Gyuniku Negimaki

Japanese beef rolls

Sushi Tei opened recently in KK and the whole town is checking the place out. We've been there twice, both times unplanned so I don't have photos to show. I must say that the restaurant is the most impressive Japanese restaurant in KK, with a good view of the sea and the nearby islands. The wait is long, especially for dinner. I found the food good (for KK standard) but portions are stingy. An example is the gyuniku negimaki or beef rolls, an appetizer I love.

Sushi Tei's beef negimaki is RM19.60 for 4 skinny rolls, if I don't remember wrong. We had two orders and that set us back by about RM39.20, before tax. I immediately set out the next day to prove to my kids that I can make enough negimaki with RM40 to make them wish they never crave for negimaki again.

I bought RM31 worth of shabushabu beef and 4 packets of enoki mushrooms at RM2.80 each. Ok, that makes a total of RM42.80. Each packet of enoki made 6 beef rolls, giving us 24 negimaki and that still left us with 1/2 packet of beef for our instant noodles. See how much restaurants make?

I sauteed the first batch of negimaki in butter and then glazed them with a thick teriyaki sauce. For the second batch, I noticed that the negimaki caramelized nicely and seared really well because of the teriyaki sauce from the previous frying and that's how I did the rest of the negimaki: melted the butter, added a spoonful of teriyaki sauce to the pan and sauteed the beef rolls briefly at high heat. That way, the teriyaki  sauce was cooked into the beef. Yum.

My kids found the spring onions too strongly flavored for the negimaki. You can leave the spring onions out and replace it with blanched asparagus or carrot strips or even french beans, or omit the veg altogether. I prefer steaming the enoki which keeps them in tidy little bundles whereas blanching them in water can make them soft and soggy. The enoki need to to pre-cooked because the beef will only take a couple of seconds to cook. You can use chicken breasts, flattened with a mallet, for toriniku negimaki but for the best negimaki, use wagyu sirloin. Oh boy.

And yes, my kids have had enough of gyuniku negimaki.







Gyuniku Negimaki
12 to 14 slices of paper-thin beef (the thinner the better; makes meltingly soft rolls)
2 packets of enoki
butter for frying

1. Make the sauce:
2 T light soy sauce
2 T mirin
1 T sugar
optional: 1/4 t dashi granules

--put everything into a pot or pan and cook until thickened but not too thick. Adjust the taste to your liking.

2. Trim the bottoms off the enoki. Pick any dirt off or give the enoki a quick wash. Separate into 6 to 7 equal portions. Lay on a steaming plate and steam for a couple of seconds only, just enough to slightly wilt them. The enoki in the middle of the bundle may not be wilted but that's ok. You don't want them too soft or they'll loose their bite and also be hard to handle.

3. Wrap a slice of beef snugly around each bundle of enoki. There's no need to secure the ends; cooking the beef will seal them.

4. Heat up a non-stick frying pan, add 1 t butter and 4 to 6 rolls. Add a spoonful of the sauce to the pan and sear (use high heat) the rolls on all sides. Do not overcook. Repeat for the remaining rolls.

5. Use a very sharp knife to cut the rolls into 2 or 3 each because the enoki is stringy if left whole.