Japanese Vegetable Tempura Recipe

If you're looking for an authentic Japanese experience at home, look no further than this easy-to-make Vegetable Tempura recipe! With simple steps, you'll be able to make this delicious and crispy Tempura without failure!

Japanese vegetable tempura is a classic home-cooked dish with simple ingredients- batter and your favorite veggies!

You will learn how to make delicious vegetable tempura and some tips to make them crispy outside while still being light and airy in taste!

This recipe is for you if:
• You love Japanese dish.
• You want to make vegetable tempura.
• You are looking for easy vegetable tempura recipe.
• You want to know how to make crisp tempura.

Let me walk you through the ingredients and the instructions. If you want to check the recipe, jump to the recipe. Let's get started!

Jump to:

• About this recipe
• What is Tempura?
• 📋 Ingredients
• How to make tempura batter
• How to make tempura sauce
• 🔪Instructions
• Helpful Tips
• How to eat it
• Best vegetables for Tempura
• What to serve with
• FAQ
• Thanks For Stopping By
• 📖 Recipe
• Japanese Vegetable Tempura Recipe

About this recipe

• Easy vegetable tempura recipe
• Tips for making crispy Tempura
• The batter without egg
• Variations of ingredients

What is Tempura?

Tempura is a classic Japanese dish made by battering and deep-frying ingredients such as seafood, fish, and vegetables.

Vegetable tempura is an irresistible assortment of vegetables for any occasion. Whether it's a family gathering, party appetizer, or main dish and side dish for dinner - this delicious recipe will make the perfect addition to any meal.

It's delicious as it is, or a topping of udon noodles and rice bowl.

Popular vegetable tempura ingredients

Various vegetables are suitable for Tempura, but root vegetables, kabocha squash, and mushrooms are the classic choice. I pick kabocha squash, sweet potato, bell pepper, and eggplant in this recipe.

You can find more great veggies for Tempura in the variation section.

📋 Ingredients

Here are the ingredients (amounts are in the recipe card below).

• Vegetables: This recipe uses kabocha, Japanese sweet potato, bell pepper, and eggplant. You can use other vegetables also-- refer to the list of "Best vegetables for tempura" in the following.
• Oil: I love using White sesame oil (taihaku) or rice oil to get an extra crispy texture. You can use any oil, such as vegetable oil or canola oil.
• Batter: This recipe uses water, cake flour (or all-purpose flour), and baking powder. No egg is required.
• Mentsuyu and daikon

How to make tempura batter

Typical tempura batter is made from egg, wheat flour, and water, but you can make it without egg like my recipe, or you can make it with rice flour if you prefer gluten-free.

Use ice-cold water rather than lukewarm water because gluten is easily formed when the temperature is high. It's also better to chill the flour if possible.

If you combine the batter ingredients too much, the gluten will be formed, and your Tempura will be heavy and chewy. It's ok to leave lumps of flour.

Tempura batter mix

The fastest way to make tempura batter is by using tempura batter mix. You need to add water and mix it up. But we won't use it as we can easily make the batter with simple ingredients.

How to make tempura sauce

Make the sauce with mentsuyu (noodle soup) and daikon oroshi. I use store-bought mentsuyu in this recipe, but you can find a homemade mentsuyu recipe in the Kake soba noodle recipe. Adding grated daikon to the sauce is common as it helps digest fatty food like Tempura. You can also add lemon juice or grated ginger for the same reason.

🔪Instructions

Tempura is a simple dish, and how to make it is super easy! Cut ingredients, make the batter, dip ingredients in the batter, and deep fry until cooked.

Let me show you how to make it. Click here to watch the recipe video.

1. Slice the kabocha and sweet potato thinly, cut the bell pepper into quarters, cut the eggplant into quarters, and make slits 4 to 5 times.
2. Next, make a batter. Add cold water to a large bowl.
3. Sift in the flour and baking powder with a strainer.
4. Mix (do not mix until smooth).

