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Who can resist delicious crispy homemade vegetable tempura? When making tempura at home, the goal is a crispy yet airy coating that doesn’t absorb oil when deep-fried. I’ll teach you how to achieve excellent results in this recipe.
Alongside sushi and ramen, tempura is another mandatory menu item for Japanese restaurants. Encased in a crunchy, crispy yet light batter, these perfectly deep-fried seafood, and vegetable are seriously addicting.
After sharing my Shrimp Tempura recipe, I am excited to share today’s recipe on Vegetable Tempura (野菜の天ぷら) since many of you have requested for it. Dipped in batter and deep-fried, each vegetable gets cooked perfectly on the inside, while the natural sweetness and flavor is enhanced. You would enjoy them piping hot with a delicate dipping sauce with grated daikon.
Some of the common vegetables used for Tempura include Japanese sweet potatoes, mushrooms (shiitake or king oyster are delicious), Kabocha squash, bell peppers, lotus roots, and eggplant. When I make vegetable tempura at home, I also like to include shiso leaves as well.
The Key for Perfect Vegetable Tempura
Before I start talking about how to make Tempura, please understand that even for the Japanese, making perfect Tempura is not easy. It requires a lot of skills and practice so don’t be discouraged if your first tempura does not look like ones from restaurants. But how do you get that crispy texture without the food being too oily?
The key for perfect tempura is batter and the temperature of the oil. I created a few steps below to go over the tips for making tempura.
Tips on Making Perfect Vegetable Tempura
Tempura Batter
Most of Tempura chefs recommend that flour to water ratio should be 1:1. Some recipe requires an egg (or two depending on the amount of flour and water), and some don’t. It’s up to you. When the batter is too thin, the ingredients won’t have much of batter around it and there is no fluffy and crisp texture to it. When the batter is too thick, you feel like you are eating the chewy exterior.
Please remember a few tips about the batter. Always mix the batter using chopsticks for only a few seconds to at most 1 minute, leaving lumps in the mixture on purpose. Overmixing the batter will result in the activation of wheat gluten, which causes the flour mixture to become chewy and dough-like when fried.
The cold batter is absolutely necessary for the unique fluffy and crisp tempura. All the ingredients (water, egg, and flour) must be cold prior to making the batter, and it has to be made RIGHT BEFORE you deep fry and has to be kept cold at all times to avoid activation of wheat gluten.
What Oil To Use for Tempura
The Tempura specialty restaurant uses untoasted sesame oil (clear) or a special blend of oil that is a combination of many kinds of oil. Each restaurant has its own secret recipe and blends that they perfected over the years. At home, you can simply enhance the flavor by adding sesame oil into the vegetable oil.
The temperature has to be between 320-356°F (160°C – 180°C) depending on how long it takes to cook through the ingredients. If it takes a long time to cook, then deep fry at a lower temperature because high temperature will cook the batter too fast and inside won’t be cooked thoroughly. And remember, cold battered ingredients will lower the oil temperature quickly; therefore, if you need to deep fry vegetables at 338°F (170°C), you need to bring the oil to 356-365°F (180-185°C) first.
How to Deep Fry Tempura
If you ask me what’s the most difficult part of making Tempura, I’d say it’s to keep the right temperature at all times while deep frying. It cannot be too high or too low. Most of the time I do not require thermometer, but if you are not used to deep frying, I highly recommend you to get a thermometer to precisely know at what temperature you are deep frying. The right sound of tempura being deep-fried is like a light sound. Like cider just being opened. That kind of light bubbly sound.
In order to maintain the correct temperature, do not overcrowd with ingredients when deep frying. As guidance remember just half of the oil surface should be covered with ingredients. When you put too many ingredients in at once, the oil temperature will drop too quickly.
What if the oil gets too hot? The quick solution to this is to add a bit of extra oil or add more cold battered ingredients. As I said, it is all about temperature control when deep frying.
Lastly, please pick up crumbs in the oil between batches. The burnt crumb will attach to your new tempura if you don’t pick them up, and oil will get darker once the crumbs become burnt and it leaves a bad flavor in the oil.
Itadakimasu!
I hope I didn’t overwhelm you. It’s a simple recipe, et it requires some skills and practice to make perfect Tempura. Good luck!
