I’m participating in the Cooking Challenge 2023 over at Reddit and the theme for 6-12 August is Okinawan. Okinawa is a Japanese prefecture south of its mainland. It’s a group of islands and has a distinct language, ethnicity, and culture from the rest of Japan.
Did you know that Okinawa is identified as one of the world’s Blue Zones? This means that the average life expectancy of its population is higher than the average.
Okinawans credit healthy eating habits as a factor to their longevity. They use the term nuchigusui, meaning “medicine of life,” which is a philosophical concept used to refer to cuisine and other aspects of life in Okinawa.
Goya Champuru, the dish that I’m making for this challenge, certainly reflects the Okinawan mindset when it comes to food. This is made with goya and stir-fried with eggs and other ingredients like tofu, pork belly, or luncheon meat. Goya, also known as nigauri in mainland Japan, is the Okinawan name for bitter melon.
For this recipe, I bought small bitter melons, the kind that’s usually used in Indian cooking, simply because I thought they looked closer to the Okinawan goya. These bitter melons have more pronounced ridges and they’re about 5 inches or so in length.
This time I also used sugar to rub on the goya slices. I saw from another site that said it’s to help lessen the bitterness. I was familiar with using salt to draw out the bitterness, but it’s the first time that I saw someone using sugar too.
I also added dried bonito flakes and mirin to the sauce. I let the bonito flakes steep in hot water, as if I was making tea. Mirin was added to give more dimension to the sauce. It’s a straightforward sauce – mainly soy sauce and water.
I’ve actually tried making goya champuru a few years ago when I was trying to live healthily. I didn’t like the taste back then, probably because it was too bitter but I was pleasantly surprised this time. The sauce was an improvement and this dish doesn’t take long to cook. Most of the total time comes prepping the goya slices and draining the tofu. I think I’ll be making a small batch once in a while.
Notes for the future
- Go for a different kind of bitter melon
While the bitter melons that I bought looked photogenic, these were more bitter than the normal. I’m not a fan of bitter things in general, so I’ll stir clear of these in the future. I’ll just get the normal kind from the grocery.
- Give it more time to rest
Although the taste wasn’t too bad in the end once the whole thing was cooked, I’ll probably add more time to the “resting” period of the bitter melon. If I have more time, I’ll increase the “resting” period to 30 minutes or even an hour. That way, I’ll be sure to drain most of the bitterness from the fruit.
- Try something else
I saw other people using luncheon meat or spam as the meat of the dish instead of pork. Since I usually have a can or 2 in stock, I’ll use those instead for a different taste. I’ll skip on the salt during cooking though since both kinds of canned meat are already salty.
I’ll swap out the bonito flakes with dashi and maybe use brown sugar in place of mirin. I’ll also add a dash of cooking sake for the additional umami flavor.
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