Inamuduchi
イナムドゥチ·(ee-nah-moo-doo-chee)
Obaa's Pot on the Stove: Slow-Simmered Weekend Comforts
Translating to 'imitation wild boar,' this soup is a nod to a time when Ryukyuan courts hunted the island's lush forests before grandmothers pivoted to Okinawa's undisputed staple: pork. It is a deeply savory, velvety bowl of pure comfort that smells exactly like an island kitchen. The magic lies in a dual-broth synergy of oceanic bonito and earthy pork, combined with the rigorous, fat-stripping boil of the meat known as abura-nuki. Boil the pork belly on a lazy Sunday, and you can assemble this undisputed king of holiday soups in fifteen minutes on a Wednesday.
Before you start
Tackle the pork boil on the weekend.
The abura-nuki technique takes an hour of gentle simmering. Do this on a Sunday, stash the pristine broth and cooked pork belly in the fridge, and you'll have a fifteen-minute assembly waiting for you on a busy weeknight.
Ingredients
- pork belly block1/2 lb
- water4 cup
- katsuo dashi2 cup
- dried shiitake mushrooms3 med
- konnyaku3 1/2 oz
- atsuage2 oz
- kamaboko2 oz
- shiro miso1/3 cup
- sugar1 tbsp
Method
- 01
Boil the pork belly whole to strip impurities and create a pristine broth.
Submerge the block of pork in 4 cups of water over high heat. The water will cloud with scum; skim this away diligently, then reduce the heat and simmer partially covered for an hour until a skewer glides easily through the meat.
- 02
Reserve the meat and the pure pork stock.
Remove the pork belly and let it cool. Save exactly 2 cups of the boiling liquid to serve as your foundational buta dashi, or pork stock.
- 03
Purify the konnyaku.
Konnyaku has an earthy smell straight from the package. Drop the block into a small pot of boiling water for three minutes to remove the odor, then drain.
- 04
Cut all solid ingredients into uniform matchsticks.
Okinawan aesthetics demand harmony. Cut the cooled pork belly, rehydrated shiitake, konnyaku, atsuage, and kamaboko into uniform rectangular strips roughly one and a half inches long and a quarter-inch thick.
- 05
Marry the oceanic and earthy broths.
In a large pot, combine the 2 cups of reserved pork stock with 2 cups of bonito stock. Bring to a gentle simmer, add the pork belly strips and shiitake mushrooms, and let them cook for ten minutes.
- 06
Thicken the soup with a sweet miso slurry.
Add the konnyaku and atsuage to the pot. Ladle a bit of the hot broth into a small bowl, whisk in the white miso and sugar until completely smooth, and pour it back into the pot to simmer gently for another five to ten minutes until velvety.
- 07
Finish with the kamaboko and serve.
Drop the kamaboko strips in right at the very end. Once heated through for about a minute, remove from the stove and ladle the thick, comforting broth into deep bowls.
Notes
Mimicking Okinawan sweet miso.
Authentic island white miso is exceptionally sweet and paste-like. Standard mainland Japanese white miso found in American markets is saltier; adding a tablespoon of sugar perfectly bridges the gap to recreate the island flavor.
Substituting the fish cake.
Traditional recipes call for Castella kamaboko, a yellow, egg-based fish cake practically impossible to find outside of Okinawa. Standard white or pink kamaboko is the universally accepted substitution.
From Cook Okinawan in America.