Variations
Tonkatsu is also popular as a sandwich filling (katsu sando) or served on Japanese curry (katsu karē).
Tonkatsu is sometimes served with egg on a big bowl of rice as katsudon.
In Nagoya and surrounding areas, miso katsu, tonkatsu eaten with a miso-based sauce, is a specialty.
Variations on tonkatsu may be made by sandwiching an ingredient such as cheese or shiso leaf between the meat, and then breading and frying. For the calorie conscious, konnyaku is sometimes sandwiched in the meat.
Several variations of tonkatsu use alternatives to pork:
- Chicken katsu (チキンカツ), which uses chicken instead, often appears in Hawaiian plate lunches.
- Menchi katsu (メンチカツ) or Minchi Katsu (ミンチカツ mince Katsu), is a minced meat patty, breaded and deep fried.
- Hamu katsu (ハムカツ ham katsu), a similar dish made from ham, is usually considered a budget alternative to tonkatsu.
- Gyū katsu (牛カツ beef katsu), also known as bīfu katsu, is popular in the Kansai region around Osaka and Kobe.
A similar cuisine with ingredients other than pork, beef or chicken is called furai (fry), not katsu (cutlet), such as aji-furai (fried horse mackerel) and ebi-furai (fried prawn).
Tonkatsu in Korea is known as donkkaseu (돈까스) or donkaseu (돈가스), a simple transliteration of the Japanese word to Korean. Saengseonkkaseu (생선까스 fish katsu) is a Korean fish cutlet modeled on the Japanese dish.
Read more about this topic: Chicken Katsu
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