Finding the Seaweed Used in Japanese Seaweed Salad

[JoJo5]

Hi everyone,
I've fallen in love with seaweed salad and want to make it at home. Anyone know where I can
buy the seaweed in bulk? I have all of the other ingredients and now just need the main one.

Thanks,
JoJo

[JoJo5]

Thanks for the latest posts. I'm going to get there yet.

JoJo

[Ora Moose]

Costco has large 28oz containers of http://www.azumafoods.com/products/Sa... but it's already made, not for making at home.

It's not bad, almost comparable to restaurant quality and at much better price.

[JoJo5]

Thanks for your responses. I guess I'll give the frozen option a try. I bought 3 different types of dry seaweed at Hong Kong (ex super 88) about 3 weeks ago but none of them was the right one. I'd hoped that there was an easy answer.

Have a good Sunday.
Joanne

[gimlis1mum]

Are you talking about the bright green seaweed salad, or the darker type? I forget where I heard that the bright green strands are an extruded product, not a natural seaweed. Anyone else know?

[almansa]

I've heard that as well, but I'm not sure I believe it. I could make an extruded green product containing coloring, agar and carageenan, but it wouldn't come out like the seaweed in the salad. I've tried many times, but just can't get it right. Wakame has stem like appendages that are common in prepared seaweed salad.

[another_adam]

I'm also under the impression that it's something that's not exactly seaweed (I've hard the extrusion thing, too, but I actually thought it was perhaps the stem of some sort of sea plant not normally classified as "seaweed" and not normally eaten in this form in Japan, dyed bright green and sold to sushi restaurants, especially on the east coast). I do rather like it from time to time, though (we called it "soylent seaweed"), and unintuitively, a good source for it is Bazaar Russian market. It's already flavored from them, though.

For a similar and completely undeniably seaweed-based product, you might be looking for "seaweed stems", sold salted in refrigerated packs in Korean markets. It's called "miyeok julgi", and you take it out and soak it, changing the water several times, and wash it well to remove the salt. You then blanch them and chop/shred them so that they're thin and bite-sized. Maybe it's just my technique, but they never come out as evenly thin as the bright green "seaweed salad" when I do it, though. (You also have to be careful not to over-blanch them, since they can get overcooked and turn sort of slimy and no longer pleasingly toothsome)

Reliable definitely has miyeok julgi, but I've had bad luck with the brand they carry (too many foreign objects lurking in with the stems). I prefer to get them at H-Mart, because they have a bigger selection, including a brand I prefer. I typically buy a couple packs and freeze them, they keep just fine.

[Chris VR]

I saw the same at http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/824778

This article http://www.nytimes.com/1997/08/13/gar... says "Only the stems and branches of wakame are used for the salad, which, at its basic best, is made with strands of agar-agar (gelatin-like sheets made from seaweed),"

[almansa]

Most restaurants by 3 kilo tubs of frozen seaweed salad from JFC. Since you have the other ingredients, I'd go with frozen fresh seaweed from the aforementioned markets, but don't expect to end up with what you get at restaurants.

[grant.cook]

Hmmm... I know certain seaweeds you can buy dried and then reconstitute.. the obvious thoughts are Ebisuya, Miso Market, or maybe H-Mart. You can also buy prepared seaweed salad at H-Mart for not too bad a price..

[emannths]

Reliable Market too.