Like many traditional Japanese dishes, this chicken dish has a unique proper serving style that is integral to the cooking process itself. The pot used to cook the dish must be the same size as the bowl it is served in. The last word in the name, "buri," is simply a designation for the type of round deep bowl that this dish is served in, of the appropriate size. The words "oyakodon" actually mean "mother and child," because it incorporates both chicken and egg.
Savory Sauce
This Japanese food recipe includes a savory sauce is made from soy sauce, water, sugar, sake or mirin, and dashi. Sake and mirin are two different types of rice wine. Mirin is sweeter than sake, so less sugar is needed with mirin. However, mirin is harder to find. Dashi is a fish base, much like boullion. It is sometimes difficult to find as well. Both of these can be purchased at an Asian market, or at some grocery stores with varieties of international foods.
Cooking the Egg
The real skill of this chicken dish is in cooking the egg. A constant temperature of about medium-low heat on most stoves will do the trick. If done properly and carefully, the egg drizzled on top of the sauce will solidify, much like a funnel cake solidifies from batter to bread. The egg traps the chicken and onions floating on the top as it hardens, and leaves just the sauce underneath.
The pot is the same size as the bowl, so that the solidified egg can simply be slid into the bowl, atop a bed of rice, and sit across the entire top of the bowl. The sauce is poured over the top, and sinks down through the cracks in the chicken and egg dish into the rice below.
Serving
This chicken dish is usually eaten with chopsticks, and most often shared among a group of people. Though, chopsticks and sharing from a single bowl is not recommended for those not extremely adept at the use of chopsticks, as the egg is very slippery, and the rice moistened enough by the sauce to be very difficult to grab.
Traditional Japanese Chicken and Egg Recipe
Ingredients:
- 1 c soy sauce
- 1 c water
- 1/2 c sugar
- splash sake or mirin
- 1/2 t dashi
- 2 chicken breasts (or thighs) chopped into bite-sized pieces
- 1 onion, sliced into slivers
- 6 eggs
Directions:
- Combine soy sauce, water, sugar, mirin or sake, and dashi and bring to a simmer to form the sauce.
- Simmer the chicken in this sauce until it is almost done, aproximately 7 minutes.
- Add the onion, and simmer until it turns a light brown. Both the onion and chicken should be thoroughly done at this point.
- Add six scrambled eggs to the pot, carefully maintaining the sauce at just the right temperature so that the egg cooks properly. Drizzle the egg and allow to cook for about 2 minutes, then slide off into a bowl over rice.
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