Other Tempura Recipes
Japanese Ingredient Substitution: If you want to look for substitutes for Japanese condiments and ingredients, click here.
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- 4 cups neutral-flavored oil (vegetable, canola, etc) (for deep-frying; untoasted sesame oil is often used; vegetable oil : sesame oil = 10 : 1)
- 1 Japanese sweet potato (Satsumaimo)
- ⅛ kabocha (squash/pumpkin)
- 2 inch lotus root (renkon) (peeled and precooked, I used boiled lotus root (Renkon no Mizuni) from a Japanese grocery store)
- 2 king oyster mushrooms (eringi)
- 1 Japanese eggplants
- 4 shiso leaves (perilla/ooba)
- 1 large egg (50 g w/o shell) (cold 1 large egg, 40 ml)
- 200 ml iced water (¾ cup + 4 tsp to be precise)
- 1 cup all-purpose flour (plain flour)
- ¾ cup dashi (Japanese soup stock; click to learn more) (Kombu Dashi for vegan/vegetarian; or ¾ cup water + 1 tsp dashi powder)
- 3 Tbsp soy sauce
- 2 Tbsp mirin
- 2 tsp sugar
- 2 inch daikon radish
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Gather all the ingredients.
- Combine dashi stock, mirin, sugar, and soy sauce in a small saucepan and bring it to a boil. Then lower the heat and let it simmer until sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from heat and set aside.
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Gather all the ingredients.
- Slice Japanese sweet potato into thin pieces and soak in water for 15-30 minutes to remove excess starch. Then dry them using paper towels.
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Cut kabocha squash and lotus root into thin slices. Soak lotus root in vinegar water (2 cups water + 1 tsp vinegar).
- Cut King oyster mushroom into thin slices.
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Discard the head of the eggplant first, then cut it in half lengthwise. Then cut the eggplant lengthwise into very thin (⅛ inch, 3 mm) slices leaving the top 1-inch part intact. Gently press down on the eggplants to fan the slices out.
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Once the ingredients are ready, heat 1 ½" (3 cm) of the oil to 356ºF (180ºC) in a deep-fryer or pot. To make the batter, sift the flour into a large bowl.
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Gather all the ingredients.
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Sift all-purpose flour.
- Add the egg into very cold water.
- Whisk vigorously and discard the form on the surface.
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As you slowly pour the egg mixture into the flour, mix the batter for about 1 minute with chopsticks in a figure 8 motion. Do not over mix and leave some lumps in the batter to avoid activation of wheat gluten. Keep the batter cold all the time by adding 1-2 ice cubes in the batter or by putting the batter bowl in a larger bowl containing ice water.
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Start deep-frying from the root vegetables as oil temperature needs to be a bit lower than non-root vegetables. If the ingredient is wet, dry them with a paper towel before dredging in the batter. While tempura is being fried, moisture from the ingredients will be evaporated and tempura will become crispy. However, if the ingredients have extra moisture, the tempura will become soggy after being deep-fried.
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For root vegetables, deep-fry at 320°F (160°C) for 3-4 minutes. For vegetables and mushrooms, at 338-356°F (170-180°C) for 1-2 minutes. Do not overcrowd with ingredients. Remember you only put ingredients taking up about half of the oil surface area. When you put too many ingredients, the oil temperature will drop quickly. Make sure to keep the right temperature all the time. For shiso leaves, sprinkle a bit of sifted flour on the back of the leaves and dip only the back of the leaf into the batter, and deep-fry for 15 seconds. For ingredients that are hard to keep the batter on, such as Shrimp Tempura, Kakiage, or shiso, we dust extra flour before dredging the ingredient in the batter. Flour works as glue and the batter tends to stay on the ingredients.
- Transfer tempura to a wired rack or paper towel to remove excess oil.
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Between batches, using a fine-mesh strainer, remove the tempura crumbs, which will burn and turn the oil darker if you leave them in the oil.
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Grate daikon and squeeze water out. Serve tempura immediately with grated daikon. To enjoy, add grated daikon in the tempura dipping sauce for a refreshing taste.
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You can keep the leftovers in an airtight container and store in the refrigerator for 2 days or in the freezer for a month. To reheat, use the oven or oven toaster to make the tempura crispy again.
