February 12, 2009

Chicken Breasts vs. Thighs/鶏の胸肉と腿肉

I made chicken breast kara age the other day. I prefer breasts to thighs because the former is less expensive and less fatty. An interesting fact about chicken meat is that breasts are less expensive than thighs in Japan, while the opposite is true in the United States.
先日、鳥の胸肉の唐揚げを作りました。私は胸肉のほうが腿肉より安いし脂が少ないので好きです。鶏肉に関する興味深いことは、日本では胸肉のほうが腿肉より安く、米国ではその逆だということです。

Traditional Japanese cuisine is said a cuisine of subtractive mixing or a cuisine of subtraction because it involves a number of subtractive steps such as the extraction of dashi from dried bonito shavings and kombu, the removal of bitter, harsh, and other unwanted components from ingredients, and parboiling, and this is one of the reasons why chicken thighs are preferred in Japan. Thighs are cooked in ways to reduce their excess fat.
伝統的な日本料理は減算混合の料理または減算の料理と言われます。鰹節や昆布から出汁を抽出する、素材から灰汁などの不要な成分を取り除く、湯がき(湯通し)する、など減算的な工程を多く含むからです。このことが日本では腿肉のほうが好まれる理由の一つです。腿肉は余分な油を減らすように調理されます。
Note: The phrase "cuisine of subtraction", as used here, has nothing to do with the "Cuisine of Subtraction", the food philosophy of the sushi restaurant Sushi-Ko in the United States.
注:ここで言う「減算の料理」とは、米国の寿司レストラン「Sushi-Ko」の食に関する考え方「Cuisine of Subtraction」とは関係ありません。

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I often had trouble eating chicken when I lived in Chiba Prefecture. It was often too fatty and made me feel sick; though most of my food consumption was kyuushoku, which may have had something to do with that. I didn't realize that thigh meat was used rather than breast meat. Suddenly I understand why my Japanese friends politely ate very little of my homemade kara age. >.>;;

Hiroyuki said...

amazedtodeath: Thanks for your comments, and sorry for my late reply. I noticed it only today! You mean you make your homemade kara age with chicken breats??