Asian Recipes
806 recipes. Page 4 of 34
The Asian category gathers popular dishes from Japan, China, Thailand, Vietnam, India, and beyond. Curry, stir-fried noodles, mapo tofu, pad Thai, and pho are among the Asian favorites commonly enjoyed in Korean households.
Iburigakko (Smoked Daikon Pickle)
Iburigakko is an Akita preserve made by hanging whole daikon in hardwood smoke for several days, then maturing it for about two months in a bed of rice bran, steamed broken rice, salt, sugar, and turmeric. Smoking removes moisture and gives the radish an amber surface, while the cool winter fermentation develops its firm texture and savory flavor. This is a large traditional batch that requires a dedicated outdoor smoker, a sanitized food-safe vessel, and careful packing so every radish remains in contact with the pickling mixture.
Beef Brisket Pho Guksu (Charred Ginger Beef Rice Noodle Soup)
Beef pho guksu is a Vietnamese-style rice noodle soup that pairs the clean, sweet depth of charred-onion-and-ginger broth with thin slices of Korean chadolbaegi brisket. The broth starts with dry-charring whole onion and ginger directly in a pan until the surfaces blacken. This step burns off the raw pungency and draws out a caramelized sweetness that defines the soup's aroma. Fish sauce and a measured amount of sugar season the strained broth, producing a full-flavored liquid that finishes clean. To cook the brisket, the boiling broth is poured directly over the thinly sliced meat in the bowl, allowing gentle heat to set the beef while leaving it tender and slightly pink. Bean sprouts, cilantro, and lime wedges arrive on the side so each person adjusts freshness and acidity to taste, following Vietnamese table tradition. The marbled fat in Korean brisket adds a richer body to the broth than standard pho, making this a distinct take that sits between Korean gomtang and Vietnamese pho.
Freekeh Herb Salad (Smoky Roasted Wheat & Fresh Herbs)
Freekeh is an ancient Middle Eastern grain produced by harvesting wheat while the grain is still immature and green, then roasting the harvested stalks over an open fire. The outer chaff burns away while the moist interior of each grain survives the flame, and it is this controlled scorching that gives freekeh its defining characteristic: a pronounced smoky aroma layered over the nutty, grassy quality of young wheat. When boiled, the grains hold their shape and retain a firm chew that standard wheat varieties lose after cooking, making freekeh particularly suited to salads that must hold up at room temperature. In this preparation, the cooked grain is combined with generous quantities of fresh parsley, mint, and dill, whose cool, bright flavors complement rather than compete with the smoke. A dressing of fresh lemon juice and extra-virgin olive oil is enough to bring the bowl together, as the grain itself provides sufficient depth without a complex sauce. Diced cucumber and halved cherry tomatoes add moisture and acidity, and crumbled feta cheese contributes salt and a creamy richness that ties the components into a coherent whole. The salad benefits from resting for at least an hour before serving, as the dressing absorbs into the grain and the herb and grain flavors gradually merge.
Aloo Paratha (Spiced Potato Stuffed Flatbread)
Aloo paratha is a whole wheat flatbread filled with mashed potato, garam masala, chili powder, and cilantro, then cooked in a pan. Mash the cooked potatoes while hot and spread them out to release steam, which helps prevent the filling from leaking and the dough from tearing during rolling. Divide the dough and filling into equal numbers of portions, place the sealed side down, and roll slowly to about 15cm. If the filling begins to show through, reduce pressure and roll from the center outward. Set both sides over medium-low heat, apply the oil in portions, and finish when golden spots and light puffing appear.
Bibingka (Filipino Coconut Rice Cake)
Bibingka is a Filipino baked rice cake that belongs almost entirely to the Christmas season, sold warm from clay-pot stalls outside churches after Simbang Gabi, the nine-day series of dawn masses leading up to Christmas Day. For Filipinos, the smell of bibingka cooking over charcoal at four in the morning is inseparable from the feeling of the holiday itself. The batter is made from ground rice flour mixed with coconut milk, eggs, and sugar, then poured into a clay pot lined with fresh banana leaves. The pot sits between two layers of live charcoal - one below and one held above on a metal lid - so both surfaces cook simultaneously. This top-and-bottom heat is what gives bibingka its characteristic crust: lightly charred and fragrant on the outside from the banana leaves, moist and tender within. As the batter cooks, the banana leaves release a vegetal green fragrance that infuses into the rice cake and leaves faint dark marks on the underside. Midway through cooking, slices of salted duck egg are pressed into the surface alongside fresh coconut shavings, then a brush of butter is applied and the cake returns to the heat. During this final pass the sugars in the butter and batter caramelize at the edges, producing a triple wave of banana leaf, coconut, and butter aromas. The finished texture sits somewhere between a glutinous rice cake and a sponge cake - slightly sticky and chewy yet airy and soft. The salted egg cuts through the sweetness and gives each bite a complexity that plain sweetness alone cannot provide. Bibingka vendors outside Philippine churches in December, tending glowing braziers in the pre-dawn darkness, are one of the country's most enduring Christmas images.
