Asian

Asian Recipes

813 recipes. Page 4 of 34

Curry, stir-fry noodles, and Asian recipes

Monjayaki

Monjayaki never sets into a pancake. A very loose flour-and-dashi batter cooks down with finely cut cabbage on a hot griddle, and diners scrape it up a bite at a time from the edge with small spatulas, pressing each bite briefly onto the hot griddle to crisp it. Most closely tied to Tsukishima in Tokyo, it is about eating the crisp, browned base and the soft center together. Dried squid, dried shrimp, and tenkasu add savory crunch to the Worcestershire-seasoned liquid.

Prep 15min Cook 15min 3 servings

Kimchi Hard

Iburigakko (Smoked Daikon Pickle)

The daikon hangs in hardwood smoke for days until the skin turns an even amber and the radish is dry enough to bend, and only then does it go into the rice bran bed. That smoking needs a dedicated outdoor smokehouse with fire control, never a home oven or an enclosed room, because of fire and carbon monoxide risk. Bran, steamed broken rice, salt, coarse sugar and a little turmeric must fill every gap between the radishes and cover the top, since the pickle then sits through winter for 50 to 60 days. Any mold, off smell or unusual stickiness rules it out for eating.

Prep 60min 0 48 servings

Noodles Medium

Beef Brisket Pho Guksu (Charred Ginger Beef Rice Noodle Soup)

Halved onion and ginger, charred black in a dry pan, lose their raw bite and lend a caramel sweetness to an otherwise clear broth. Thin slices of Korean chadolbaegi brisket go into the bowl raw and cook only from the boiling broth poured over them, staying soft and juicy. The thinner the slices, the better that brief heat reaches the middle. The marbled brisket fat adds more body than standard pho, landing somewhere between Korean gomtang and Vietnamese pho. Bean sprouts, cilantro, and lime on the side let each person tune aroma and acidity, with the cilantro added just before eating so its scent stays fresh.

Prep 18min Cook 25min 2 servings

Salads Medium

Freekeh Herb Salad (Smoky Roasted Wheat & Fresh Herbs)

Freekeh starts as young green wheat that is fire-roasted on the stalk, then threshed and dried, which leaves a faint smoky note in every grain. Boiled, it stays chewy and keeps its shape among the vegetables. Parsley and cilantro, chopped down to their tender stems, lift the smoke with fresh green aroma, and lemon juice with olive oil forms the only dressing. Herbs stirred into hot grain lose their scent, so the freekeh is spread out to cool until just lukewarm first. An hour's rest after mixing lets the dressing soak into the grains.

🥗 Lighter Meals

Prep 14min Cook 20min 2 servings

Asian Medium

Aloo Paratha (Spiced Potato Stuffed Flatbread)

The mashed potato is sealed inside whole wheat dough and rolled out with it, so the filling ends up as a thin layer running through the whole bread. It is seasoned with garam masala, chili and chopped cilantro, and a good one leaves the pan with golden spots and a few puffed patches.

Prep 25min Cook 15min 2 servings

Baking Easy

Bibingka (Filipino Coconut Rice Cake)

In the Philippines, bibingka is sold outside churches after the dawn Masses of the Christmas season, baked in clay pots lined with banana leaves over charcoal. Coals above and below cook both surfaces at once and keep the inside moist, while the leaves leave a green fragrance and faint dark marks on the underside. This version swaps all that for a round pan in a regular oven, and it leaves out the salted duck egg and coconut slices that vendors press on top midway. Rice flour and coconut milk give a texture somewhere between a rice cake and a sponge cake: a little chewy, but still soft and springy.

Prep 15min Cook 30min 4 servings

Rice Easy

Butadon

Thin slices of pork shoulder and onion cook in a gingery soy sauce and go over rice. The pan comes off the heat while a little sauce still pools at the bottom, and that sauce is spooned over the rice.

Prep 15min Cook 15min 2 servings

Stir-fry Easy

Chili Paneer (Spicy Fried Cheese Stir-Fry)

Chili paneer comes out of Indo-Chinese cooking, the fusion style that grew from Hakka Chinese communities settled in Kolkata. Paneer, a fresh Indian cheese that holds its shape instead of melting, is dusted lightly with cornstarch and pan-fried until crisp outside and soft within. Soy sauce, chili sauce, and a little vinegar coat the cubes for only about 30 seconds, leaving them dry rather than sauced.

