Japanese Omelette (Tamagoyaki)

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Photo by jetalone/flickr

Serves 2.

Ingredients

3 eggs
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon sugar
2 tablespoons dashi or water
1 teaspoon mirin or sherry
1 teaspoon Japanese soy sauce
2 teaspoons oil
2 tablespoons cooked green peas
2 tablespoons finely diced cooked carrot
2 tablespoons grated white radish
few slices Japanese pickled ginger

Directions

Beat eggs lightly until well mixed but not frothy. Stir in salt, sugar, dashi, mirin and soy sauce.

A Japanese omelette pan is rectangular, but a round pan may be used and
the omelette trimmed after it has been cooked and rolled. Heat the pan,
rub with paper towels dipped in oil and pour in enough beaten egg to
coat the pan. The pan should not be hot enough to brown the egg -
Japanese omelettes are pale.

Scatter in some peas and diced carrot as soon as the egg is set.
Start rolling the omelette in a neat cylinder. Pour in more egg and
when set, roll around the first omelette. Remove from pan, press firmly
to shape. A bamboo sushi mat is useful for this.

Allow to cool, then slice thickly with a sharp knife. Make a mound with
the radish, place the ginger on top and serve alongside the omelette.

Recipe excerpted from Encyclopedia of Asian Food by Charmaine Solomon (Periplus Editions, 1998)