Yosenabe (Japanese Hot Pot)

This is one of the easiest Japanese hot pots to make. You don’t have to follow any particular list of ingredients — you just add in whatever you want! Yose means to “gather up things” and that’s exactly what you’ll do when making this nabe hot pot. It’s the perfect way to use up a leftover vegetables or meats you may have sitting in your fridge. For the broth, you can purchase a pre-made broth mix or make your own with chicken stock, miso, or soy sauce, or even just water and kelp!

Ingredients

Fish and Meat

• 150g (5.3oz) white meat fish fillets, cut into bite size pieces (I used blue eye cod)
• 4 medium size prawns (shrimps), deveined (note 1)
• 4 mussels , beard removed, shell cleaned
• 150g (5.3oz) chicken thigh fillets, cut into bite size pieces

Vegetables

• 10 Chinese cabbage leaves (350g (12.3oz))

½ bunch spinach (100g (3.5oz))

• 50g (1.8oz) carrot, diagonally sliced into 5cm (2”) lengths
• 2 stems of shallots (scallions), diagonally sliced into 5cm (2”) lengths
• 6 shiitake mushrooms , stem removed (note 2)
• 150g (5.3oz) or ½ pack of firm tofu, cut into 6 small blocks
• 150g (5.3oz) or ½ pack of knotted shirataki, rinsed and drained (note 3)

Soup Stock

• 600ml (20.3oz) dashi stock (note 4)
• 40ml (1.4oz) light soy sauce (note 5)
• 1 tbsp sake (Japanese rice wine)
• ½ tbsp mirin

Directions

Make Chinese Cabbage Rolls (note 6)

1. Boil Chinese cabbage in a large pot for about 8-10 minutes or until the thickest part of the stem becomes tender. Transfer the leaves from the pot to a strainer and drain.
2. Using the same pot and water used for Chinese cabbage, blanch spinach for a minute until the colour of the leaves become bright green colour. Drain in a strainer and run cold water over the spinach to quickly cool it down so that it is no longer warm.
3. Hold the bunch of Chinese cabbage vertically and squeeze out excess water. Do the same for the spinach.
4. (Please see the photo steps below the recipe for the remaining steps below) Place a bamboo sushi mat (if you have one) or two layers of baking sheets made into a square with the width of the baking sheet on the cutting board.
5. One leaf at a time, Chinese cabbage leaves need to be placed horizontally with the inside of the leaves facing up, slightly overlapping each other.
6. Starting from the end closest to you, place a Chinese cabbage leaf on the mat/paper.
7. Place a second leaf wrong way around so that the root end of the leaf is placed next to the tip of the leaf of the first cabbage leaf. Make sure that two leaves overlap slightly for continuity.
8. The 3rd leaf will now be placed in the same direction as the first leaf. Repeat with two more leaves.
9. Take half of the boiled spinach leaves and place them horizontally on your end of the Chinese cabbage, leaving a 1cm (3/8”) gap.
10. Starting from your end of the mat or baking paper, pick up the end of the mat/paper using both hands and start rolling the cabbage slowly using the mat/paper to support. Place the middle fingers and the index fingers onto the vegetables to secure them when rolling.
11. Once the mat/paper goes over the rolled part of Chinese cabbage (be this time, Chinese cabbage covered the spinach (see the 3rd photo in the photo steps), move one hand to the outside of mat/paper to support the roll while pulling the mat/paper forward using the other hand.
12. When completely rolled, squeeze the roll while the mat/paper is still on the roll so that excess water will be removed while keeping the log shape (excess water will make the soup stock thinner). If you tilt the roll vertically, water drains better.
13. Repeat and make one more log. Cut the log into roughly 4cm (1 1/2”) disks.

Soup Stock

1. Mix the Stock Ingredients together in a bowl or a jar.

To Cook at Once on Stove

1. Group each ingredient together and place them in a wide shallow pot. I always place prawns and shells in the centre for dramatic effect when cooked.
2. Pour the soup stock into the pot and heat over high heat with a lid on. Once it has started boiling, turn it down to medium low heat to simmer for about 5-8 minutes until all ingredients are cooked through.
3. Serve immediately.

To Cook on Dinner Table

1. Place ingredients on a large plate, grouping each ingredient together, accompanied by a pair of long chopsticks or tongs to pick up the ingredients (particularly seafood and met) and drop them into the pot.
2. Add the soup stock into a pot and place it on a portable cook top. Bring it to a boil.
3. Let each individual pick the ingredients of their choice and cook in the pot or let someone pick some ingredients and cook them in the pot for the others. You may need to adjust the heat depending on how full/empty the pot is.

How to Eat Yosenabe

1. You will need a ladle or a large spoon to pick up delicate ingredients and soup from the pot as well as small bowls for individuals.
2. Using individual’s chopsticks or a ladle/spoon, take food from the pot into an individual bowl. Add some soup stock with a ladle/spoon to the bowl.
3. Add a dash of shichimi togarashi to the bowl, if you are using it.

Notes

1. My prawns were about 40g (1.4oz) each. I did not remove the head, nor the shells because I wanted to extract good flavour out of them. You can remove the head and shells if you like.

2. To decorate the surface of shiitake with flower pattern, I made 3 incisions crossing in the centre, then made v-shape cuts along these lines.