5. Dust the eggplant and bell pepper with flour (no need for kabocha and sweet potato).
6. Put oil about 2 cm (1 inch) high in a pan and warm it to medium heat at 170C/335F. Dip the vegetables in the batter and put them in the pan.
7. Deep-fry until cooked (about a couple of minutes, depending on the vegetable).
8. Place them on a cooling rack or paper towels to drain excess oil.
9. Make daikon oroshi (Grated radish).
10. In a small bowl, dilute mentsuyu (noodle soup) with water according to the bottle instructions and add daikon oroshi to make tempura sauce.

Here you go! They're so crispy and tasty.

Dip them in tempura sauce and enjoy the authentic Japanese dish!

Helpful Tips

1. Dust flour on the ingredients

If you dust ingredients with flour, the extra surface will reduce the water content of vegetables and keep them from getting soggy. In addition, the batter sticks to vegetables, and you can fry them without having the tempura skin come off. So dust bell peppers and eggplants (which contain a lot of moisture) with flour. Kabocha and sweet potatoes are not necessary.

2. Do not fry too many at once

You will lower the oil temperature by adding many ingredients to the pot. Then the moisture in the batter will not evaporate well, and your Tempura might become soggy. To keep the oil temperature consistent, put the ingredients in less than ⅔ of the pot and save some space open.

3. Remove Tenkasu (Agedama)

Tenkasu (or agedama) is crunchy bits made from the leftover batter during cooking tempura. If you leave them in the pot, old tenkasu stick to the new Tempura and ruin the texture. So, remove the tenkasu with a fat skimmer spoon before adding a new Tempura.

4. Drain off the oil

Draining oil after frying is also essential. After cooking the Tempura, remove excess fat by placing it on a cooling rack. Keep them upright as much as possible, and do not stack them.

How to eat it

If you go to a Japanese restaurant, Tempura serves commonly with tempura sauce (tentsuyu) or just salt. But at home, you can enjoy more options. Here are how to eat Tempura!

• Tempura sauce (tentsuyu): A dipping sauce for Tempura made from soy sauce and dashi. If you are a vegetarian, dashi is made from fish, so you should avoid this.
• Salt: Add a little salt on top and eat it; then, enjoy the simple taste. You can also use flavored salts such as matcha, spicy, citrus, etc.
• Soy sauce: Add a bit of soy sauce. Do not dip in it as it is salty and overpowers the taste of Tempura.
• Chuno sauce (Japanese Worcestershire-style sauce): Add the sauce to your taste.
• Or without any condiments.

Best vegetables for Tempura

Let's make more vegetable tempura! If you are looking for different veggies, here is the list! Shiso, asparagus, okra, and many more!

• Kabocha squash
• Sweet potato
• Eggplant
• Bell pepper
• Okura
• Shiso
• Shishito pepper
• Asparagus
• Zucchini
• Onion
• Carrot
• Shiitake mushrooms
• Maitake mushrooms
• Eringi mushrooms
• Enoki mushrooms
• Lotus roots
• Kale
• Butternut squash
• Snow peas

What to serve with

Since Tempura consumes plenty of oil, other side dishes should be as light as possible.

Here is an example of what to serve with:

• Vegetable tempura
• Daikon miso soup
• Tofu and seaweed salad
• Tamagoyaki with tuna and scallions

FAQ

Thanks For Stopping By

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog♡ If you've tried this recipe(or any other recipe on the blog), please give it a star rating below!

Also, feel free to leave comments if you have any questions. I love hearing from you!

Chef JA Cooks is a Japanese food blog that shares simple and healthy Japanese home cooking recipes, including vegan and vegetarian. From traditional Japanese recipes to modern recipes with step-by-step instructions.

More Tempura Recipes You Might Like

• Sweet potato tempura
• Kabocha tempura
• Eggplant tempura
• Kakiage (Vegetable fritters)
• Kakiage don (Rice bowl)

📖 Recipe