Tsukune (Japanese Meatballs)

How to make Tsukune?

Tsukune is a traditional Japanese dish. Japanese meatballs are meat balls first boiled in water, and then grilled. We used chicken meat, you can also diversify with pork or beef. This dish is prepared with homemade sauce from mirin, soy sauce, sugar, garlic and ginger. Japanese meatballs turn out a little sweet because of the sauce, but that’s the piquancy. If you want to add spice to this dish, then we recommend adding cayenne pepper flakes to the sauce.

When preparing Tsukune, we used a clever trick. Minced meat was formed with a measuring tablespoon and a small knife, so the hands do not get dirty with sticky minced meat. A spoon with minced meat was placed in hot water and the spoon was knocked several times on the bottom of the pan. The minced meat easily fell out of the spoon and the shape of the meatball remained round.

Recipe type: Chicken

Recipe type: Japanese

Yield: 4-6

Prep time: 25 mins

Cook time: 1 hour

Total time: 1 hour 25 mins

Ingredients:

Garlic — 2+2 cloves

Green onion — a bunch

Chicken breast — 1 piece (540 grams)

Fresh ginger — 25 grams

Chicken egg — 1 piece

Salt — ½ teaspoon

Soy sauce — 120 ml + 1 teaspoon

Corn starch — 1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon

Mirin — 120 ml

Cane sugar — 2 tablespoons

Directions:

1. Cut the chicken breast into small pieces.

2. Peel the garlic and grate it on a fine grater.

3. Peel the ginger and grate it on a fine grater.

4. Cut the green onion into small pieces.

5. Minced meat: in a blender cup, add pieces of chicken breast, half grated garlic, half grated ginger, one chicken egg, green onion, salt, 1 teaspoon soy sauce, 1 tablespoon corn starch. Make minced meat!

6. Sauce: in a saucepan, mix 120 ml of mirin, 120 ml of soy sauce, the remaining half of garlic and ginger, 1 teaspoon of corn starch, 2 tablespoons of cane sugar.

7. Cook the sauce over medium heat until it starts to thicken (it took us 15 minutes). Stir the sauce all the time so that it doesn’t burn.

8. Pass the sauce through a fine sieve.

9. Using an ice cream spoon or a measuring spoon to form balls from minced meat. It is not convenient to do it with your hands, since the stuffing is very sticky.

10. Bring the water to a boil in a saucepan. Dip each ball in water and cook until it floats to the surface.

11. Put a few chicken meatballs on skewers.

12. Grease a frying pan or grill with oil and fry each chicken ball for 2-3 minutes on each side. Pour the sauce over the top. Leave some sauce to serve.

Serving: Serve hot, sprinkle a little sauce on top and sprinkle with chopped green onions, sesame seeds.

Bon Appetit!