Editor’s Note: The post was originally published on Jan 20, 2013.
Looks fantastic. Just one more question: how do you keep the fried tempura hot? The few times I tried to make it, we just ate every fried batch and went back to the kitchen. Not ho good, if you want to make it for guests. Any suggestions? Thanks!!
Hi Lara! Ideally, Tempura should be eaten right after deep fried. I’d deep fry the amount you serve first, then do a second batch (for second round) if it’s for guests. Otherwise you just have to drain excess oil from the tempura after fried. Placing tempura vertically helps to drain excess oil. Use wire rack rather than paper towel, so bottom is not going to be soggy. When you serve, re-heat using a toaster oven and that helps in terms of crispiness. Hope this helps!
Soo perfect! Normally i don’t like tempura but seeing yours making me change my mind.
You don’t like tempura? I wish I can change your mind totally. 🙂
I LOVE vegetable tempura!!! I’ve never cooked it before but with your recipe and tips I intend to give it a go. Thank you for providing such clear instructions. I am not surprised your cheesecake recipe is the most popular. You can just tell from the photo it’s heavenly. I’ll be making your cheesecake for my upcoming birthday in a few weeks time along with other savoury recipes. My theme for the party is Japanese food 🙂
Hi Marianna! Thank you for your kind feedback. I hope you enjoy my tempura batter! It’s delicious and the texture should come out well if you are pretty good at deep frying. 🙂 Cheesecake is very popular among bakers. I should be baking more often. 🙂
Hi,nami.I like your recipe so much.and your explanation, is great,I learned many things from you. Thanks!But, I’m living in a small town of Spain, can’t found the asia ingredients over here.I had tried CHEESECAKE,DORAYAKI …from here.well,finally was OK,I think so.At least someone said it was good.jeje.And now I have a problem,hope you can help me,please.My son is 2 and half years old.I’m trying to make some food for him evrytime.Like eegs, meatball with the sauce.noodles… But that’s difficult.He didn’t eat well.Just the rice,thin noodles,eggs.He doesn’t like the vegetables,shrimps,some kind of fish.I hope he can like to try everything.I don’t know what can I do for him? So, could you tell me some advice,please.
Hi Joanna! I’m really happy to hear you enjoy my blog and thanks for your time to write here.
As for your son, it’s hard to advise without knowing more details, but I would suggest to include tiny bit of “challenging” item in his favorite food. Don’t include a lot – start tiny portion, that’s almost not visible…or almost non sense. You can always increase the portion when he’s more “comfortable” with flavor and the look. The point here is to encourage him to eat the one he doesn’t like. He and his tongue will get used to the flavor and texture, and he will also get used to eating things that he doesn’t like. After a while it will be “normal” for him to eat that challenging ingredient.
I also recommend to keep rotating his menu. Try not to feed the same food, because one day he’ll say he doesn’t want to eat anything else but the food you are giving to him. It’s better now to show him that we eat different things.
Also, prepare some little treat (not like candy). For us, it was a gummy vitamins. We would give them anyway, but we pretended it was a treat saying that they won’t get any if they don’t eat everything.
Hope that helps? 🙂
Hi, I want to make this Tempura tonight-don’t understand what (egg water is?) can you let me know before 7pm
Dolores, egg water is a mixture of egg and water.
To make 1 cup (240 ml) egg water, you will need to combine 1 cold large egg (40ml) and 200 ml ice water.
Not sure where you are located, but I hope I responded before 7pm. 🙂
I live in California, thank you for responding on time, I have all the stuff ready, and soon I will start cooking, will let you know how my guests liked it/thank you again
Lovely , Lovely crispy shrimp and vegetable tempura. Can I use any other leafy green vegetables.
Hi Imelda! Hmmm leafy green vegetables are quite hard to deep fry as the oil temp is pretty high and the leafy vegetable will be cooked instantly (like shiso leaves are very quick to be deep fried). I recommend non-leafy vegetables such as broccoli, carrot, potatoes, asparagus, etc… 🙂
je n’ai jamais fait Tempura, en regardant vos conseils de préparations, c’est vraiment simple et géniale. Et je vous remercie beaucoup
Bonjour Faehau! Merci! 🙂
Sorry, but has this been translated into English with Google Translate? It’s pretty hard to follow… Love the pictures, and the basic explanation, but certainly not the best tempura recipe I’ve ever read – with some blatant mistakes even.
