Shiokara ✦

Shiokara

What it is

Squid cut into strips and left to break down in its own salted liver — the traditional cure runs near twelve per cent salt at room temperature, the supermarket version five per cent and refrigerated. The three styles are named by colour: red with the liver, white without it, black with the ink stirred through.

In the kitchen

Treat it as a seasoning, not a dish: a teaspoon through hot rice, into butter for grilled squid, or into a cream sauce does the work of a whole tube of anchovy paste. Rinse the spoonful in sake if the liver note is too loud.

Goes with

Rice Cucumber Junmai sake Negi Butter Yuzu Daikon

Same species

Dried squid (surume)

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