How To Make Katsu Sando | Recipes
Here's how to make katsu sand by Tim Anderson, MasterChef winner and owner of Nanban restaurant in Brixton.
Transcript
00:00 Hi everybody, I'm Tim Anderson.
00:01 I'm the executive chef and owner of Nanban
00:05 and author of Nanban the Cookbook.
00:07 It's a restaurant in Brixton.
00:08 We do what's called Japanese soul food.
00:11 And today we're gonna make a Japanese soul food classic,
00:14 katsu sando, tonkatsu sandwiches.
00:17 So a katsu sando has to have a lot of texture.
00:24 So obviously you got the crispy, juicy breaded pork
00:28 and the lovely soft white bread.
00:30 But then I always like to have a lot of fresh crunch
00:32 from cabbage.
00:33 So this is a hispy or sweetheart cabbage.
00:36 If you can get the flat round cabbage
00:38 you sometimes see in Asian supermarkets,
00:40 that's even better.
00:41 But this is really good, really sweet.
00:43 We wanna slice this as thinly as you can.
00:45 If you got a mandolin at home, you can use that.
00:48 Otherwise just a nice sharp knife.
00:50 If you're really lazy or you have to prepare a lot
00:55 of katsu sandos, you can also run this
00:57 through a food processor with a slicing attachment.
01:00 And actually you can use kind of whatever cabbage you like.
01:02 I like hispy 'cause it's so sweet and fresh.
01:04 Red cabbage is fine too.
01:06 Not traditional, but really nice, really peppery.
01:09 All right, that's our cabbage done.
01:13 All right, so we've got our cabbage sliced up, ready to go.
01:17 Now obviously we have to turn to the pork itself.
01:19 So there's a lot of different cuts actually
01:21 that work for this, but I really like loin.
01:24 It's a really sort of good balance of fat and lean meat.
01:27 It's tender enough that you can bite right through it
01:29 in the sandwich and it's the perfect size as well.
01:31 It fits within slices of bread just about perfectly.
01:34 Now ordinarily when I'm making tonkatsu,
01:35 I like a nice big thick pork chop
01:38 because that way it stays a bit pink
01:39 and juicy in the middle actually.
01:41 But with a sandwich, you wanna get something
01:42 a little bit thinner.
01:43 Now if you've ever made schnitzel before,
01:44 they always tell you to bash out the pork,
01:46 make it really, really thin,
01:47 or if it's chicken, to butterfly it and then bash it out.
01:50 But I think that almost always just results
01:52 in overcooked, dry pork.
01:54 I never understood why they do that.
01:55 So these are about right.
01:57 These are just over sort of a centimeter and a half thick,
02:01 which is thick enough that they'll be easy to cook through,
02:03 but not so thin that they will dry out.
02:06 So these are perfect.
02:07 Now we're gonna season these well with salt
02:10 and white pepper.
02:20 And also this, this is meat tenderizer powder.
02:24 Obviously 'cause you want to be able to bite through
02:26 the pork in the sandwich,
02:28 you don't wanna have to chew or struggle with it at all.
02:30 It has to be as tender as possible.
02:31 I tried different marinades to achieve this,
02:34 but what I didn't like is that the marinades
02:35 tended to impart too much flavor.
02:37 I really just wanted this to taste like pork.
02:39 So a friend of mine recommended this.
02:40 It's derived from papaya,
02:42 has an enzyme in it called papain,
02:43 which is the same thing you get in kiwi fruit or pineapple,
02:46 which sometimes makes your tongue go tingly.
02:48 That's actually the tenderizer effect
02:50 happening on your tongue.
02:51 So it actually starts to break down the meat
02:54 and it works really, really well.
02:55 It's very effective and doesn't impart any other flavor.
02:58 You should use it very sparingly
03:00 because actually if you use too much,
03:02 it can make the meat kind of mushy,
03:04 kind of too soft actually.
03:05 We'll just sprinkle that on like you would salt
03:08 on both sides.
03:16 Okay, so these are nice and seasoned.
03:18 We wanna put these in the fridge for about an hour
03:21 for that tenderizer to work its magic on these.
