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 My father used to make "Suki Yaki" once
in a blue moon. It would be an all-day affair, with
trips to an Asian grocer and much boiling of bones and
other exotic and possibly occult kitchen activities.
At the end of all that there would be a huge pot of
what I consider to be the most delicious stuff ever
to be set on the table in a huge pot. This is a recreation of that recipe. The recipe
is called "suki yaki," but when I looked
up sukiyaki recipes online I found that that's not what
it is at all! Real sukiyaki is cooked at the table, a piece
at the time, by those who are dining, and the dish I
remember was cooked before being served. Hence the name
"pseuki yaki."
I was not able to get the actual recipe, as the "recipe"
card contains only a list of ingredients. So, I have
done my best to backwards-engineer it. I've gotten pretty
close, according to my memories of the original dish,
and as I tighten it up more I'll update this page.
What you'll need:
1.5 to 2 pounds of beef bones (soup bones)
1
block of firm tofu, sliced into dice-sized pieces
2
cups of dried shiitake mushrooms, reconstituted
(soaked) and squeezed dry
1.5 cups of canned
bamboo shoots, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 pound of well-washed & stemmed fresh spinach
leaves
3 oz of rice
sticks (rice vermicelli), broken into segments 3
inches long or less
1 large scallion or several
small ones, cut up fine
1/2 cups of soy sauce
4
tbsp of sugar
1 pound of very very very thin-cut
beef (shabushabu meat) if you can get
it, very thinly sliced beef if you can't
2
large pots - at least one should be stewpot-sized
- and a strainer
Notes on various ingredients:
- The meat: shabushabu meat is so
thin that you can cook it completely just by swishing
it around in hot broth for a few moments. You don't
really have to chew it; it practically falls apart
by itself. This is ideal for pseuki yaki, but you
may not be able to get this unless you can get to
a good Asian grocery. Second best is meat sliced
very thin across the grain by the butcher or whoever
has the meat-slicing job at the grocery store. Third
best - and what I have to settle for, sigh - is
wafer steak, sliced into strips about an inch and
a half long and as thin as I can manage.
- The rice noodles: The easiest way I have
found to break up the rice noodles, and also the
most satisfying, is to separate out the amount that
you plan to use and put it into a sturdy Ziploc
bag. (It must be sturdy. Flimsy off-brand bags won't
do!) Suck out all the air you can, seal it, then
put it on the ground and just walk all over it in
your socks. Crunch it up good!
- The shiitake: You can use whole dried
mushrooms, or you can get big inexpensive
bags of cut-up and dried shiitake. The whole ones
look prettier but you have to soak them for hours
beforehand (at least - I like to soak them overnight)
and then cut off the stems. The sliced ones reconstitute
more quickly - you can soak them for a half hour
- but don't look as pretty.
- The spinach: I buy a pound of spinach
and, while it's still in its bundle, cut off the
bottom 2 inches, which gets most of the stems. Then
I cut the whole bundle from top to bottom, 2 inches
at a time, to chop it into bite-sized pieces at
once. Wash the cut-up bits well.
On to the cooking of the food!
First, make the broth. In the large pot, add
enough water to cover the beef bones plus about an inch.
turn up the heat and bring it just up to a boil, and
then turn it down and let it simmer covered for at least
six hours. After the first hour, skim out the stuff
floating at the top. Check periodically, and when the
liquid boils down enough to uncover the bones add a
few more cups of water. When the broth is done, skim
as much of the fat off the top as you can. I do this
with a large spoon, dipping it just into the surface
so the fat floating above the broth will go into the
spoon. Then pick out the bones and pour the broth through
a strainer into the stew pot. (Alternately, you can
strain the broth, then put it in the refrigerator for
future use, in which case the fat will congeal on the
top and be very easy to remove.)
Put the pot with the broth on the stove and turn
the heat back up. When that reaches a gentle boil, add
in the shiitake, scallions, bamboo, soy sauce, and sugar,
and stir. Cover and let it return to a low boil. After
about 10 minutes add in the tofu and spinach. By this
time the pot should be getting pretty full, and you
might have to press the spinach down into the broth a
bit. Don't worry, the spinach will cook down, but add
in another cup or two of water anyway. Cover and let
that return to a boil, about 10 minutes. When it does,
add in the rice noodles. Cook for another 5 minutes.
Finally, add in the meat and stir well so it won't cook
in a clump. Take off the heat after a minute and serve
over or alongside rice.
My father used to eat this with raw egg, dipping
the stuff in the egg right before eating it. That's
not for me, but maybe some others may like that.
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