Butadon
Butadon places 280 g thinly sliced pork shoulder and 120 g onion over 2 cups cooked rice. Slice the onion with the grain to 0.5 cm and finely mince or grate 1 tsp ginger. Bring 120 ml water, 2 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tbsp mirin, 1 tbsp sugar, and the ginger to a boil over medium heat. Add the onion and cook it for 2 minutes before laying the pork slices into the liquid without overlapping them. Cook the pork for 5 minutes, turning each slice once so both sides meet the sauce. Stop reducing when about 2 to 3 tbsp sauce remains in the bottom of the pan. Divide the rice between wide bowls, arrange the pork and onion on top, and spoon over the remaining sauce. The method keeps enough liquid for the rice instead of cooking the pan completely dry.
Chili Paneer (Spicy Fried Cheese Stir-Fry)
Chili paneer belongs to Indo-Chinese cuisine, a fusion genre that emerged in the late nineteenth century when Hakka Chinese immigrants settled in Kolkata and began cooking with Indian ingredients and techniques. Cubes of paneer, India's firm fresh cheese that holds its shape under high heat without melting, are coated in cornstarch and deep-fried until a crisp shell forms, then tossed in a blazing-hot wok with diced garlic, green chilies, bell peppers, and onions, all brought together in a sauce built from soy sauce, chili sauce, tomato ketchup, and vinegar. The starchy crust absorbs the punchy sauce while shielding the soft, milky interior of the paneer, and the contrast between the crunchy shell and the yielding cheese inside is the defining pleasure of the dish. Two distinct styles exist: dry, where the sauce barely coats each cube and the dish is eaten as a starter or with drinks, and gravy, where a thicker, glossier sauce pools generously around the paneer for scooping with naan or ladling over fried rice. The flavor profile, salty soy meeting sour vinegar, sweet ketchup cutting through hot chili, is neither Chinese nor Indian but something entirely its own, a product of a specific immigrant community adapting to a new place while keeping familiar techniques alive.
Fukuregashi Brown Sugar Steamed Cake
Fukuregashi is a Kagoshima sweet steamed as a thick slab, rising strongly through the reaction of baking soda and vinegar in a flour and brown-sugar batter. Because soda makes it plump, it is also called soda sweet, fukurakan, or fukurekan. It belongs to the region's brown-sugar food culture, shaped by the difficult history of Satsuma control over sugarcane and sugar production in the Ryukyu and Amami islands. Once served at harvest festivals and with tea during farm work, it is now eaten year-round. The texture is fluffy while warm and chewier after cooling. Wrapping the steamer lid in cloth to stop condensation and steaming for a full forty minutes cooks the thick center evenly without wetting the surface.
Cantonese Honey Char Siu (Glazed BBQ Pork with Five-Spice Honey)
Char siu is the defining roasted meat of Cantonese cooking, recognizable by the lacquered sheen and reddish-amber color of the cuts hanging in the windows of siu laap shops across Hong Kong and Guangzhou. Pork neck or shoulder is the preferred cut because the fat distribution throughout the muscle fibers keeps the meat moist during the high-temperature roast. The marinade combines soy sauce, hoisin sauce, five-spice powder, Shaoxing rice wine, and honey. Five-spice - star anise, cassia cinnamon, cloves, Sichuan pepper, and fennel seeds ground together - contributes an aromatic complexity that bridges the saltiness of soy and hoisin with the sweetness of honey. After an overnight marinade, the meat roasts at high heat while being basted repeatedly with a honey glaze that lacquers the surface with successive layers of caramel. The traditional method suspends the pork on hooks inside a lychee charcoal oven, exposing every surface to radiant heat and allowing fat to drip away freely. This technique produces a crust that is sweet and concentrated on the outside while the interior stays fatty and juicy. The edges of the cut, where the honey carbonizes against the direct heat, develop a thin, slightly bitter char that is the most prized part of any char siu. Char siu is eaten sliced over rice as a complete one-plate meal, piled over wonton noodles, or served cold with hot English mustard as a simple appetizer.
