Why is This Japanese Stock Better Than Mine ? (hint:うま味)

this video contains an ad from node VPN hey guys salute this is Alex welcome back to the ramen series season 2. the plan for today is simple I want to bring my Ramen broth to the next level but I can only do that by fixing a tiny little detail first that has a tremendous impact on the soup five years ago I made an entire series about run well I explored all the fundamentals [Music] here I am five years later still unsatisfied the ramen Bowl I've been making since that first season it tastes good but it doesn't taste spectacular it doesn't taste subarashi I simply want to turn myself into a Japanese ramen master [Music] is that too much to ask so in the last episode at kodawari a legendary ramen restaurant here in Paris I told the chef Jean-Baptiste I think this is where I'm struggling in this in this humming Adventure at the moment but my Ramen dissatisfaction from the bowl of ramen that I make well long story short he responded that the problem could come from the broth itself it's unacceptable me the seasoned french cook not being able to nail down a basic stock how can that be okay I'm losing my French I've got tons of flavor in my broth onions carrots celery garlic sweetness bitterness acidity saltiness I've Got the Whole World in my blood and yet it's lacking umami we need to talk about this so Umami is a Japanese term that means more or less satisfaction or like savoriness I think literally translates to essence of deliciousness so basically Umami is a sensation that we experience through receptors that we've got on the tongue or in the mouth and that is why it is called the fifth taste along with acidity saltiness bitterness sweetness and this one is Umami and that is exactly what's bugging me I know how to add the other four tastes but how do I add the fifth let's face it I got no idea I thought I had an Umami PhD more or less from the past season of The Ramen series because that I don't but I do know someone who really has an Umami PhD also affectionately known as Mama Umami is a leading expert in the field of umami science in fact her PhD was written about extracting Umami in broth pretty perfect right she's the director at the Umami information center a Japanese organization that's dedicated to spreading Umami information worldwide foreign thank you so much for accepting to do this chat with me my pleasure so at the moment I'm working on Ramen I'm trying to extract as much Umami as possible so which food contains the most Umami Japanese soup stock which is called Dashi and adashi is almost a pure Umami solution we usually use dried seaweed combo kombu has loads of MSG right yes glutamate please Umami taste and we use dried Bonito katsubishi as a kind of a fish and there is very rich in inocinate and the combination of glutamate and inocinate makes strong Umami this is a synergistic effect one plus one is more than eight times higher Umami taste one plus one instead of doing equals two you said one plus one equals eight yes do you know why this happened is combined to the glutamate receptor on neuro 10 and the innocentity is coming to change glutamate receptors structure and more strong binding is made by the inocinate we are not changing the amount of MST but the perception is stronger yeah what do you think the difference is between Japanese Dashi and for example a classic French stock there are so many different kinds of taste substances in the stock extracted from the ingredients including glutamate from vegetables and inocinate coming from uh meat or fish many other different kinds of taste substances are in the western style soup stocks this means that a taste of western style soup stop is more complex that she should be a very simple Umami Solution that's amazing so what is the relationship between Umami and ramen usually the many different kinds of women Rich ingredients are used for making soup stock for alignments showy Ramen we have a glutamate from soy sauce and shio ramen basically a chicken soup stock so chicken soup stock has almost glutamate and inocinate socio could be a good example to study Umami oh yes the combination of salty taste and Umami makes very good Harmony okay amazing thank you so much you really helped me understand Umami you know I think clearly this is much clearer by the way you are gone all right guys that was fascinating right I mean I thought I knew what Umami was clearly I was off way off so during that chat I also realized something the importance of Dash she even said Dashi is pure Umami solution I need to make Dashi foreign [Music] smells exactly like that now this alone could work but as you've understood earlier on we're gonna pair it with a booster Bonito flakes called katsuo machine [Music] fishy and Smoky that stuff has been cut like paper thin it's thinner than thin paper to be honest that stuff is pretty good it could be a snacker okay I'm gonna stop there because I need to hold back right so the first step is to soak these pieces of kombu anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours I just want them to be fully rehydrated foreign we need not to boil it though it's a bit like tea if you over Brew it then you also extract unwanted compounds all right so I've got some nice bubbling action going on I'm going to take them out and by the way you don't want to discard this you can make a second Dashi with that stuff turn off the heat and then the idea is to drop this whole bag at this stage the idea is to wait for all the Bonito flakes to sink down to the bottom of the pan then I'll just strain it through a cheesecloth I think we are getting there that stuff at the moment is like pure gold color all right I'm just gonna get some some French stuff that I made in the previous episode out of the fridge so that I can taste both of them I'm just gonna reheat my French stock so that it's the same temperature as the Japanese Dashi right so this is the French stuff this is the ramen stock model that I've been making for the past five years it has carrots onion celery garlic ginger or chicken the world in it and this Dashi was kiwi and Bonito flakes I would go for this one which I know already [Music] but I can feel the brownness the sweetness of carrots onions and obviously like the the meatiness behind it what is satisfying to be honest now what about Dashi I'm excited slightly scared I don't know why [Music] okay and now a quick ad from our sponsor node VPN so I've been using nordvpn for so many years now that I can't imagine how to navigate online without it just like you guys I hear tons of stories about social accounts from friends and relatives being hacked but with the advanced threat protection from node VPN this is a thing of the past plus what I love about their service is the fact that I can stay anonymous online when I work scroll through the internet or even watch a movie nordvpn keeps it strict no log policy they don't track they don't collect they don't share your private data but they still protect it the kill 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stock jean-batis the chef from codawari was bright my broth lacks um and it doesn't struck me when I tasted it on its own [Music] but when you taste these two it's night and day okay this one is super satisfying I mean there is some kind of solution an obvious one in front of me I'm gonna try it just in case I feel like I'm transgressing something [Music] because it's fish and meat but now you've got the flavors on one side but you've also got like this satisfaction on the other side that's very good [Music] right now I do have a much better understanding of umami both on a theoretical but also on a practical level however I would say that I still lack a bit of that connection between Ramen and um so that's something we haven't touched yet there are four types of ramen the reason shoyu soy sauce miso miso paste tonkotsu so Buck fat and then there is shio ramen or salt based Ramen now remember what Kumiko said about shio Ramen the combination of salty taste and Umami makes very good Harmony so shio could be a good example to study Umami ah yes yes yes right so when it comes to shio Ramen there are not that many options at least here in the west there is one I guess there is one one iconic example of how to make glorious shio Ramen the chef has been mentioned a few times by Ramin Authority and by Jean-Baptiste the chef at kodawari so actually I know I went because we have the same passion you know his name is Ivan Arkin and his Ramen is spectacular there even was a whole Chef stable episode about him on Netflix but the chef is based in New York [Music] I guess I have to pack my suitcase we see us in the next one bye-bye [Music]

Channel: Alex

Views: 454,661

Keywords: ramen, umami, うま味, dashi, kombu, inosinate, glutamate, katsuobushi, taste, japan

Id: tC1sewE96jw

Length: 15min 14sec (914 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 01 2023