Dish · japanese
Tempura
Shrimp and vegetables dipped in a thin egg batter and deep-fried until the coating turns light and lacy rather than thick or bready. The batter should stay pale, not golden brown like most fried food.
Where it comes from
Tempura's batter-fry technique arrived in Japan with Portuguese traders in the 16th century, who fried food for Lenten fasting days, and Japanese cooks adapted it into a lighter style suited to seafood and vegetables.
What cooks argue about
The batter is the whole argument: cooks insist on ice-cold water and barely mixed batter, leaving lumps, because overmixing develops gluten and turns the coating tough and bready instead of crisp and delicate.
Nobody has published a tempura recipe yet. The page stays out of search until one exists, which is the rule for every thin page here.