Chanko Nabe (Sumo-Style Hot Pot)
Chanko nabe is a Tokyo hot pot associated with communal meals in sumo stables. Chicken thigh and chicken meatballs simmer with napa cabbage, carrot, leeks, mizuna, mushrooms, tofu, fried tofu, and kuzukiri in a garlic and ginger chicken broth. The ingredients are not added all at once: dense vegetables and raw chicken cook first, followed by mushrooms and stems, then delicate greens and tofu. Diners take fully cooked pieces from the simmering pot while the remaining ingredients continue to cook.
Nikuten (Layered Beef Tendon and Potato Pancake)
Nikuten is a griddled specialty of Takasago in Hyogo. A thin wheat batter is layered with bonito powder, sweet soy-simmered potato, konjac, cabbage, scallion, tender beef tendon, and tempura crumbs, then covered with more batter, flipped, sauced, and folded in half. Unlike a mixed okonomiyaki batter, the stacked construction keeps the potato pieces and shredded vegetables distinct. The tendon must be simmered until tender before assembly, while the final griddle stage heats every layer and crisps the outside.
Ika Ninjin (Dried Squid and Carrot Pickle)
Ika ninjin is a Fukushima winter side dish of dried squid and carrot cut into matching fine strips and soaked in a cooled marinade of sake, soy sauce, and coarse sugar. After half a day, the squid rehydrates and softens while the carrot remains crisp. Boiling the marinade dissolves the sugar and cooks off its raw alcoholic edge, but it must cool completely before it touches the carrot. The dish is ready after about 12 hours and becomes more deeply seasoned after another day or two under refrigeration.
Mushroom Memil Soba (Warm Buckwheat Noodles in Mushroom Dashi)
Beoseot memil soba is a warm buckwheat noodle soup built on dashi stock seasoned with soy sauce and mirin, with shiitake and oyster mushrooms simmered for five minutes so their concentrated woodsy depth moves fully into the broth. Dried shiitake contributes far more umami than fresh, and oyster mushrooms torn along the grain absorb more liquid than sliced. The soba noodles are cooked separately and rinsed in cold water to strip off surface starch, which keeps the broth clear and prevents the noodles from turning soft. A small curl of yuzu zest placed on top just before serving sends a sharp citrus note across the broth's earthy weight, lifting the finish without overpowering it. Green onion scattered on top adds a layer of fresh aroma and color.
Gado-Gado (Indonesian Peanut Salad)
Gado-gado means mix-mix in Javanese, and the name describes exactly how the dish is assembled and eaten. Blanched spinach, bean sprouts, cabbage, and boiled potato are arranged on a plate alongside hard-boiled egg, fried tofu, and fried tempeh, then drenched generously with a thick peanut sauce before being mixed together at the table. The sauce is made by pounding freshly roasted peanuts in a mortar and mixing them with chili, garlic, tamarind, palm sugar, and kecap manis. The result is a complete flavor system in a single condiment -- nutty, spicy, sour, and sweet all at once -- so no additional seasoning is required. Street vendors pound the peanuts to order for each customer, and the smell of toasting nuts fills the air around their carts. Crushed kerupuk, the shrimp cracker common across Indonesian cooking, is scattered on top to add a shattering crunch that contrasts with the soft vegetables and protein. As the crackers absorb the sauce over the course of the meal they soften and swell, and that textural transition is considered part of the eating experience rather than a flaw. The dish adapts easily: built from vegetables alone it becomes a complete vegan meal, and loaded generously with egg and tofu it provides substantial protein. In Indonesia, gado-gado is eaten at any hour of the day with no particular seasonal or mealtime association, appearing at roadside carts and home tables with equal frequency.
Aloo Samosa (Indian Crispy Potato-Filled Fried Pastry)
Samosa first appears in written form in a 10th-century Central Asian cookbook under the name sambosa, then follows trade routes westward into Persia and east into the Indian subcontinent, where it settled into street-food culture so thoroughly that chai stalls sell hundreds before noon each morning. The dough is stiff - flour, water, and oil kneaded until firm - and rolled thin. Too soft a dough absorbs oil during frying and turns greasy rather than crisp. The filling is boiled potato mixed with cumin, fresh green chili, and cilantro; the cumin's earthy fragrance permeates the potato during the mixing. The dough folds into a cone, filling goes in, air is pressed out carefully before sealing - trapped air expands in the hot oil and splits the crust. Fried at the correct temperature, the layered shell blisters outward, turns golden brown, and shatters audibly on first bite. Inside is a warm, lightly spiced potato that has absorbed all that cumin. Mint chutney and tamarind sauce are served alongside, their sourness and sweetness doing what the filling alone cannot.
