Shio Kōji Recipes – Pork Sauté and Pickled Cucumbers (2024)

Today, I have two simple Shio Kōji Recipes – Shio Kōji Pork Sauté and Cucumbers Pickled in Shio Kōji. Shio Kōji is a magic marinade made from kōji, an ancient mould that is used to make Japanese seasonings such as miso, soy sauce, and sake. It’s a flavour bomb and so simple to use.

I decided to publish two recipes (the 2nd recipe is in a separate post) because both recipes are so short, thanks to Shio Kōji. Let me introduce you to this super-handy marinade.

What is Shio Kōji

Shio Kōji (photo below) is made by fermenting rice grain kōji with salt and water for 7-10 days at room temperature.During the fermentation process, starches from the rice are converted into sugar, which gives Shio Kōji a slightly sweet and salty flavour.

Kōji is a food made by putting koji mould (Aspergillus oryzae) called ‘nihon kōji kabi‘ (ニホンコウジカビ) on steamed rice, barley, or soy beans. It is then cultured at a particular temperature and humidity. Each type of kōji retains the original shape of the grain but you can see the hairy mould around the grains.

Because this mould is used widely in Japan to produce many Japanese seasonings and sake, nihon kōji kabi was certified as the ‘National Mould’ by the Brewing Society of Japan in 2006. It’s very rare for a mould to get such an honour.

When you marinate meat or fish (or even vegetables) in Shio Kōji, starches and protein are broken down, producing sugar and amino acid, which makes the ingredients full of umami. It also tenderises meat.

Other than using Shio Kōjias a marinade, you can use it in place of salt in many dishes. The amount of salt included in Shio Kōji is 1/5 of the same amount of salt. It is also OK to eat fresh Shio Kōji.

Shio Kōji can keep in the fridge for a month. You can also freeze it for 6 months (it never hardens even when frozen).

You can buy Shio Kōji in a bag at Japanese grocery stores or online shops such as eBay and Amazon. There is also a liquid-form of Shio Kōji. You can use it in the same way as the paste-form.

You can make Shio Kōji at home, but I’d rather buy it. To make Shio Kōji, you will need koji, which is even harder to find at Japanese/Asian grocery stores than Shio Kōji.

How to Make Shio Kōji Pork Sauté

Among many Shio Kōji recipes out there, this is a typical example of how to use Shio Kōji on meat.

You will need:

• Pork steaks – I used 5mm /3⁄16″ thick scotch fillet
• Shio Kōji – paste-form
• Pepper
• Oil to sauté

All you need to do is marinate the pork in Shio Kōji for 1 hour. Sprinkle pepper on the marinated meat, then sauté.

If you need to sauté in batches like my recipe, you need to clean the frying pan after each batch. Due to its sugar content, Shio Kōji gets burnt easily while sautéing.

Instead of pork, you can use chicken, beef, or lamb. You may also add garlic to the marinade. Here is an example of baked chicken drumettes with Shio Kōji and garlic. They were delicious!

How to Make Cucumbers Pickled in Shio Kōji

This is even simpler than the pork sauté. You will need:

• Cucumber sliced into 1cm thick pieces
• Shio Kōji
• Mirin (optional)

Please see the separate post and recipe for Cucumber Slices Pickled in Shio Koji here.

Yumiko