Nikujyaga

I would like to inform you one of the Japanese traditional meal today.
What do you imagine about a Japanese traditional food? A sushi? A nattoなっとう? A sukyaki?
Have you heard Nikujyaga肉じゃが before? We cook Nikujyaga for dinner many times in Japan and it tastes different depending on a home. Some people use beef but some people use pork for the Nikujyaga.

For the first I am going to share the meaning of Nikujyaga here.
Niku means meat and Jyaga means totatoes that is to say Nikujyaga is a meal made of meat and potatoes.

I share you how to cook Nikujyaga.
You cut some vegetables that an onions, carrots and a lot of potatoes.

Usually we put some Konjacこんにゃく it’s made from the starch of devil’s tongue. Do you eat Konjac in your country? We often eat it for boiled dishes and we have some kinds of Konjac for example a plate konjac, ball konjac and strings of konjac. We also have tied konjac like the pictures. The tied konjac consists of strings of konjac. You are difficult to chew a konjac because it is spongy and very rubbery so that it’s in risk for kids of sticking in their throat. And the tied konjac is easy to chew for kids and I often use the tied konjac for cook.

This is a main ingredient! I choose beef for Nikujyaga. Beef is more expensive than pork though. My mother that her home town is in east of Japan chooses pork for nikujyaga.

In this connection I may add that the Japanese people who live in east of Japan tend to use pork for cooking and people who live in west of Japan tend to take beef for cooking. Actually a curry rice made of pork in east of Japan and made of beef in west. I like both though.

Anyway you boil them for about 20 minutes seasoned by some soysauce, sake for cooking, sweet sake and some sugur.

All done!
It’s easy to cook and you can take a lot of good nutrition! You can try cookng!

See you next time!