Japanese BBQ: A Failed Attempt

Most of the time, when you read postings like this on the Internet they are how-to success stories. People seldom dedicate entire blog entries to their failed attempts at doing something new. I figure failures are often times as important as successes, so why not.

Since visiting Japan for the first time, I've been pretty obsessed with Yakiniku (焼き肉). We've all heard of Yakiniku, and we all know what it is: Grilled (yaki) Meat (niku). While we were in Japan, we ate at a number of restaurants that served you a platter of delicious raw meat that you cooked up to your liking right at your table. Also included in the meal were various dipping sauces and other tasty things to lay upon the flames. Add a few frosty cold Shandygaffs and some nihonshu, and you are in gastronomical heaven for the better part of an evening.

Anyway, for several years I have wanted to buy one of the special stoneware Japanese barbecues and some of their special charcoal with high hopes that I could replicate some of the splendor of Yakiniku at home.  So when we visited LA in July, I finally pulled the trigger on said Japanese cooking accoutrements. A couple weekends later, I tried.

PROBLEM 1: MEAT
Getting REALLY good quality meat in Reno is hard. Getting meat even remotely close to the stuff they have available in Japan is pretty much impossible. I tried to find some beef cheek and some uncured pork belly and this was the best I could do. We also diced up a filet, some chicken, and to add to it all, we picked up a few shrimp and scallops.

You also must have a nice bowl of long-grain Japanese white rice, otherwise you're doing it wrong...

About $40 worth of dipping sauces.

PROBLEM 2: THE GRILL AND CHARCOAL.
I found out quickly that this is more difficult than you would think.

Having never used this kind of charcoal before, I didn't really think to much about it. I knew it was made differently and burned really slow and hot, and produced less smoke than conventional American charcoal.

The grill seems pretty self explanatory.

Luigi is never far when there is this much meat.

Getting the charcoal to actually burn, was quite the challenge. After some on-the-fly Googling, I deduced that this kind of charcoal is meant to burn and heat up over a period of SEVERAL HOURS.  LIKE MANY SEVERAL HOURS.

The grill waiting for some actual hot charcoal. I don't really think you are supposed to acually burn the charcoal in these types of grills. Rather, you transfer already smoldering chunks of charcoal into it.

After an hour or so I was able to get a few pieces going.

We were finally able to cook as the late setting summer sun started to disappear behind the mountains.

The beef cheek was just a BAD idea.  The chicken, pork and filet was ok. Thankfully we had some scallops, shrimp and corn.

Pretty much everything was charred.

Disappointing. I am not sure if I will have another go at this next summer. Perhaps a do-over is in order.