{"id":184566,"title":"Kushikatsu – Osaka’s Breaded Skewers","modified":"2026-10-05T16:30:36+02:00","plain":"Small skewers of meat, shrimp and vegetables, coated in fine panko, deep-fried and then dipped just once into a thin, dark sauce.\n\n\n\nA counter, an ice-cold drink, and golden skewers arriving in small batches, still piping hot. \n\n\n\nThe coating crunches as you bite into it, the beef or shrimp stays juicy inside, and the dark, tangy, slightly sweet sauce seeps into every ridge of the crust. Between bites, a piece of raw cabbage refreshes your mouth. You promise yourself the next one will be the last, then reach for another.\n\n\n\nAnother panko-fried dish : ebi fry, large Japanese-style breaded shrimp\n\n\n\nWhat is kushikatsu ?\n\n\n\nKushikatsu is an Osaka specialty\u00a0: small bites threaded onto skewers, dipped in batter, rolled in very finely sifted panko, then quickly deep-fried. \n\n\n\nEach skewer holds just one ingredient, ensuring even cooking. They are dipped into a thin Worcestershire-based sauce, lighter than the thick tonkatsu sauce served with breaded pork cutlets. At the table, there is one rule\u00a0: dip once, never twice.\n\n\n\nThe name describes the dish\u00a0: kushi means \u201cskewer\u201d and katsu comes from the English word cutlet, itself derived from the French \u201cc\u00f4telette\u201d. \n\n\n\nIn Tokyo, it is more commonly called kushiage\u00a0: several ingredients alternate on the same skewer, the breadcrumbs are coarser and the sauce is thicker.\n\n\n\nBorn in the working-class district of Shinsekai\n\n\n\nKushikatsu emerged in the late 1920s in Shinsekai, an Osaka district populated by laborers and foundry workers. \n\n\n\nIn 1929, Yoshie Hyakuno opened Kushikatsu Daruma, serving inexpensive, filling breaded skewers that could be eaten standing up, with one hand. A street vendor, Yoshinobu Matsushita, however, claimed to have been selling a similar dish as early as 1926 under the name \u201cNikatsu\u201d.\n\n\n\nOne skewer, one ingredient\u00a0: the rule was as practical as it was culinary. The pieces cooked evenly, and the vendor tallied the bill by counting the empty skewers left on the counter. \n\n\n\nKushikatsu went on to become part of Osaka's popular comfort food scene, known as B-ky\u016b gurume, alongside takoyaki and okonomiyaki.\n\n\n\nIn Nagoya, breaded cutlets are served topped with miso : this is miso katsu\n\n\n\nAt the counter, the sauce sits in a shared stainless steel container, hence the ban on dipping a skewer again once you have taken a bite, known as nido-zuke kinshi.\n\n\n\n Raw cabbage, served in unlimited quantities, refreshes the palate and doubles as a spoon for scooping up more sauce. Since Covid-19, many establishments have replaced the shared container with individual bottles.\n\n\n\nThe main ingredients in kushikatsu\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nYou can choose whatever ingredients you like for the skewers : cubed beef and chicken thigh, thin slices of pork wrapped around the skewer, shrimp, cherry tomatoes, asparagus, eggplant, onion, hard-boiled quail eggs or cheese-stuffed chikuwa. Cut everything into small pieces. A compact skewer fries quickly and keeps its coating crisp.\n\n\n\nThe batter combines flour, egg, milk and water, with a little grated Japanese yam, or yamaimo, which makes it light and sticky.\n\n\n\n The panko is sifted before coating\u00a0: the finer crumbs form a thin, even crust. Traditional kushikatsu counters fry in beef tallow, known as heddo, but a neutral frying oil works very well at home.\n\n\n\nThe sauce starts with red wine heated to cook off the alcohol, thinned with bonito dashi, sweetened with honey and zarame sugar, then finished with Worcestershire sauce, a little tonkatsu sauce and ketchup. It stays thin and is served well chilled, with raw green cabbage cut into large pieces.