Katsu Curry

In college, we'd frequent a little eatery called 'Eat Dessert First' (or EDF for short). They served ice cream, a variety of cakes and cookies, but they also had savory Japanese fare as well. One of my favorite meals was the katsu curry. Katsu is basically breaded and fried protein. There's chicken katsu, don katsu (pork), salmon katsu, even tofu katsu for the vegetarians. And of course, curry is Japanese curry (which was referred to as 'kah-reh' in our Korean household). Japanese curry is a thick sauce made with plenty of vegetables, a roux as a thickening agent, and you guessed it, curry powder.

In my house growing up, my mom always bought ready-made curry roux. So, that's how I do it. Good enough for mama; good enough for me. It's easy enough to make yourself, if you don't have access to it. I referenced a quick one in my old curry rice post but do a little google search and you'll find dozens of others.

Ingredients [serves 2]:
curry
1 small potato, diced
½ small onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 small carrot, diced
4 to 6 mushrooms, chopped
3 cups chicken stock
2 cubes curry roux
spicy pepper (optional)
2 teaspoons oil (canola, vegetable, olive)

don katsu
2 thick cut pork chops
½ cup flour
1 egg
2 cups panko breadcrumbs
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
+ oil for frying

+ sticky white rice
+ hard boiled egg

To make the curry, toss the vegetables and oil into a saucepan and place over a low heat. Let them cook until the onions are transparent. Add in the chicken stock and curry roux cubes and bring to a boil. Stir to combine and cook until thickened, about 10 minutes.

That's all you've got to do to make the curry!

All right, now let's talk about the don katsu.

Prepare the pork by pounding it between two pieces of cling film.

The pork should be pounded to about 1/4-inch thin.

 Grab three dishes. In one dish, add some flour. In a second dish, add an egg. In the last dish, sprinkle in some breadcrumbs. Whisk a little salt into the egg and a bit of pepper into the flour.

Dredge the pork in the flour, then dip it in the egg, and lastly, coat it in breadcrumbs.

Heat a skillet with enough oil to coat the pan and pan fry the pork until the breadcrumb coating is golden brown and crisp.

Serve up the pork on a big plate with some rice.

Pour on plenty of curry and sprinkle with chopped scallions. Oh, and if you're into it, add a hardboiled egg. The curry is flavorful and spicy and a perfect accompaniment to the crispy pork and rice.

Enjoy!

Here are the recipe pages: