Last night, I made donabe, also known as Japanese claypot rice. I’ve never cooked rice in a claypot before, so I was wary of doing it, but it was pretty easy and came out well. Claypot rice is such a good one-meal dish because you get your carbs, protein, and veggies all in one go without having a ton of dishes to do.
For the claypot rice (for either 4 people, or 2 people plus leftovers for lunch for both people), I used:
- 1/2 cup of mixed grains/beans from some package I got at the Japanese market
- 2 1/2 cups of white rice.
- 3 cups of water
- 1 tbs soy sauce
- 1 strip of kombu
- 1 tbs Chinese cooking wine (or sake)
- a cup of chopped up fried tofu
- a handful of chopped up Japanese mushrooms
- About 2 cups of chopped greens — I used some Japanese green for this.
Other than the rice, water, soy sauce, and sake, the topping is pretty up to your preference. Next time, I think I’ll use shiitake to add more savory flavor to the rice.
I rinsed and drained the rice, then soaked it with the measured amount of water, sake, soy sauce, and kombu for 30 minutes. During those 30 minutes, I roughly chopped everything else. After the soaking period, I put the claypot on the stove, put all the toppings on top, and turned the heat onto medium-low for about 10 minutes, then to medium-high until steam started coming out. Once steam started coming, I turned it to medium-low again for about 7 minutes, never opening the top (don’t want the steam to escape!). After 7 minutes, I turned the heat completely off and just left the pot there to steam for 20 minutes with the cover on.
I wasn’t sure if this was actually going to work, but at the end of 20 minutes, when I took the cover off, I was greeted with the pleasant fragrance of cooked rice! I mixed everything on top together with the rice and was thrilled to see there was even a nice brown rice crust on the bottom. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as crunchy as I had hoped.
The end result was still good nonetheless. While the rice was steaming, I also made a quick chawanmushi, which is basically a savory steamed egg custard.
The ingredients for chawanmushi (feeds 2 people):
- 4 small eggs or 3 regular sized ones
- 1/2 the amount of veggie broth as eggs. So if you have 2 cups of eggs, you just need 1 cup of broth.
- a couple leaves of the raw greens from the donabe above. Or you could use green onion.
- 1 tsp soy sauce
- 1/2 tsp mirin
- 1 tsp cooking wine/sake
Beat all the ingredients together and then pour into small ramekins. The ramekins should be about 2/3 full. Place into a steamer and steam for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, poke a toothpick through the middle. It shouldn’t be too yolky in the middle.
Other than the chawanmushi, the dinner was completely vegan. But for meat-eaters, I could see Chinese bacon or sausage adding a lot of flavor for the donabe. For the next day’s lunch, I had leftover donabe with natto and bonito flakes mixed in. Delicious.

My stomach is grumbling. So hungry!! This looks so good.
It’s really easy to make too, so you should try it! If you can make pizza dough, you can make this.
Chawanmushi has been a recurring reminder for me to get some ramekins, stat. Looks like a great, homey meal!
Thanks. It’s the first time I’ve made chawanmushi in a ramekin. Before we got the ramekins, I just made a huge one in a big bowl. But these single-serving ones are easier to steam.