Day 11 and we are off to the Land of the Rising Sun
Day 11 of 2018 World Cup we stay in the east and take a quick hop over to Japan to cook Tsukune.
Tsukune is basically a pork meatball, although they are also often made with chicken. They can be grilled or add to soups. Yakatori restaurants will grill them on a skewers, which was how I was hoping to cook them.
The Cook
I followed the recipe which you can see in the steps below. However, there was far too much liquid added, which resulted in the pork mixture being too wet. I will try this again but will reduce the amount of sesame oil added and would also consider not adding the egg.
I combined all the ingredients into a food processor and then shaped into balls. I put them in the fridge for a couple of hours on a plate. Next time I will wrap each one individually in clingfilm and leave in the fridge for a minimum of 4 hours.
As the mixture was so wet I didn’t think skewers would work so cooked these on the Weber Griddle, with some added oak wood chunks.
Towards the end of the cook I brushed the meatball with the sauce a couple of time.
The Verdict
These turned out better than I thought they would. They were quite moist and had absorbed quite a lot of the smoke. The flavour of the mixture before cooking was quite strong, which was a good thing but they got lost a little in cooking. Definitely want to try these again but need to make a few tweaks.
BBQ Tsukune
- Prep Time15 min
- Cook Time20 min
- Total Time35 min
Ingredients
For the Tsukune
- 500g Pork Mince
- 2 Shallots
- 1 Garlic Cloves (crushed)
- 1/4 tsp Ginger
- 1 egg (beaten)
- 1 tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Pepper
- 4 tbsp Sesame Oil
- 2 tsp Sake
- 1 tsp Sugar
For the Sauce
- 1 1/2 tsp Soy Sauce
- 1 1/2 tsp Mirin
- 1 tsp Sake
Method
Combine all the ingredients in a food processor and mix until the pork mixture until it looks a little sticky.
Shape the mixture into 6 meatballs, put on a plate, cover with clingfilm and place in the fridge for 4 hours.
Set the BBQ up for direct cooking, add the griddle and let it heat up. Place the pork balls in the griddle and cook, turning every 5 minutes.
Combine all the ingredients to make the sauce and then after 15 minutes baste the pork balls. Cooke for 5 minutes then turn the balls over and baste again.
Remove from the BBQ and let them cool a little. We ate these on there own but you could serve with some boiled rice and veg to make more of a meal of the dish.
