What Kind of Beef to Use for Curry

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Made with beef, potatoes, carrots, mushrooms, and curry roux, this savory and hearty Japanese Beef Curry makes for a fabulous introduction to new curry eaters. Adapted to Japanese tastes, it's balmy and sweet with a stew-like consistency. Even children enjoy information technology thoroughly! You lot take to give this piece of cake recipe a try.

Japanese Curry Rice or Karē Raisu (カレーライス) is an extremely popular dish for all ages in Japan. We adore our curry so much that it is considered ane of the country's national dishes along with ramen and gyoza! In this recipe, I'm bringing you lot a most comforting Japanese Beefiness Curry (ビーフカレー).

This takes a bit of preparation compared to the Japanese Chicken Curry but the stop result is totally worth the effort and fourth dimension. It'south a hearty stew that volition satisfy your deepest peckish.

Tabular array of Contents

• What is Japanese Curry?
• The Key Ingredient: Japanese Back-scratch Roux
  • Adding Flavour Boosters
  • Homemade Curry Roux
• How to Brand Japanese Beef Back-scratch
  • Ingredients You lot'll Need
  • Overview: Cooking Steps
• 5 Of import Cooking Tips
• How to Serve the Back-scratch
• How to Store Japanese Beefiness Back-scratch
• FAQs
• What to Serve with This Japanese Beef Curry
• More than Japanese Curry Recipes You lot'll Honey

What is Japanese Curry?

In case you've never tried Japanese curry, I want to rapidly introduce it to you lot as it is quite unlike from Indian or Thai curry or whatsoever other rendition of curry for that thing.

The dish has a long history in Nippon and was in fact introduced by the British Royal Navy during the Meiji Restoration 150 years ago. Notwithstanding, information technology was not until the early twentieth century that curry became a mainstream staple in Japanese households.

A classic Japanese back-scratch usually features tender morsels of meat, potatoes, sweetness bites of onions and carrots, and a thick brownish sauce that whispers in a gentle sugariness.

Although most spice aficionados would draw Japanese back-scratch as mellow, the degree of spiciness varies depending how you'd make it. I can ever bring up the chili heat if preferred.

Today, you lot can find many versions of Japanese curry, with some featuring unique local ingredients and produce.

The Cardinal Ingredient: Japanese Curry Roux

To make Japanese curry, the recipes well-nigh always include a box of Japanese curry roux, which can exist found at Japanese and Asian supermarkets or in an Asian food alley at your local grocery stores.

All the curry spices are packed in a form of solid roux resembling a cake of baking chocolate. You can detect them existence labeled according to the spice levels of balmy, medium hot, or hot.

Younger children can easily enjoy the "balmy" level and now that my kids are older, I mix the mild and the medium-hot for my curries. For those who have toddlers, there is even a Japanese curry roux for toddlers that yous may find at Japanese grocery stores.

For those who prefer tingling heat, the "hot" might not be plenty for yous, but you can certainly punch things up past adding in some cayenne pepper and blackness pepper.

Adding Flavor Boosters

To avert "out of the box" sense of taste, it's very common to mix two-three different brands of the Japanese curry roux and add dissimilar condiments to enhance the flavor for the curry sauce. We'll talk more about it in the cooking tip section beneath.

Bootleg Curry Roux

Not a fan of shop-bought curry roux? No problem! Yous tin can make information technology from scratch.

Homemade Curry Roux

You demand iv-5 ingredients to brand this back-scratch roux: Butter, flour, Japanese curry pulverization, and garam masala (and cayenne pepper for the spicy version).

When you have fourth dimension to make curry roux, make a double batch, and store it in the freezer for later use!

How to Make Japanese Beefiness Curry

Ingredients You lot'll Need

• Beef (My top choice is chuck roast; read more later)
• Veggies: onions, potatoes, carrots
• Mushrooms
• Garlic and ginger
• Wine
• Beef stock/broth
• Seasonings: tomato paste, Japanese curry pulverization, Japanese curry roux, bay leafage, etc
• Optional add-ins: grated apple, milk, Worcestershire sauce

Overview: Cooking Steps

1. Cut the onions and showtime sautéing them until tender and caramelized.
2. Meanwhile, cut all the vegetables and beef.
3. Sear the beef and add together it to the caramelized onion.
4. Add the wine, stock, carrots, mushrooms, and seasonings, and cook for 2 hours (add together the potatoes fifteen minutes prior to finish cooking in social club to relieve their shape).
5. Add Japanese curry roux and serve with rice!

5 Of import Cooking Tips

ane. Get Chuck Roast instead of Stew Beef

Butcher counters sell pre-cut stew beef. This cut is more than economic because it'south fabricated up of the odds and ends from other different cuts. Chuck roast, on the other hand, is from the shoulder muscles, and while initially quite tough, cubes of chuck roast can break down into tender, delicious, flavorful meat after cooking low and slow.

