[Off Hour Bistro] Cornmeal Breaded Tonkatsu (Japanese Deep-fried Pork Cutlet)

When asked about Japanese food, most people could easily list out several off the top of their heads. And whether you’re familiar with Japanese cuisine or not, you’d probably realize that there are many fried foods — tonkatsu is one of them.

Tonkatsu, or Japanese pork cutlet, is a deep-fried panko (bread crumbs) breaded pork cutlet. The word tonkatsu is a combination of ton (豚), meaning pig, and katsu (カツ), short for カツレツ, meaning cutlet in English.

The dish originated in 1895, during the Meiji Era, in Ginza, Tokyo. Rengatei (煉瓦亭), the restaurant said to be where yoshoku (Japanese-style Western cuisine) originated from, was the first to serve “pork katsuretsu (cutlet)” with shredded cabbage. While the pork cutlet, different from tonkatsu, was a thinly sliced pork, the dish was the first form of the thick-cut fried pork cutlet we came to love.

It wasn’t until 1929 that another restaurant in Ueno, Tokyo, called Ponchi-Ken (ポンチ軒), started serving the tonkatsu we all know and love today.

Tonkatsu is one of the most known dishes in Japanese cuisine. In many tonkatsu restaurants, other than the classic tonkatsu with shredded cabbages, there are many ways to feature tonkatsu. Tonkatsu is not only a dish that people often indulge in but even more so before competitions. “Katsu” in Japanese also means 勝つ, which means to win or to overcome in English. Such puns made tonkatsu a beloved dish before crucial events such as exams or big games.

Today, we’re making a derivative version of the traditional tonkatsu, in which we’re replacing panko with cornmeal. I thought of trying it with cornmeal, as I have some leftover cornmeal in my cabinet, and it turned out well.

Ingredients

• Pork Loin Chops (boneless, center-cut) x2
• Egg x 2
• Flour
• Cornmeal as needed
• Oil as needed
• Salt & pepper as needed

Option:

Prep lettuce/shredded cabbage on side for salad.

Steps:

1. Make 5–6 light cuts on the meats and add salt and pepper on both sides of the meat. Place a piece of saran wrap on top of the meat, and gently pound pork with a rolling pin (or meat mallet if you have one) until both pieces of meats are equally flattened.
2. Sprinkle flour on both sides of the meat for coating.
3. Prep the breading stations. Crack and whisk the eggs and keep them in a shallow bowl/plate. Fill another shallow bowl/plate with cornmeal.
4. Dip the meats into egg wash, then cover them with cornmeal.
5. Heat up the oil (about 2cm tall from the bottom of the pan). Heat till 338ºF and put the pork into the pot for frying. Fry till the porks are browned.
6. Enjoy!