I love the flavours in this dish. It is one of our family’s favourite comfort foods.
Daikon is a crunchy vegetable with a very subtle taste which can be enhanced by a simple stir-fry sauce. My mince balls can be customised with whatever you have in you pantry and fridge.
What I like to do is use whole spices. I love the crunch and flavour explosion of coriander seeds. These are from my garden and are particularly flavoursome. If you grow coriander, make sure to keep a few twigs which grew to seeds, make a bouquet and keep it to dry. When it is fully dry, place it in a plastic bag and shake it. You can also pick the little seeds. The tricky part is to get rid of vegetable matter. You can do that with sieves or colander of different calibres or by hand in front of a good movie :) Or even at the “apéro” (drinks and nibbles before a French meal) with you friends.
In this recipe I use these coriander seeds and also cumin seeds. I grate a bit of nutmeg. The Japanese flavour comes also from the garlic, échalote (or small onion), fresh ginger, soy, mirin and sesame oil.
I use my Magimix Cook Expert to mince and it only take a few quick pulses to make a beautiful paste. Once it is done, carefully remove the blade and shape mini balls.
I like to shape the mini mince balls by pressing and rolling the paste between my palms. I want all the air out. It is also important to make them all the same size so they have the same cooking time.
Daikons have 2 “skins” one external which you peel, one internal which you can either take out if too rough and make a separate stir fry in the shape of little cubes. In this case, I have cut a round slice of daikin to test the roughness of the inner skin. It was actually not to different from the inside so I decided to simply peel the outer skin and cut the whole daikon into French fries looking sticks.
Once the daikon is cut, you need to make the sauce with soy, sugar, mirin and that’s it.
Then heat your wok or large frying pan. Add vegetable oil (neutral taste such as peanut or canola would be perfect). Fry the mince balls while shaking the pan. You can also stab them with a skewer by 3 or 4 and BBQ them adding the gorgeous sauce (soy, mirin and sugar), when they’re drizzling.
Feel free to change the ingredients according to what you have today in you kitchen.
What makes this dish special are the sesame oil and mirin with ginger (fresh is better but use ground if it is all you have). The rest is up to you. If you don’t have mirin, use a bit of lemon juice or vinegar.
- 2 daikon radishes
- 2 tbs tasteless oil (canola or peanut)
- 1 garlic clove
- 3 tbs soy (to taste)
- 600g beef, already minced or rump
- 1 egg white
- 1 tbs coriander seeds (or ground coriander)
- 1 tbs cumin seeds (or ground cumin)
- A bit of grated nutmeg (optional)
- 1 echalote (or 1 small onion)
- 1 garlic clove
- 1 tbs fresh ginger, coarsely cut (or ground dry ginger)
- 1 tbs sesame oil (or vegetable oil)
- 1 tbs palm sugar (or any sugar)
- 2 tbs tasteless oil (canola or peanut)
- Fresh coriander (cilantro) to serve (optional)
- 3 tbs Japanese soy sauce
- 1 tbs palm sugar (or any sugar)
- 1 tbs mirin (or rice vinegar)
- Peel the daikon and cut in the shape of French fries. If the inner white skin is too rough discard. It is usually alright to just consider it as you would the rest and just cut the whole radish in "fries".
- Cut rump in medium cubes. Mince in a food processor in several pulses
- Add all the ingredients and pulse several times until well mixed.
- Make nice little mince balls (all the same size for them to cook evenly). Place them on a plate.
- Heat oil in a frying pan. Drop half the balls at once. Shake the pan to make the balls roll. It will coat them in oil and will keep their round shape. Regularly shake the pan until they are cooked but not overcooked (not too dry). Taste one to be sure :) and stop right there... you can't eat them all now...
- Place them in a warm dish.
- Proceed with the second batch. Add to the warm dish and cover with foil.
- Wipe the pan if there is too much oil. If not, just add a bit of oil and raise heat to max.
- Chop garlic finely, tip it in the pan. Stir for 1 min.
- Tip daikon.
- Add soy. Stir and fry for 3 mins or more, according to your taste.
- Prepare the sauce by mixing the sauce ingredients together.
- Reheat the balls in the microwave if necessary. I don't, they're usually very hot :)
- Pour the sauce over the balls and toss them delicately in the sauce for at least 1 min.
- Tip daikon in a warm serving dish, tip balls on top with their sauce. Sprinkle fresh coriander.
- Done!
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