is a preparation of fish, especially ''

unagi is the Japanese word for freshwater eel, particularly the Japanese eel, . Unagi is a common ingredient in Japanese cooking, often as '' kabayaki''. It is not to be confused with saltwater eel, which is known as '' anago'' in Japanese. ...

'' eel,, vol. 7,"kabayaki" by describes it as being used principally or almost always for ''unagi'' (「もっぱら鰻」) where the fish is split down the back the Japanese dictionary says ''kabayaki'' applies to such fish as ungai, hamo, and dojō (or belly), gutted and boned, butterflied, cut into square

fillet Fillet may refer to: *Annulet (architecture), part of a column capital, also called a fillet *Fillet (aircraft), a fairing smoothing the airflow at a joint between two components *Fillet (clothing), a headband *Fillet (cut), a piece of meat *Fille ...

skewer A skewer is a thin metal or wood stick used to hold pieces of food together. The word may sometimes be used as a metonym, to refer to the entire food item served on a skewer, as in "chicken skewers". Skewers are used while grilling or roastin ...

ed, and dipped in a sweet

soy sauce Soy sauce (also called simply soy in American English and soya sauce in British English) is a liquid condiment of Chinese origin, traditionally made from a fermented paste of soybeans, roasted grain, brine, and '' Aspergillus oryzae'' or ''Asp ...

-based marinade before being cooked on a grill or griddle. Besides ''unagi'', the same preparation is made of other long scaleless fish such as ''hamo'' ( pike conger), ''dojō'' (

loach Loaches are fish of the superfamily Cobitoidea. They are freshwater, benthic (bottom-dwelling) fish found in rivers and creeks throughout Eurasia and northern Africa. Loaches are among the most diverse groups of fish; the 1249 known species of C ...

), catfish, ''anago'' (

conger eel ''Conger'' ( ) is a genus of marine congrid eels. It includes some of the largest types of eels, ranging up to 2 m (6 ft) or more in length, in the case of the European conger. Large congers have often been observed by divers during t ...

), and ( gunnels). One can also find canned products labeled as kabayaki-style ''sanma'' (

Pacific saury The Pacific saury (''Cololabis saira'') is a member of the family Scomberesocidae. Saury is a seafood in several East Asian cuisines and is also known by the name mackerel pike. Biology Saury is a fish with a small mouth, an elongated body, ...

). ''Kabayaki'' eel is very popular and a rich source of vitamins A and E, and omega-3 fatty acids., p.144- A popular custom from the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

, pp.167-8, repeats a story of an eel purveyor from Edo who asked a calligrapher to write the Ox (day) character as a sign calls for eating ''kabayaki'' during the summer to gain stamina, especially on a mid-summer day called , which falls between July 18 and August 8 each year. The eel ''kabayaki'' is often served on top of a bowl (''

donburi is a Japanese "rice-bowl dish" consisting of fish, meat, vegetables or other ingredients simmered together and served over rice. ''Donburi'' meals are usually served in oversized rice bowls which are also called ''donburi''. If one needs to d ...

'') of rice, and called ''

unadon is a dish originating in Japan. It consists of a '' donburi'' type large bowl filled with steamed white rice, and topped with fillets of eel (''unagi'') grilled in a style known as ''kabayaki'', similar to teriyaki. The fillets are glazed with a ...

'', the fancier form of which is the ''unajū'', placed inside a lacquered box called ''jūbako''. It is also torn up and mixed up evenly with rice to make , which is enjoyed especially in the

Nagoya is the largest city in the Chūbu region, the fourth-most populous city and third most populous urban area in Japan, with a population of 2.3million in 2020. Located on the Pacific coast in central Honshu, it is the capital and the most pop ...

area.

Kantō vs. Kansai

Broadly, two schools of cooking the kabayaki exist. In the

Kantō region The is a geographical area of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. In a common definition, the region includes the Greater Tokyo Area and encompasses seven prefectures: Gunma, Tochigi, Ibaraki, Saitama, Tokyo, Chiba and Kanagawa. Slight ...

(eastern Japan), the eel is slit down its back, p.140 and butterflied, so a lighter-colored stripe of the belly runs down the middle of each fillet on the skin side. The long eel is cut into shorter, squarer fillets and skewered., p.9 In Kanto, the skewered eel is first grilled, plain, into what is known as , then steamed, before being flavored and grilled again; as a result, it turns out more tender and flakier after grilling. In the

Kansai region The or the , lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo and Shiga, often also Mie, sometimes Fukui, Tokushima and Tottori. The metropolita ...

(western Japan), the eel is slit down the belly and directly grilled without being steamed, often still in their original length, and called . The outer skin could be tough and chewy, so eel cooked in Kansai style may be placed between layers of hot rice, for the steam to help tenderize it. In the Kansai area, the eel is often called ''mamushi'', just like the name of the common viper in Japan, ''

Gloydius blomhoffii ''Gloydius blomhoffii'', commonly known as the mamushi,Mehrtens JM (1987). ''Living Snakes of the World in Color''. New York: Sterling Publishers. 480 pp. . Japanese moccasin, Japanese pit viper, Qichun snake, Salmusa or Japanese mamushi,Gumprech ...

''). Some speculate the name is a corruption of ''mabushi'' meaning "besprinkle", while others say it is a reference to the eel being rather similar to the viper in shape and vigor-endowing abilities when consumed.

Etymology

Several hypothesized origins for the name ''kabayaki'' are given. The name came to be generally written using the kanji 蒲焼 meaning

cattail ''Typha'' is a genus of about 30 species of monocotyledonous flowering plants in the family Typhaceae. These plants have a variety of common names, in British English as bulrush or reedmace, in American English as reed, cattail, or punks, in A ...

-grilled. Resemblance to the brown plush flower spikes of the cattail plant has been suggested as etymological origin in several old writings (; the writings of ; , p.67). Food historian (1881–1958) has argued that originally the whole eel was skewered vertically and cooked that way, giving rise to the name on the resemblance to the cattail both in form and color. This is incidentally the same as one hypothesized etymology for kamaboko. Another touted theory explains the name as due to resemblance of the charred skin side to the (, . Motoyama also notes a proposed etymology from .

Kantō vs. Kansai

Etymology

References

Further reading