Recipe: Re: Kamaboko - Basic Fishcake

Hi Eleanor,

Sorry... I don't have a recipe for kamaboko, either. It's not the kind of product that can be readily made at home.

What I did turn up is a recipe for basic fishcake from Elizabeth Andoh's book "At Home with Japanese Cooking." She uses the fishcake paste to make dumplings for Oden. It's nowhere near as fine and smooth as kamaboko, but you might be able to experiment putting the fishcake paste into little molds and steaming it.

Her proportions are:

1/2 pound white meat fish fillets (such as sole, flounder, or halibut)
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1-1/2 tablespoons beaten egg
scant 1/2 teaspoon salt

Method is to grind the fish fillets to a paste (in a food processor, blender, meat grinder, or mortar), then blend in the remaining ingredients. To cook for Oden, form the fishcake paste into small patties and deep-fry at medium temperature until golden and cooked through.

Another thought re: kamaboko. Depends on what recipe you're using it for, but have you thought of using fake crab sticks or fake lobster meat (a.k.a. surimi) instead of kamaboko? They have a somewhat different flavor and shapes, but they're formed by the same method as commercially produced kamaboko, and are readily available in supermarket fish departments.