Oyster Soy Milk Nabe has the lightest flavors and should always be enjoyed first. Provided to
The Beijing winter gets misty with the steam of hotpots cooking all over the city, but there is one style that is very different from the others. Fan Zhen explores the fusion surprises from Nobu in the imperial city.
Chefs who grasp the essence of food know it is more than just food. It should not feed just the body but inspire the mind and please the soul. The newly appointed executive chef at Nobu Beijing is clearly one of the enlightened ones and he proves it with a selection of seasonal, simple but theatrical hotpots.
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"The biggest difference between Chinese and Japanese-style hotpots is that we really try to keep it complex but light and elegant at the same time," Karu Wedhas says.
The traditional Chinese way is to cook different sliced raw ingredients in a steaming pot of basic broth over gas or charcoal. Japanese hotpots, or nabe, are not random, but are carefully put together, ingredients paired with the appropriate broths.
"We try to accentuate each individual flavor, with none overpowering the other, but everything being complementary so it all comes together. We look for balance," he says.
Everything is orchestrated, and every detail is looked into. Every flavor is a play on texture, while every texture suggests a flavor. That's how the chef tempts our taste buds.
The first nabe on the table is the lightest, with fresh juicy oysters barely blanched in an ivory-colored savory soy milk accentuated with bright orange baby carrots and fresh green sugar snap peas. Little squares of smoky seared silken tofu sit in the broth while plump oysters are the hidden delights just waiting to be discovered.
And, it is the soy milk that binds all together in this light, tasty prelude as we wait, an expectant audience, for more nabe.
Next on stage is a washi paper hotpot that comes with a sweet-and-sour broth that brings out the seafood flavors of shrimps, scallops, salmon and seared cod - the main characters. The supporting cast is a bouquet of broccoli, bokchoy and more sugar snaps. This pot is for the seafood lover who enjoys the sharper tang on the taste buds.
The star of the show, however, is the kiritanpo nabe with chicken. It comes steaming to the table with its base of dashi stock supporting a perfect cornucopia of lightly grilled chicken fillets, Japanese rice rolls - the kiritanpo - grilled and cut diagonally to sit beside the chicken.
The rice roll and chicken stay miraculously crisp while their bases simmer in the broth, full of the sweetness of bonito and konbu, the Japanese kelp used to introduce umami.
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The first hint that everything is not what it seems is a tiny floret of coriander in the hotpot. In traditional Japanese cooking, hardly any coriander is used, but this is Nobu, following a tradition where Peruvian flavors had fused into traditional Japanese.
The fusion adventure expands in the meat dish that follows - a spicy beef toban anticucho cooked with a South American chili pepper. Its hot and sour accents wake up a palate lulled by the hotpots, and prepares us for another surprise that comes to table to end the meal - the Nobu Flower Pot.
With passion fruit and mint blooming in our mouths, we reluctantly leave the table, happy to have experienced a really good production of flavors and textures, and an introduction to yet another hotpot option to warm hungry tummies throughout winter.
Chicken Kiritanpo Nabe is the signature nabe at Nobu Beijing. Fan Zhen / For
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Orignal From: Nabe at nobu
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