Squid and Taro Stew from ‘Sweetness and Lightning’

squid taro stew from amaama iinazuma

My love for cooking manga has reached its peak in the last few months as I have found that my best stress relief from this hectic period in my life is cooking. I’ve done a couple of recipes from food manga before and for a while I entertained having a separate blog just for recipes I tried from manga. And then I realised I’m much too old to handle all the blogs. As it is, I’m struggling to keep two, let alone keep up with tumblr like I used to! Hence, I’ve decided to put them all here in my personal food/travel blog of sorts. It’s under a new section I’ve boringly called Manga Cooking!

Obviously, Manga Cooking’s about recipes I’ve seen and read from various manga I’ve been reading over the last whatever. It may be recipes featured in food manga or just some meal related to manga. As usual, I’m not sure how often I’ll be doing this. I’ve actually made an effort for a while to try one manga dish from a manga I’ve been reading per month and hopefully I have the energy to actually write entries for it.

Sweetness and Lightning from Amagakure Gido

For my maiden post, I’m excited to share my trial of Squid and Taro Stew from Sweetness and Lighting (甘々と稲妻, ch.8, vol. 2). It’s a manga by Amagakure Gido and features a widowed father who is learning to cook home-coooked meals for his adorable daughter, Tsugumi. He seeks the help of his student, who is daughter of a local restauranteur and TV chef. She’s not good in cooking either but together, they manage to try recipes and share delicious meals. This manga is super adorable and the recipes looked super easy. After reading it from Crunchyroll, I just wanted to try a recipe from the series. Hence, here I am trying one dish.

The recipe is Squid and Taro Stew (イカと里芋の煮物), a dish that Tsumugi requested from her dad after he asked her for a dish that her mom made that she wanted to it. To be honest, it seemed like a difficult dish and I think it’s a dish that’s probably most convenient to friends who live in Asia where squid is cheap and taro is abundant. I actually substituted fresh squid for fresh octopus and frozen squid for this but it still turned out great. And lol, taro here in Wollongong costs $10/kg which is CRAZY expensive. ; w; Taro, you’ve become so precious to me.

[yumprint-recipe id=’5′] 

Sweetness and Lightning from Amagakure Gido
I feel ya, Tsugumi. It was wicked good.

I really love this dish. It’s rich in umami which is a flavour profile that’s in between salty and sweet. The cooking technique they pointed really helped the flavors to seep in. In fact, I realise that this dish was much better one or two days later! Although the manga said it was a side dish I actually ate it as a main since the taro was a fluffy yet heavy starch to eat. It was lovely. The taro was pillow soft and the sauce gives it a subtle sea-like taste which works well with the squid. I finally understand why this dish was so memorable to Tsugumi.

My only issue is the cooking of the squid. I changed the instructions a bit to accommodate the cooking of the squid. Minutes in cooking is hard to gauge as what we consider high or medium heat might be different. I’ve placed tips in the recipe and changed how to finish the recipe without overcooking the squid. When I cooked this dish, I actually used a mix of octopus and squid. Maybe if I stuck to squid, I’d get the nice chewy texture of well-cooked squid. Mine turned out just a bit gummy which I tend to forgive once the sweet sauce covers my tongue. Still, keep watch of your squid!

I actually made a video of this dish. I had aspirations to make a youtube video of my experiments for manga cooking but my kitchen is too small and I’m not happy with our kitchen’s lighting. Maybe when I have a better kitchen or a better lens, I’ll make a video of my experiments. For now, I hope you don’t mind that I’m sticking to this.

If you have recipes you read and manga and think I should try, just leave a comment or holler over at twitter and let me know a recipe you’d like for me to try!

8 thoughts on “Squid and Taro Stew from ‘Sweetness and Lightning’

  1. I was just googling around to see about an alternative for this recipe! Like Potato and squid rings… I can’t get Taro anywhere near me!

  2. I think using potatoes and squid rings will still work. The texture won’t be the same but I think the potato can absorb the flavours of the sauce well. Let me know how it goes!

  3. hi, i would like watch your video of how to make this awesome dish, can you share the link with me?

    Thanks!

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