Steak Rice Bowl
The steak rice bowl (ステーキ丼) comes from Episode 3, Season 4 of "Solitary Gourmet." In the show, the steak rice in Hakone is served with raw egg, making Goro visibly blissful. Chef Manda shared her recipe on "Manshi Manyu," and Xi Miaoya also posted a tutorial on Zhihu. I couldn’t find a recipe on Xiachufang, so I wrote this one based on slightly modified versions of theirs. I’ve only made it twice myself, and both times were a bit rushed, so there aren’t many photos—please excuse that.
Ingredients
Steps
First, choose a good steak, about 3 cm thick, with some marbling. (In the picture, the steak I bought has too much fat, which makes it easy to feel greasy, and it’s also not thick enough.) Before pan-searing, take the steak out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter until it reaches room temperature, then pat off any blood with kitchen paper. If it’s frozen, defrost for at least an hour in advance.
Rub both sides of the steak with olive oil, sprinkle with sea salt and black pepper, and get ready to cook. No need to marinate!!!
Heat a frying pan over high heat with no oil until it starts to smoke white. A cast-iron skillet is even better because it heats more evenly. Add the steak. If you hear a loud sizzling sound, the temperature is high enough. If it’s not sizzling vigorously, take the steak out and continue heating the pan.
Here’s a little trick for checking doneness of steak by hand (borrowed illustration). This is also what Xi Miaoya mentioned on Zhihu. By comparing the firmness of the steak when you press it with a finger to the firmness of the fleshy part of your palm when you press your fingers together, you can tell how done the steak is. I cooked mine to about medium-rare, roughly 1.5 minutes per side.
A properly seared steak should have a golden, glossy crust. Once the steak comes out of the pan, wrap it immediately in foil or parchment paper to help it reabsorb its juices fully. Don’t discard the fat and juices in the pan; we’ll use them to make the sauce.
Mix 1 tablespoon each of sake, mirin, and Japanese soy sauce in a small bowl. Over medium heat, add sliced onion to the frying pan, then pour in the mixed sauce and about half a small bowl of water. Boil over high heat until the sauce thickens slightly.
Slice the steak thinly against the grain. I didn’t slice very well here, because the steak was too thin so I had to cut it a bit thicker. A well-cooked steak should be evenly pink across the cross-section.
Fill a bowl halfway with rice, drizzle on some sauce, lay the steak slices all over the top, then pour over the remaining sauce and sprinkle with chopped scallions or shredded white scallion. Dig in!