Beef Sukiyaki Pasta

In the hands of cookbook author Hiroko Shimbo, the flavors of beef sukiyaki become an easy weeknight meal.

- Karen Shimizu

SUKIYAKI, A DISH OF BEEF Simmered in a sauce made of shoyu, sake, and sugar, dates back to the late 19th century in Japan, when a centuries-old taboo against eating beef was lifted and it entered the culinary canon. The name comes from the word for plow (suki), the main blade of which was sometimes used for direct-heat cooking (yaki)-or so one story goes. Today, sukiyaki is still a special-occasion dish, one that calls for paper-thin slices of beef and that's traditionally prepared on the table, hot pot-style, in a special cast-iron vessel.

That's how cookbook author, Culinary Institute of America instructor, and Japanese culinary expert Hiroko Shimbo first encountered sukiyaki. Growing up in Japan, Shimbo ate the dish just once a year. "My father, who otherwise never got into the kitchen, made it on December 31st," she remembers. "We always bought the finest quality meat." But when Food & Wine asked Shimbo for a sukiyaki recipe in 2005, she decided to create a more everyday version. She dispensed with the tabletop cooking arrangement, instead creating a stovetop sukiyaki of beef, tofu, and scallions paired with spaghetti, drawing the sweet-savory flavors of the celebratory dish into an easy weeknight meal.