The first time I ate nasu dengaku, I experienced acute cognitive dissonance. It was at Fou Fow Ramen, my favorite ramen place in Amsterdam, where, in addition to the tastiest noodle soups, they also serve various Japanese side dishes. I knew I ordered eggplant. My eyes saw me putting eggplant in my mouth. But in the meantime I really tasted something else on my tongue: apple pie. The reader who requested our today’s classic had a similar experience. Well, not the apple pie thing, but the bubbling question: what is this? Where does that taste come from? How does an eggplant become so tasty?
To start with that first question: nasu dengaku – I love that name alone to taste it on my tongue, although in my enthusiasm I sometimes accidentally say nagu densaku – is a traditional Japanese vegetable dish for which eggplants are scored, grilled over wood and lacquered with a sweet, sticky miso marinade. And with that you immediately have the core of the answer to the second and third questions: add the qualification sweet + sticky to the deep savory taste of miso and multiply this by the smoky aroma of a wood fire.
My association with apple pie is more difficult to explain. Yes, the flesh of the aubergines becomes soft and creamy and the mouthfeel that this gives could, with some good will, be somewhat compared to that of a warm apple compote – by which I mean compote that you have just cooked and have not yet cooked. stirred until there are still large chunks of apple in it. In any case, there is the same danger of burning your palate with too much gluttony. (Don’t ask how I know that.) Nasu dengaku also contains quite a bit of sugar, perhaps not enough to serve it as a dessert, but still enough for a certain caramel effect.
Furthermore, I suspect that the taste palette of miso may extend much further than umami, that famous savory or fifth taste that is usually attributed to it. Miso is a paste of fermented soy beans and the wildest aromas can be created during such a fermentation process. Just think of the cigar smoke, blackberry jam, pigsty, almond blossom, licorice, juniper berries and chocolate that can sometimes be smelled and tasted in wine, while that wine only contains grapes. Similarly, I currently have a jar of sourdough starter in my refrigerator, made from nothing but organic whole-grain rice flour and water, that smells overwhelmingly of apple cider. Anyway, if someone had told me after that first bite at Fou Fow Ramen that there was cinnamon in the marinade, I would have happily believed them.
Smoky, creamy, sweet and savory at the same time, there is little about nasu dengaku that not to like is. And yet there are also quite a few things that can be messed up. Too much sugar, for example, not only disrupts the balance, but also means that you have had enough after two bites of nasu. Undercooked flesh is always a very bad idea with eggplant – but don’t worry, that’s what those cross cuts are for. Finally, it is also important not to brush the miso marinade on until the end. If you do this at the beginning, it will be at the expense of what I will call the life force of the miso.