What’s Really
in Japanese Seaweed Salad?
That’s why, in the following years, I’d usually pick a Japanese restaurant for dinner, where I’d order three servings of sashimi and four of seaweed salad. Like many others, I thought the fluorescent tangle of greens was a healthier alternative to rice bowls and sushi rolls.
Wakame seaweed is mainly grown and consumed in Japan and Korea. After being “fished” from the sea, the seaweed is blanched to better preserve it. It’s then sold fresh or dried to be exported abroad.
Goma wakame literally means “sesame seaweed”. It’s hard to trace its exact origins, but it seems the dish pretty much starts and stops at Japanese restaurants in Europe. Japanese food journalist Melinda Joe said the salad is not only not popular in Japan, but pretty much unknown.
-Melinda Joe
Jun Giovannini, chef at the Mu Fish restaurant in Nova Milanese, near Milan, confirmed that so-called goma wakame is not consumed in Japan.
-Jun Giovannini, chef at the Mu Fish restaurant in Nova Milanese
To make the salad, the dried seaweed is dipped in water, drained, cut into small pieces and then mixed with soy sauce, mirin, sesame, sesame oil, yuzu juice, grated ginger, rice vinegar, chilli and sugar.
Although the seasoning of Japanese wakame dishes are similar to the goma wakame we’re familiar with – sesame-oil and sesame-based sauces – the appearance and taste are totally different. Wakame can also be stir-fried, added to soups and eaten with sashimi or octopus.