Hi Amys! I do not use google translate to write my post/recipe even though English is my second language. Basic Tempura recipe is very simple and pretty much same (or just slightly different) in every household in Japan. However what makes tempura special is the deep fry skill. It took me quite some time to get to where I am in terms of my tempura making and I feel I still need to improve my skill looking at these photos. There are tempura specialized restaurants/chefs and they make excellent tempura that it’s hard for me to achieve. I use this recipe all the time and I’m sorry to hear it didn’t work for you. There are a lot of Japanese who don’t make tempura at home because it’s not “easy” to make a perfect looking/texture tempura. So hope you won’t give up with your first try! 🙂
Your English is completely legible and understandable. I had no problems understanding you and thank you for taking the effort to learn English well enough to publish an entire blog and respond to people’s comments. Not many English speakers could do the same in Japanese! 🙂 I can’t wait to try this tempura, I have many fond memories of my father’s friend Junichi-san sitting and making us batch after batch. As many have noticed, tempura is best served when piping hot so the tempura chef doesn’t get any rest. 🙂
Hi L Rozelle! Thank you so much for your kind words. I’m glad to hear my recipes are okay. 🙂 It’s a lot of work for a host to serve tempura as it’s impossible to eat together at the table. My mom always wishes to go to tempura shop for a special occasion so she can enjoy tempura sitting down, instead of being busy serving for the family. Thank you for sharing your sweet Japan story!
How long do you typically fry each piece of vegetable? (2 min?)
Hi Kaori! I updated my recipe with cooking time:
For root vegetables, deep fry at 320°F (160°C) for 3-4 minutes. For vegetables and mushrooms, at 338-356°F (170-180°C) for 1-2 minutes.
Hope this helps! 🙂
Hi,
I tried Tempura Vegetables and Shrimps accoding to your instructions. They were perfect !! yes we all loved it.
Wishing you much more popularity.
Lalani
Hi Lalani! I’m so happy to hear you all enjoyed the tempura! Thanks so much for your kind feedback and support! 🙂
Good evening, thank you, great knowledge that you shared, very much appreciated…..
Thank you! 🙂
Nami, How frequently do Japenese cooks use a technique of drizziling the batter (tempura) over the half cooked ebi veggis,and the surface of the oil,then lastly gather-up the finished items with the very course batter drizzilings? Does this techniue have a separate nihon name?Do you think it is worth the extra step to bother with this?
Hi Don! Are you talking about home cooks or chefs? Home cooks, it really depends but most probably don’t care too much about how tempura look. They don’t need to make their tempura look like restaurants’ tempura… plus it’s extra batter = extra calories… it’s all about the look and texture.
However, tempura restaurants do that. I’ve seen them pour the batter over the oil/ingredients (and it depends on ingredients).
I don’t think there is no special name for it. Or maybe in specialized tempura restaurant world, they might, but I don’t know…
If you ask me, I don’t think extra batter is not necessary but the texture of batter is important even though you don’t have that extra batter around the ingredients.
Nami,thank you for the very thorough
reply. Oc course,I very much appreciate your interest to reply. Don
Nami,Thanks for our tempura batter reply,and reminding me about testing batter temp with dry chopstick oil bubbles.I have been experimenting with optimizing my batter,even farther. I always keep a bottle of cheap vodka in my freezer(not refrig.) for many uses. One use can be for deep frying batters. Substituting part of the icewater with a matching part of the freezr vodka(it will not freeze at all) will help speedup the evaporation of some of the liquid from the batter.Alchol is very volitol and evaporates much faster than water.All the alchol will be mostly evaporated at complete of complete cooking,and in theory, will help keep more crisp..at finished product.Some of British fish/chip shops also substitute cold seltzer water with the vodka ,to even farther evaporate liquid before cooking is completed. I do this often. Don
Hi Don! Yeah, it’s common to use beer and carbonated water to make deep frying batter so that the batter stays airy and crisp. I looked into traditional tempura recipes but most chefs at tempura specialized restaurants in Japan don’t use it. Personally I think it’s a really good trick, but I try to keep my recipes authentic on my blog and try to teach traditional technique… Thank you for sharing your tip with my readers though, I really appreciate it!
