Dashi (fish broth) Recipe

By taochavez

Ingredients

• 4 cups water (960ml)
• 2 handful of dried bonito flakes (or 4 small packs of dried bonito flakes)

Details

Servings 4
Cooking time 10mins
Adapted from japanesecooking101.com

Preparation

Step 1

or fish broth is a very important component in traditional Japanese cooking.  It is used in soups, stews, boiled vegetables and many other dishes.  It is not hard to make at all, but it is one step you have to take before you cook food.

You can use the bonito flakes not only for Dashi but also for sprinkling on other dishes like okonomiyaki (Japanese pancake, yum!).  Your cat might also like to share them with you :)  So don’t worry, you won’t waste them after you make Miso Soup once.

Boil water and then add dried bonito flakes in a pot. Let it simmer for 2-3 minutes.

Thanks for the recipe. I do have one stupid question, though. I like Japanese food and cook it very often at home. Since I do not know Japanese my sources of information are blogs, yutube and other webs. I always thought that dashi is a stock made from bonito flakes and kombu. I know about 2 ways to make it. The first, boil kombu and bonito for a very short time. The taste of a stock is very strong in this case. The second, use leftover bonito and kombu from the first try and boil it for a long time. It is time consuming, but the taste is very soft and nice.

You are not missing anything, and both are good way to make dashi. Dashi is just a simple stock or broth that can be made from variety of ‘umami’ ingredients, such as dried bonito flakes, konbu (dried kelp), dried sardines, and dried shiitake mushroom. You can use it by itself or combination such as bonito and konbu. Here, we wanted to make it as simple as possible, yet very flavorful. Konbu & bonito combination may create the best dashi (called ichiban dashi), but quick dashi using bonito flakes alone can still be great and much better than using instant dashi powder which many people use these days.

Thanks for the explanation. It all make sense now:)

Hi, my name is Lia and i’m writting to you from Chile. Here we don’t have so many ingredients and i only know Hondashi or Ajinomoto. Can i make this recipe with this ingredient? How do i make it?

Hondashi is an instant version of dashi, so go ahead and use it according to the package. Or I would use 1 teaspoon or so of Hondashi for 2 cups of boiling water.

Heather

you could freeze dashi, but it may be easier to just make it when you need it.

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