MARKETS : Home Cooking, Japanese Style

Nijiya Market, 2533 - B, Pacific Coast Highway, Torrance, (213) 534-0770. Hours: 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily. Also at: 3860 Convoy St . , San Diego, (619) 268-3821.

Shopping for Japanese food in Los Angeles these days is almost like buying groceries in Osaka or Tokyo. Our Japanese supermarkets stock the same sauce mixes, noodles and candies, and they even import fresh seafood from Japan. Local farms grow all kinds of Japanese produce, and we have specialty stores making fresh tofu and Japanese pastries. Now Nijiya, the Los Angeles area’s first authentic Japanese deli and convenience mart, has opened in Torrance. Neighborhood markets just like Nijiya are a fairly recent, but growing, phenomenon in Japan’s traffic-choked cities, where working couples prefer to pick up a little dinner near home at the end of the day. Some Japanese lament the fact that Ok’san (the housewife or “honorable interior one”) may no longer spend most of her time in the kitchen fussing over an elaborate family supper. But others are grateful that they can create similar meals without doing much cooking.

At the rear of Nijiya, which is about the size of a large 7-Eleven market, hot deli items and bento boxed lunches are prepared in the store’s kitchen. Sushi rice is made here too, and with a little sashimi from the cooler one can put together a chirashi sushi meal simply by arranging sliced fish over a bowl of the rice and adding some pickled ginger and other zuke.

Rice is still the center of most meals in Japan, and Nijiya specializes in side dishes and condiments to go with it. “We call these accompaniments okazu-- rice partners--or for more formal meals, hashi yasume,” says store manager Osamu Fujita. “Loosely translated, ‘hashi yasume’ means ‘list for the chopsticks.’ ” The Japanese love lots of little tastes, and as far as they’re concerned, the longer the list, the better the meal.

Some foods that come under the okazu or hashi yasume heading, such as fish cakes or pickled vegetables, are factory-produced. However, in the cooler case to the right of the deli kitchen, Nijiya keeps the sort of freshly cooked okazu someone might make at home. There are various kinds of braised vegetables, little salads and, my favorite, kabocha-- deep orange Japanese pumpkin that has been simmered in seasoned broth.

Most of Nijiya’s fresh deli foods are pretty familiar stuff, but you get a very different view of Japanese home-style eating by browsing the store’s cooler cases. They hold many preserved products such as the natto or katsuo shiokara, described below. In former times, just a little of these strong-tasting foods would enhance the ever-present bowls of rice, supplanting fresh fish and vegetables during Japan’s cold winters. These days such foods may be a snack or one of many okazu set out for a meal.

More to Western tastes perhaps would be the pre-sliced sukiyaki beef or the many kinds of fresh noodles. Nijiya stocks a huge collection of ramen, soba and udon packaged in handy kits with various condiments. These are a definite improvement over the instant dry noodles in a cup.

Nijiya Torrance is the second in a proposed chain of stores that originated in San Diego. The next Nijiya is expected to open in West Los Angeles.

Nijiya displays its hot foods (soups, noodles, bentos and fried dishes) at the deli counter at the back of the store, but only at lunchtime or in the late afternoon. Between 2 and 5 p.m. you have to order from a list, rather than by sight.

SHOPPING LIST:

HOMEMADE OKAZU

These are available in the cold case to the right of the hot deli counter.

* Shirapae: The name means “white-mixed.” This is a salad of julienned vegetables in a creamy white tofu dressing.

* Kampira: This is another vegetable dish, named after a mythical hero of old Japan. To make it, gobo (burdock: a long thin root vegetable with a musky flavor) is julienned and braised in a sake-laced broth.

* Yasai nitsuke: Simmered, mixed vegetables often show up in fancy bento box meals. Nijiya’s yasai include thick wedges of bamboo shoots, shiitake mushrooms and daikon cooked in soup broth. The vegetables are served at room temperature without the broth.

