Fried ── Fried dishes
Tempura
battered and deep-fried seafood and vegetables
Seafood 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.
Lineage
What it's made of
Shrimp, white fish, and seasonal vegetables get a light coating and a quick fry in hot oil. The Edo-mae style fries a thin batter in sesame oil until crisp and dips it in a savory sauce, while Nagasaki tempura's batter itself is sweetened and needs no dipping at all — the same word, tempura, carries two entirely different flavor designs depending on where it's made.
How it's made
Seafood and vegetables are dusted with flour, then dipped in a batter of egg yolk, ice water, and flour before frying at 160-180°C. Not overworking the batter is said to be the key to the Edo-mae style, with ice water used to hold back gluten; the Nagasaki style instead mixes sugar, soy sauce, and sake into the batter itself, seasoning it directly.
Why it took this shape
The dish is said to trace to a Portuguese-style fritter that arrived in the 16th century, and it's thought to have split into distinct lines from there: a sweetly battered form that took root in Nagasaki, and a crisp, sesame-oil-fried form that developed in Edo. Growing rapeseed-oil production and street-stall culture are said to have driven its spread in Edo, while Nagasaki, a gateway for trade with the Portuguese, shaped its own form.
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
Known for it here
- Known for it here: Tokyo
Against a backdrop of growing rapeseed-oil production and street-stall culture, the crisp, sesame-oil-fried Edo-mae style of tempura, eaten with a dipping sauce, is said to have developed here.
- Known for it here: Nagasaki, Nagasaki
As a gateway for trade with the Portuguese, Nagasaki developed its own tempura with sugar and soy sauce mixed directly into the batter, eaten as is without any dipping sauce.
Contrast
- Ebi FuraiBreaded, deep-fried shrimp. The leading theory traces it to applying the cutlet's breading method to shrimp, with its spread as a Nagoya specialty said to date only from after the war.
- Ocha no Ha TempuraFreshly picked new tea leaves are dipped in a thin batter, fried quickly, and salted straight from the oil — an early-summer dish from sun-drenched, tea-growing Miyazaki, a taste available only for the brief window when the first tea leaves come in.
- Kogyo no TempuraSmall fish native to Lake Biwa — koayu, isaza goby, or smelt — are battered and deep-fried. Because each fish has a different season, some combination is available almost year-round, and freshly fried, the fish loses the aroma freshwater fish are sometimes known for.
- Namazu no TempuraA specialty of Itakura, a town ringed by the Tone and Watarase rivers and known as Gunma's water country. Catfish is fried skin-on into a mild, fluffy-fleshed dish that carries on the river-fish trade the town once ran.
- Shiozuke Takenoko no TenpuraBamboo shoots from Otaki, known for a pale color and little bitterness, are salt-cured then desalted, seasoned in a soy sauce mixture, and fried in an egg-and-flour batter — a way, it's said, of holding onto shoots grown in a short spring season long enough to eat them year-round.
- Shaku no TempuraShaku, 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.