So, for a succulent Japanese curry (and of course whatever beefiness stew recipe), I strongly recommend getting chuck roast.

For really tender meat, information technology usually takes two hours. Practice non blitz the cooking procedure. Otherwise, the beefiness will exist tough and chewy. Make sure there'due south plenty liquid and keep an middle on the dish. If the recipe calls for less than 1 60 minutes for cooking the beefiness, information technology can't be expert.

If you lot can't become chuck roast, try round roast, rump roast, or pot roast.

2. Sear the Meat

This is an essential footstep if y'all want to make the most flavorful meat. Searing caramelizes the natural sugars in the meat and browns the proteins, forming a bronze crust on the surface that amplifies the savory flavor of the finished dish.

Once the sauce is thickened, you volition be rewarded with a succulent curry with tender pieces of meat in a rich, velvety sauce.

3. Caramelize the Onions

When you boring cook the onions over an extended menses of fourth dimension, the natural sugars in the onions caramelize, bringing out their sugariness and making them extremely flavorful. It takes fourth dimension, merely you tin can ever become the other prep work done while sautéing the onions.

4. Personalize Your Back-scratch with Season Boosters

The beauty of curry is its room for customization. Every melt has the liberty to enhance and personalize the flavors with different ingredients (some tin be unexpected). You can see the full list in my Japanese Craven Curry recipe, but here are some of my favorite ones:

• Grated apple
• Honey
• Ketchup
• Butter (Add with roux)
• Garlic (Add while sauteeing)
• Ginger (Add while sauteeing)
• Milk
• Reddish wine
• Soy sauce
• Tonkatsu sauceor Worcestershire Sauce

Pair one or two of the above with the main ingredients of your curry. For case, I don't apply red wine unless information technology's for a beefiness curry. Try out unlike combinations or change up the proportions to see what you like.

5. Add the Potatoes 15 Minutes Before Finishing

Because the beef needs to exist simmered for about ii hours, I similar to add together the russet potatoes toward the end of simmering. That style, we'll retain the shape of the potatoes instead of them being dissolved into the curry sauce.

You can use Yukon gold potatoes, which tend to continue their shape. But I similar the floury, light, and fluffy texture of russet potatoes for the curry.

How to Serve the Curry

Japanese curry is almost e'er served with steamed rice. I accept detailed instructions on how to cook Japanese short-grain rice in a pot over the stove, a rice cooker, an Instant Pot, or a donabe (Japanese clay pot).

Serve the steamed rice in half of a shallow bowl, and so add piping-hot back-scratch sauce to fill the other half of the basin.

Typically, the Japanese curry is garnished with fukujinzuke (red pickled radish) and rakko (pickled shallots). Put the actress pickles in a basin/plate on the table so y'all tin can add more as you eat.

How to Store Japanese Beef Curry

You lot tin proceed the leftovers in an airtight glass container and store them in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or in the freezer for a calendar month. The texture of the potatoes will change in the freezer, then I recommend removing them before freezing.

Defrost the frozen curry in the refrigerator for 24 hours and reheat in a pot to serve. If needed, add ¼ to ½ cup (lx-120 ml) of water to dilute the back-scratch when reheating.

FAQs

I don't take 3 hours to make curry. Are there any other recipes that are quicker?

If y'all want to cutting down on the simmering fourth dimension for beef curry, you lot can make my Instant Pot Pressure Cooker Japanese Curry recipe.

Or attempt my Japanese Craven Curry or Japanese Seafood Curry!

My goop disappeared while cooking!

When you simmer stews like this for a long menstruation of time, it's very of import to use a heavy-bottomed pot with a tight-fitting lid. The pot I use is Staub brand and their hat seals perfectly. Le Creuset is okay, but I still run across some evaporation from the gap between the lid and the pot.

Tin can I make a vegetarian version?

Japanese curry normally includes a poly peptide of your selection (usually beefiness, chicken, pork, or seafood), onions, potatoes, and carrots. For a vegetarian option, yous can add together firm tofu right before you serve simply to oestrus it through.

Why is my meat tough and chewy after cooking?

Showtime, I recommend getting chuck roast instead of stew beef. Beef stew meat is typically fabricated up of the odds and ends from other unlike cuts. Chuck roast is a pretty tough cut, but subsequently cooking low and slow, it becomes cook-in-your-mouth tender.

Secondly, you do need to melt it for 2 hours every bit all the beef stew recipes practice. Do not blitz it. Otherwise, the beef will be tough and chewy. Make sure at that place's enough liquid and go on an middle on the dish.

