Back when I lived in Japan, I applied for a part-time job at a local restaurant called Uotami (ιζ°), which has a chain of izakaya restaurants. It was an attempt to exit my comfort zone and get a job where I can finally put to practice the stuff I learned in culinary school be able to sustain my spending on Gunpla model kits whenever I looked at Amazon Japan. Good lord. I was spending more than what my sponsor was giving me every three months and I decided the best way to deal with the problem was to have a part-time job that would help me afford the extra spending money I needed.
I worked five hours, three days a week, usually around the time the restaurant opens for the evening. I felt sluggish and slow at times but there were a lot of things I easily picked up and learned how to do quickly. That was thanks to my boss at the time, who was rather friendly towards me despite me being a foreigner. Unfortunately, he was transferred two months after I was hired, and I ended up with a different boss whom I didn't exactly get along with as well.
My favorite part of the kitchen was the fryer. It was my first time dealing with an industrial fryer and having to cook stuff in it, but my first boss showed me the ropes. He showed me where to find the portions of marinated chicken, the fries, and the sliced lotus bits... Among other stuff. Most of the fried stuff just needed to be dusted in a little potato starch then fried for three to four and a half minutes. Within two days of being at the fryer I was already used to it and I was cooking all the fried foods easy (the cleaning of it though, is another story).
Needless to say, during my time there I also learned how to make tori karaage (ιΆεζγ), Japanese fried chicken, and a staple at every izakaya. My mother and I had been trying to nail this recipe right for years, but it was only after working from an actual restaurant myself and needing to make this over and over that I managed to perfect the proper way of cooking it.
This recipe is good for two. Or just one if you're like me. π
