Fried ── Fried dishes
Shaku no Tempura
Shaku no tempura — deep-fried mud shrimp eaten whole, shell and all
Shaku, a mud shrimp burrowing deep in tidal flats, is battered and deep-fried shell and all — a summer delicacy that spoils fast enough to rarely leave Kumamoto, eaten whole, shell, meat, and innards, for its intensely rich flavor.
- Origin: Kumamoto
- About 910 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
Mud shrimp living in burrows in the tidal flats are washed clean of mud, coated in batter and deep-fried until crisp. Because the flesh, shell and innards are all eaten together, the flavor is intense and distinctive, and the dish is said to be treasured locally as a delicacy found nowhere else. Though it resembles a mantis shrimp, it's actually a different kind of crustacean, a wholly separate creature.
How it's made
At low tide, a brush is inserted into the shrimp's burrow in the exposed mud flat, and the shrimp, reacting as if to a predator, comes out and is caught one at a time. Once washed clean of mud, it's coated in batter and deep-fried whole until crisp. It's eaten with a dipping sauce or salt, sometimes flavored with shiso, green laver or Japanese pepper. A paste made by mincing the gills and legs of a raw shrimp and grinding them in a mortar, called 'shaku miso,' is also said to be enjoyed with rice or as a drinking snack.
Why it took this shape
Because the mud shrimp spoils quickly and can't survive long out of water, it's said to be distributed almost nowhere outside Kumamoto prefecture. Precisely because it can only be tasted locally, cooking methods that use every part — frying, boiling in salted water, working it into a miso paste — are thought to have developed, leaving a food culture tightly bound to the tidal flats where the shrimp lives. The distinctive fishing method known as 'shaku fishing,' luring the shrimp out of its burrow with a brush, is said to be a sight unique to this catch.
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
Contrast
- TempuraSeafood and vegetables battered and deep-fried. Said to trace to a Portuguese-style fritter that arrived in the 16th century, with the style that developed in Edo and the one rooted in Nagasaki differing sharply in how the batter itself is made.
- Nagasaki TempuraFish and vegetables are coated in a wheat batter sweetened with sugar and sake, then fried crisp into something closer to a fritter than standard tempura — said to descend from a seasoned-batter fry eaten by Portuguese traders, eaten plain since the batter itself carries the flavor.
Also from Kumamoto
- Amakusa DaioA large-bodied meat fowl once kept in Amakusa in the Meiji and Taisho eras, said to have died out in the early Showa period before Kumamoto prefecture spent roughly a decade recreating it; reportedly among the biggest jidori breeds, shipped at 120–150 days.
- Gane-ageSweet potato cut into batons is coated in a ginger-sweetened batter and deep-fried. "Gane" is Amakusa dialect for crab, said to describe the shape of the fried strands, and the dish also serves as a vegetarian offering at Buddhist services.
- Tai SomenSomen noodles are simmered in the broth of sea bream head and bones cooked down whole — a celebratory dish said to reflect the influence of nearby Shimabara's somen tradition. In Yamato's Mamihara, a version called "taimen" simmers the whole fish instead.
- Tako MeshiSun-dried octopus is rehydrated, chopped, and either cooked into rice with burdock and carrot or mixed in afterward — a dish that leans on the concentrated flavor of dried octopus, known for the summer sight of octopus hung out to dry in Amakusa's Ariake.
- Baniku SobaFrom the Aso area of Kumamoto: hot soba topped with horse meat simmered sweet and salty. It's said to carry the history of a region where horse meat took root as a restorative food for the injured and ill.
- ButaaeBoiled octopus and eggplant are stir-fried in a sweet, spicy barley miso — an Amakusa home dish said to have begun as a stand-in for pork, once hard to come by, using the local octopus instead while keeping the old name, "pork mix."