Opinion – Recipes from Marcão: Japanese-style meat salad transforms barbecue leftovers

Aware of the risk of being canceled by Japanese food purists, I’m going to commit a culinary bastardy here: the leftover barbecue tataki.

Tataki is the name of a Japanese technique in which slices of fish or meat, grilled on the outside and raw on the inside, are served with a citric and ginger sauce.

The method is perfect for using the rare meat left over from the barbecue. You transform the original meal into a light and refreshing snack, suitable for a hot summer night.

As soon as the barbecue is finished, you must store the meat in the refrigerator. This reduces the risk of contamination and makes the meat easier to slice.

After cutting the cold meat into slices, it is interesting to leave it for a few hours in a marinade with soy sauce, garlic and ginger.

This liquid must be discarded before serving the meat with the ponzu sauce, soy sauce with lemon. To get closer to the original flavor, use Sicilian lemon: it is also common to use Japanese citrus fruits, such as yuzu, but rarely our green lemon.

As for the type of meat, the softer and leaner the better. I made it with rib-eye steak (bife ancho), removing all the fat before slicing.

A flank steak is also great, as long as you remember to slice the meat against the grain of the muscle. In the particular case of the flank steak, you must break these fibers along the length of the piece.

Of course, you can also prepare tataki from scratch, without having barbecued it beforehand. I suggest using filet mignon, soft and fat-free, or tuna —a classic of classics in tataki.

You grill the meat over very hot heat, just a minute or two per side, until the entire surface is charred (and the inside is still raw). Then just cool the grill, cut and follow the other steps normally.

BBQ TATAKI

Yield: 2 servings

Difficulty: easy

Ingredients

• 300g rare barbecue leftovers

marinade

• 3 tablespoons of soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons sweet culinary sake (mirin)
• 1 crushed garlic clove
• 1 teaspoon(s) grated ginger
• 1 tablespoon chopped chives

ponzu sauce

• Juice of ½ Sicilian lemon
• 60 ml of shoyu
• 60 ml of rice vinegar
• 60 ml of myrin
• 1 tablespoon sesame oil

Way of doing

1. Leave the barbecue meat in the fridge for at least 1 hour.

2. Heat the marinade ingredients until boiling. Let cool.

3. Clean the meat of fat and membranes. Cut it into thin slices. Leave it immersed in the marinade liquid, in the fridge, for 2 hours.

4. Mix the ingredients for the ponzu sauce.

5. Discard the matinada, distribute the meat on flat plates, drizzled with the ponzu sauce