Getanha
Getanha is made by baking a broad brown-sugar slab, cutting it into triangles, and coating every piece in warm brown-sugar syrup. Sift 500g cake flour with 2.5 teaspoons baking soda twice so the leavener is distributed evenly. Boil 200g brown sugar for the dough with 200ml water for 3 minutes, then cool the liquid for 20 minutes before it reaches the flour. Mix only until no dry patches remain. Transfer the dough to a parchment-lined baking sheet and use damp hands to spread it to an even 1.5cm thickness. Bake in an oven preheated to 190°C for 20 minutes. Insert a skewer in the center, remove the slab when no wet dough clings to it, and leave it in the pan for 15 minutes. For the coating, boil 300g brown sugar with 150ml water for 5 minutes until the syrup is smooth. Cut the baked slab into 20 isosceles triangles. While the syrup is warm, immerse each triangle for 10 seconds on each side, then place it on a rack. Rest the coated pieces for 30 minutes without drying the surface hard. This final rest lets the syrup remain moist on the outside while entering through the cut edges of the firm baked dough.
Cabbage Mochi (Soy-Braised Cabbage with Rice Cakes)
Cabbage mochi is a local dish from the Ose district of Koriyama, Fukushima, made by coating softened rice cakes with cabbage cooked in soy and kombu seasoning. The mochi are first boiled for about two minutes until pliable, while roughly cut cabbage is quickly stir-fried in oil. Sake, mirin, and water are added so the cabbage can soften without scorching. Soy sauce and concentrated kombu noodle sauce then give the vegetables a savory, lightly sweet broth. The drained mochi go in last and are turned gently until every surface is coated. The dish has been prepared in Ose for more than eighty years. Farming households that produced their own rice and cabbage could make it throughout the year, serving it as a simple meal or a substantial snack.
Sichuan Dry-Fried Green Beans
Sichuan dry-fried green beans, gan bian si ji dou, showcase the dry-frying technique at the center of Sichuan home cooking. Beans are blistered in a scorching wok with little or no oil until their skins wrinkle and develop brown spots, a process that drives off moisture and concentrates the natural sweetness locked inside each pod. The exterior collapses from snappy and raw into something chewy and almost leathery, while the interior retains a slight give. Minced pork, ya cai (Sichuan preserved mustard greens), dried red chilies, and Sichuan peppercorns go in during the final minute. The pork adds meaty depth, the ya cai contributes a funky, saline punch, the chilies supply sustained heat, and the peppercorns deliver the characteristic numbing tingle known as ma la that coats every bean surface. If ya cai is unavailable, a spoonful of doubanjiang or finely chopped fermented cabbage provides a comparable layer of fermented salt. The finished dish holds a textural duality that belongs entirely to the gan bian method: tough skin outside, yielding core within. It appears on Chinese restaurant menus as a palate-cleansing vegetable course between heavier meat dishes, and it works just as well as a rice accompaniment or a cold-beer snack.
Yuzu no Kawa-ni (Glossy Candied Yuzu Peel)
Yuzu no kawa-ni is an Oita preserve made by shaving the rough outer surface of thick yuzu peel very lightly, removing the fruit and seeds, boiling and draining the peel 2 to 3 times to reduce bitterness, then simmering it with sugar equal to 80 percent of the peel's weight until glossy. In the yuzu-growing areas around Hita, Kusu, and Taketa, it is served with tea and included in New Year osechi. Adding the sugar in three portions and reducing moisture slowly over low heat lets the thick peel turn translucent without collapsing. The finished preserve can be eaten in pieces or sliced thin for bread, amazake, and other sweets.
Chicken Inasal (Bacolod Citrus Lemongrass Grilled Chicken)
Chicken inasal is the defining grilled chicken of Bacolod City in the Western Visayas region of the Philippines, so inseparable from its origin that it is commonly called Bacolod chicken. An overnight marinade of calamansi juice, cane vinegar, lemongrass, and garlic allows the acid to work deep into the muscle fibers, tenderizing the meat while coating it in layered citrus and herb fragrance. During grilling over coconut-shell charcoal, the chicken is basted repeatedly with annatto oil, which stains the skin a vivid orange and keeps the exterior perpetually moist so it never dries over the coals. The charcoal smoke combines with the calamansi and lemongrass aromatics to build a smoky-citrus flavor profile that distinguishes inasal from other grilled chicken preparations. The chicken is served alongside garlic rice with a small dish of chicken oil mixed with calamansi juice for dipping. In Bacolod, an entire street called Manokan Country is lined with dozens of inasal stalls that operate simultaneously every evening, filling the neighborhood with charcoal haze.
