Gyudon is that beef rice bowl you see everywhere in Japan. It’s delicious and it’s super easy to make. Japanese fast food.
There’s nothing to it. Beef, onion and a simple sauce served up on a bed of rice. Maybe topped with a poached egg if you want to get really fancy. Some pickled ginger. A bit of green onion.
Gyudon is the Yoshinoya beef bowl
This is that beef bowl. The Yoshinoya beef gyudon. The Japanese equivalent of the fast food burger.
Yoshinoya is a chain that’s all over Japan. There’s a few in California as well. I still remember the first time I had it. Love at first bite.
Like most things Japanese there’s more than meets the eye. Yoshinoya has been serving up gyudon since 1899. Yes, I got the date right. And it’s huge. Everywhere.
It’s not even the biggest gyudon restaurant chain in Japan. That title goes to Sukiya. Another huge chain. Haven’t been to Sukiya. Will have to try that next time.
gyudon - japanese beef bowl
Ingredients
gyudon
- 12 oz thinly sliced ribeye or sirloin
- 1/2 large onion sliced thinly
- 1/2 cup dashi made from hon-dashi (see note below)
- 2 tbsp mirin
- 3 tbsp sake
- 2 tbsp low sodium soy sauce
- 2 tsp sugar to taste
- 1 tbsp shiro miso - white miso
To serve
- short grain white rice
- pickled ginger
- green onion
- shishimi togarashi
- poached egg (optional)
Instructions
gyudon
- Combine dashi, mirin, sake, soy and sugar in a wok or saute pan large enough to hold all the ingredients. Bring to a simmer over medium low heat..
- Mix in the miso. One trick I like is to put the miso in a small strainer and work it through into the soup base. That way you aren’t chasing miso around pan. That sucks.
- Add the onions, bring to a simmer and cover. Cook until the onions are soft. This takes about 5 minutes.
- Add the beef and continue cooking until just done. This takes no time at all. It depends on how thinly sliced the beef is, of course. Few minutes max.
- At this point taste. It may need more salt. That’s why I use low sodium soy. Easy to add salt. Impossible to take it away.
- Serve over rice and garnish with pickled ginger, green onion, sesame seeds and shichimi togarashi. A poached egg makes a nice addition. The creamy egg yolk with the beef and rice. Yum. A bowl of miso soup makes a great start to this meal.
Notes
Nutrition
Chicken tortilla soup is a soup that eats like a meal. It is loaded with chicken, tortillas and lots of garnishes.
This is pretty authentic chicken tortilla soup. There are a couple of tweaks that might get me in trouble with purists. But if you want a satisfying bowl that’s better than your local Mexican joint read on.
Poach the chicken in chicken stock
This is soup. And the backbone of soup is stock. So it makes sense to try to get every bit of chicken flavour into your soup. At least it makes sense to me.
That starts with gently cooking the chicken in the stock. That’s a trick you should always use. Gently poach your chicken in stock. Gently is the operative word here. You want to take your time. Bring the chicken up to an internal temperature of 175F.
If you have time then put the chicken bones back into the stock after you remove the chicken. Cook it some more. There’s flavour in those bones.
