Sakana no Nitsuke Recipe (Japanese Simmered Fish)

Hey everyone, I'm Yuto and today on Stachy I'm going to show you how to make a flavourful Japanese simmered fish dish called Sakana no Nitsuke. Let's get straight to it. I'm going to start with two fillets of fish and sprinkle them with salt to draw out the excess moisture. I'm using a kind of red bream called Kinmedai today but you can use any kind of white fish like cod, flatfish or even mackerel. You can also use whole fish instead of fillets if you prefer. Let the rest for 10 minutes. While you wait, cut 20 grams of fresh ginger into slices. We will add this to the sauce later. Next take the fish and make a shallow cross on the skin sides making sure not to go too deep. Then we're going to wash the fish. So place it in a heatproof bowl and prepare a bowl of ice water next to it. Pour freshly boiled water over the top and then after about 10 seconds transfer the fish to the ice water to stop it from cooking. Now place it on a chopping board and pat it dry with kitchen paper. Next take a pan big enough to lay the fish flat and add 150 milliliters of water, 150 milliliters sake, 45 milliliters of mirin and 30 grams of sugar. Turn the heat on medium and stir until the sugar has dissolved. Once it's dissolved place the fish in the liquid with the skin side facing up and then add the ginger slices from earlier. Now we'll wait for that to come to a boil. Once it starts boiling lower the heat and place a droplet on top, set a timer and let it simmer for three minutes. A droplet is pretty important for this recipe since it will prevent the delicate fish from breaking. If you don't have one you can use a piece of foil or baking paper instead. I have a video on how to make your own droplet so check it out if you're interested. While you wait measure out 50 milliliters of soy sauce. After the three minutes are up remove the droplet and pour the soy sauce in one third at a time. Baste the fish until the soy sauce has dispersed into the rest of the sauce before adding the next third. Once it's all added place a droplet back on and simmer for 10 minutes. While we wait for that I'm going to blanch some komatsuna or Japanese mustard spinach to serve on the side. Start boiling a small pot of water and cut the spinach into five centimeters pieces. Prepare a bowl of cold water in advance then blanch for a minute. If you can't get this komatsuna you could use regular spinach or bok choy instead. When a minute is up scoop them out and place them in the cold water to stop the cooking process and preserve their bright color. So 10 minutes have passed let's check on the fish. Remove the droplet and baste the liquid over the surface. As the final step we will keep doing this until the liquid is reduced to one third of its original volume. When it looks like this we're ready to serve. Carefully transfer the fish to a plate and garnish with ginger. Place the mustard spinach on the side and drizzle with the sauce. You definitely will not use all the sauce so you can save it for something else such as a secret ingredient for stews or even curries. So there you have it delicious sakana no nitsuke made with red bream. Thanks so much for watching if you want to learn more about this recipe check out the written version on my blog the link is in the description. Hope to see you next time have a great day.