Chimushinji (Okinawan Pork Liver Broth)
Chimushinji is an Okinawan broth made by boiling pork liver and pork separately, skimming away blood and foam, then simmering island carrot and potato in bonito stock mixed with the pork cooking liquid. Red and white miso season the finished soup, while garlic leaves go in last for fresh color and aroma. The name joins chimu, pork liver, with shinji, a decocted broth. It belongs to Okinawa's kusuimun tradition of nourishing food for tired or unwell days, but it should not be treated as medical therapy. Cook the liver fully through and serve the soup hot rather than leaving any pink center.
Osaka-Style Okonomiyaki (Japanese Savory Cabbage Pancake)
Osaka-style okonomiyaki is the signature griddle dish of Japan's Kansai region - a thick, cabbage-loaded savory pancake whose name means 'grilled as you like it.' Finely shredded cabbage is folded into a batter of flour, eggs, and dashi stock, then poured onto a hot griddle with strips of pork belly laid across the top. The pancake cooks slowly on medium heat, developing a golden crust on each side while the interior stays moist from the cabbage. Once done, it receives thick okonomiyaki sauce, zigzags of Japanese mayonnaise, a shower of bonito flakes that dance in the rising heat, and a dusting of aonori seaweed powder.
Kaburazushi (Koji-Fermented Turnip and Yellowtail)
Kaburazushi places salt-cured yellowtail inside salt-cured turnips and matures the layered pieces with sweet rice koji, carrot, yuzu peel, chili, and cured turnip leaves, yielding 24 portions. This home method does not instruct the cook to cure raw yellowtail with an improvised salt ratio. Buy commercially prepared fish and turnips from an authorized seller under refrigeration, check their use-by dates, and reject swollen packages or products with an uncertain cold chain. Cook 360 g rice and cool it to about 60 C. Mix it in a sanitized vessel with 200 g rice koji and 400 ml boiling water, hold the mixture near 50 C for 8 hours, and cool the sweet koji promptly. Dry the cured turnips and cut a pocket into each thick round without slicing through. Briefly rinse and dry the cured yellowtail, cut it to fit, and insert one piece per pocket. In a sanitized, completely dry food-safe vessel, repeat layers of sweet koji, filled turnip, 100 g carrot, 2 seeded chilies, and 15 g yuzu peel with its white pith removed. Cover the top with 200 g cured turnip leaves and add a clean drop lid and weight. Mature at or below 4 C for 7 to 10 days, checking the vessel and aroma every day. If putrid odor, mold, abnormal gas, or slime appears, do not taste the batch; discard all of it. Because the fish remains unheated, pregnant people, older adults, young children, and immunocompromised diners should avoid a home-fermented batch.
Biang Biang Mian (Xi'an Hand-Pulled Belt Noodles with Chili Oil)
Biang biang mian takes its name from the sound the dough makes when the cook slaps it against the counter to stretch it into wide, belt-like ribbons, a technique practiced in Xi'an and across Shaanxi Province for centuries. The dough is made from high-gluten flour and rested for at least thirty minutes to an hour until fully pliable; insufficient resting causes the noodles to tear during the pulling stage. Once rested, the dough is pulled by hand into strips as wide as a belt and as long as an arm, with an uneven thickness that creates varying chew across a single strand. The cooked noodles are dressed with a topping of minced garlic, chili flakes, Sichuan peppercorn powder, and chopped scallion, then smoking-hot rapeseed oil is poured directly at the table. The sizzle activates the aromatics and blooms the chili into a fragrant rust-colored oil that coats each strand. Soy sauce and black vinegar are stirred through to add a salty-sour backbone that anchors the richness of the chili oil. The character for biang, written in one of the most complex Chinese characters with over fifty strokes, is said to encode the sounds of the kitchen: slapping dough, sizzling oil, and the satisfied sighs of eaters. No standard digital font includes the character, and it must be written by hand. The dish belongs to the category of belt noodles found across Shaanxi and is considered one of the province's most representative street foods, eaten at breakfast, lunch, or as a late-night meal.
About Asian
Each country brings its own signature spices and sauces, so even the same ingredients can produce completely different flavors. With a few key pantry items - coconut milk, fish sauce, curry powder, doubanjiang - you can recreate the tastes of Asia at home.