In Japan, people are accustomed to eating eel during the summer. Eel contains a lot of protein and easy to be digested. So, that's why Japanese people believe it is good to eat eel during the hot summer time when they lose their appetite and easily get tired from the heat.
In Japan, there are many small restaurants which specialized in eel. They mainly serve eel dishes and only few non-eel related items.
And the Japanese people even have a special "Eel Day"(in Japanese "do yo no ushi no hi") for eating eel in the midsummer day of OX. In this year, 2014, it will be on July 29.
"Unagi Kaba-yaki" Grilled Eel with special Tare sauce
Live eel in fish tank (left), how to cut eel (right)
Freshwater eel has a distinctive muddy taste. In order to get rid of that muddy flavor, live eel must have been kept in the fish tank with clean freshwater for a couple of days.
There are few differences in how to prepare the eel between "Kanto" region (Eastern Japan) and "Kansai" region (Western Japan).
Usually open up the eel from the back side of the eel in "Kanto" and from the belly side of the eel in "Kansai" because the time when eel dish became popular in Edo period, there were more Samurai in "Kanto" than "Kansai" and the way cutting eel from belly side reminds them of "Hara-kiri", that's why the eel are cut from back side in "Kanto" region.
How to cut eel
In "Kanto" region, after cut and cleaned the eel, it will be lightly grilled, steamed and then grilled again with "Tare" special sauce (*Every eel restaurants has their own recipe for "Tare" sauce and usually it's been kept for decades, as same age as the history of the restaurants).
In "Kansai" region, after cut and cleaned the eel, it will be simply just grilled with "Tare" sauce.
So, the taste of eel in "Kanto" is said to be less fatty and texture is tenderer. In "Kansai", taste is richer and texture is tougher
The eel grilled with the sauce is call "Kaba-yaki"(蒲烧) and without sauce is called "Shira-yaki"(白烧) . "Shira-yaki" goes well with grated fresh wasabi. And "Sansho" pepper (山椒粉) for both "Kaba-yaki" and "Shira-yaki"
Let's eat eels in the summer!!
Filleted eel (left), Grill the eel (right)
