Tsukemono & Furikake Don (丼の振り掛けて漬物)

As you can see, I am working on my Japanese. I am not very good at it, because I rarely have an opportunity to practice. It took me a while to find all the symbols in kanji and hirigana for the title, let alone try and make sure I got it grammatically correct (or close... any Japanese language buffs feel free to correct it).

This dish is what I make when I don't feel like cooking. I guess you could say it is a hapa girl's version of PB&J, but it always surprises me how much I enjoy it.  Tonight, we only had leftovers enough for one person, so Mr. Mochi ate the leftovers and I threw this together for myself.

I have pontificated at great lengths about how much I love shiso katsuo ninniku so it is just as well that I am using it in a dish for this blog. Usually tsukemono like the pink pickled garlic are used as a garnish on or next to the main dish, but here I use them as star players. Also returning to bat is furikake, which I used in an earlier blog post to create the furikake chex mix. This is a much more traditional application of furikake and assuredly just as delicious.

Fukujin-zuke (福神漬) is another tsukemono that is actually much much more popular than my lil' faves shiso katsuo ninniku.  Fukujin-zuke is a tsukemono made with daikon radish and other ingredients pickled a bright red or reddish orange color. It is very crisp and snappy with a bright and sweet pickle taste, so it is usually served alongside curry. It is similar in taste and texture to takuan, which is also pickled daikon. Along with pickled ginger (benishoga) and pickled shallots (rakkyo), they are probably the most well known tsukemono outside of Japan, besides the ubiquitous gari ginger served with sushi and sashimi. For more info on tsukemono, see my shiso katsuo ninniku post.


Tsukemono and Furikake Donburi
(丼の振り掛けて漬物)

1-1 1/2 cups rice
1/2 cup shiso katsuo ninniku
1/4 cup fukujinzuke
1 tbs furikake
shredded shiso leaf, to garnish

Make sure the rice isn't hot, but rather warm or room temperature, or your furikake will get soggy and your pickles warm rather fast. Place the rice in a bowl, and sprinkle with the furikake. Mix the two types of tsukemono together, and pour over the top of the furikake. Eat immediately, stirring the toppings into your rice as your eat.

Feel free to substitute any type of tsukemono or furikake that you like and have on hand. If you are not using the garlic, you might want to cut down the amount of tsukemono since the garlic is bulky and a half cup of those goes less far than a packed half cup of something else. Honestly, I wish I had some takuan because I think the yellow color would go better with the pink of the garlic, but I didn't have any on hand. So the reddish orange and pink kind of clash visually, but they taste great together!

P.S. My dog ate most of my shiso when she had a stomachache, so I had no shiso to put on my donburi as I usually do. RIP my cute little shiso. Luckily a couple of sprouts survived, but I have to wait until they get bigger before I start stealing their leaves.

See Also:
Una-Tama Donburi
KFC Katsu Donburi
Mapo Tofu