I love japanese food and your website helps me a lot. Thank you
Thank you for your kind words, Yanti! xo 🙂
Hi, I recently heard that you can use matcha powder with salt to make tempura sauce with it. I was wondering if you have a recipe for it? I saw several recipes with just matcha powder and salt, but I didn’t know if they were authentic Japanese recipes or not.
Hi Apple Girl! Yes we enjoy it with matcha salt too. It is (good quality) matcha and salt (kosher or sea salt is great). More matcha than salt, there is no specific recipe for it, but just sprinkle some salt into matcha (not the other way around). Hope you enjoy!
Looks so delicious. I think I need to get ambitious and try this. Thank you for linking to your Shrimp Tempura and how to prepare shrimp (straight).
Hi June! Thank you! I’m glad you found the tutorial on straightening shrimp. 🙂
I have been making the batter with seltzer water. Do you recommend I change? I also include shrimp and chicken in my tempura.
Hi Peter! Some Japanese use this western technique to make tempura batter too these days, but traditionally we did not and still do not use carbonated water to make tempura. 🙂 You can definitely use it!
Hi, can I know if there’s a way to make tempura without using egg? I mean a totally vegetarian tempura recipe?
Thank you
Hi Jayani! Some people make tempura without an egg – just flour and water as main ingredients. You can adjust the water. Some people add a tiny bit of rice vinegar too. 🙂
Hello Nami ????
My name is Paula from Australia, I clicked on your website for your vegetable tempura and couldn’t stop watching you making your recipes they all look so delicious. So I wanted to sign up but it’s coming up mailing list not active ???? I will try again another time.
Thank you for all your beautiful recipes I am going to start with your veg tempura tonight ????????????
Hi Paula! Thank you so much for your kind comment here. I just added your email to subscriber list. Hope you enjoy(ed) the tempura recipe! xo
Hi Nami,
I tried your tempura recipe last night and followed it to a tee but the batter was quite thick right off the start and the veggies came out soggy and doughy. Any ideas where I went wrong? Thanks!
Hi Weston! First of all, thank you so much for trying this recipe. It’s a bit hard to trouble shoot without looking at the batter or how you deep fry…
Thick batter – if it’s thicker than mine, then my first thought was that your 1 cup has probably more than 120 g. If you scoop up with a measuring cup, it can be as much as 150 g. So if you’re not using a scale, make sure to fluff up the flour first, and then scoop up flour with a spoon, and then transfer to a 1 cup measuring cup, That way, the weight is as close as 120 g.
Next is the deep fry oil temperature. When you said “soggy” my first thought was that your oil was too low. If it’s higher temperature, it shouldn’t be “soggy”. It looks like it absorbed so much oil at low temperature.
Hope this helps a little bit….
Hi, I don’t have a thermometer to put in the oil, is there any other way I can tell if the root vegetables would cook thoroughly> last time the sweet potato took a very long time to bake so I ended up cooking it in a pot with boiling water.
Hi Judy! Tempura can be one of the difficult dish among deep frying dish, mainly because each ingredient has different deep fry temperature and cooking time. But the common sense apply so once you feel comfortable deep frying, it should not be too difficult.
Root vegetables take time to cook, so it’s best at the lower temperature (but it’s not low temp) and slowly cook through. If it’s too low, then the batter will absorb all the oil. When you put the root vegetables in the oil, bubbles should come out. If it looks calm, then it’s too low. And make sure not to overcrowd because that means that you put too many ingredients and oil temperature went down fast. Just start with 2-3 pieces.
When the oil gets hot, it burns faster before the inside is cooked through. If you are not sure, take it out and insert a bamboo skewer to see if it goes through smoothly. Tempura requires some practice and I’m not an expert at it as I don’t deep fry often anymore. So don’t be too hard on yourself if it doesn’t come out. It’s one of the hardest (even though it’s simple!) skills in Japanese cooking. 🙂
I made this and it brought back memories–so much lighter than the tempura you often find in restaurants in the US! My husband felt like he’d never had real tempura before because the stuff he’d always eaten was so bready.
