Curry Korokke | Recipe

A healthy curry croquette recipe

What is a croquette?

Croquette is basically a deep fried egg-shaped or roll ball made of potatoes. The potatoes are often pre-cooked and mashed until it is fluffy and light. Cooked ground meat and or veggies are added to the mash potatoes prior to forming it until into round cylindrical shaped balls. The balls are then coated in breadcrumbs and deep fried to perfection. With a crunching outer shell and a soft and warm texture inside, croquette is one addicting dish that is worth every calorie.

For this recipe, I remixed a Japanese croquette (also known as korokke) recipe, making it healthier and more flavorful.

Materials (make ~12 korokke)

Link to printable recipe! ;)

Korokke

• 4 russet potatoes
• 2 cups of raw rice cauliflower (~3/4 rice cauliflower)
• 1 small onion, finely diced
• 2 large carrots, finely diced
• ½ cup of frozen peas
• ½ lb ground beef
• Salt and pepper to taste
• ½ of 3.2oz pkg of Golden Sauce curry paste cube
• 12 quail eggs (optional)

Crunchy Coating

• 1 large eggs (for the breading)
• 2 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp of oil
• Tonkatsu Sauce

Procedures

Prepping the veggies:

Peel the carrot and potatoes. Dice the potatoes into ½–1 inch cubes. The smaller the potatoes cubes, the faster they cook. Dice the carrot and onion into super tiny cubes.

I usually used Trader Joe’s rice cauliflower, but for you guys, I cut up a fresh cauliflower. :)

Remove the outer greens of the cauliflower. Mince the cauliflower into super fine pieces. The goal is to make it looks like rice. Trader Joes has premade rice cauliflower if this step is too messy for you or you are short on time.

Cooking the potatoes/cauliflower:

Into a rice cooker steamer basket, add in the diced potatoes and rice cauliflower. Set the rice cooker to steam mode and steam for 40 minutes. To steam the potatoes and rice cauliflower in a steamer pot, bring the water in the pot to a boil before adding the steamer basket with potatoes and rice cauliflower into the pot. Put on the lid and set the timer for 40 minutes.

Making that curry meat filling:

Into a heated pan (preferably non-stick of course), add in 1 tsp of canola oil, ground beef, and 1 tbsp of water. Use the cooking utensil of choice, break up the ground beef into tiny pieces. The water helps make the breaking up part easier. Once the ground beef is semi cook and has the perfect brown color, add in the onion and curry paste. Wait, why do we add the curry cubes at this stage? Check out the Tips and Tricks section. Stir until the onion is fragrance and turns a little translucent. Add in the carrot and frozen peas. Cook until the carrot is cooked.

Secret to a crunch coating with deep frying:

There will be no deep frying for this recipe due to my healthy goal, but feel free to deep fry. The key to a perfect baked panko crust is to toast the panko in a pan until golden brown before coating the croquette. In a non-stick pan, add the panko and 1 tbsp of oil. Set the heat to medium low and toast the panko away. Be sure to constantly stir the panko to avoid uneven browning spot. Once the panko reaches a dark golden brown color, remove it from the heat and set it aside.

Perfecting the soft-boiled quail eggs technique (this step is optional, so skip if you don’t want quail eggs inside the korokke):

Bring a pot of water to a boil. Drop in the quail eggs, gently. Cook for 2 minutes and 20 second. After 2 min. and 20 sec. remove immediately and submerge in an ice bath. Carefully shell the quail eggs and set aside.

Time to form the balls:

By this time the steaming process should be complete. Run the cooked potatoes and cauliflower through the ricer twice into a bowl. Add in the cooked meat filling and mix it up well. Cover with seran wrap and let it cool in the fridge overnight or for at least 1 hr until the croquette batter is completely cool.

To make balls with quail eggs inside, take about ¼ cup of the mixture and flatten it gently. Carefully add the quail egg in the middle and cover the top with a thin layer of mixture. Using your hands gently form the mixture into a ball around the quail eggs. Don’t be too rough or all the nicely cooked egg yolk will leaks out into the ball and that is no longer fun.

