Monday Dinner: Ginger pork

Tonight, I grilled ginger-marinaded pork and cooked rice with daikon radish. Rice cooked with vegetables and sometimes meat or fish, called takikomi gohan, is a very popular rice dish in Japan.



Ginger pork (for 3 people):
Pork (10 oz) - I used pork butt, but you can use leaner cut if you want.
Ginger (1 medium piece)
Ground sesame (1 Tbsp) - Use a food processor to grind sesame seeds.
Soy sauce (3 Tbsp)
Mirin (2 Tbsp)
Cooking wine (2 Tbsp)
Vegetable oil (1 Tbsp)

1. Slice pork as thinly as you can. Using half-frozen meat makes it easier to do.
2. Combine all the other ingredients and create marinade.
3. Put pork in the marinade and let it sit for 5-10 minutes.
4. Heat vegetable oil in a pan on high heat. Grill pork until all sides are brown.

I served it with broiled Chinese broccoli that I found at the farmer's market. You can use any greens, like pak choy, spinach, and broccoli. It looks kind of dry in the picture, but meat actually stays pretty moist and juicy. You should definitely try this Asian marinade.

Daikon rice (for 3-4 people):
Sticky Korean/Japanese rice (1.5 cup)
Daikon radish (about 1/2 cup of sliced white part - about 2-3 inches - and 1/2 cup of chopped leaves)
Sesame oil (1/2 Tbsp)
Soy sauce (1 Tbsp)
Cooking wine (1 Tbsp)

1. Peel and slice daikon radish (little bigger than bite size). Chop up the leaves.
2. Heat a pan with sesame oil on high heat and stir-fry daikon pieces and chopped leaves.
3. When they are tender, put soy sauce in, but not directly on daikon. Let soy sauce heat up for a second or two until it smells nice, then mix everything together.
4. Put cooking wine and mix everything together. Turn the heat off and set it aside.
5. Wash rice and put water in as you would normally cook rice. Add daikon in the rice.
6. Cook as you would normally cook rice.

It's kind of hard to get daikon with nice green leaves, so it's OK if you only have the white part.

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