* Warabe salad: Mountain-grown fern shoots, similar to fiddle-head ferns, are a favorite Japanese vegetable. They show up in this salad lightly dressed with rice vinegar and mixed with thin slivers of squid.

* Kiriboshi daikon salad: Long, linguine-like strands of kiriboshi daikon (literally “cut and dried daikon”), simmered in a delicious semi-sweet broth, are the main ingredient in this salad. The daikon is tossed with shiitake and carrot.

* Shiro kintoke mame: These look like glazed white lima beans. Fujita describes them as “Japanese-style fava beans cooked in a sweet sauce.” A similar vegetable is Uguisu mame, large green peas in the same sauce as the shiro kintoke mame. Both have a slight sweetness that complements the many salty okazu below.

* Hijiki: The flavor of these ebony-colored seaweed strands are reminiscent of licorice.

COMMERCIAL OKAZU

These are all in the cold cases along the right wall.

* Chuka zensai: Also called Chinese hors d’oeuvres, this sesame-dressed mixture of clear noodles and julienned vegetables is packaged in a salami-shaped plastic container.

* Seasoned bonito: This dry-cured fish, cut into bite-sized squares, resembles ham.

* Chimi: A whole array of delicacies. Each has its own “special taste,” which is the closest an English explanation can come to describing chimi’s meaning. Under the chimi heading are certain wild mountain vegetables and a collection of seasoned preserved seafoods. Nijiya carries more than a dozen seafood chimi , including hotate okizuke , marinated scallops with sea flavor; katsuo shiokara, a spreadable pate -like blend of bonito and seasonings; kurage uni , seasoned jellyfish strips with uni ; and uni-ika , strips of squid in a flavorful uni paste.

* Fish cakes: Japan produces a mind-boggling assortment of fish, and Nijiya’s fish cake department seems to have them all. They come steamed, broiled, roasted and deep-fried in all sorts of shapes and with dozens of flavorings and additions. Chikuwa, a long cylindrical fish cake that has been roasted on a stick leaving a hole at its center, and gobo ten, a deep-fried gobo -flavored fish cake in a dumpling shape, are two of the best known.

An excellent way to try various types of fish cakes is in oden , a steamy broth filled with all sorts of foods. Small Japanese pubs specialize in it, and vendors pushing steaming carts with roofs sell oden at night. You can buy your choice of ingredients on skewers or by the plate. Osaka-style oden uses many kinds of fish cakes, while in Tokyo, cooks add vegetables and seafood. Japanese hot mustard is an essential condiment for oden ; you dip skewered pieces of fish cake or vegetables into it.

* Oden set: An easy way to cook oden at home is to buy an “oden set” in Nijiya’s fish cake department. It consists of assorted styles of fish cake including the essential chikuwa , together with pieces of fried tofu on a Styrofoam tray. You simmer the set ingredients in broth, which if not homemade, may be bought as a concentrate in the sauce section. (See prepared sauces and the recipe below.)

* Natto: In the section next to the chimi fish products are half a dozen kinds of natto --pungent, cheesy-tasting fermented soy beans. Natto is popular for breakfast with rice and steaming bowls of miso soup. Supermarkets carry it in cans or jars, but Nijiya sells only brands packaged in individual portions with the traditional mustard and soy sauce accompaniments in little pillow packages--possibly the Japanese answer to individually boxed cereal.

At one time, natto’s keeping qualities made it a convenient shelf staple--something like peanut butter for Americans. Today, however, natto is far less salty and is kept refrigerated. It also comes in various styles: whole bean, chopped and a gourmet version-- kotsubu natto --made from tiny young soybeans.

* Konnyaku: The Japanese love this bland-tasting product for its smooth, glassy texture. It looks like khaki-brown jelly and absorbs the flavor of soups and stews. Konnyaku is made from the same root vegetable that produces shirataki, the jelly-like noodles in sukiyaki. In Japan both are sold in tofu shops, and at Nijiya you’ll find them next to the tofu.

