Photo by Masashi Nizaki
Ingredients
4 whole eggs
4 1/2 cups water
1/2 ounces dried kombu
1/4 cup packed dried bonito
1/2 ounces dried shiitake mushrooms
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon mirin
8-10 thread saffron
1/2 cup chopped deveined shrimp
How to make Saffron Chawanmushi
1. In a heavy based pot, add 2 cups of water and dried seaweed and let stand for 10 minutes so that the seaweed can soften and hydrate.
2. To the pot of seaweed and water, add bonito, dried shiitake mushrooms, soy sauce and sugar (or mirin) and bring to a light simmer over medium-low heat.
3. Allow your broth to simmer slightly covered for 25-30 minutes. Once your broth has simmered, strain out the solids. Add salt or more soy sauce into the broth to taste, erroring on the side of a fuller flavored broth.
4. Return the strained liquid while still hot to another clean pot, add saffron threads whole, and allow the broth to infuse covered for 1 hour.
5. Once your broth has infused and cooled, crack eggs into an appropriately sized bowl and slowly whisk your saffron dashi broth directly into the eggs, reserving about the last 1/4 cup of broth with the saffron threads still intact and set aside to later garnish the Chawanmushi with. Once your dashi and eggs are fully incorporated, you should have a mixture that feels smooth and silky. Optionally strain through a fine mesh strainer for a silkier result.
6. Arrange some pieces of shrimp at the bottom of either a ramekin or heat proof bowl with a 1 cup capacity of your choosing and ladle the Chawanmushi custard batter over top of your shrimp, leaving just a half an inch or so from the top of the ramekin.
7. Place ramekins or bowls in a wide pot or lidded pan, place just enough water into the pot or pan to cover the ramekin 3/4 of the way up and bring to a light simmer over medium-low heat, once at a light simmer, reduce heat to low and steam the chawanmushi for 10-15 minutes, checking after 10 and giving the ramekins a light giggle to see if the center is set. The texture will resemble jello or soft tofu once done. It’s best to treat the steaming of the custard as a patient process as an aggressive boil can curdle the chawanmushi and overcook it.
8. Using tongs or a towel, carefully remove the chawanmushi from the water bath and let it cool over a cooling rack or on top of a kitchen towel for a few minutes. Before serving, spoon 1-2 tablespoons of dashi overtop of the set custard. Serve while warm.
Photo by Masashi Nizaki
The Stroy of Saffron Chawanmushi
Where it all began
In 2019 I had the extraordinary opportunity to fly to Japan and explore Tokyo as a part of a cultural exchange exercise facilitated through their department of education and ventures which have begun to increasingly invest in collaborations with various artists from across the globe. My two weeks were packed with various market trips, tea tasting, omakase menus, food classes and other culturally immersive programs meant to inspire an understanding of Japanese food and culture. These excursions were in anticipation of a meal I was commissioned to cook for at the Tokyo Food Lab for a short list of Japan’s most important and influential people across the food, technology, and agricultural space.
Inspired by my regular visits to Raku on MacDougal Street in New York, where many udon lunches were accompanied by the flawless execution of a savory dashi-based custard known as “Chawanmushi”, I knew that I wanted to capture a glimpse of the Iranian palate in this forthcoming dinner with something I would be both proud serving and even more grateful to technically pull off. After scouring many markets for herbs and spices in anticipation of the dinner, I realized how even more critical it was to tell the story of spice and Iranian culture in a means that was approachable by the Japanese palate, one that seemed distant to the flavors and nuances of spice that I grew up with my entire life.
Saffron Chawanmushi has become a cornerstone for my storytelling around not only this particular trip, but as a means to celebrate the continued work I do across all cultures and exchanges, in hopes of crafting more dialogue in places where our likeness for certain foods and flavors may seem unlikely. Chawanmushi traditionally is an egg custard based on “Dashi”, a rich stock of kombu, bonito and other aromatic additives such as dried mushrooms or fish.
I took an Alice In Wonderland-like trip through the market stalls of the famous Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, known among both the local and international communities of food and aquaculture at large as the most important fish market in the world. Between the bidding auctions for blue and yellow fin tuna, and the surreal collection of seafood on display which made the ocean feel like something that up until that moment knew absolutely nothing about. Within the hysteria of chefs and locals, I managed to procure a collection of dried seaweed, dried fish, and aged bonito to create a “Saffron Dashi ‘’ utilizing more from the smuggled pantry I naturally brought with me to Tokyo in my luggage. The resulting dashi which I committed days to make (out of nervousness and nothing else), was whisked into some of the most beautiful farm fresh eggs I have ever used, and the resulting batter was steamed into a golden yellow custard which for me still is the single greatest piece of mise en place I have ever created. Among the room of esteemed guests, I shared with them the uses of saffron, the meticulous process behind harvesting and processing the spice as well as the social and political implications of the ingredient. Topped with pieces of Hokkaido uni, and soft quail eggs, the Chawanmushi was unanimously agreed by the group to be one of the best they had ever eaten, and the Saffron flavor seemed to find an identity in that dish that felt just as mush Japanese as it did Iranian.