Simmered Stuffed Aburaage (Shinoda-ni)

Surprisingly juicy and tasty, Simmered Stuffed Aburaage is a perfect dish to go with rice. It looks like Inarizushi, but the aburaage pouches are stuffed with pork mince. Thinly sliced lotus roots and shiitake mushrooms beneath the aburaage pouches add different textures to the dish.

I found a Simmered Stuffed Aburaage recipe in my old Japanese recipe book published in 1981. In this recipe, the filling is just pork mince with finely chopped green onions. The stuffed aburaage pouches are cooked with sliced bamboo shoots and shiitake mushrooms.

I changed the recipe slightly and added a couple of finely chopped vegetables to the mince, which made the filling more interesting with different textures. I also adjusted the simmering broth slightly.

Left: Recipe from my old cookbook. Right: My dish.

About Shinoda-ni

The recipe in my old cookbook does not mention this, but today’s dish is also called ‘shinoda-ni’ (信田煮). Aburaage is called ‘shinoda’ (信田) in the Kansai region (the western region of Japan), so simmered dishes with aburaage as a main ingredient are called shinoda-ni, where the word ‘ni’ (煮) means simmered.

The name ‘shinoda’ came from the famous Shinoda forest in Osaka prefecture, which is known for the Japanese legend of a white fox. Since the fox was also associated with aburaage in Japanese mythology (as I mentioned in my recipe Kitsune Soba), ‘shinoda’ was linked to aburaage.

I like the way Japanese people adopt the name of the dish based on history, legend, and/or analogy. The dish name does not even represent the key ingredient or the cooking method. It is so imaginative and creative. Some examples of the name of such dishes include Gisei Tofu, Mizore-ni, Rikyū Age, and Kitsune Soba. I explained where these names came from in each post.

What’s in My Simmered Stuffed Aburaage (Shinoda-ni)

• Aburaage
• Lotus roots cut into thin quartered pieces
• Rehydrated dried shiitake mushrooms, stem removed and quartered
• Oil.

The original recipe uses boiled bamboo shoots instead of lotus roots. I didn’t have bamboo shoots, so I substituted it with lotus roots that I happened to have. I think it worked well. If you have bamboo shoots, by all means, please use them. You can also use other vegetables that are suited for quick simmering.

Aburaage Filling

• Pork mince
• Finely diced rehydrated dried shiitake mushrooms
• Finely diced carrot
• Finely chopped green onions
• Corn flour/cornstarch
• Ginger juice, squeezed from grated ginger
• Soy sauce
• Cooking sake.

You can substitute the vegetables mixed into the pork mince with other vegetables such as edamame, burdock, and lotus roots. Some recipes also add hijiki seaweed.

Simmering Broth

• Dashi stock
• Shiitake dashi from rehydrating the dried shiitake mushrooms
• Soy sauce
• Sugar.

Garnish

• Finely julienned green onions, soaked in cold water.

In my recipe, Cold Nyūmen, I talked about shiraga negi – the white part of green onions finely julienned. Today’s garnish is very similar to it, but I used the green part of green onions today. I diagonally julienned them to make long strands. When you leave them in cold water for a while, they start curling and become decorative.

How to Make Simmered Stuffed Aburaage (Shinoda-ni)

Making Stuffed Aburaage Pouches

1. Remove the excess oil from aburaage by submerging them in boiling water or pouring boiling water over them.
2. Drain, cool them down, then halve each aburaage crosswise so that you get two squarish aburaage pieces.
3. Gently squeeze water out of the aburaage pieces and make a pouch from each aburaage.
4. Mix diced vegetables and corn flour/cornstarch in a bowl, then add the remaining Aburaage Filling ingredients to the bowl. Mix well.
5. Fill the aburaage pouch with the mince mixture and fold the opening to secure the pouch.

Cooking Stuffed Aburaage

1. Sauté lotus roots and shiitake mushrooms in the pan, then place the aburaage pouches radially on top of the vegetables.
2. Add the Simmering broth to the pan and simmer.
3. When most of the broth evaporates, turn the heat off.
4. Transfer the dish by sliding the pouches and vegetables to a serving plate and garnish with the julienned green onion.

If you are worried about the folded end opening while cooking, you can put a toothpick through, as if you are sewing, to secure the end.

I slid the cooked dish onto the plate to maintain the same radial presentation of the pouches, but it is not a ‘must’.

Simmered Stuffed Aburaage is not an eye-catching dish in terms of colours, but it is a typical home-cooking dish that has a great taste. Because the aburaage absorbs the broth, the moment you bite into the pouch the delicious flavour of the broth fills your mouth.

You can serve Simmered Stuffed Aburaage as a main or a side. You just need to change the number of pouches per serving. It keeps 2-3 days in the fridge.

Yumiko

5 from 1 vote

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Simmered Stuffed Aburaage (Shinano-ni)

Prep Time

15 mins

Cook Time

8 mins

Total Time

23 mins

 

Surprisingly juicy and tasty, Simmered Stuffed Aburaage is a perfect dish to go with rice. It looks like Inarizushi, but the aburaage pouches are stuffed with pork mince. Thinly sliced lotus roots and shiitake pieces beneath the aburaage pouches add different textures to the dish.

