Fried ── Fried dishes
Hatoshi
shrimp paste sandwich fritter
Shrimp and squid paste sandwiched in bread and deep-fried, a Nagasaki specialty said to have arrived from China in the Meiji era, growing from a shippoku banquet course into a food loved across the city.
- Origin: Nagasaki City, Nagasaki
- About 970 km west of Tokyo
Lineage
What it's made of
Shrimp and squid paste is sandwiched between slices of bread and deep-fried. The bread's surface fries up crisp and fragrant, while the inside delivers the shrimp's springy bite together with the paste's soft give. Two entirely different bases — bread and fish paste — fusing into one fried dish gives it a character unlike anything in Japanese, Western, or Chinese cooking alone.
How it's made
Shrimp and squid are worked into a paste, mixed with onion, mayonnaise, salt, pepper, and chili pepper, spread on bread, sandwiched with a second slice, steamed once to hold its shape, and then deep-fried. Using the bread itself as the coating, with no panko added, is said to be the key, giving a crisp outside and a soft inside.
Why it took this shape
Said to have arrived in Nagasaki from China in the Meiji era, its name written 'hato-shi,' or 蝦多士 — shrimp (ha) and bread (toshi) — reflects its origin as shrimp paste sandwiched in bread and fried. Once served as a course within Nagasaki's shippoku banquet cuisine, it's said to have become familiar enough to be sold from street storefronts, condensing a meeting point of Chinese and bread-eating cultures into a single dish.
Before You Go
Dishes in the same style
- Agemaki Yuba no NimonoFresh yuba sheets are layered, rolled into a log, sliced into rounds, and deep-fried before a slow simmer in a light broth — a Nikko dish built on the region's rippled yuba-making craft, served at New Year's and celebrations.
- Aji FryFilleted horse mackerel breaded in panko and fried. Chiba prefecture holds some of the richest mackerel fishing grounds in Japan, and frying is thought to have taken root as a quick way to eat regional brands like the oily 'golden aji' fresh.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Also from Nagasaki
- ArumadoA hard-boiled egg dyed pink is wrapped in fish paste and steamed into a kamaboko log that shows a pink-rimmed cross-section when cut — a Hirado specialty, with kin dishes called "arimado" in Sasebo and "ryugan" in Nagasaki.
- Goto UdonA hand-pulled noodle from Shinkamigoto, Nagasaki. Its technique is thought to trace back to envoys returning from Tang China, and the island's camellia oil is worked into the dough for a smooth, elastic bite.
- HanahajikiCucumber, carrot, deep-fried tofu, and shrimp are cut into strips and fanned out on a plate to be dipped in a hot mustard vinegar-miso — a dish from Isahaya said to be named for how the mustard "flicks the nose," traditionally served at Buddhist memorial services.
- HikadoFish or chicken and vegetables like daikon and carrot are diced fine and simmered, thickened at the end with grated sweet potato — said to originate in a meat stew eaten by Portuguese residents of Nagasaki, its name from the Portuguese word for "minced."
- HikitoshiChicken raised at home is butchered for this Iki hot pot, typically enriched with iki-doufu, a rich local tofu, and firm-boiled somen — said to have begun as a dish served to guests in the inner parlor, its name tracing to "hiki-toshi," leading a guest through.
- Agodashi RamenA ramen said to have started on Ikitsuki island off Hirado, Nagasaki Prefecture. A soy-based broth built on grilled and dried flying-fish stock, eaten across a wider stretch of Nagasaki where agodashi is part of everyday cooking.