Small Dishes or “Sake-no-sakana” 酒の肴

This is another presentation of small dishes (#1) I served one evening as starters. They are perfect little nibbles to go with sake. On the left of the white rectangular plates are skewers of Nibuta 煮豚, marinated boiled quail egg ウズラの味玉 and Ginko nuts 銀杏. All toasted in the toaster oven and then skewered using small bamboo skewers with knots called “noshi-gushi のし串*” (The skewers were for decorative purposes and I used them just because I had them.)

Note: I did not toast/grill the food on the skewers since the bamboo skewers would burn. Instead I toaster-ovened the food and after cooked put it on the skewers for presentation.>br />
*Noshi-gushi are a take-off of a better known item called “Noshi-bukuro のし袋”  which is the special envelope containing money given as a gift at happy/festive occasions (wedding etc) or at funerals. The envelope has two decorations; one is called “noshi” and another is called “mizuhiki 水引”. Mizuhiki is a traditional Japanese decorative knot. The knot on the “noshi-gushi” is thought to be reminiscent of the  “mizuhiki” of  the “noshi-bukuro”. Make sense? 

Here is the close up (#2) of the skewered nibuta, quail egg and ginko nuts all toasted/grilled (the ginko nuts were coated with salt before toasting). Since the noshi-gushi are very thin, the ginko nuts can be skewered without splitting them. This combination worked well. The marinated boiled quail egg had a nice creamy yolk and savory flavors from the marinade they were soaked in.  I also served “Mock tofu 擬制豆腐” (#2 right). Since I thawed “ikura イクラ” salmon roe the day before, I served some on cucumber cups (#3). I seasoned the cucumber with sweet vinegar and also added a bit of Japanese noodle sauce on the ikura. Although not shown in the picture, just before serving I garnished this with threads of dried nori seaweed or “kizami-nori 刻み海苔”.

In a small covered container resembling a miniature Japanese lidded soup bowl, I served squid shiokara イカの塩辛” (frozen in a pouch) (#4).

The variety of flavors and textures were a treat thoroughly enjoyed with our favorite house sake.