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HOW TO MAKE MIXED TEMPURA APPETIZER

What Is Tempura Batter?

Mixed tempura is a common appetizer on sushi menus. It includes a variety of vegetables deep fried in tempura batter as well as a fish, usually shrimp. Tempura batter is a Japanese batter; it is very airy in texture and has very little sodium so it is a good batter to use on any food you might enjoy.

For this appetizer dish, you will need: sliced fresh vegetables and butterfly shrimp. And, for garnish we will use shredded seaweed, sliced daikon, sprinkle of finely chopped green onion, and a lemon slice.

BUY THE INGREDIENTS

Vegetables - all vegetables can be bought at your local grocery store.

For our veges we used cremini mushrooms, cucumber, daikon, and butterfly shrimp as our fish. Cucumber and daikon are easy to cut into taller slices. The mushrooms; we just cut them in half.

You can use whatever veges you like; green beans, green pepper, shiitake mushrooms, cauliflower, zucchini, broccoli, onion, and eggplant are also commonly used.

Shitake mushrooms, you can buy at your Asian grocer, although several grocery stores sell them now. Cremini mushrooms you can buy at your local grocery store.

Shrimp - you can buy the plain shrimp pre cooked frozen at your local grocery store; and then you can butterfly them before you batter and cook them. Buy the medium to large size.

For the garnish - Nora sheets can be bought at the Asian grocer, or any grocery store that sells fresh sushi. Shredded nora (seaweed) is at your Asian grocer.

Daikon is available at some grocery stores and at most Asian grocers that sell fresh vegetables. There are two types of daikon at the Asian grocery, pickled and just a plain daikon. Both are good.

The plain one is white in color while the pickle done is yellow in color. Buy the plain one, usually with fresh produce. The pickled daikon is packaged and in the fridge section.

CUT, SLICE, PEEL THE INGREDIENTS

For the lemon slice(garnish) just buy a fresh lemon and cut a slice.
Use the shredded seaweed bought at your Asian grocer, or use a piece of nora and just cut it into thin slices as shown in this photo.

To prepare the daikon radish, just use a peeler to remove the outer layer; then cut it into thin strips.

Except for the mushrooms, you want to cut slice your vegetables thin and tall (strip like); those are best for vegetable tempura.

BUY OR MAKE THE TEMPURA BATTER

Tempura Batter you can either buy it at the Asian grocery, and some grocery stores do sell it. Look in the International Foods aisle. It is about $3-4, per box.

To Prepare the Store Bought Batter:

Put the amount of water you will need for the batter mix into freezer to get very cold almost ice like.

Measure out the amount of batter mix your going to use.

Put the very cold ice water in a bowl.

Sprinkle the batter powder mix on top of the water evenly. Use a chopstick or small wire whisk to quickly mix the flour into the water. Only mix till flour dissapears into the water and to get rid any large flour lumpies. Small lumpy flour bits in batter is good.

Prepare your ingredients for cooking before making the tempura batter.

Make the batter just before deep frying so the batter is cold going into the deep fryer.

Deep fry each tempura item until just slightly colored or about 2 minutes. If your using raw ingredients, like raw shrimp, you may require more fry time.

If your just making one roll you won't need much flour; just portion water to flour; the amount of flour is 1/3 more than the water used.

Tempura batter has a variety of uses, the most common being for shrimp tempura, and tempura vegetables, and of course, deep fried sushi rolls.

Tempura - Making Your Own

You can also make your own tempura batter. To make/prepare your own tempura; you will need 1 egg, 3/4 cup all purpose flour, 3/4 cup very cold water, tad of salt.

Mix the egg in a bowl, then add the very very cold ice water and mix both. (Put your water in the freezer to get ice cold.) Sprinkle the flour over the water/egg mixture evenly.
Use a knife or chopstick or small wire whisk to mix the flour into the water/egg mixture just until the flour dissapears and to get rid of any large flour lumpies. And do:
Use ice cold water (but not ice cubed water); and don't; mix the batter hardly at all; the batter should be somewhat lumpy.

Make your batter just before deep frying, that way, the batter will be very cold going into the fryer.

Deep fry each tempura item until just slightly colored or about 2 minutes. If your using raw ingredients, like raw shrimp, you may require more fry time.

BATTER AND COOK THE VEGES

Next, just dip/roll the vegetables, one at a time; into your batter then into the deep fryer for a couple of minutes. Use a deep fryer spatula to lower them into the fryer.

Use the fryer spatula to remove the veges when batter turns slightly browned. Put them on paper towel on plate for a few minutes to remove excess oil from cooking.

PREPARE, BATTER, COOK THE SHRIMP

You can make your own butterfly shrimp tempura.

If you straighten a shrimp(either pre cooked frozen-thawed or raw shrimp), then cook it in tempura batter, it is know as 'shrimp tempura'.
If you butterfly a shrimp and then batter/cook it with tempura batter, it is known as 'butterfly shrimp tempura'.

When you buy pre cooked frozen plain shrimp, they typically look like the shrimp in this photo. You can buy them in a package, containing many shrimp or in a shrimp ring. Either can be used. The shrimp size is stated on the package using a number, or shrimp rings usually state size as small, large, medium, jumbo.


To make your shrimp tempura you need to buy the pre cooked plain frozen shrimp, large or medium size, thaw them in the fridge for a few hours, then you butterfly each shrimp.
View How To butterfly a shrimp here

If you prefer, you can have the shrimp look like a strip(tall), with somewhat of a curve.

To do so, the shrimp must be slightly straightened, use your hands to firmly straighten each shrimp at its two curves.

This photo is of 'shrimp tempura', made with frozen pre cooked (then thawed) plain shrimp, using the 'packaged shrimp tempua batter'. Cooked in the deep fryer for about 2 minutes.



This photo is of 'shrimp tempura', bought at the store as pre-made 'frozen shrimp tempura', then just cooked in the oven for 10-15 mins at 450.

BATTER and COOK THE SHRIMP

Next, batter each shrimp, and cook them in the deep fryer for about 2 minutes each. Because these are pre cooked once they are thawed they are ready to eat, so they don't require much cook time in the deep fryer. Just to slightly brown the batter.

If you want to use raw shrimp, you can buy them at the 'fresh fish' counter at your local grocery store. They would require more cook time in the fryer.

Add To Serving Dish and Garnish

Add the tempura veges and butterfly shrimp tempura to the serving dish and add some sliced or grated daikon, a lemon slice; sprinkle of green onion, shredded nora, and a little side dish of tempura dipping sauce or ponzu dipping sauce.

These dipping sauces are at the Asian grocer. Local grocery stores do not sell them. Wasabi, just a dab, may be added also.

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