First off, the ingredients:
- 1 whole medium sized daikon
- 1 package spare ribs (cubed)
- 2 cups brown rice
- 1 cup soy sauce
- 2 tbsp kosher salt
- 3 tbsp corn starch
Take the daikon and chomp it into little cubes. One thing though, you may or may not find the daikon with the greenery still attached. Most times I get the pure white daikon instead of the ones with the greenish stuff on the top like the ones pictured. I honestly wouldn't be able to tell you why, but the pure white ones are what my mom bought when I was little, so g'damnit thats what I'm telling everyone else to buy! Gently rinse the daikons with a collander but be sure not to agitate it too much cause they have feelings too, and the bruising might make them angry >:(
Now take the spare ribs (make sure you buy the cubed kind cause I didn't this time, and fucking hell they're hard to chomp through even with a big ass g'damn cleaver) and lightly brown them in a wok, or any type of pot that won't stick too much at the bottom, but can hold a decent amount of liquid. You can definately help the spare ribs along if you throw a bit of olive oil or whatever your oil of choice into the pot, but I chose to just lightly dust the bottom with some Pam and let the grease from the spare ribs slowly cook out. I drained a bit of the grease before I added any other ingredient due to the fact that 'Mixed Rice' is a saucy dish and I don't want all the grease swimming around in it.After the spare ribs are pretty browned, add the rinsed daikon cubes to the pot, and stir a few times, making sure that both the ribs and the daikon are evenly spread throughout the pot. Now, add your soy sauce and mix letting it cook for a little bit with the lid on. This will slightly steam the ribs and sort of infuse the flavor into the meat.
Now, add just enough water so it reaches over most of the bits of daikon and meat and let boil for approximately 45 minutes.
Now, while you're letting the daikon cook down, I hope you have a rice cooker
cause if not, this is going to be kinda weird. I suppose that "Success" rice or "Uncle Ben's" will work as well, but nothing like rice in a rice cooker. :D Anyways, I measured out about 2 cups of rice for both Mike and I, with a little left over for lunches the next day.As you may or may not have noticed I'm using brown rice, because I just think its a bit better for you than your generic white rice, less starch and all that jazz. I'm using organic whole grain brown rice that I got
from Whole Foods, on sale mind you, but its still pretty badass :D Anyhoo, it should end up looking something like this when you're done with it...
Now, after your soup concoction has been boiling for about 45 minutes, it should look something like this... >>
At this point, be sure to add your salt and mix it around because thus far all it has is the soy sauce. One thing also, I use low sodium soy sauce so it takes away from the taste a bit, I know I know, whats the point, low sodium soy sauce and adding kosher salt? Ah hah! therein lies the genius...I bought such a big tub of low sodium soy sauce, I have no choice but to use it :X, however, most of the time I find that it works just as well even without further adding salt, the saltiness just gets washed away when I use it in stews and whatnot.
Ok, after you've thoroghly mixed the salt in
to the pot, prepare a corn starch mixture using your corn starch and some water. You want to get the consistency of Elmer's glue.After you're done mixing the corn starch and water together, turn off the burner and gently fold it into your spare ribs and daikon pot, making sure not to stir too much, but enough so that the corn starch gets evenly distributed throughout the pot.
You let this mixture thicken up for a few minutes while gently agitating it. The leftover heat from keeping the pot on the stove should cook the corn starch at just the right temperature. There's other thickening agents out there that aren't as finicky as corn starch, but again, its what I was taught to use, therefore, what I'm showing you to use :P
Now, after everything's been throughly mixed and thickened fill your bowl/plate of choice with some rice, spoon the thickened Spare Rib and Daikon mixture onto the rice, grab a bottle of Sriracha, and drizzle on top to taste.
