Bamboo Shoots with Ground Pork the Japanese Way

Besides mushrooms, one of C and J's other favorite veggie to eat are bamboo shoots. I often prepare this dish for them when I want something fast and simple. This dish is adapted from a recipe in one of my favorite cookbooks, Japanese Cuisine for Everyone (A Quick and Easy Cookbook).

Ingredients:
1 lb boiled bamboo shoots
1/2 lb ground pork
cooking oil

Sauce:
1.5 cup dashi stock
3 tablespoons mirin
1/4 cup soysauce
1 tablespoon sugar

Mirin is a sweet cooking rice wine that you can purchase in the Japanese section of your supermarket or at Japanese or most Asian supermarkets. Making dashi stock deserves a post in itself. But simply, you can make dashi stock by soaking an ounce of kelp (kombu) in 4 cups of water for an hour, bringing it to a boil and then removing the kelp from the water just as it starts to boil. Or you can do what I do, buy the instant tuna (bonito) dashi powder and follow the directions. It's much easier to buy already cooked (boiled) bamboo shoots in packages or cans, but you can get them fresh and prepare them by scoring them first, boiling them for 20 minutes, and then peeling them.

First cut the bamboo shoots into 1.5 inch chunks.

Stir-fry the ground pork in a bit of cooking oil until done, about five minutes. Remove the wok.

Put the sauce in the wok and bring to a boil. Add the pork and bamboo shoots and turn the heat down to low and continue simmering until most of the sauce is gone (about 10 minutes).

That's it! Simple, quick, and easy to make in bulk.