This is a quick side dish. Eggplant goes so well with miso and green capsicum adds bright colour to the dish. My Miso Stir Fry with Eggplant, Capsicum and Pork uses thinly sliced pork but you can make it with mixed pork (ground pork). Or even without meat. Then it becomes a vegetarian dish.
If you ask Japanese people what the classic miso stir fry dish (miso itame, 味噌炒め) is, they will all say ‘Miso Stir Fry with Eggplant and Capsicum’. Each household might have different flavouring in the sauce and the vegetables might be cut differently, but the basic sauce is made of miso, sugar, soy sauce, sake and mirin.
Perhaps because of the sweet flavour, children usually love this dish even if there are a lot of vegetable pieces in it. And it goes very well with rice.
Eggplant flesh melts when cooked in oil and it goes so well with miso. Capsicum is also a good friend of sweet miso flavour. No wonder this dish is a classic ‘miso itame’ dish in Japan.
When I had just migrated to Australia, the only eggplant I could find was the large eggplant which was about 15-18cm (6-7”) long and 6-8cm (2½-3”) wide. I had a fit when I saw them for the first time at the vegetable shop because the eggplants I was familiar with back in Japan were half the length and half the diameter of the Aussie eggplants.
But these days, I can get smaller eggplants. They are sold as ‘small eggplant’ in Sydney. The small eggplant is half the width but the length is often almost the same as the large eggplant. It is kind of in between the large eggplant and the Japanese eggplant. But the skin is tender.
I occasionally find small eggplants that are half the length of the large eggplant, similar to the Japanese eggplant. Then, I feel an urge to buy them even if I have no plans to cook eggplant.
I know many dishes that use eggplant but some of them are suited to smaller eggplants. For example, eggplant tempura is cut in half lengthwise, then cut half way to make a fan shape, as you can see in my post, Tempura. This shape cannot be made using a large eggplant.
Because the colour of eggplant is a beautiful deep purple, I think that people try to keep the skin of the eggplants intact to show the colour in Japanese dishes. With the large eggplant, it is very difficult to cut them into small pieces while keeping the skin on every piece because there is so much flesh compared to the amount of purple skin.
Incidentally, the skin of the Japanese style eggplants is soft and we even eat raw eggplants by softening the very thin slices of eggplant with some salt, i.e. quick eggplant pickles. I once tried the salted eggplant pickles with the large eggplant but I failed miserably. The skin was so tough that I could not chew it and the flavour was not nice at all!
But when stir frying, like today’s Miso Stir Fry with Eggplant, Capsicum and Pork, I can use a large eggplant and still have purple skin on each piece. Cut the whole eggplant lengthwise into quarters or 6 long wedges, then cut each wedge perpendicular to the first to cut into bite size pieces (see the photo below).
It’s also quite alright to use small eggplants, of course. It’s just that you need to cut them differently. If I was using a small eggplans, I would either halve it lengthwise, then cut into smaller pieces in the same way as with the large eggplant. Or I would use the roll cutting method, particularly if the width of the eggplant is narrow. This roll cutting method is called rangiri (乱切り) in Japanese and I posted the step-by-step photos of how to roll cut in Sweet and Sour Pork Meatballs (Subuta).
I added sliced pork belly to this dish to give it a bit of volume. But you don’t need to use meat at all. You can also make miso stir fry with just eggplant or just capsicum and they will still be tasty.
The key to this dish is the flavoursome sweet miso sauce. This sauce will work well with any combination of the three ingredients in this recipe. Just adjust the amount of meat and/or vegetables to match the total quantity of meat/vegetables against the quantity of sauce.
Yumiko
This is a quick side dish. Eggplant goes so well with miso and green capsicum adds bright colour to the dish.
My recipe uses thinly sliced pork so you could make this dish as a main for two with a bit more meat.
You could also make it without meat. Then it becomes a vegetarian dish.
- 200 g (7oz) thinly sliced pork belly cut into bite size pieces (note 1)
- 300 g (10.6oz) eggplant , cut into quarters vertically, then into 3cm long pieces
- 150 g (5.3oz) capsicum , cut into 1.5cm (⅝") wide strips
- 1½ tbsp oil
- ½ tbsp sesame oil
- 25 g (0.9oz) miso (note 2)
- 1 tbsp each sake and mirin
- 1½ tsp sugar
- ½ tsp soy sauce
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Add all the Sauce ingredients to a bowl or a jar. Mix well until the miso is well combined and is lump free.
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Add ½ tablespoon of oil to a frypan over medium high heat. Cook pork for a couple of minutes until slightly burnt and cooked through. Transfer the meat to a plate.
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Turn the heat down to medium low and add remaining oil and sesame oil to the pan.
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Add eggplants and cook for a couple of minutes rotating each eggplant piece so that all sides are cooked.
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Add capsicum and cook further 5 minutes (note 3) or until eggplant becomes soft. Add the cooked meat and mix.
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Add the sauce (note 4) and turn up the heat to medium high. Cook until only a small amount of sauce is left.
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Serve immediately.
1. Instead of pork belly, you can use other parts of the pork such as pork loin, pork tenderloin. As long as meat is not for stewing and is suitable for sautéing or stir frying, it should be fine. You can use pork mince (ground pork) if you wish.
2. 25g (0.9oz) of my miso was a slightly heaped tablespoon.
Saltiness varies depending on the type of miso. Usually, the lighter the colour of the miso, the sweeter and less salty it is.
3. My capsicum was very large and the flesh was quite thick. So I needed to cook it for about 5 minutes. But if your capsicum is smaller with thinner flesh like those you find in Japan, then you will only need to cook the capsicum pieces for few minutes. This means that you cook for about 5 minutes in step 4 and a few minutes in step 5.
