Aburaage (油揚げ abura-age or aburage) is a Japanese food product made from soybeans. It is produced by cutting tofu into thin slices and deep frying first at 110~120 °C then at 180~200 °C again.
Abura-age is often used to wrap inari-zushi (稲荷寿司), and is added to miso soup. It is also added to udon noodle dishes which are called kitsune-udon because of legends that foxes (kitsune) like deep-fried tofu. Aburaage can also be stuffed e.g. with nattō before frying again.
There is a thicker variety known as atsu-age (厚揚げ) or nama-age (生揚げ).
The Japanese were the first to develop tofu pouches. However, little is known of their early history.
Because of their long storage life,
light weight, and complexity of production, tofu pouches lend themselves
to large-scale factory production and widespread distribution.
In Japanese mythology abura-age is the favorite food of Kitsune and Inari.
Inarizushi (稲荷寿司) is a pouch of fried tofu typically filled with sushi rice alone.
It is named after the Shinto god Inari, who is believed to have a fondness for fried tofu.
The pouch is normally fashioned as deep-fried tofu (油揚げ, abura age). Regional variations include pouches made of a thin omelette (帛紗寿司, fukusa-zushi, or 茶巾寿司, chakin-zushi). It should not be confused with inari maki, which is a roll filled with flavored fried tofu.
A version of inarizushi that includes green beans, carrots, and gobo along with rice, wrapped in a triangular aburage (fried tofu) piece, is a Hawaiian specialty, where it is called cone sushi and is often sold in okazu-ya (Japanese delis) and as a component of bento boxes.[9][10][11][12]
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