Jagaimo Oyaki

Oyaki are delicious little fried filled parcels, usually with a buckwheat outer shell but can be made with pretty much anything that you can form into a dough, in this case leftover mashed potato.  The filling of these oyaki is an attempt to recreate the flavours of some that we bought from a street vendor outside the Hachiman shrine in Tomioka, Tokyo- a mixture of chopped pork and prawns, similar to what you’d find inside everyone’s favourite little dumplings, gyoza.

Ingredients.

• Approximately 2 cups of cold mashed potato
• 4 tablespoons potato starch
• 100g Chinese (napa) cabbage
• 100g raw, shelled prawns
• 150g minced pork
• 2 tablespoons sake
• 1 tablespoon grated ginger
• 1 finely chopped spring onion
• 12 stalks of chives, finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 5 teaspoons soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons rice vinegar
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1/2 red chilli, finely chopped
• Vegetable oil for frying

1. Finely chop the cabbage and then mix with the salt in a bowl.  Leave this for 10 minutes to extract the excess water from the cabbage. After the 10 minutes has passed put the cabbage into a clean cloth and squeeze over the sink to remove as much liquid as possible.
2. Finely chop the prawns and thoroughly combine with the pork mince in a bowl. Now add the cabbage, spring onion, chives (reserving half a teaspoon of chives for the dipping sauce), ginger and sake, then mix together to complete the oyaki’s filling.
3. To make the outer dough simply knead the potato starch into the mashed potato until it reaches a firm but workable consistency- if it’s too sticky add a bit more starch.  It should make a dough similar to Italian gnocchi.
4. Divide the potato dough into eight balls (if you want to be overly precise like us, use some scales to do this- ours were 67.5g each).
5. Flatten a ball in your hand until it is approximately 4″ across, and then add a heaped teaspoon of filling.  Close the sides of the dough around the meat and shape into a neat patty.  Add no more than this much filling or your oyaki won’t seal properly.
6. Repeat this until you have 8 perfectly formed patties, each one around 3″ in diameter.
7. Heat up about two tablespoons of oil in a frying pan and put in four oyaki.  Fry over a medium heat for 5 minutes on each side until golden brown and cooked through.  Leave the first four in a warm place while you fry the second batch.
8. While waiting for the oyaki to fry you can make the dipping sauce.  Mix the soy, vinegar and sesame oil in a bowl and season with the chives and chilli.

These oyaki are best eaten hot while the outer shells have a mochi-like chewy texture, or at room temperature.  Don’t be tempted to eat them after they have been refrigerated as the casing dries out too much.

Serves 4 people, makes 8 oyaki.