FRESH FISH SECTION

Nijiya stocks a small tank with one large crab and live clams. A sign affixed to the tank reads, “Do Not Feed.” Apparently children try to offer rice-cracker snacks to the crabs and Fujita disapproves.

Beside these few live creatures, most of the fish at Nijiya is ready to cook. You’ll find sliced barracuda to glaze with teriyaki sauce or whole herring, split for grilling shio-yaki style (literally salt-grilled). Also ready for the broiler are skewered shishamo , small sardine-like capelin filled with their roe.

In addition to fresh salmon steaks are three traditional styles of thickly sliced, salted salmon. Beni jake is a lightly salted red salmon. The salt acts as a light preservative and draws off the moisture, making for a dense, very salmony-tasting piece of fish. The lighter-colored amagio salmon is similarly cured, and the karakuchi salmon is the saltiest of the three.

SASHIMI SECTION

Nijiya carries a substantial selection of fish ready to slice into sashimi. It may include Nippon hamachi --yellowtail flown in from Japan (most of the yellowtail served in California sushi bars has been frozen). You’ll also find peeled nama ebi or sweet raw shrimp, lined up like little soldiers in their tray, and cooked shrimp and beautiful coral-colored slabs of smoked salmon.

There’s shime saba --a rice vinegar-marinated mackerel usually made into oshi-zushi by pressing rice onto a small rectangular mold, topping it with the fish and cutting the pressed sushi into neat rectangles. Kazunoko konbu is kelp leaves encrusted with a thick coating of crunchy, briny cod eggs and neat rectangles of squid come ready to be cut into long strands of ika soba or “noodles” made of squid.

FREEZER SECTION

Look for the several flavors of ready-to-fry croquets, including crab and potato with their shaggy breaded coats of panko --Japanese-style bread crumbs. Small Spanish mackerel are prepared the same way, with just their tiny tail protruding from the breading. Completely cooked teriyaki eel and saba nitsuke (simmered mackerel in a sweet soy broth) need only be gently heated to eat.

While the Japanese supermarkets carry all kinds of dumpling wrappers, Nijiya concentrates instead on several brands of individually frozen meat-stuffed dumplings or gyoza . Pan-grilling gyoza pot sticker-style, until they become crisp on one side, is traditional but gyoza are delicious in soup too.

SAUCES AND BRAISING MIXES

* Curry products: Marketing surveys show that curry is served in Japanese homes at least once a week. Japanese markets devote as much space to curry convenience products as Western markets devote to frozen pizza.

Japanese curry products come in all sorts of preparations including basic curry powder. Many kinds of semi-dry curry mixes, to which you add meat and vegetables, contain onions and a meat sauce base. Completely cooked curries come canned. The mixes come in all spice levels from mild to extra-hot.

* Dashi: This essential Japanese cooking stock may be purchased as a bottled concentrate or in dry form. The dry dashi comes in packets that resemble tea bags. To make prepared dashi , simply boil water, add the bag and simmer about 10 minutes. Most packages have good directions.

* Cooking stock mixes: Basic to almost every Japanese dish is a mixture of dashi with soy sauce and mirin, a sweet rice wine. Several products now on the market combine these ingredients. Their labels provide a chart advising how much water to add for various purposes. For instance, dipping sauce for cold noodles requires one part sauce base to one part water while soup stock calls for one part base to four parts water. To make a broth for oden, one part base to seven parts water is advised. There are slight variations among these sauce bases; the manager can counsel you on the best one to buy for your purpose.

* Yaki-niku no tare and other sauces: Yaki-niku or marinated grilled beef is quite similar to Korean barbecue. Yaki-niku marinade may be found in the same shelves as the teriyaki sauce and the ponzu sauce, a mixture of soy sauce and Japanese lime used for sushi.

As a convenience, instead of mixing chicken stock, dashi, light soy and mirin, you can use concentrated oden broth mix to make 9 1/2 to 10 cups oden broth.