Don't forget to see the section 'MEAL IDEAS' below the recipe card! It gives you a list of dishes that I have already posted and this recipe that can make up a complete meal. I hope it is of help to you.

Recipe Type: Main, Side

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: aburaage recipes, fried tofu recipes

Serves: 10 pieces

Author: Yumiko

Ingredients (tbsp=15ml, cup=250ml)

• 5 sheets aburaage
• 80g/2.8oz lotus root
• 3 dried shiitake mushrooms (rehydrated, medium size, note 1)
• 1½ tbsp oil

Filling

• 200g/7.1oz pork mince
• 2 tbsp dried shiitake mushrooms rehydrated and finely diced (note 1)
• 2 tbsp carrot finely diced into 3mm² /⅛in² cubes
• 2 tbsp green onions finely chopped
• ½ tbsp ginger juice (squeezed from grated ginger)
• ½ tbsp soy sauce
• 1 tbsp cooking sake
• 1 tbsp corn flour/cornstarch

Simmering Broth

• 1 cup/250ml/8.5fl oz dashi stock
• 1/5 cup/50ml /1.7fl oz shiitake dashi (from rehydrating the dried shiitake mushrooms)
• 2 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 tbsp sugar

Garnish

• Curled julienned green onions (note 2)

Instructions

1. Slice the lotus root about 3mm/⅛" thick, then quarter each slice. If the diameter of your lotus root is small, halve it.

2. Remove the stem of shiitake mushrooms and quarter them. If your mushrooms are small, halve them.

Make Aburaage Pouches

1. Place 5 sheets of aburaage in a bowl/pot and add boiling water. Jiggle and drain. Let them cool down.

2. Cut each aburaage in the middle crosswise to make two square pieces. You will make 10 pieces.

3. Take 2-3 pieces of aburaage at a time, spread them on your palm, and stack them up. Place the other hand over the aburaage and press to squeeze the water out of them. This way, you won't break the delicate aburaage pouches.

4. Open each aburaage from the cut side, by gently detaching the tofu stack inside and make a pouch. Ensue the tofu at the bottom corners of the pouch are also detached.

Filling

1. Put carrot, shiitake mushrooms, green onions, and corn flour into a bowl and mix well.
2. Add the rest of the Filling ingredients to the bowl and mix well until the vegetables are evenly spread in the mince and the mince mixture becomes sticky.
3. Divide the filling into 10 equal portions.

4. Taking one aburaage pouch at a time, put one portion of the filling inside the pouch. Press the filling down to fill the corners. The filling should come up to around half of the pouch. Fold the opening to close the pouch (note 3).

Cooking and Serving

1. Heat the oil in a frying pan large enough to place 10 pouches without overlapping, over high heat.

2. Put the lotus roots and shiitake mushrooms into the pan and sauté for 1-2 minutes, turning over the vegetables.

3. Place the aburaage pouches, folded side up, on top of the vegetables radially. (note 4).

4. Add all the Simmering Broth ingredients to the pan and bring it to a boil. Reduce heat to medium and cook for 3 minutes with a lid on.

5. Remove the lid, turn the pouches over and cook for further 2 minutes or so, without the lid, until a small amount of liquid is left (note 5). Turn the heat off.

6. Slide the contents in the pan, including the broth, onto a serving plate maintaining the position of the pouches (note 6).

7. Put the julienned green onions in the middle and serve.

Recipe Notes

1. I used 5 dried mushrooms in total. They were medium sized when rehydrated, and 2 of them were finely diced for stuffing.

If your mushrooms are very small, you need to increase the number of mushrooms.

2. To make them decorative, diagonally slice green onions very finely, with a sharp angle so that each strip becomes long (more than 5cm/2” long). Then put the julienned green onions in cold water to curl up. It is similar to making shirahga negi but slightly easier to make.

3. If you are worried about the folded end opening while cooking, you can put through a toothpick, as if you are sewing, to secure the end. See the sample photo in the post. But don't forget to remove the toothpick when serving!

4. I placed the pouches radially hoping to slide the cooked dish from the pan to a large plate, maintaining the presentation. If you prefer not to place the pouches this way, that’s OK too.

5. If the evaporation is too fast, reduce the heat to slow it down. You may also need to add a small amount of water to keep cooking.

6. If it is too hard to slide the dish onto a plate without messing up, put the pouches on one side of the pan and transfer the vegetables to a serving plate, then place the pouches on top of the vegetables.

7. Nutrition per pouch. 1/10 of the vegetables and broth is included.

serving: 102g calories: 181kcal fat: 14g (18%) saturated fat: 3g (15%) trans fat: 0.0g polyunsaturated fat: 3.5g monounsaturated fat: 6.6g cholesterol: 15mg (5%) sodium: 274mg (12%) carbohydrates: 7g (3%) dietary fibre: 1.1g (4%) sugar: 1.7g protein: 7.7g vitamin D: 0mcg (1%) calcium: 89mg (7%) iron: 1.0mg (6%) potassium: 247mg (5%)