1 knob shin shouga (new crop ginger)

Salt: 2-3% of the weight of the vegetables
Red shiso: Volume equivalent to 2 umeboshi
Note: It is assumed here that the red shiso used to make umeboshi is used for the pickle. I know you don't make umeboshi; simply rub red shiso with salt and squeeze.

Put them all in a bowl, place a plate on top, and place a weight on top of the plate. Let sit for 1 hour.

The point is to use 2-3% salt. You can leave out other vegetables and use eggplants only.

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Aki nasu wa yome ni kuwasuna
秋茄子は嫁に食わすな。
Don't let your daughter-in-law eat autumn eggplants.

There are two possible interpretations to this very famous saying:
1. Autumn eggplants are so tasty that you shouldn't give them to your daughter-in-law.
2. Autum eggplants have the effect of cooling one's body, so don't give them to your precious daughter-in-law.

Which is true, I don't know.

Sissi said...

Thank you, Hiroyuki for the recipe and for the explanation of the saying. Shizuo Tsuji opts for the first explanation ;-) I think I am lucky to have a wonderful mother-in-law who would rather give me delicacies than keep to herself :-)
I will try this afternoon pickling my aubergines. I hope they will catch a beautiful colour!
(By the way, I think I have found a Japanese teacher. We start next week. Although, I don't fool myself: it will take years and years before I can read recipes... maybe understanding videos on youtube will come quicker! Talking about videos, have you seen this video on my blog?: http://youtu.be/1gD8nV8RlPU It is awful and funny at the same time!)

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Yes, I did, and I just don't know what to say...

Sissi said...

It's very intriguing... I was very curious to know you opinion!

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Sorry, I'm really out of touch with contemporary anime, and I am kind of indifferent to it. You should ask some young Japanese people, especially males, to get any decent answers...

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, I am completely ignorant of the Japanese anime, manga, etc.. I am not always even sure if a film is for children or adults! I think I prefer foodie tv series ;-) although this particular scene with the potato really made me laugh!

Sissi said...

I have just started to pickle aubergines with salt and a shiso leave (it took me some time to start it, my long-time preserves take me lots of time in the Summer...). I will check the results tomorrow! Thank you for the advice and instructions!

muskratbyte said...

Thank you for the eggplant pickle recipe - this looks like the same type as my favorite type of store-bought Japanese pickle!

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: I hope you like the asazuke.

muskrat: Are you talking about shibazuke 柴漬け?
A recipe in Japanese can be found here:
http://www.sirogohan.com/sibaduke
I'm thinking of making shibazuke in the near future.

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, I have left the salted aubergines all night covered with a plate and then with something very heavy. The skin is still quite hard, but maybe it's the aubergines' fault. The taste of the flesh is excellent though! And very surprising! I will wait several hours, maybe the skin will soften too.

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: I'm glad that you liked your asazuke.

There are varieties with soft skin that are suitable for tsukemono. The one I showed in this post is one example. I hope you can find such a variety.

Sissi said...

I suppose it must be a special Japanese variety... Maybe next time I'll peel it in a fancy (one row in two) way. This way I'll obtain something in the middle.