What to Serve with This Japanese Beef Back-scratch

• Japanese Macaroni Salad
• Cold Brew Hojicha (Roasted Green Tea)
• Chicken Katsu or Tonkatsu

More Japanese Curry Recipes You'll Love

• Back-scratch Udon
• Back-scratch Bread (Curry Pan)
• How to Make Japanese Curry Roux
• 15 Japanese Curry Recipes You'll Love

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Japanese Beefiness Back-scratch

Made with beefiness, potatoes, carrots, mushrooms, and curry roux, this savory and hearty Japanese Beefiness Curry makes for a fabulous introduction to new curry eaters. Adjusted to Japanese tastes, it'southward balmy and sweet with a stew-like consistency. Fifty-fifty children enjoy information technology thoroughly! Yous have to give this easy recipe a try.

Prep Time: ten mins

Cook Time: 2 hrs 50 mins

Total Time: three hrs

Servings: 8

Cook Mode Forbid your screen from going night

• ▢ ii onions (large; one¼ lb, 567 g for eight servings)
• ▢ ii Tbsp neutral-flavored oil (vegetable, rice bran, canola, etc.) (divided for the onions and beef)
• ▢ 2 Tbsp unsalted butter (divided for the onions and beef)
• ▢ 1 russet potato (11 oz, 309 g for 8 servings)
• ▢ 1 carrot (large; 8 oz, 230 one thousand for 8 servings)
• ▢ 6 cremini mushrooms (2.6 oz, 80 grand for 8 servings)
• ▢ 1 knob ginger (ane inch, two.5 cm; ½ tsp grated for viii servings)
• ▢ 1 clove garlic (minced)
• ▢ 1¼ lb boneless chuck roast (I recommend chuck roast for its tenderness and higher quality; you can use stew beef as it's slightly more economical, but information technology'southward made up of bits and pieces leftover from carving the chuck roasts, so the meat is not equally tender)
• ▢ ¼ tsp kosher salt (Diamond Crystal; use half for salt)
• ▢ ¼ tsp freshly ground blackness pepper
• ▢ 1 Tbsp all-purpose flour (plain flour)
• ▢ ½ cup carmine vino
• ▢ ½ Tbsp Japanese curry powder
• ▢ i Tbsp tomato plant paste (or ketchup)
• ▢ 4 cups beef stock/broth (1 QT for eight servings; store-bought beef stock is frequently salted; for less sodium intake, utilize 2 cups/480 ml beef stock + 2 cups/480 ml water)
• ▢ ⅛ apple (I use Fuji apple; add more for sugariness; substitute one Tbsp honey or mango chutney for 8 servings)
• ▢ 1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• ▢ 2 Tbsp milk
• ▢ one bay leaf
• ▢ one box Japanese curry roux (7-8.4 oz, 200-240 k for 8 servings; or employ my Japanese Back-scratch Roux recipe)

For Serving

• ▢ cooked Japanese short-grain rice (1-1½ cups (180-270 grand) per person)
• ▢ fukujinzuke (Japanese ruddy pickled vegetables) (optional)
• ▢ rakkyo (Japanese pickled scallion) (optional)

Japanese Ingredient Substitution: If y'all want substitutes for Japanese condiments and ingredients, click here.

• Gather all the ingredients.

  

To Set up the Ingredients

• Cut the onions into sparse slices.

  

• Preheat a large heavy-bottomed pot (I used this 5.5 QT Staub Dutch oven) on medium heat. When the pot is hot, add half of the butter, half of the oil, and the onions to the pot. Stir to glaze the onions with the oil.

  

• Sauté the onions, stirring once in a while, for nearly 20-25 minutes. Meanwhile, motility on to the adjacent footstep (but stir the onions and keep an eye on them). When the onions are wilted, reduce the stove'southward heat to medium depression (as they tend to burn quickly). Once the onions are tender, translucent, and a bit caramelized, remove the pot from the oestrus and set aside until the beef is washed searing.

  

• Skin and cut the russet potato in thirds.

  

• Then, cut each piece in half or quarters. Soak the pieces in water for fifteen minutes (or until added to the pot later on) to remove the starch. Drain and set aside.

  

• Peel and cutting the carrot diagonally while rotating it a quarter turn betwixt cuts (we call this cut technique "rangiri" in Japanese).

  

• Clean the mushrooms. I utilise a pastry brush and avoid washing mushrooms as they absorb moisture. However, it's okay to quickly rinse them. Then, cut them into sparse slices.

  

• Grate the ginger (I utilise this ceramic grater), measure out the corporeality needed, and prepare aside. Mince the garlic clove (I skip it here as I use a garlic press).

