This Japanese mushroom rice recipe is made entirely in the rice cooker. Seasoned with soy sauce, mirin, and a couple other yummies, this is an easy way to enjoy a savory and filling vegetarian meal. (It's really simple, but I really love it.)
A warm, cozy bowl of mushroom rice is much less intensive than making mushroom fried rice.
Japanese mushroom rice, also known as kinoko gohan, can be found in Japanese supermarkets as a ready to go meal, usually with some meat and additional vegetables.
At home, I prefer making it in the rice cooker, for an easy, one pot, vegetarian meal.
Serve this with a creamy fresh corn soup, homemade kimchi, or simple and succulent edamame pods.
Ingredients
There are just 6 main ingredients in this receipe with an optional 7th.
- Mixed mushrooms - You can use fresh or rehydrated shiitake mushrooms, enoki mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, or the mushroom of your choice.
- Brown Rice - This recipe uses short gran, brown rice. You can substitute white rice but the water quantity will just need to be adjusted.
- Mirin - This is a traditional sweetened rice wine used in so many Japanese recipes such as Nobu's famous miso marinated cod and Japanese baked salmon.
- Sake - Sake is also a traditional alcoholic rice wine used in Japanese recipes for sweetness, freshness, and umami.
- Once opened, it can last up to a a couple weeks n the fridge, depending on the type of sake you use (filtered, unfiltered, fruity, savory, etc.) You'll know when it's starts to go off, since it will oxidize and start tasting really sour.
- The specific type of sake you use doesn't matter so much in this recipe.
- Substitute with plain water, if you don't have sake on hand.
- Butter (optional) - It's unorthodox, but it really makes this dish something special that you just crave over and over again.
See recipe card for quantities.
Instructions
These photos are shown using a rice cooker, but the method is the same if you use a regular pot on the stove.
- Step 1: Wash rice and add water along with a piece of dried kombu.
- Step 2: Once the kombu blooms (about 15-20 minutes), remove and discard. While the kombu is blooming, slice the mushrooms and discard any tough stems.
- Step 3: Add soy sauce, sake, and mirin to the rice and water and mix.
- Step 4: Pile the prepped mushrooms on top of the rice. It will seem like a lot, but they will shrink considerably.
- Step 3: Once the rice is cooked, the bottom of the pot may be brown due to the soy sauce sinking to the bottom.
- Step 4: Add butter if using, and mix thoroughly to distribute the soy seasoning that has sunk to the bottom of the pot.
Garnish: Top with green onion, nori strips, and/or toasted sesame seeds.
Storage
Store in the fridge for up to 3 days. Freeze for up to a month.
Top Tips
- This recipe makes about 3 cups of food. This is good for 2 large portions or 4 smaller portions to serve with other food.
- To make this in a pot on the stove, use a pot large enough to hold the rice and mushrooms. Bring the drained rice and water to a boil. Then mix in the soy sauce, sake, and mirin. Layer the mushrooms on top. Bring back to a boil (if it stopped boiling), then turn down the heat to a gentle simmer (low bubble). Cover and continue cooking until the rice is cooked. This should take about 40-45 minutes for brown rice or 25-30 minutes for white rice.
- To make this recipe with white rice (short grain or long grain), reduce the amount of measured water from 1 ½ c to ¾ c.
- To be honest, dried kombu can be expensive. If you don't use it regularly, I wouldn't buy a whole package of it. Omit the kombu, and top the finished dish with some seaweed strips or crisps.
- Similarly, if you don't drink or use sake regularly, substitute with water. Sake adds very subtle notes of sweetness, freshness and umami, but don't buy a whole bottle if you're not going to use it all. It keeps for about a week after opening in the fridge.
- Where this recipe goes wrong is if there is too much water. Most brown rice packages call for 1.5 - 2 times the amount of water to rice. However, since the mushrooms also release water into the rice, I use a 1:1.5 ratio of brown rice to water.
Other Vegan Recipes
More Side Dishes
Recipe
Japanese Mushroom Rice (Kinoko Gohan)
This Japanese mushroom rice recipe is made entirely in the rice cooker. Seasoned with soy sauce, mirin, and a couple other yummies, this is an easy way to enjoy a savory and filling one pot vegetarian meal.
Servings 2
Calories 197kcal
Ingredients
- 1 c brown rice (I used short grain) See Note 2 for white rice substitute
- 1 ½ c water plus additional water to rinse the rice
- 1 g konbu about 2" square, see Note 3 for substitute
- 4 c mixed mushrooms, sliced enoki, oyster, shitake, trumpet, etc.
- 2 Tb soy sauce
- 2 Tb sake see Note 4 for substitute
- 1 Tb mirin
- 2 Tb butter or vegan butter optional
Garnish ideas
- sliced green onions
- toasted sesame seeds
- seaweed strips
Instructions
- Rinse rice with water and drain.
- Add rice to rice cooker with the measured 1 ½ c water and dried kombu. Soak for 20-30 minutes.
- While the rice and kombu soak, prepare the mushrooms. Trim off an inedible stems of shiitake mushrooms or enoki mushrooms, Separate into smaller pieces with your hands or chop into 1-2" pieces.
- Remove the rehydrated kombu from the rice pot. (See Note 3 for kombu discard.)
- Mix the soy sauce, sake, and mirin into the rice.
- Layer the mushrooms directly on top of the rice.
- Set the rice to cook per the rice cooker setting. When rice cooker turns off, open, and mix up the rice and mushrooms. The soy sauce seasoning will settle to the bottom, so you'll want to distribute it through the rice.
- Mix in the opitonal butter.
- Serve hot with optional garnish.
Notes
This recipe makes about 3 cups of food. This is good for 2 large portions or 4 smaller portions to serve with other food.
- To make this in a pot on the stove, use a pot large enough to hold the rice and mushrooms. Bring the drained rice and water to a boil. Then mix in the soy sauce, sake, and mirin. Layer the mushrooms on top. Bring back to a boil (if it stopped boiling), then turn down the heat to a gentle simmer (low bubble). Cover and continue cooking until the rice is cooked. This should take about 40-45 minutes for brown rice or 25-30 minutes for white rice.
- To make this recipe with white rice (short grain or long grain), reduce the amount of measured water from 1 ½ c to ¾ c.
- To be honest, dried kombu can be expensive. If you don't use it regularly, I wouldn't buy a whole package of it. Omit the kombu, and top the finished dish with some seaweed strips or crisps.
- Similarly, if you don't drink or use sake regularly, substitute with water. Sake adds very subtle notes of sweetness, freshness and umami, but I wouldn't buy a whole bottle if you're not going to use it all. It can last a couple weeks after opening in the fridge, but taste before using. If it has oxidized too much, it will start tasting sour instead of sweet.
- Where this recipe goes wrong is if there is too much water. Most brown rice packages call for 1.5 - 2 times the amount of water to rice. However, since the mushrooms also release water into the rice, I use a 1:1.5 ratio of brown rice to water.
Fortune Cookie 🥠
Be yourself - not your idea of what you think somebody else's idea of yourself should be.
Henry David Thoreau
Courtney says
Why do you remove the kombu after it rehydrates? What happens if you leave it in to cook?
asiantestkitchen@gmail.com says
If you leave it in, the kombu may get slimy and bitter if it's boiled and cooked for too long. That being said, I have eaten it after it's been boiled and not faced any dire consequences. Hope that helps!