Mirin

The glaze is built on it: brush, grill, brush again until the skin mirrors.

Sugar, salt and alcohol reduce to lacquer. That is the teriyaki idea entire.

One brings alcohol, the other sugar. Most Japanese braises want both.

Sweetness stops kelp stock reading thin without adding any salt to do it.

Sugar and alcohol carry the pepper away and leave the translucent sweetness.

Sweet sake glazes the cut face so it goes glossy, not mushy.

Sweetness is the only thing that makes the astringency pleasant.

Sweetness is the standard Japanese lever against bitterness. Nothing subtle about it.

Rice sugar caramelises below the point at which the skin would burn.

Sweet rice alcohol rounds off the smoke’s hard edge.

Sweetness against saline mineral. The standard Japanese proportion.

Sweet rice wine is what stops the dipping sauce reading as pure salt.

Sugar lacquers the cap and stops the sulfur reading as sharp.

Sweet rice wine and sour rice wine, straight from the same starting point.

Sweetness masks the amines in oily fish. Simmered miso mackerel needs it.

Thins the paste to brushing thickness and pushes the sugar already in it.

Reduce it to syrup and the sear turns glassy instead of dry.

Alcohol carries sugar into a sponge faster than any syrup could manage.

Glaze a fatty breast: alcohol goes, sugar sets before the fat gives up.

Sweet rice alcohol over macerated berry acts like a very quiet sake kasu.

Sugar and alcohol are both truffle solvents. A teaspoon in the stock is plenty.

Koji esters and cocoa butter lactones: one sweetness from two directions.