Furofuki Daikon is thick-cut Daikon radish cooked in Dashi broth and served with seasoned Miso sauce poured on top. When Daikon is cooked in boiling hot broth, it gets very hot, much more than some other ingredients, because of its high water content. Furofuki Daikon is a traditional Japanese winter dish from old times to warm you up, and it is not a coincidence that Daikon is in season and at peak flavor in cold months there.
Furofuki means “bath blowing” literally, but with Daikon, what does that mean? There are a couple of different stories coming from the name, but the simplest one is that a person who blows to cool hot Furofuki Daikon resembles a person who prepares a hot bath by blowing on firewood. Nobody heats bath water that way today, and the name has lost that context; however, it just emphasizes again that the dish is super hot!
Daikon pieces for the dish are nicely chamfered (cut with angled edges), and the style is called Mentori. Mentori is one of the important techniques in Japanese cooking. Removing (or rounding) the edges or corners helps keep vegetables from falling apart in the process of cooking in boiling liquid. Daikon is not as soft as Kabocha squash and less likely to break up, but it will still look nice if you take one more cutting step during cooking. Also the Daikon is precooked in water with rice because an enzyme from rice is thought to tenderize Daikon radish. Traditionally cloudy water from washing rice is used to cook Daikon, but you may not have that water on hand when you want to cook Daikon.
The Miso we used here is Shinshu Miso, a kind of white Miso, but you can use Awase (mixed) or even red Miso. Different Miso have different sweetness, so you may want to adjust the amount of sugar to put in the sauce. Yuzu is also a taste of Japanese winter, so if you are able to get it, definitely add it to the sauce. It gives a nice fragrant citrus flavor. If you can’t find it, just leave it out.
This winter feels colder than usual even for southern California. You might not want to go out at all anyway with the virus and everything. Cook hot Furofuki Daikon, eat, and get warm at home!
Furofuki Daikon Recipe
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Ingredients
- Daikon 6″ long
- 2 Tbsp rice
- 6 cup Kombu Dashi
Yuzu Miso Sauce
- 1/2 cup white Miso Paste
- 1/4 cup Mirin
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup Kombu Dashi from cooking
- 1/4 tsp grated Yuzu
Instructions
- Cut Daikon 1 1/2″ long (4 cm), Peel the skin, cut the edges at an angle (chamfering).
- Put Daikon and rice in a pot, and add water to submerge the Daikon. Cook at medium heat until just boiling, lower the heat, cover, and cook until soft for 30-40 minutes. Remove Daikon from water and wash or rinse to remove rice.
- In a large pot, put Daikon and Dashi. Cook for 20-30 minutes at medium-low heat. Keep hot while making sauce.
- In a small pot, put Miso, Mirin, sugar, and Dashi, then cook until thickened. Turn off the heat and mix in grated Yuzu.
- For each serving, place a Daikon piece in a dish and pour sauce over the Daikon.
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