If you are trying to add more vegetables or salads to your diet, I highly recommend this book: Easy Japanese Pickling in five minutes to one day. This dressing is written to be used with small Japanese eggplants, but Ms. Ogawa suggests that cucumbers make a nice variation. It’s an easy and original way to serve either vegetable.
Cucumbers in Spicy Soy Sauce
from Easy Japanese Pickling
by Seiko Ogawa
serves four
page 33
3 to 4 small thin Japanese cucumbers (or 5 Japanese eggplants)
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons Japanese mustard powder mixed with equal amount of water
1 1/2 Tablespoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons mirin
Cut cucumber into slices. (Cut small eggplants into 3/4-inch dice.) Stir in the salt. Let stand 15-30 minutes.
Combine remaining ingredients well.
Squeeze the vegetable well and toss in the mustard mixture. Let stand 10-15 minutes.
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Tess's Japanese Kitchen 
Just found your site, awsome stuff and I will definitely be trying some of the recipes!
Quick question, though. What exactly is Japanese mustard powder, and is it any different from what we’d find here in the stores in the USA?
Thanks Mark!
Japanese mustard powder is similar to what is available in U.S. groceries. A bit hotter and less stable (it looses its heat if you let it sit too long).
I’m working on my site here and haven’t got everything back into place, but if you look here:
https://1tess.wordpress.com/essentials/whats-in-stores/
Scroll down, about half-way to the bottom to see “Seasonings and Flavors.” Click on the picture of the mustard powder so you can to see it larger. S&B distributes lots of Japanese products in the U.S.
Or maybe regular mustard powder with a dab of wasabi paste.
Here are the books I am studying :
https://1tess.wordpress.com/essentials/reference-recipe-books/
I am mostly using Ms. Shimbo’s book.
Thank you! :)
I like pickles in general, and although it’s been forever and a day, I still fondly remember the Japanese-style pickles I had with my beef donburi at some little restaurant in Japantown in San Francisco many, many years ago. It was definitely a place that the locals liked, because I think if I hadn’t had my local friend showing me around, I never would have even found the place, much less knew it existed. :) Hopefully I can try my hand at making some at home.
Hope you like these, then.
All the recipes in that book are not so much like U.S. / European style pickles with salt and vinegar, but are more like marinated vegetables or salads—different flavors and not meant to be kept a long time.
That’s good too. :)