A typical Japanese home cooking dish, Braised Burdock (Kinpira Gobō) is a vegetable side dish. Burdock root and carrot are cut into matchsticks and cooked in a slightly sweet soy sauce. It is very fast to make and can be made ahead of time.
- Roasted white sesame seeds
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Add oil to a saucepan and heat over medium high heat. Add burdock and sauté for a couple of minutes.
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Add carrots and mix well and cook for 30 seconds.
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Add water, bring down the heat to low and place a lid on. Cook for 2 minutes. (note 4)
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Remove the lid, add the remaining ingredients, turn the heat up to medium high and cook until the sauce almost evaporates.
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Turn the heat off and let it cool. Serve individually or in one bowl with sesame seeds sprinkled on top.
1. You can buy bags of frozen burdock that are already cut into match sticks or shredded. You can buy them at Japanese grocery stores and some Asian stores.
If you are using a fresh burdock, please refer to my post under the heading 'ABOUT BURDOCK' where I explained how to prepare it. Cut the root into 5cm (2") long pieces, slice each log 3mm (⅛") thick vertically, then cut the slices same direction into 3 mm (⅛") matchsticks.
2. If you are using shredded burdock, I would suggest that you cut the carrot to a size similar to the burdock pieces.
3. Chilli can be fresh or dried.
If you have diners who cannot handle chilli, you can omit this. And when serving, you can serve it with shichimi tōgarashi (Japanese chilli spice mixture) for those who want a bit of kick.
4. If water evaporates too fast, add some more water.
5. This is a perfect side dish for a bento box. It keeps 4-5 days in the fridge. If you are using fresh burdock, then you can freeze Kinpira Gobo.