Miso-Glazed Fish

When I added the miso and sugar to the hot sake/mirin, it flamed up and emitted a giant fireball that almost burned my eyelashes off. Did anyone else's preparation catch on fire? I had just turned the mirin/sake to low heat, and maybe I should have let it cool off first? After I stopped screaming I finished the recipe as directed and it was totally delicious.

One big problem cooking Japanese food in the US is one of the most important ingredients, mirin, is relatively hard to get. Most stores simply don't carry it. There's a company in California, Yaegaki, that makes real mirin in the US, as well as a decent everyday sake that is served as the house sake in every Japanese restaurant I've patronised on the West Coast. Don't use pre-salted mirin or sake when cooking Japanese food.

Pacific cod
Vodka for sake
Grocery store mirin
Broiler
Used my Food Saver vacuum sealer marinating dish to shorten marinating time to 40 minutes. Very good.

Make sure to double the marinade, I didn't have enough to really coat the fish

Broil on top rack in oven. I reheated the leftover marinade to spoon on top of the fish - delicious. I served over soba noodles and stir-fried shitakes, red onion, ginger, garlic and bok choy. Really nice!

This was delicious. I used reasonably thick cut trout fillets. One suggestion I would make is to use parchment paper instead of aluminum foil to cover the baking sheet. Parchment paper is compostable. It survived 6 minutes of broiling (3 minutes per side) and 4 minutes of baking at 400F. And you don't need to oil it. I'm trying to move away from using aluminum foil, which does save cleanup time. Parchment paper is equally effective.

This was the most delicious salmon I have ever cooked! I used "dark" miso, though, and "normal" sweetened mirin but omitted the sugar. A touch of homemade chilli jam added a zing to the overall zestiness too. Thank you.

A few commenters stated the fish was overcooked in the video. I've cooked it twice now. The first time, only the edges were charred; the second, it was just about as charred as in the video. Let me tell you, the more char the better.

I used sherry because I had neither sake or mirin. I made it with salmon. Easy and stellar results. Great weeknight meal

Vodka for saki.

1.5 lbs of salmon cut into serving size pieces, skin on. The mixture was sufficient for this amount of salmon.

Retained (and re-boiled) the marinade for extra sauce.

Broiled skin side down on tin foil, did not flip, thus I was able to scoop the fish from the tin foil and leave the skin and most of the dark fat on the tin foil.

Did not char the fish as much as shown in the picture (the fish in the picture is over-charred IMHO).

omit sugar. there is sugar in the mirin.

If skinless fillets, place 3 inches from heat for 5 minutes. Fold under skinny end for uniform thickness

I have made traditional Japanese miso-glazed fish for decades, but boiling off the alcohol on the sake does make a nice difference in results. As does preheating the oven (keeps glaze from burning, not being too long under broiler). My Japanese friends always told me that salmon was too nice a fish for this prep --in Japan it's usually used for more oily, cheaper fare -- but I think it works great on wild-caught fish. Serve with kinpira and Japanese rice. Excellent.

This turned out fantastic. I used brown miso paste, vodka thanks to everyone's comments (didn't want to buy sake), brown sugar and mirin and marinated for 24 hours. My oven has the heating element on top, so I put the fillets skin side down and broiled for about 7-8 minutes. Fish was perfectly cooked and a bit crispy. The taste is much more subtle than I was expecting, and not as sweet - I may even up the sugar next time. Will definitely try it with other fish!

I know this note I'm responding to is from two years ago, but I had the same thing happen tonight, except it was while I had the heat set on medium high before adding the sake and mirin. Quite the entertaining spectacle, since no one was hurt.