For no quail eggs option, just form them into 12 egg-shaped balls.

Time to coat and bake:

First, preheat oven to 400 degree Fahrenheit. Prep the coating station by putting the flour, egg, and toasted panko each into 3 separate dishes. For the eggs, add in ¼ cup of water and beat it up real well. Season each tray with salt and black pepper. Roll the balls into the flour, egg, and toasted panko (yep in that order). The flour acts as a glue for the egg, and the egg mixture acts as a glue for the panko. Bake the balls for 20–25 minutes.

Results

Time to serve these up with Tonkatsu sauce. The croquettes are super flavorful. They are crunchy, soft, and melt in your mouth. Little did you notice that it is full of veggies.

Here is what it looks like with the egg inside. Look at at perfect soft boiled eggs!

For leftover korokke, freeze for later consumption. Just reheat them up in the oven at 400 degree Fahrenheit for 30 minutes.

ENJOY!

Tips and Tricks

Make the curry croquette in advance:

This is a perfect recipe to make in advance for party or late weeknight dinner. Why? Refrigerate the curry croquette mixture to make it easier to work with. Hot mashed potatoes and cauliflower will fall apart and burn you if you are trying to handle it, so don’t do it! If the time is limited, let it sit in the freezer for 45 minutes to cool it down. If there is no time limit, then make the croquette mixture the night before, cover with seran wrap, place it in the refrigerator, and go to bed.

Curry paste cube, what the heck is that?

Check out my previous Japanese curry pot pie recipe to learn about the Golden Sauce Curry mix paste.

Why add curry paste cubes in the beginning instead of at the end?

Most recipes call for adding the curry paste toward the end of the cooking process. This method works, but requires the curry paste cubes to be minced finely to help it dissolves evenly and quickly. However, I hate this method especially when I have leftover frozen curry paste. In addition, this methods made it hard for me to adjust my water amount when making curry. I found out that if you add the curry paste in the beginning, not only does the heat toast the curry paste, making it more fragrance, but it gives the cubes enough time to dissolve by the end of the cooking process.

Why cook the quail eggs for 2 minutes and 20 seconds?

The key to any perfect soft-boiled eggs is timing. I found that 2 minutes and 20 seconds at medium-high heat on a gas stove works for quail eggs for this recipe. For chicken eggs, drop them in the rolling pot of water and cook for 6 minutes and 30 seconds at medium high heat. Please note that the timing for a perfect soft-boiled eggs can varies from 30 secs — 1 min depending on the type of stoves.

What is Tonkatsu sauce?

Tonkatsu sauce is basically Japanese BBQ sauce that is sweet, smoky, and salty with a light hint of tanginess. The sauce is eaten with tonkatsu (hint the name), a fried chicken/pork cutlet. This sauce can be found at any American grocery stores (Target carries this) in the Asian section. If you can’t find this sauce at, Serious Eats has an awesome recipe for it.

History

References: 1, 2, and 3 (an amazing article on the history of some popular Japanese fried dish)

Croquette is a popular dish that is eaten in all culture, India, France, Korea, Japan, and even Europe . Each culture has their own unique version of croquette, but today I am going to focus on the history of the Japanese croquette, known as korokke.

Korokke is a dish brought over by the French in the late 1800s or early 1900s. It was believed that due to the lack of dairy in Japan, the Japanese invented korokke.

The differences between a French croquette and a korokke is that the korokke has meat and veggies mix into the mashed potatoes and it is not made of dairy. The French croquette has cheese and milk, which is the binding agent and is coated in breadcrumbs. The Japanese croquette is made of solely potatoes, their binding agent, and is coated in panko (a flakier breadcrumbs). Here is a nice article on the differences between breadcrumbs and panko.

Questions

Do you guys like my new format? I am trying to put my awesome degree to work!