ODEN

3/4 pound mixed ground beef and pork

1/2 onion, shredded

1 egg, beaten

2 tablespoons flour

Salt

Oil for deep-frying

1 cake konnyaku, optional

1 large daikon, peeled and sliced into 1/2 circles

1 turnip or 2 zucchini, sliced and cut into 1/2 circles

3 or 4 “oden sets”

6 hard-cooked eggs, peeled

Oden Simmering Mixture

1 or all of following condiments: mustard paste, shichimi, seven-spice mixture, red pepper flakes (ichimi) or ground sansho pepper

Mix ground meats, onion, egg, flour and little salt in bowl. Shape into 3/4-inch meatballs. Heat oil to 350 degrees. Deep-fry meatballs 4 to 5 minutes or until cooked. Drain on paper towels.

Rub konnyaku with salt. Lightly pound with meat mallet and rinse. Cut into 2 1/2-inch triangles about 1/2-inch thick. Set aside.

Boil daikon slices in water to cover until they can barely be pierced with wood pick (should nnot be quite cooked). Cook turnip in same way. Pour boiling water over fried tofu and fish cakes from oden set to remove oil. Drain well. Cut fish cakes into 1 1/2-inch pieces. Leave eggs whole.

Use large, flame-proof earthenware pot (donabe) that disperses heat slowly or any heavy, wide, shallow cooking pot. Heat Oden Simmering Mixture over low heat almost to boil.

Add konnyaku, daikon and turnip to broth and simmer until heated through. (If using zucchini, add near end of cooking time.) Add oden sets and simmer on very low heat about 90 minutes without covering pan. Use enough stock at beginning of cooking time so ingredients almost float. Add meatballs and eggs last 30 minutes of cooking. By time oden is ready to serve, broth should be reduced by 1/3 and should be darker. Makes about 8 servings.

Note: This is a community dish; pot should be brought to center of table for all guests to help themselves. Give each diner wide soup bowl and several wooden skewers. Pass small dishes of mustard and shakers of spices. Oden keeps well for 2 days and tastes even richer when reheated.

Oden Simmering Mixture

4 cups chicken stock

4 cups prepared dashi

3/4 cup light soy sauce

3/4 cup mirin

Combine chicken stock, dashi, light soy sauce and mirin.

JAPANESE DINNER CURRY

1 1/2 pounds boneless chicken meat (mixture of thigh and breast meat is best), skinned

2 tablespoons oil

2 medium onions, coarsely chopped

1 large white rose potato, cubed

2 small carrots, sliced into rounds

4 cups water, approximately

1/2 (10-ounce) package frozen peas

1 small (3.5-to 4.4-ounce) package curry sauce mix

Cooked rice

Fuku jin zuke (sweet Japanese pickle always served with kari raisu)

Cut chicken in large, bite-size pieces. Heat oil in skillet or saucepan and saute onions until tender and translucent. Add chicken and brown slightly.

Add potato, carrots and 4 cups water and bring to boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer until meat is tender, about 25 minutes. Mix in peas. Add curry sauce mix, stirring until completely dissolved. Simmer 5 minutes, stirring continuously. Add little more water if too thick. Serve steaming hot over rice, accompanied with fuku jin zuke pickles. Makes 5 to 6 servings.

This recipe can be made with bottled teriyaki sauce, or you can make your own.

TERIYAKI GRILLED FISH

1 to 1 1/2 pounds sliced fish (barracuda or salmon)

7 1/2 tablespoons Teriyaki Sauce

Run 2 bamboo skewers lengthwise through each fish slice, about 1 inch apart. Brush part of Teriyaki Sauce on both sides of fish. Reserve remaining sauce.

Place fish on broiler pan in preheated broiler 3 to 4 inches below heat or on small, lightly greased grill about 4 inches above solid bed of glowing coals. Cook, turning once and basting often with remaining sauce, just until flesh inside fish looks opaque, 5 to 7 minutes. Makes 3 or 4 servings.

Teriyaki Sauce

3 tablespoons soy sauce

3 tablespoons mirin

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 1/2 teaspoons salad oil

Combine soy sauce, mirin, lemon juice and oil in small bowl.