Dutch Heritage
One of my favourite things as a child was when my grandma picked me up from elementary school for the lunch break. The excitement was due to my absolute favourite Dutch snack, a broodje kroket. A deep fried crust of bread crumbs filled with meaty ragu stuffed inside a bread roll.
The soft bread roll offers a pillow-y undertone to the hearty crunch of the kroket. Although I prefer it with a hard bread roll and a few slices of cucumber, with matching looks of outcry and despair from my fellow citizens. Sorry to disappoint you guys.
The Dutch cuisine is home to many deep fried foods well they are more snacks anyway. We even have the "bamischijf" which is a disc filled with stir-fried noodles and then deep fried.
What all these snacks have a common is a thick brown bread crusted layer that is often filling and gives them it's trademark crunch.
Tempura
The first time I went to a quality Japanese restaurant, I had a tasting menu. One of the dishes on it was "tempura". I was familiar with tempura through cafés where it's usually served on the snack category. Often these frozen tempuras are reminiscent of the Dutch snack category with a thick crust.
So when the dish arrived, the first thing I noticed was the difference in colour. It was definitely more of sand colour rather than the dark brown colour I knew. The second feature was the lack of covering, the batter didn't necessarily cover the whole vegetable. Hmm.. interesting. Hold up, a vegetable? I was quite surprised since I hadn't seen a deep fried vegetable before.
On that note; In the UK I stumbled upon a snackbar that sold deep fried snickers, shrug.
The tempura vegetable grew on me and I couldn't wait to taste it. There was a soy sauce accompanying the dish but when I taste something new, my first bite is always "raw". So I lifted the lotus root and took a bit. That bite shifted my whole perspective on deep fried food.
The batter was so incredibly light and airy, the lotus root moist and chewy and I immediately understood the purpose of the sauce in the context of the palette of the dish. I finished the lotus root and my eye was drawn to the plate, A PRAWN in tempura!
Once again, the prawn was light and it had the perfect crunch.
Whenever I am in an unfamiliar city I give myself the task of finding a Japanese spot that serves tempura. It is truly a delight for ones tongue and wellbeing.
The Originator
Tempura is one of the trademarks of the Japanese cuisine. All thanks to Portugal.
In 1543, a Chinese ship with three Portuguese sailors on board was headed to Macau, but was swept off course and ended up on the Japanese island of Tanegashima. These sailors were the first Europeans to step foot on Japanese soil.
The islanders saw them as barbarians as they came from the south and didn't look like them. Japanese was in a middle of a civil war so the Portuguese set up a trading post to trade guns. The trading grew and items like soap tobacco, wool and recipes were trade
1603, the Edo period. The Japanese shogun Iemitsu saw Christianity as a threat to the country and banished it. Thus banishing the Portuguese traders from the country. The Portuguese left their mark with a recipe called "Peixinhos da Horta" or "Little fishes from the garden". That was also my neighbourhoods cat favourite dish.
Funny enough Peixinhos da Horta is not about fish. They are green beans fried in a flour batter. The word tempura comes from tempora which means "time" (ad tempora quadragesima), and refers to the "Ember Days". A period where Christians don't eat red meat and stick to vegetables and fish.
The Michelin starred chef Jose Avillez said:
“So the way around that (referring to Ember days), was to batter and fry a vegetable, like the green bean. And just to add to it, we called it peixinhos do horta, little fish of the garden. If you can’t eat meat for that period of time, this was a good replacement. When the poor couldn’t afford fish, they would eat these fried green beans as a substitute”
The Japanese people simply took over this dish and improved it like they did with Ramen and green tea that both came from China. The Japanese are simply not limiting the ingredients to green beans. They use everything from shitake to sweet potatoes.
At that time oil was a luxury good thus it was a luxury to eat tempura. During the Edo period the Japanese culture of Yatai grew. Yatai refers to famous food stalls of Japan. The food stalls were descendants of the food stalls that were located near Buddhist temples. As dignitaries travelled between the city and the shrine, the food stalls were a convenient option.
Eventually the yatai introduced themselves to the city. Later down the line when oil became more accessible deep fried foods became a staple of Yatai and so tempura was introduced to the masses.
Tempura grew particularly popular around the Tokyo Bay, as it was rich in seafood. It was often served with a trademark soy sauce and shaved radish.
Due to the technological advancements of the 20th and 21st century. Cooking oil became cheap, add globalism to the equitation and tempura became a worldwide favourite.
But as with all things getting it perfect is one of the hardest things to do.