🏠 Everyday

Prep 15min Cook 12min 2 servings

Desserts Easy

Fukuregashi Brown Sugar Steamed Cake

Baking soda and vinegar react in the batter and push this thick brown sugar cake high in its cloth-lined colander. In Kagoshima it is also called soda-gashi or fukurakan for that soda rise. It grew out of the Satsuma domain's Edo-period control of sugarcane and brown sugar, and was once eaten at harvest festivals and as a snack during farm work. Warm from the steamer it is fluffy; once cool it turns chewy.

Prep 20min Cook 40min 8 servings

Grilled Medium

Cantonese Honey Char Siu (Glazed BBQ Pork with Five-Spice Honey)

In Hong Kong and Guangzhou, char siu hangs from hooks in roast-meat shop windows after roasting in a fire oven; this version gets its lacquered red-brown surface on a rack in a home oven. A spoonful of honey is held back and brushed on only after the first turn. The slightly charred edges are the prized bits, and the meat is sliced thin over rice or wonton noodles.

At least 2 hr 45 min 4 servings

Soups Medium

Chanko Nabe (Sumo-Style Hot Pot)

Sumo wrestlers ate this hot pot together in their stables, which explains how much goes into a single pot: chicken thigh, chicken meatballs, napa cabbage, mizuna, shiitake, soft tofu, fried tofu and kuzukiri noodles. The broth is chicken stock with grated garlic and ginger, and people help themselves to whatever is done while the rest keeps simmering.

🏠 Everyday

Prep 25min Cook 30min 4 servings

Pancakes Hard

Nikuten (Layered Beef Tendon and Potato Pancake)

In Takasago, Hyogo, nikuten gets built in layers instead of mixed like okonomiyaki: potato, konjac, cabbage, scallion, beef tendon, and tempura crumbs stack on a thin round of batter, which folds in half after saucing. Because nothing is stirred together, the floury potato, soft tendon, and crisp crumbs each keep their own texture. The potato and konjac simmer with the tendon in soy sauce, sugar, and mirin, so all three share the same sweet-salty seasoning.

Prep 30min Cook 135min 4 servings

Kimchi Easy

Ika Ninjin (Dried Squid and Carrot Pickle)

Fukushima's winter side dish steeps dried squid and carrot, cut into matching fine strips, in sake, soy sauce, and coarse sugar for 12 hours, until the squid softens and the carrot soaks up the soy while keeping its crunch. The boiled marinade has to cool to room temperature first; poured hot, it cooks the carrot limp.

Prep 20min Cook 5min 4 servings

Noodles Easy

Mushroom Memil Soba (Warm Buckwheat Noodles in Mushroom Dashi)

Five minutes in soy-and-mirin-seasoned bonito dashi is enough for shiitake and oyster mushrooms to spread their savory, woodsy flavor through the whole broth. Tearing the oyster mushrooms along the grain, instead of slicing them, lets them soak up more liquid. The soba cooks in a separate pot and gets rinsed in cold water, washing off surface starch that would cloud the broth and leave the noodles limp. A pinch of grated yuzu zest at the end floats a sharp citrus note over the earthy broth so the bowl finishes light, and sliced chives add color.

Prep 12min Cook 15min 2 servings

Salads Easy

Gado-Gado (Indonesian Peanut Salad)

The name means 'mixed' in Javanese, and that is how gado-gado is eaten across Indonesia: blanched cabbage and bean sprouts, boiled potato, seared tofu and halved eggs, all stirred into a thick peanut sauce. Street vendors pound roasted peanuts in a mortar; this version shortcuts with peanut butter loosened with soy sauce, palm sugar and lime juice, which still lands nutty, sweet and tart at once. With potato, tofu and eggs on the plate, it eats like a full meal rather than a side.

🥗 Lighter Meals

Prep 20min Cook 10min 2 servings

Asian Medium

Aloo Samosa (Indian Crispy Potato-Filled Fried Pastry)

Mashed potato and green peas, seasoned with garam masala, cumin, and chili powder, go inside a stiff dough that has oil rubbed into the flour. A half-round of dough is rolled into a cone, filled, and pressed shut into the triangle that makes a samosa recognizable. They are fried golden and served warm with mint chutney or tamarind sauce.

