Nikujaga
Beef and potatoes simmered in dashi, soy and mirin until the potatoes have soaked up the broth and started to fall apart at the edges. The Japanese equivalent of a dish your mother made.
Photograph credit: Nikujaga at yakiniku restaurant just outside Moon Beach by Syced · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons
What Goes With It
- Steamed rice and miso soup
- Pickles
- Cold barley tea
Sides from the same cuisine on this site: Japanese Milk Bread (Shokupan), Nasu Dengaku.
How to Make Nikujaga
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Soak the potato chunks in cold water for 10 minutes, then drain — this removes surface starch that would cloud the broth.
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Heat the oil in a wide pot and fry the beef over medium-high heat for 2 minutes until it changes colour. Do not brown it hard.
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Add the onions and cook 3 minutes until they soften at the edges.
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Add the potatoes and carrot and turn everything in the pan for 2 minutes.
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Pour in the dashi, sake and sugar, bring to a simmer, and skim off any grey foam that rises.
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Add the soy sauce and mirin, then lay a circle of baking paper directly on the surface as a drop lid.
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Simmer gently for 20 to 25 minutes until a skewer slides into the potatoes with no resistance.
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Add the shirataki for the last 5 minutes if using.
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Take off the heat and leave to cool in the broth for at least 30 minutes — this is when the flavour goes in. Reheat gently and scatter with snow peas to serve.
Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.
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Notes From the Method
The paper drop lid is the whole technique. It keeps everything submerged in half the liquid you would otherwise need.
Let it cool in the broth before serving. Straight from the heat it tastes thin.
Waxy potatoes hold together; floury ones dissolve into the broth.
Leftovers
Refrigerate up to 3 days and it improves. Reheat gently. Freezing makes the potatoes grainy.
Common Questions
How long does Nikujaga take to make?
15 minutes of preparation and 35 minutes of cooking, plus 30 minutes of cooling, so allow 1 hour 20 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 4.
Nikujaga Nutrition
No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (some ingredient lines cannot be read). Why some recipes have none.
Your notes on this recipe
Cooked this? Keep a note for next time
Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked. Found a mistake? Tell us.
First published ; last changed .
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