\n\n\n\nTechnical tips for great kushikatsu\n\n\n\nMore Japanese skewers, grilled this time : chicken tsukune\n\n\n\nUse skewers shorter than 15 cm and bite-sized pieces weighing around 20 g. Bread about ten skewers at a time, just before lowering them into oil at 170 \u00b0C. Allow about one minute for vegetables and two for meat.\n\n\n\nSifted panko burns quickly. Remove the crumbs after each batch with a tea strainer, otherwise they will blacken and give the next skewers a bitter taste. Drain on a wire rack and serve immediately, with the chilled sauce and cabbage.\n\n\n\n\n\n\tKushikatsu\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\tSauce (interdiction de tremper deux fois)80 ml red wine300 ml Worcestershire sauce1 teaspoon ketchup1 tablespoon tonkatsu sauce1 tablespoon honey2 tablespoons zarame sugar (or brown sugar if unavailable)80 ml bonito dashiP\u00e2te \u00e0 frire200 g all-purpose flour1 egg100 ml milk (whole)100 ml water50 g Japanese yam ((yamaimo), grated)Garnitures au choixCherry tomatoes, asparagus, eggplant, onion (as desired)Beef (round or chuck), thinly sliced pork (komagire), chicken thigh, shrimp (as desired)Hard-boiled quail eggs, cheese-stuffed chikuwa (as desired)Panko200 g pankoAutres ingr\u00e9dientsFrying oil (as needed)Green cabbage (as desired)Salt and pepper\t\n\t\n\t\tPour the panko into a sieve.Rub it through the mesh to make it finer.Heat the red wine to evaporate the alcohol.Add the bonito dashi.Dissolve the honey and zarame sugar in it.Add the remaining sauce ingredients.Bring to a gentle boil.Let cool completely.Beat the egg.Add the milk and water.Pour the mixture over the flour and stir until no lumps remain.Stir in the grated yam.Choose wooden skewers less than 15 cm long.Cut the beef and chicken thigh into 2 cm cubes.Thread 3 cubes onto each skewer, totaling just under 20 g per skewer.Squeeze the skewered meat in your hand to shape it.Carefully lay out the thin slices of pork.Season them lightly with salt and pepper.Wrap them around the skewer.Squeeze the skewered meat in your hand to shape it.Remove the stems from the cherry tomatoes.Thread them onto the skewers.Then pierce them in several places with a fine point to prevent them from bursting during frying.Shell the shrimp and remove the legs.Remove the dark vein.Trim the tip of the tail.Straighten the shrimp and thread it onto the skewer, starting at the tail.Cut each chikuwa into 5 sections.Fill the inside with cheese.Thread 2 sections onto each skewer.Cut the cabbage into large pieces.Rinse it with water.Dip each skewer into the batter.Remove the excess batter.Bury the skewer in the panko.Bread about ten skewers before moving on to frying.Heat the oil to 170 \u00b0C.Fry the vegetable skewers for about 1 minute.Fry the meat skewers for about 2 minutes.Drain the skewers as soon as they are nice and crispy.Place them on a wire rack.Arrange them on a platter once the oil has drained off.After each batch, use a tea strainer to scoop out the panko that has fallen into the oil, as it is too fine for a standard skimmer.Dip each skewer generously into the sauce just before eating.Dip the cabbage into the sauce as well.\t\n\t\n\t\tThe most important thing is to keep each skewer small. Cut wide ingredients into small pieces and place them at the tip of the skewer; cut long ingredients into thin strips, with the aim of reducing the quantity on each skewer. This takes longer to prepare, but the result is much better: cooking is quicker, the coating stays crispy, and the appearance is neater.\nSkim the oil frequently. The sifted panko is so fine that it burns quickly, and oil full of blackened crumbs spoils both the flavor and the appearance of the next skewers.\nThe brand of Worcestershire sauce makes a noticeable difference to the flavor of the finished sauce.\n\t\n\t\n\t\tPlat principalJaponaise","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}