03:24 All right, so we've got our pork,
03:26 which has been in the fridge tenderizing for about an hour.
03:29 And now we're gonna move on to the next step,
03:31 which is to pane, to breadcrumb the tonkatsu.
03:34 So tonkatsu sandwiches, katsu sandow,
03:36 they're always delicious
03:37 'cause it's deep fried pork in a sandwich,
03:39 so what's not to like?
03:40 But there are a few tricks,
03:41 few little things you can do to make it amazing,
03:44 not just really good.
03:45 Obviously the meat tenderizer powder
03:46 is one of those little tricks.
03:48 Good quality pork is important as well,
03:50 but then how you breadcrumb
03:51 and a few things that go into that
03:52 is also gonna make a really amazing katsu sandow.
03:56 So we're gonna move on to that now.
03:58 I'm gonna start by beating a couple of eggs.
04:00 And to these, we're gonna add a little bit of vegetable oil.
04:13 The oil is obviously water impermeable.
04:18 So when you mix this into the eggs,
04:20 it creates a kind of barrier around the pork.
04:23 It kind of seals in the water
04:25 and the juice from the pork itself.
04:26 It won't evaporate off as much, which does two things.
04:28 First, it keeps the meat juicier,
04:30 and secondly, it keeps the water from seeping out
04:31 into the breadcrumb after it's cooked,
04:33 so the breadcrumb itself stays crunchier.
04:35 (gentle music)
04:38 All right, nice and smooth.
04:46 Then what you need is some flour.
04:49 So I found for some reason
04:51 that it is a food science question that's beyond me.
04:55 Strong white bread flour works best in a katsu sandow.
04:58 It is a better adhesive somehow,
05:00 and also I feel like it helps with the crunch a bit,
05:03 something about the gluten in it.
05:05 And then finally, we have panko, panko breadcrumbs,
05:08 Japanese-style breadcrumbs,
05:09 more like shavings of bread than actual bits of bread.
05:14 And we just do egg, flour, breadcrumbs.
05:18 When you're panning, also, it's a good idea
05:24 to have one wet hand, which you're using
05:27 to deal with the eggs, and then one dry.
05:31 So nice and well-coated into the flour.
05:35 Back into the egg again.
05:38 And that double dipping in the egg
05:47 forms a really nice kind of glue.
05:50 All right, so just gonna pat that in.
05:57 As you're putting the panko on the chops,
05:59 you can actually kind of press it down
06:01 and flatten it out a bit, make it nice and wide
06:03 so it fills the bread when we make the sandwiches.
06:07 All right, so that's all panned.
06:11 They already look good, actually.
06:13 And you can make these ahead of time, by the way.
06:14 These'll be fine in the fridge for up to a day, actually,
06:16 so you can make 'em the day before,
06:18 and all you have to do is drop 'em in oil to fry 'em,
06:19 which is what we're gonna do next.
06:21 Okay, so we've got our lovely pork chops
06:23 all coated in crunchy panko.
06:25 Now it's time to deep fry.
06:26 So safety first with deep frying,
06:28 you wanna use a big pot where the sides come up
06:31 several inches above the surface of the oil
06:33 so in case it does bubble up, it doesn't overflow,
06:36 especially with a gas hob with an open flame,
06:38 that's a big fire risk.
06:39 So use a big pot for your deep frying.
06:41 Use a neutral vegetable oil with a high smoke point.
06:44 This is sunflower, but rapeseed is good, too, or peanut.
06:47 And you wanna get the oil to 180 degrees for these chops.
06:51 So buy a thermometer if you don't have one.
06:52 Every kitchen should have a thermometer.
06:54 They're very, very useful,
06:55 especially for things like meat cookery, for example.
06:58 But in the case of deep frying,
07:00 just a normal jam thermometer will do.
07:02 So this is at about 190, which is fine for these chops,
07:07 but if your chops are thicker,
07:09 you want to use a lower temperature.
07:12 So around 160, 170 is sort of a good, safe temperature
07:15 for most pork chops 'cause you want it to form
07:17 that lovely, rich, golden brown crust
07:20 at the same time that it cooks through.