4. Mix the sauce while pouring it into the stir fry as the sugar is most likely sitting at the bottom of the sauce bowl/Jar.
I am very happy I have finally made this recipe. Miso and eggplants really work well together. I didn’t have pork so I have used thinly sliced chicken breasts marinated in some soy sauce and sake (leftovers from other recipe).
It will be a regular addition to our menu.
Thank you for your blog
Hi Anita, yes, chicken can work too. Glad you tried that.
I made this for lunch the other day and it was delicious!! The sauce works so well with each ingredient, and together they combined into something wonderful! Not too heavy that you feel groggy for the rest of the day but filling enough to give me plenty of energy! I wasn’t able to keep my eggplant skin so beautifully purple, but I guess that just means I will need to try to make it again!
Hi Emma, that’s great. It goes very well with rice. It is difficult to keep the colour of the eggplant skin when stir-frying. I did not do it but if you really want to keep the colour, you could quickly fry them first to lock in the colour, then stir-fry for a shorter period.
Hello yumiko, I would like to know what kind of miso would be better for this recipe?
White, red or awase miso?
Hi Ruth, normal brown miso is the best for this recipe. Don’t buy miso with dashi stock in it as they tend to be saltier and you don’t need dashi in this recipe, either.
I mean awake miso is also brown miso.
thanks for this recipe !!! Today I could try this recipe and it was better than I expected, I am definitely a fan of the recipes you publish, especially those that use miso slightly sweetened, very delicious.
Hi Ruth, I am glad that you liked it.
Hi Yumiko,
I am fairly new to your recipes but they all look gorgeous. I have made only one of them, the smashed cucumber salad, and it was really fun to smack that cucumber around. Especially since the dish turned out so well. It is a new favorite in my small family of two.
No longer am I drawn to fussy recipes, primarily because we live in the very rural midwestern United States and many ingredients are just not available readily. Going to the “big city” of our small area is a trek but still, there are very few Asian stores or even big supermarkets that carry some of the ingredients that both you and Nagi can get in Sydney.
I would like to use this recipe as a main dish for three people this weekend. Do you have any suggestions or recommendations other than increasing all ingredients? Thank you for very detailed instructions, it is very helpful for those of us unfamiliar with Japanese cooking.
Hi, do you mean adding other ingredients to give this dish more volume? If so, you could add cabbage cut into bite size, sliced onions, scallions cut into 2″ long. If you are asking about different thing, please let me know.
Yes, I suppose that was most of my question. Because you said that it is served as a side dish, I wondered what could be done to make it a main dish. Your suggestion of cabbage, onions and scallions is great. What about using tofu instead of pork? How much of all the vegetables, as well as tofu or pork, would it take to make a main dish for 4 people? I was in Springfield, which is our “big city” here in southwestern Missouri, found a great Asian market and was able to get some organic red miso as well as beautiful, long Japanese eggplants. So now I am more excited than I was before because I can make the recipe and maybe it will taste like yours (I hope!).
Thank you, Yumiko, for your generous suggestions.
Hi Faith, tofu would be great to add to this dish in addition or instead of meat. If main dish, I would increase the quantity by 50-80%. Simply increase the amount of meat/vegetables. Which vegetable/meat to increase is really up to you.
Yumiko-San,
Just made this and was really delicious! Here in Hawaii, we’re lucky to have Japanese eggplants. Thank you for posting all your recipes.
Hi Sachi-san, that’s great. Ah, Japanese eggplants. I envy you!
Hey Yumiko
I’ve never bought or tasted eggplant in my life but at the Brisbane Wednesday markets I’ve been admiring the different varieties and today I bought some small round graffiti eggplants as your recipe looks amazing.
They’re about the size of a golf ball so I thought I should for the recipe I’d be able to get away with quartering them? Your thoughts?
I remember a 100 years ago, a vegetarian friend would eat the big black eggplants but she had to salt it heaps prior to BBQing. I see they’re still selling them but the cute purple & white variety looks so more appealing.
I buy about 6 different green veges each Wednesday so I thought I could whack some of these into the stir fry as well.
Also, on a Sunday night I chop up 10 containers full of mainly Asian greens, take 2 to work each day and whack them into the microwave for 2mins and give them a hit of oyster sauce. If I were to cut the eggplant on the Sunday, would they last a couple of days in a container with the other veges?
Hi Barb,
Your thinking of quartering each graffiti eggplant would be the best way to go. They should be great for this dish.
As for your second question, flesh of eggplant (white bit inside the skin) becomes brown when it is exposed to the air. If you mix them with other vegetables, it might also become brown. If you must cut them in advance, wrap them tightly so that there is no air contact and place them in a sealed container to keep. Also, as you cut them, you need to place them in a bowl filled with water which stops eggplant pieces from contacting the air even before wrapping to store.
Well-cooked eggplant melts in your mouth. I hope you like eggplant.
Hi Yumiko
I made it twice on the weekend and absolutely loved the dish. I used it as a side dish to Nagi’s Vietnamese Caramelized Pork and last night as a side with BBQ’s pork chops.
The sauce is really, really good and is so good with the veges. I don’t think there’s anything stopping me in the future from enjoying eggplant. I see what you mean about them turning brown when cut. I’ll bring them to work whole and quarter them just prior to microwaving them.
Thanks again, we really enjoyed this.
This looks so wonderful and fresh. Here in Sweden we also have issues finding proper Asian eggplant. They’re usually the size of a small rugby ball. But, I’ll give this a try using what I can find and see how it goes. Love stir-fry’s.
Although my eggplant was also large and not the Asian size, it wasn’t as big as your eggplant in Sweden. You may cut them into 6 or even 8 lengthwise, then slice thin into bite sizes. The key is to have purple skin on every piece.