Donabe Niku-miso Rice

I was in a mood for making a rice bowl dish one night.

The very rustic Lu Rou Fan I had in Taipei was so delicious that I just couldn't forget the experience. So, as an homage to their incredible comfort food, although it's not quite the same, I made my version of pork-over-the-rice dish with my donabe.

It's a quick Niku Miso Gohan (miso-flavored ground pork over rice), cooked with soup & stew donabe, "Miso-shiru" Nabe. This very thick-body donabe does a great quick braising (also great for slow cooking).

For my regular Niku Miso Gohan, you can find it on toiro's website. It's really good! But this time, I tweaked the recipe to make it more like Chinese-style, by sauteing garlic & ginger in sesame oil, adding doubanjiang (Chinese hot bean paste), and garnishing with cilantro. The miso was our homemade miso. Oh, and I also simmered boiled eggs with the meat sauce, too!

In less than 15 minutes, my new Niku-miso Gohan was ready and smelled so nice. It was served over the freshly made rice, cooked with the double-lid donabe rice cooker, "Kamado-san", and garnished with some cilantro, blanched asparagus, and quick-stewed boiled egg. Bravo! This dish was so complete and so tasty. I actually had a second serving after so quickly finishing the first bowl. So, here's the quick recipe:

Chinese-style Niku-miso Gohan

Ingredients

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 tablespoon ginger, minced

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 to 1.5 teaspoons doubanjiang (Chinese hot bean paste), optional

14 oz ground pork (fatty kind)

4-5 shiitake mushrooms, cut into small cubes

1/4 cup sake

1/4 cup miso

2 tablespoons brown sugar

soft boiled eggs

cilantro

blanched cut asparagus

cooked donabe rice

Procedure

1. In Miso-shiru Nabe, saute the garlic and ginger with the sesame oil over medium to medium-low heat.

2. Once they are fragrant, push them to one side. Add the doubanjiang to another side and let it cook until it's fragrant.

3. Add the pork and stir. Once the pork is almost cooked through, add the shiitake mushrooms and stir.

4. Add the sake, miso, and brown sugar. Stir.

5. Add the boiled eggs. Cover with the lid and simmer for 5 minutes.

6. Turn off the heat and let it rest for 10 minutes.

7. Serve over the rice with cilantro and asparagus.

One of the side dishes was steam-fried Taiwanese spinach, with the tagine-style donabe, "Fukkura-san". It's also super-easy to make, and such a delicious one-pot side dish. I just sauteed garlic in sesame oil until browned, covered the skilled with the spinach, steam-fried with the lid on for 3 minutes. Uncover to add 1 tsp of chicken powder, some salt and pepper, toss, and cover again. Turn off the heat and the dish is ready.

It was a perfect collaboration of three different donabe pots. Donabe did all the magic.

Happy donabe life.