07:22 A little bit of pink in the pork is fine,
07:23 but you don't really want rare pork.
07:27 I mean, I don't mind it, but it puts a lot of people off.
07:28 And also, it's a bit chewier that way.
07:30 And of course, you want this to be nice
07:32 and as tender and soft as possible in the sandwich form.
07:36 So 180 will do for us.
07:38 So we'll lay the chops in the hot oil.
07:52 And because these aren't that big,
07:54 they'll only cook for about five or six minutes.
07:58 All right, so these chops are looking beautiful
08:02 and golden brown, look at that, oh my God.
08:05 So they're ready to come out.
08:08 So drain them well.
08:11 You can use a rack or just paper towel on a tray.
08:14 And just like any meat, you want to let them rest a bit
08:21 before you cut into them or bite into them.
08:23 And what that does is as the meat cools,
08:30 it sort of evens out the cooking
08:32 and it also makes the liquid inside less volatile
08:37 so it doesn't come gushing out when you cut into it.
08:40 So it keeps the juices in the meat, basically.
08:42 So let those rest for about five minutes
08:43 and then we can construct our sandwiches.
08:45 Okay, so we've got everything we need now
08:50 to make an awesome katsu sando.
08:52 We've got our katsu, so we're just gonna put it in a sando.
08:55 Got our cabbage as well and a few special condiments.
08:58 So it's not really a tonkatsu sando without tonkatsu sauce.
09:01 So katsu sauce is kind of like a Japanese brown sauce.
09:04 You can buy it at any Asian supermarket.
09:07 Some big supermarkets, normal supermarkets
09:09 have it these days.
09:10 You can make it yourself as well,
09:12 but it's kind of like making your own ketchup.
09:14 Like it's kind of a faff
09:15 and it's not gonna be as good as the store-bought stuff.
09:17 So you should just buy some tonkatsu sauce.
09:19 Really, really lovely and sort of an essential flavor
09:23 in a tonkatsu sandwich.
09:25 We also have Kewpie mayo.
09:26 Kewpie mayo is a Japanese brand of mayonnaise.
09:29 It's very highly seasoned.
09:30 It uses malt vinegar and whole egg yolks.
09:33 So it's a richer, slightly sweeter flavored mayonnaise.
09:35 Really delicious.
09:36 You can also, by the way,
09:37 kind of make your own Kewpie mayo at home.
09:40 There are recipes online,
09:41 but you can also buy this just about anywhere
09:43 these days as well.
09:44 So you may as well get some, it's delicious.
09:46 So supermarket white bread.
09:49 This is the standard katsusando bread.
09:53 I think it's really important
09:55 to have this kind of bread for katsusando.
09:56 You can use really whatever bread you like though,
09:58 but I think that the texture and the flavor of this
10:00 is sort of nostalgic for me with these sandwiches.
10:03 You don't wanna get the cheapest white bread you can find
10:06 'cause it's too flimsy.
10:07 It'll sort of fall apart and squish down
10:09 to become too thin.
10:10 So you gotta get something that's got some substance to it.
10:12 All right, so bread, Kewpie mayo on one side.
10:17 Be generous with it.
10:18 (upbeat music)
10:21 Then a lot of cabbage.
10:25 Then katsu sauce straight on the cabbage.
10:31 The cabbage basically will help to catch that sauce
10:36 so it doesn't get too onto the bread,
10:39 which will make the bread really soft.
10:41 Then our lovely tonkatsu.
10:47 Little bit more sauce on there, just in a big ring.
10:51 Little bit more cabbage as well.
10:55 Other piece of bread.
11:00 Give it a good squish and then we slice and enjoy.
11:05 Oh yes.
11:10 Look at that.
11:12 Lovely, juicy, delicious pork katsusando
11:16 full of cabbage, full of sauce, full of Kewpie mayo.
11:19 Delicious soft white bread.
11:22 And it's simple and it's quick.
11:25 There's really nothing stopping you
11:26 from making this right now.
11:28 (upbeat music)
11:30 (upbeat music)
11:33 (upbeat music)