One concern though. I had fresh lotus root and used it as indicated (peeled, washed, then soaked in water/vinegar). My husband came through the kitchen and ate one slice raw while I was cooking. He later read you shouldn’t eat fresh lotus root raw because as an aquatic plant, it may contain parasites. So now we’re wondering how rare “may contain” is—is it just a small chance or did he likely acquire Fasciolopsis buski parasite doing this. We bought the lotus root at an HMart in the US. I’m hoping it’s a rare thing and people don’t worry about it, but I can’t tell from reading online.
Hi Natasha! I’m so glad to hear you and your husband enjoyed this recipe. Thank you for your kind feedback. 🙂
As for the lotus root, I looked it up in Japanese, and many sites said you “can” eat fresh (seasonal) raw lotus root but it tastes better when cooked. Some people may have a stomachache (probably eat too much) but if your husband just had a few bites, I don’t think he should be worried about it. 🙂
Hi, Nami! This vegetable tempura looks absolutely delicious. I’ll have to try some. Also, have you ever heard of ice cream tempura? It’s really good and I want to try to make it at home. Do you know the recipe for it?
Hi Ashlynn! I think I might have tried once somewhere… it’s not something we eat in Japan, but I know it’s a popular dessert at Japanese restaurants here. Maybe I’ll give it a try one day! 🙂
Thanks Nami! I researched a little about ice cream tempura, and I found out that it’s not completely Japanese, but you like mixes of Japanese food with a twist, so I think you’ll enjoy it!😊
Hi Ashlynn! Yeah I’ve seen it on the menu at Japanese restaurants in the US, but not in Japan. I think I’ve even tried it once… maybe one day I’ll try at home!
Great recipe thanks🤗. Had this dish at restaurant for first time, want to try at home!
Hi Rhoda! Hope you enjoy the recipe! 🙂
Domo arigato Nami-san! For sharing this recipe and great instruction on the techniques. I made tempura for the first time and it turned out pretty good for a first try.
I appreciate so much your hard work on what you are sharing on your blog; it is helping me learn to cook the foods of my childhood and more so I may share them with my children and husband! This is a blessing I cannot properly put into words!
I hope you and your family have a very happy New Year 💗
Hi Midori-san! You have no idea how much your kind words mean to me! Thank you for trying my recipe. I’m happy to hear your family enjoyed the dish. 🙂 Happy New Year to you and your family!
Dear Nami, Your Oshechi Ryori posts were wonderful. I am vegetarian, and made a New Year’s dinner for my husband and friends – all JOC recipes. It was a HUGE success. Everything was delicious and I especially appreciate the notes in recipes for vegetarian/vegan options. The menu included Gomae, Warm Mushroom Salad, Simmered Bamboo Shoots, Inarisushi, Teriyaki Tofu, and Vegetable Tempura. All of the ingredients were purchased at Mitsuwa in Arlington Heights, IL.
Thank you for all of your (and your team’s) hard work, beautiful photography, clear instructions, and excellent information. Unfortunately, we didn’t photograph the meal. I don’t think about these things until it is too late.
Hi Darcy! Thank you for your kind words! You have no idea how much your kind words mean to me! I often worried about our vegan/vegetarian readers if they have enough recipes from my site to make dishes or they know how to make my recipes into vegan/vegetarian-friendly. So thank you for sharing your enthusiasm and positivity! Happy New Year!
Hi! I bought a fresh renkon. What’s the best way to pre cook or prepare it before I tempura fry it? Thanks!
Hi Jennie! If you can slice thin (5-7 mm), you can just go straight fry without precooking it. 🙂
Hello, Nami!
As usual, thank you for all of your wonderful recipes. My best friend and I will be moving to Japan in a few weeks, and we’re both very excited about the opportunity to try out more of your recipes in our new kitchen! However, we’ve run into a few questions about some of your fried dishes.
We’ll be purchasing a Japanese microwave/oven that has an air-frying function (過熱水蒸気) built into it. Do you have any idea if we would be able to make your tempura, karaage, and other fried recipes with this device? We were both hoping that if we could make these dishes a little bit healthier, we might be able to enjoy them even more often!
