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Atsuko's Japanese Kitchen: Home-cooked comfort food made simple
Learn how to make the enigmatic and umami-rich comfort food of Japan, with over 60 recipes straight from Atsuko’s Ikeda’s authentic yet modern Japanese Kitchen.
Japanese home-cooking is full of comfort, but a version of comfort food that is stylish, mouth-watering and less unhealthy than most. For those who aspire to recreate the Japanese dishes enjoyed in restaurants or on holiday, and to discover even more about the secrets and techniques involved in Japanese home cooking, you are invited into Atsuko’s Kitchen . Learn the subtle art of creating a balanced meal as demonstrated with an easy-to-follow infographic. Learn the basics, such as how to season food the Japanese way, how to prepare dashi stock and how to make variations on basic rice. Choose from the delicious array of main dishes you might be familiar with, such as chicken teriyaki, tonkatsu pork, beef tataki, gyoza, seared tuna with ponzu, vegetable tempura, okonomiyaki, grilled eggplant with sesame sauce, plus recipes from Atsuko’s own family and modern creative repertoire. Also featuring ‘izakaya’ small plates for sharing and sumptuous modern desserts, there is Japanese comfort food for every occasion. With tips on how to present your dishes in the traditional way, anecdotes and cultural explanations of dishes, discover the secrets of Japanese home-cooking for yourself.
Japanese home-cooking is full of comfort, but a version of comfort food that is stylish, mouth-watering and less unhealthy than most. For those who aspire to recreate the Japanese dishes enjoyed in restaurants or on holiday, and to discover even more about the secrets and techniques involved in Japanese home cooking, you are invited into Atsuko’s Kitchen . Learn the subtle art of creating a balanced meal as demonstrated with an easy-to-follow infographic. Learn the basics, such as how to season food the Japanese way, how to prepare dashi stock and how to make variations on basic rice. Choose from the delicious array of main dishes you might be familiar with, such as chicken teriyaki, tonkatsu pork, beef tataki, gyoza, seared tuna with ponzu, vegetable tempura, okonomiyaki, grilled eggplant with sesame sauce, plus recipes from Atsuko’s own family and modern creative repertoire. Also featuring ‘izakaya’ small plates for sharing and sumptuous modern desserts, there is Japanese comfort food for every occasion. With tips on how to present your dishes in the traditional way, anecdotes and cultural explanations of dishes, discover the secrets of Japanese home-cooking for yourself.
192 pages, Hardcover
Published July 9, 2019
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117 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 16, 2020
While there's a great selection of recipes (appetizers, soups, noodles, side dishes, dressings, one plate meals, and special meals), what sticks with me is the reminder to have a balanced meal with 5 tastes/5 colors/5 cooking techniques.
March 4, 2022
This won't be the Japanese cookbook for everyone, but it's just what I was looking for (and I looked through all 28 Japanese cookbooks at the library). Here's what I like about it:
- It's approachable at just 80 solid recipes, and it doesn't feel like there's any filler
- It has a good balance between having a spin on the traditional recipe but without going into pretentious or "out there" for the sake of novelty (a great example of this balance is the teriyaki chicken with lime; it's a perfect step into something new, but I can omit the lime if want)
- It's light on recipes that require sushi-grade fish, something I will never buy based on price and availability
- Its recipes are sorted by appetizer, easy meals, special occasion meals, and desserts, the categories I use when reaching for a cookbook, instead of by the main protein. Separating main courses into easy and special occasion is especially nice when trying to deduce timescales at a glance
- Every single recipe has a photo
- Atsuko accomplishes the incredible task of distilling each recipe to just one page. This does make some of the method writing a bit hurried (e.g. for the onsen tamago it could be unclear whether or not to crack the egg before adding to the pot) but is sooo convenient for photocopying and super nice to avoid flipping a page back and forth with greasy fingers. Even many of the recipes that depend on each other are on adjacent pages!
- I also like that when an ingredient is used twice in different steps, it's simply listed twice in the ingredient list
- It includes a lot of home-cooking recipes rather than the greatest hits recipes from anime
- It has low expectations for me, even in the gyoza wrapper recipe Atsuko mentions she just uses frozen wrappers and I appreciate the honesty
The biggest negative is that the recipes do not list expected cooking times, and though the separation of main courses into easy and special occasion mitigates this I do wish I had a better idea of what to expect time-wise, but this isn't a major complaint.
- It's approachable at just 80 solid recipes, and it doesn't feel like there's any filler
- It has a good balance between having a spin on the traditional recipe but without going into pretentious or "out there" for the sake of novelty (a great example of this balance is the teriyaki chicken with lime; it's a perfect step into something new, but I can omit the lime if want)
- It's light on recipes that require sushi-grade fish, something I will never buy based on price and availability
- Its recipes are sorted by appetizer, easy meals, special occasion meals, and desserts, the categories I use when reaching for a cookbook, instead of by the main protein. Separating main courses into easy and special occasion is especially nice when trying to deduce timescales at a glance
- Every single recipe has a photo
- Atsuko accomplishes the incredible task of distilling each recipe to just one page. This does make some of the method writing a bit hurried (e.g. for the onsen tamago it could be unclear whether or not to crack the egg before adding to the pot) but is sooo convenient for photocopying and super nice to avoid flipping a page back and forth with greasy fingers. Even many of the recipes that depend on each other are on adjacent pages!
- I also like that when an ingredient is used twice in different steps, it's simply listed twice in the ingredient list
- It includes a lot of home-cooking recipes rather than the greatest hits recipes from anime
- It has low expectations for me, even in the gyoza wrapper recipe Atsuko mentions she just uses frozen wrappers and I appreciate the honesty
The biggest negative is that the recipes do not list expected cooking times, and though the separation of main courses into easy and special occasion mitigates this I do wish I had a better idea of what to expect time-wise, but this isn't a major complaint.
July 28, 2022
Might have to buy a copy of this for myself.
May 21, 2025
Lots of pictures! It's a fun cookbook to look through. I only found a couple of recipes that I would like to try, partly because I don't have easy access to some of the unique ingredients.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews