Tenshindon - Crab Omelette on Rice

Tenshindon - A Japanese/Chinese crab and shrimp omelette served over rice and topped with a sweet and sour sauce - Diversivore.com

Tenshindon - Crab Omelette on Rice

An awesome Japanese recipe with Chinese origins. The recipe makes a generous dish for two people to share. You can easily halve it for a single person, but if you want to serve 4 you'll have to cook two omelettes, rather than trying to get everything into a single pan. Everything can still be prepared and mixed the same way - simply pour half of the egg mixture into the pan, cook, and repeat.

Course Main Dishes

Cuisine Asian, Japanese

Keyword crab, eggs, japanese seafood omelette, japanese sweet and sour sauce, shrimp, sustainable seafood, tenshinhan

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 10

Total Time 40

Servings people

Calories 568kcal

Ingredients

Crab Omelette

4 large eggs
100 g crab meat
50 g coldwater shrimp or other small, sustainable shrimp variety
30 ml dashi (2 tbsp) or no-salt-added chicken stock (see notes)
6-8 dried wood ear mushrooms
4 scallions white portions only, finely sliced
1/8 tsp salt or to taste
vegetable oil for frying

Sauce

200 ml dashi (~3/4 cup plus 1 tbsp) or no-salt-added chicken stock
10 g ginger thinly sliced
30 ml shoyu (soy sauce) (2 tbsp) or tamari
15 ml rice vinegar (1 tbsp)
15 ml sake (1 tbsp)
15 g sugar (1 tbsp)
salt to taste
5 g potato starch (katakuriko) (1 tsp) or corn starch

To Serve

250 g cooked rice (~2 cups) ideally short-grain
2-3 scallions green portions only
gari (pickled ginger) optional

Instructions

Prepare the rice ahead of time and set aside.
Soak the mushrooms in warm water for about 10 minutes. Once they're soft, drain them and cut them into thin strips.
Prepare the dashi if using (see note below if you're new to making dashi).
Crack eggs into a large bowl and whisk thoroughly. Add the crab, shrimp, dashi (or stock), sliced mushroom, scallions and salt. Stir to combine.
Add a little vegetable oil (about 2 tsp) to a medium frying pan over medium heat. Tilt the pan to spread the oil evenly. Add the egg mixture to the hot pan and stir quickly and evenly as it begins to cook. As the egg begins to set, stir more gently, moving the top (liquid) layer of the egg. Reduce the heat to low and cook the omelette (without stirring) until just set. Ideally, the top of the omelette should be soft and the slightest bit runny when you take it out of the pan.
Invert the cooked omelette over a mound of white rice (see note), then pour the gravy over it all. Top with scallion greens and ideally a little gari (pickled ginger). Serve immediately.

Notes

Making Dashi: To make dashi, pour the water into a large stock pot and add a strip of kombu (about 10x15 cm [4x6 inches]). Bring to a simmer or very gentle boil, then add katsuobushi and remove from heat. Let the dashi stand for at least 15 minutes, then strain out the solids and reserve the liquid.If you want to make your dashi vegetarian, simply omit the katsuobushi or add the liquid from re-hydrating 3-4 dried shiitake mushrooms in its place.

The Rice/Serving: To serve the tenshindon, put a generous helping of rice (enough for two) into a bowl, then invert this in a larger bowl. This will give you a dome-shaped mound of rice that you can serve the omelette over. When you pour the sauce over everything, it forms a sort of 'egg island' in the middle. Looks great, tastes better.

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