Prep 35min Cook 20min 4 servings

Baking Medium

Getanha

Kokuto, the Japanese unrefined cane sugar, goes into both the dough and the syrup, and ordinary light brown sugar will not give the same flavor. The baked slab is cut into triangles and dipped in warm syrup, and what clings to the surface slowly works its way into the cut edges. Unlike an iced biscuit, this Kagoshima sweet keeps its coating damp rather than drying it into a shell. The slab rises with baking soda, not baking powder.

Prep 90min Cook 30min 20 servings

Rice Easy

Cabbage Mochi (Soy-Braised Cabbage with Rice Cakes)

Soft rice cakes are folded through cabbage that has simmered in sake, mirin, soy sauce, and kombu noodle sauce until the ribs turn tender, leaving a salty, lightly sweet glaze on every piece. The dish belongs to the Ose district of Koriyama in Fukushima, where farm households grew their own rice and cabbage and made it year-round as a meal or a filling snack.

Prep 10min Cook 15min 2 servings

Stir-fry Medium

Sichuan Dry-Fried Green Beans

Dry-frying, gan bian in Chinese, means cooking the beans over high heat with very little stirring until the skins wrinkle and pick up brown spots. This home-style version seasons them with doubanjiang, garlic and ginger and leaves out ya cai, dried chilies and Sichuan peppercorns, so the result is salty and gently hot rather than numbing. Crumbly fried pork settles in between the beans.

🏠 Everyday

Prep 12min Cook 12min 2 servings

Desserts Medium

Yuzu no Kawa-ni (Glossy Candied Yuzu Peel)

Thick yuzu peel cooks down translucent and glossy while keeping its shape, and because the fragrant yellow layer is barely trimmed, the finished pieces smell strongly of yuzu. Sugar equal to 80% of the peel's weight is added in three rounds, and shaking the pot instead of pressing the peel keeps the pieces whole. Water is only a small top-up to prevent scorching, which is why almost no syrup is left at the end.

Prep 45min Cook 90min 20 servings

Grilled Medium

Chicken Inasal (Bacolod Citrus Lemongrass Grilled Chicken)

The orange sheen of Bacolod-style grilled chicken comes from annatto oil, brushed on thinly every time the pieces are turned. In Bacolod a street called Manokan Country holds dozens of inasal stalls, and the dish is often simply called Bacolod chicken. A sour marinade of vinegar, lime juice, lemongrass, and garlic needs at least 2 hours and ideally a night in the fridge to reach into the thighs. Set aside annatto oil that never touches raw chicken for basting, and throw out the used marinade. In the Philippines it comes with garlic rice.

Prep 20min Cook 30min 4 servings

Soups Medium

Chimushinji (Okinawan Pork Liver Broth)

In Okinawa this miso soup with pork liver is made on days when someone is worn out or under the weather. Chimu means pork liver and shinji a decocted broth; dishes like this are called kusuimun, though it is home food, not medicine.

🏠 Everyday

Prep 30min Cook 35min 4 servings

Pancakes Easy

Osaka-Style Okonomiyaki (Japanese Savory Cabbage Pancake)

In this Kansai style, cabbage and batter go in at close to equal amounts. The mixture is piled thick, the top is never pressed, and pork belly is simply laid across it. Pressing would squeeze out the air and moisture between the cabbage strands that keep the center soft. If the flip feels risky, cover it with a plate and turn it over in one go.

Prep 15min Cook 15min 2 servings

Kimchi Hard

Kaburazushi (Koji-Fermented Turnip and Yellowtail)

Thick rounds of salted turnip are slit into pockets, stuffed with commercially salted yellowtail from a licensed seller and buried in layers of sweet rice koji, where turnip and fish ferment together in the fridge for 7 to 10 days. Because the fish is never cooked, pregnant people, older adults, children and anyone immunocompromised should avoid home-fermented versions. Any spoiled smell, mold or unusual gas means the whole batch is thrown out untasted.

Prep 90min Cook 60min 24 servings