Yakitori sauce?

[Fred]

I made yakitori last night for the second time with a new recipe for the sauce. It is just soy sauce, mirin, sake and sugar. It is brought to a boil and cooked for a minute before cool down. It wasn't bad.

I seem to remember that the yakitori shops in Tokyo had a sauce that was more like a glaze than the completely liquid sauce described above. How do you suppose the Japanese thickened it. Miso? Arrowroot? Corn starch? something else?

[Grouch]

In Japan, was the thickened sauce translucent (kudzu or arrowroot) or opaque (cornstarch)?

[Fred]

translucent

[esvoboda]

Increasing the proportion of mirin to about the same as the sake will turn the sauce into more of a teriyaki sauce (teri=gloss) though this will increase the sweetness but you could compensate by reducing the amount of sugar. I've seen some yakitori sauce recipes that included roasted chicken bones. I'm not sure how common that is. With some reduction I think you'd get a thickening effect like you would with reduced chicken stock due to the gelatin from the bones. Reduced soy sauce gets quite salty and the prolonged heat doesn't do it any favors flavorwise so I'd add some to taste later if you went this route. If you just want to thicken the sauce, kuzu, katakuriko (potato starch), or arrowroot would work. I think you have an opportunity to create your own "house" yakitori sauce. :)

[blwchef]

Eds right. We use potato starch or duck demi glace depending on the application.

[esvoboda]

Chicken demi glace would be an obvious enhancement but duck demi glace? That must be awesome!

[Fred]

Thanks, guy. I know where to go with it.

Continuing on my Japanese cooking adventure, I made a scallop and vegetable tempura last night and some avocado maki rolls without the nori (my wife, you know.) That and miso soup made up the complete meal. I nailed the soup perfectly for our taste. I used just a tiny bit of dashi - enough to provide a little flavor without making the soup "fishy." It worked out pretty well. Tomorrow - pork chops.

[blwchef]

Chicken demi glace would be an obvious enhancement but duck demi glace? That must be awesome!

I make a redwine cracked black pepper teriyaki for grilled quail or other game sometimes. I love mixing french and japanese sauce techniques.

[boar_d_laze]

I'm no expert on Japanese culinary techniques but I think plain old reduction is how most thicken their yaki sauce. Standard reduction is in the 1/3 - 1/2 range. You should get gloss at about the nappe stage of thickness. Watch out for saltiness, but since you're cutting the soy sauce with mirin/sake at pretty close to 50/50, plus adding sugar you're not going to get anything saltier than the soy sauce with which you started.

You can enrich with chicken bones, chicken broth, or dashi. The dashi is a very nice touch, especially with salmon. A little weird on chicken liver, though. I've also used onion or scallion and ginger for body and flavor. Just strain 'em out when the reduction's done.

Rich