Atsuyaki Tamago (Thick square rolled omelet)

Atsuyaki tamago is a simple but favorful omelet beloved by Japanese people. Its main ingredient is simply eggs, but it's a typical favorite dish for O-shogatsu (New Year) as well as in sushi bars. The rich taste of sugar and mirin make it delicious even cold, which makes it a perfect component for a lunchbox (o-bento).
This unique egg dish is said to have been first presented to the Lord of Obi in Nichinan, Miyazaki prefecture. The town of Obi is now called "Sho-Kyoto", a town that has a Kyoto-like old town atmosphere. The dish's luxurious taste is reminiscent of a sweet custard pudding. One highly reputed shop has even been in business for over 300 years (since the Edo era). One of their authentic atsuyaki tamago sells for 1,500 yen (around 12 U.S. dollars). It's the smallest but ? weighing in at about 1 kilo -- clearly the heaviest rolled omelet in the world, so you'd better have somebody to share it with! (I wonder how many eggs they use!)

Sushi bars have two types of sweetened and soy-flavored omelets: one is the atsuyaki tamago, and the other is dashimaki tamago, which is flavored with soup stock. The traditional atsuyaki tamago dish has ground shrimp flesh mixed into it and is cooked over low heat for more than half an hour. Because of the time and skill its preparation requires, nowadays it is seen only in the finer sushi bars and is considered a delicacy. The dashimaki tamago rolled omelet has a soup-stock flavor and a very short cooking time. It's influenced by the style of Japanese home cooking in the Showa era. Reducing the soup stock and allowing the egg to hardening makes it possible to use it as an ingredient for sushi. In sushi bars, tamago yaki rolled omelet is traditionally called atsuyaki tamago, the one presented here. Some say that, to ascertain the skill of the cook, instead of ordinary sushi with raw fish a sushi connoisseur first tries the atsuyaki tamago.
But here a question arises: since sushi is considered generally to refer to raw fish on rice, how did egg become an essential sushi ingredient? Some think it's because of its color. Sushi plates display a colorful variety of ingredients, such as white (squid slices), red (tuna meat) and blue (mackerel skin) -- and the yellow of the egg fits in nicely. Still, how egg with rice got to be called "sushi" remains a mystery.

This thick, square rolled omelet is usually made with a special square or rectangular pan. In Japan, such pans are commonly sold in stores for home use. But the pans that professionals use are quite big - 21 cm wide (about 8-1/2 inches) - enabling them to cook 9 or 10 eggs at once. For this recipe, though, I used a regular, round non-stick frying pan. An 18-cm (about 7-in.) non-stick frying pan will be fine for 4 large eggs. Japanese cooks roll the egg using a pair of long wooden or bamboo cooking chopsticks, but you can use a spatula or turner if that's more comfortable.
The rolling steps below are easier said than done, but don't worry! After a few tries, you'll surely pick up this technique.

Written by Yuko Tamaki-Welply
A member of TranNet and freelance translator based in southern Spain

♦ INGREDIENTS
(serves 4)

T   = tablespoon
t   = teaspoon
c   = cup

6 to 8   medium eggs
Seasoning
6 T   soup stock (dashi)
3 T   sugar
2 t   sweet sake (mirin)
2 t   soy sauce
1 T   vegetable oil

♦ How to make Atsuyaki tamago

1. Beat the eggs gently in a bowl. Add the seasoning to the eggs and mix it in well.
2. Heat a frying pan over medium heat and coat it evenly with 1/4 of the tablespoon of vegetable oil. When the oil gets hot, wipe it off with a paper towel.
3. Pour 1/3 of the prepared egg mixture into the heated pan. Cook until the egg mixture begins to set. When the egg is almost cooked, roll the omelet toward the top end of the pan, with a pair of long chopsticks (or a turner or spatula), into a scroll shape.
4. Slowly roll from front to back. Pull rolled egg forward, re-oil other side. When the oil gets hot, wipe it off with a paper towel again.
5. Put 1/2 of the remaining egg into pan. Lift completed roll to allow egg under. When the surface is almost cooked, slowly roll from front to back.
6. Repeat the above procedure for the remaining egg mixture and let the rolled egg omelet cook until lightly browned.

Fish species are written using a variety of kanji. Each epecies has its own kanji name. It's said that not all such kanji names originated in China: many were created in Japan. Let's study the origins and meanings of fish names.