Thanks again, and best regards,
– Abigail
Hi Abigail! I’ve read about it (in Japanese) and it looks like it’s great for grilling fish etc, but not for homemade tempura and karaage. They said the store-bought deep-fried foods (tempura/karaage etc) will be crispier, but I doubt you can make it from scratch in the same way as deep frying on the stove… that’s my understanding. 🙂
So exciting to live in Japan! Good luck, and keep me posted on your adventure!
Hi Nami! Wonderful recipe! Just wondering, have you ever tried using potato starch in place of the flour? When making Korean fried chicken, it’s used to get a more crunchy crispy batter. Wondering if it would work here as well.
Hi Henry! We use it for Karaage (Japanese fried chicken) but not Tempura. Tempura batter is very specific and wet, unlike fried chicken coating that’s dry. 🙂
It is I, again. We avoid oil deep frying.
Looking for an oven baking method for Tempora.
I have tried panko not enough batter stayed on the vegetable.
Maybe oven temperature should be the same or higher than the oil temporary?
Hi Tom! Unlike panko-crusted foods like Tonkatsu or Croquettes, Tempura has wet batter and it’s impossible to bring up to the high temperature instantly to solidify those wet batter. The batter will be all dripped down if you put into the oven and wait for the coating to become crusty/crispy. So the oven temperature is quite impossible. Deep frying oil would instantly coat around the batter to solidify. I’m sorry the oven method doesn’t work for this recipe. 🙁
Can the soaking of the vegetables be done in advance? Thank you!
Hi Mar! Yes, you can do that. 🙂
Dear Nami
Thank you so much for this recipe. I have made tempura before and never really thought it matched what I had in top rated restaurants but this came out perfectly first time. Your clear instructions and tips made it very easy.
I would like to make this for friends but one who especially loves Japanese food is celiac and I was wondering if I could substitute rice flour (or another flour) for the wheat flour and would the proportions be the same?
Thanks again for the great website I will be returning for more inspiration.
Hi Graham! I’m so happy to hear your tempura came out well! AWESOME!!! Thanks for your kind feedback. It made me happy!
Oh please make this Gluten-Free Tempura! We love it as much as regular tempura. I hope your friend will enjoy it too!
https://www.justonecookbook.com/gluten-free-tempura/
I bought raw lotus root, because I want to make Renkon chips. To prepare the lotus root for Tempura how long should it be boiled for? Thank you.
Hi Wesley! Until the skewer goes through. That way, you can just deep fry it quickly to cook the batter, but not the lotus root. 🙂
want to make yellow squash in tempura should i bake the squash for about 5 to 7 minutes first
Hi Brian! No, you do not need to do that. Thinly slice it (about 7 mm) and deep fry. 🙂
Great recipe with awesome results on the first try. I used lotus root, pumpkin, zucchini, zucchini blossoms, and oyster mushrooms. The zucchini blossoms were definitely a highlight, both visually and taste-wise. Extra compliment for the batter recipe adapted to grams and the very useful note to use the same *volume* of water and flour. Otherwise I would have used the same weight with undoubtedly interesting yet inedible results. In case you ever re-work this recipe again, I would like to suggest including a printable table for all usual tempura suspects with notes on how thick to cut them, and how long to deep-fry at which temperature.
Hi Olesya! Thank you so much for your kind and detailed feedback and I always want to make a pdf of tips etc… something to think about for the future update. Thanks for the idea!
Hey girl hope you and your family are doing well. I was wondering about making tempura wakame?
Hi, 渓愛中村
You may use Wakame for this recipe as well.
Please make sure to dry them with a paper towel before dredging in the batter.😉
Can I use dried wakame or do I need to reconstitute it before hand?
Hi, 渓愛
If it’s dried Wakame, you need to reconstitute first. You may also use fresh Wakame. ☺️
I tried this tonight. Loved it. Thank you
Hi Kristine,
Thank you very much for trying this recipe and for your kind feedback!
We are so happy to hear you loved it!☺️
Hi Nami,
I love Tempura (and your recipes), but I am very uncomfortable with a vat full of boiling oil (frying not really a thing in my family). I am guessing an air frier is not a possible replacement?
Kind regards
Helen
Hi Helen, The Tempura batter is very watery, so we don’t think it will work well with an air fryer. You may try thickening the batter, but the texture of the tempura will be different. If you try it, let us know how it goes!