"umami incarnate" Ian Knauer/Grub Street
This post actually and somewhat indirectly comes from one of Nigel Slater's first recipes - those I'm working through gradually and occasionally. His second recipe is for mayonnaise. Not Kewpie mayonnaise - traditional mayonnaise - and I know I have talked about that before. I do make my own every now and then, and have so far disdained to buy a commercial brand. I have been a bit of a food snob about it. However, in his short piece on mayonnaise, he says "when mayonnaise is to be used as a dressing - a supporting role - then it invariably comes from a bottle", although of course he doesn't say which bottle.
The real stuff is saved for when mayonnaise is the star, either in its basic state or mixed with something else as in aioli and so on.
Increasingly however, I have noticed references to Kewpie mayonnaise here and there - and of course, I now can't find them. But I was definitely aware that it was a thing. Moreover it's there on your supermarket shelf so it must be popular. More popular than za'atar which is not yet there. Well not that I can see anyway.
I have now investigated a bit and will tell you that a huge number of cooks, chefs food writers, will nominate Kewpie as the the best mayonnaise available. The characteristics that were most admired were the texture which was smooth and thicker than many, the fact that it was made with egg yolks, not whole eggs, the tanginess/sweetness mix in the taste which I think came from the apple cider vinegar - but mostly that umami hit from MSG. And yes it's alright to include MSG. The American version apparently does not have the MSG and it's not as good.
So what's the story of its invention? In 1919 this man - Toichiro Nakashima - founded the Shokuhin Kogyo company in Japan, having spent some time in the USA as an intern in the Department of Agriculture and Commerce. Initially he focussed on canned salmon but in 1925 the Kewpie mayonnaise was added to the list of products and rapidly dominated the company's product line. The Kewpie name comes from the Kewpie doll which featured in a comic strip created by Rose O'Neill in 1909 which Nakashima had encountered during his stay in America. Today the company has billions of dolloars worth of sales with this product - and its variations - world-wide. Such is its success that there is a Japanese word 'mayora' to describe those people addicted to the product.
I'm not sure when it became such a big thing here. Maybe when Japanese foods like those pancakes - Okonomiyaki, became popular. Apparently the bottle has a convenient squeezy opening. It's also used - like traditional mayonnaise as a dipping sauce for all manner of things, and of course you can tart up those dipping sauces with whatever you like, or turn it into a creamy kind of salad dressing. And of course you can just substitute Kewpie for mayonnaise anywhere you would use ordinary mayonnaise.
But can you make it? Here I have to say the other reason I occasionally make mayonnaise myself is that it's a truly magical process. Yes you will find recipes for making Kewpie mayonnaise online, but listen to these words from Ian Knauer on the Grub Street website:
"There actually are recipes out there for DIY Kewpie, but by the time you stock up on the dashi powder, Japanese mustard, and crystallized MSG, you’re better off just buying a bottle of the real thing. Plus, doesn’t making your own hyper-processed mayonnaise sort of defeat the purpose?"
Or else those recipes don't have some of those things in them and so they just don't taste the same.
How do the Japanese use it? Well after now having perused a few sites, it seems the most popular uses in Japan are in Takoyaki which are sort of Japanese spicy, battered and deep-fried balls with octupus as the main ingredient; Japanese potato salad and Japanese egg sandwiches.
Which was a little bit underwhelming for me - although I should admit my bias here - I am not a huge fan of Japanese food. It looks beautiful, and either is bland or contains various unattractive to me ingredients.
I looked to see if there was anything more interesting however, bearing in mind the Grub Street advice that:
"Used sparingly, the stuff pumps up the flavor of anything you add it to, without making the end result taste at all mayonnaise-y." Ian Knauer/Grub Street
Other generalised advice included mixing it with tomato ketchup to make a spicy sauce for things like prawns, coating your cheese toastie with Kewpie mayonnaise rather than butter and using instead of butter in cookies and suchlike as well as in marinades ... Somebody also suggesting coating the rice you are going to use in a fried rice recipe with it before frying.
Truth to tell I did not find a lot of recipes in which Kewpie mayonnaise was an integral part of the recipe - but guess what - Ottolenghi was one of the chefs who experimented. Alas his recipe for Sweet potato with goma dare and crispy tofu is not online, but if you have the OTK Extra Good Things book it's in there. Alice Zaslavsky also had a go with her Fishfinger tacos with Kewpie coating and frozen pea guac and there was a recipe for Miso mayo chicken on a Japanese website called The Smart Local which also had a whole lot of other suggestions. Perhaps the most cheffy looking recipe however was from Ian Knauer on Grub Street - Broiled mussels with dynamite sauce
I don't think I'm about to rush out and buy a bottle of Kewpie mayonnaise, but maybe when summer comes and I get a bit more experimental with salads - I vow to this summer - I might give it a go.
POSTSCRIPT
September 16
2023 - Orzo or rice? - with chicken
2022 - Nothing - I now realise we were on holiday in Port Douglas - hence the 2022 hiatus
2021 - I failed - lucky dip
2018 - Nothing
2017 - Nothing
2016 - Beetroot goes with ...
3 stars is for the topic of Japanese or Japanese like food. Possible my least favourite eating experience, and I won't even go into one of my long stories about eating in a hugely expesove Japanese restaurant in the centre of Tokyo!😫