  

• Cutting the beefiness into 1½-inch (3.8 cm) cubes.

  

• Lightly sprinkle the beef with salt and pepper. Then, lightly coat the meat with flour.

  

To Melt the Back-scratch

• Preheat a carbon steel pan (or cast-fe skillet) on medium-loftier heat. When the skillet is hot, add the remaining oil and butter. Cook the beef in 2 batches. Add the beef cubes in a single layer, making certain not to crowd the skillet; otherwise, the excess moisture in the pan will end upward "steaming" the meat.

  

• Sear the beef cubes (do not move them) on ane side until brown and crusty, about 3-4 minutes, then plough them over to cook all sides. The meat will release itself from the pan when the surface is seared nicely. Transfer the seared meat to a plate and work on the adjacent batch.

  

• Once you've seared all the meat and transferred information technology to the plate, deglaze the pan. Add together the wine to the pan and utilise a wooden blunt-terminate spatula to release the flavorful browned $.25 (called the "addicted") that are stuck to the bottom of the pan. Plow off the heat and set aside this deglazed pan liquid temporarily.

  

• By now, the onions in the pot should exist caramelized and set for the next step. Reheat the pot on the stove over medium heat. Add the minced garlic (I use a garlic printing) and grated ginger.

  

• Add the curry pulverisation and lycopersicon esculentum paste and sauté for 1 infinitesimal.

  

• Add the seared beef, any juices from the plate, and the deglazed pan liquid to the pot and mix them all together. Melt, stirring occasionally, for 3 minutes, letting the alcohol from the wine evaporate.

  

• Add together the carrots and mushrooms and mix them all together. Add together the beefiness stock to merely embrace the ingredients. Cover the pot with a tight-fitting lid and bring it to a boil.

  

• Once boiling, skim off the scum and fat from the broth. I prepare a 2-cup measuring cup with water in it and make clean my fine-mesh skimmer in the water. It'due south easy to remove the scum/fat from the skimmer this mode.

  

• Grate the apple and add information technology to the broth. Then, add the Worcestershire sauce and milk.

  

• Add the bay foliage and embrace the pot with the tight-plumbing equipment hat. (Tip: Compared to Le Creuset, I think Staub has a slap-up seal on the lid and prevents evaporation). Simmer on low heat until the meat is tender, most 1 hour and 45 minutes. (Tip: To become tender beef, two hours of simmering is standard.) If you lot practice not have a tight-plumbing equipment lid, you may need to add together more beef stock or water, enough to but cover the ingredients.

  

• When the beef is tender, add together the potatoes, close the lid, and simmer for xv minutes until the potatoes are cooked through.

  

• When the potatoes are tender (and a wooden skewer can pierce through the murphy), turn off the heat and discard the bay leaf.

  

• Put 1-2 cubes of the back-scratch roux in a ladleful of cooking liquid, slowly let it dissolve with a spoon or chopsticks, and stir information technology into the goop to contain. Repeat with the rest of the blocks, 2 cubes at a fourth dimension. Adjust the amount of curry roux to your sense of taste. You may not need to apply all the roux; reserve the extra cubes for some other utilise. (Go along the leftover roux in an closed container and store in the refrigerator/freezer for 1-3 months.) Later adding the curry roux, simmer on the everyman heat, stirring often, for 3-v minutes until the sauce has thickened. Be careful not to burn the curry sauce! If the sauce is too thick, add water to dilute. If the sauce is still also thin and soupy, uncover the pot and simmer a flake longer.

  

To Serve

• Serve the curry on private plates alongside Japanese steamed rice and top with fukujinzuke (pickled radish) and rakkyo (pickled scallion).

  

To Store

• Keep the leftovers in an airtight glass container and store it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or in the freezer for a month. The texture of the potatoes will change in the freezer, and then remove them before freezing. Defrost the frozen curry in the refrigerator for 24 hours and reheat in a pot to serve. If needed, add ¼ to ½ cup (60-120 ml) of water to dilute the back-scratch when reheating.

Calories: 426 kcal · Carbohydrates: 28 g · Protein: 23 g · Fat: twenty g · Saturated Fat: 10 g · Polyunsaturated Fat: 1 g · Monounsaturated Fatty: viii g · Trans Fat: 1 g · Cholesterol: 73 mg · Sodium: 938 mg · Potassium: 873 mg · Cobweb: 4 g · Carbohydrate: 10 g · Vitamin A: 3992 IU · Vitamin C: thirteen mg · Calcium: 66 mg · Atomic number 26: 3 mg

Course: Main Form

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: beef, curry

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Editor's Note: This mail service was originally published on April fifteen, 2011. It has been updated with new pictures and video and the recipe instruction was slightly revised on May fifteen, 2022.

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