Ikura Don

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Restaurants usually charge premium for salmon fish roe, also known as ikura (イクラ) in Japanese. I like to stretch my dollar by buying good grade ikura from the Japanese supermarket so that I can enjoy a generous serving of ikura.

See Also:

• Ingredient Spotlight: Ikura
• Ikura Temaki (Salmon Roe Handroll) Recipe
• Japanese Recipes

You can eat ikura on its own (like sashimi) paired with warmed sake, but my favourite way is to eat it with rice, in the form of an easy ikura don (donburi) (salmon fish roe on rice/いくら丼). The saltiness of the roe goes well with rice, and a home treat like this made me feel very pampered even though it is so easy to prepare that this is almost a non-recipe.

Besides being utterly delicious, ikura are so pretty to look at! I like to think of them as jewels of the sea, due to their gem-like appearance and glistening red-orange hue. They taste salty, fishy and oily (all in a pleasant way) and are loaded with omega.

With leftover salmon roe, you can make ikura temaki (handroll) which uses mostly the same ingredients. Click the photo above for the recipe.