How to Pulverize Meat Quietly in Japan

    Japanese apartments aren't known for their thick walls. As a result, I am sure all my neighbors may have an unfavorably impression of foreigners, Americans in general, or myself in specific. I am loud, even when I try not to be, but everyone has moments when they get carried away. Perhaps some of this is forgivable, but the best I can do is try to make quieter choices in the future.

    Despite my best efforts, some methods of food preparation are unavoidably loud, such as tenderizing meat with a mallet. In an effort not to terrify, enrage or otherwise startle my neighbors as I battered some steak, I came up with a nifty enough little idea.

The meat doesn't have to start out small. Steaks of a larger size can be cut down to smaller, more easily smash-able pieces.

    For this, you will need smaller cuts of meat to smash, available at most grocery stores. You will also need a small mallet to smash them with and these are easy enough to find in the grocery or hundred yen store. The only other absolute necessity is a hard, fairly thick and sturdy cutting board in a small, manageable size. Mine is half of a cutting board my husband accidentally broke in half last year but similar boards are available at Ikea which ships all over Japan. The goal is to hold it steadily in one hand while smashing the meat with the other, so make sure it is both big enough that the meat and your thumb aren't in exactly the same spot and small enough that you can hold it steady while whacking it with a mallet.

Nice little cuts. Watch out for patches of fat holding the top of bottom of a piece together as this will make them harder to flatten. Slice those off for better results.

    This kind of thing is loud because the vibrations from the force applied to the meat through the mallet swing go through the counter beneath it. If we instead hold the board above a sink, the vibrations dissipate in the air. Everyone in the room will still hear the thwack of mallet upon steak, but none of your neighbors will wonder if you're building an arc or trying to punch a hole through the wall.

Nice little flat steaks.

    I repeated this process on many little steaks and found it adequate for preparations for mini chicken fried steaks.