This Japanese spinach salad with sesame, horenso gomaae, is a delicious combination of nutty, gently sweet and salty flavors mixed through wilted greens. It's easy to make, great as a side to many mains and perfect for bento, too.

side view of stack of Japanese spinach salad, horenso gomaae, in a blue and white striped bowl.

This post may contain affiliate links, where we earn from qualifying purchases. See more details in the policy page.

Spinach is one of those vegetables that can be a little divisive and maybe not as easy to like. It's maybe easier to enjoy raw as a neutral base for salads, but as a cooked vegetable, it can taste iron-y.

I get it - I wasn't necessarily the biggest fan in the past. But I have grown to love cooked spinach using a couple tricks that help you enjoy the true flavor rather than have the ironiness dominate.

Overhead view of bowl of Japanese spinach salad, spinach gomaae, with chopsticks below bowl.

One of these is using lemon, as in Greek spinach rice, spanakorizo and Calalan-style chard (which is actually more traditionally made with spinach). The other is using this Japanese sweetened sesame dressing.

What is gomaae?

"Goma" means sesame and "ae" is sauce in Japanese. The main ingredient is toasted sesame seeds, typically mixed with sugar and soy. You sometimes add other flavors like miso or dashi. You mix the ingredients into a simple, relatively thick paste-like dressing that gives a flavorful coating to whatever you mix it with.

Gomaae (also written goma-ae and gomae) is well loved in Japan and is believed to date back as far as the Edo period (17th - 19th century). Spinach gomaae is probably the most common, and certainly the one you are most likely to find in Western Japanese restaurants. But you can use the technique with other vegetables too.

stack of spinach leaves, bottle of soy sauce, bowl of sesame seeds and spoon of sugar.

Other greens work well and I've used it with steamed broccoli. You could also use the dressing with green beans and other vegetables, too.

What kind of spinach should you use?

While this works with small leaf/baby spinach, it's definitely best made with larger leaf spinach. The main reason for this is that they have more stem which make a difference.

The stems are tasty and give a bit more texture than being nearly all just leaves. But the bigger thing is they have the leaves separate more. With just leaves, they tend to clump together and don't get as evenly coated in the dressing. They're also a little trickier to eat. With more stem in the mix, that problem is massively reduced.

Making Japanese spinach salad

This is very easy to make with just a few short steps. First, trim the ends off the spinach, if needed, then blanch in boiling water. Get yourself prepared with a bowl of iced water ready.

You can either place the spinach in a pot of boiling water or place the leaves in a bowl and pour water over them. Both will work well. Though if the stems are thick, I'd say adding to boiling water may be better so you can add the stems first so they have longer in the water.

Once wilted, remove the spinach and place in the ice bath. This stops the cooking and helps the leaves retain their green color rather than become dull. Once cool, drain well - give it a really good squeeze to remove excess water - then roughly chop.

chopped spinach on wooden chopping board.

Separately, toast the sesame seeds in a dry skillet/frying pan. Even if you buy ready-toasted, it's worth warming them through a little to bring out their nuttiness. Then crush them with a pestle and mortar or in a spice grinder/food processor. You want them sandy and still with some seeds rather than a fine powder.

Add the other ingredients, mix to a paste then mix into the spinach.

grinding toasted sesame seeds with pestle and mortar.

How to serve this dish

Spinach goma-ae is generally considered an okazu, a side dish usually served alongside rice. It also works well as part of a bento, which may well have similar components to a larger meal, just in smaller quantities.

You'd typically serve this as a side vegetable to mains like fish, chicken karaage or katsu and maybe other vegetables, salads or pickles on the side, too. You could combine it with miso glazed eggplant (nasu dengaku) and ninjin shirishiri, for example, for a vegetarian combination. But really, it's pretty flexible so could pair with a pretty broad range of dishes, not just Japanese ones.

You typically eat this at room temperature though you can also serve it warm. It keeps well stored in a sealed container in the fridge for a good 3 days, so it's worth making more than you immediately need to enjoy over a few days.

Often when you look at the portion you typically serve, it seems small, but remember spinach wilts down a LOT. So you're probably eating a lot more than you realize. But then, it is really tasty so I find it easy to eat more than I plan at first!

stack of Japanese spinach salad gomaae in bowl with chopsticks below.

Horenso gomae is maybe a simple and easy Japanese spinach salad with sesame, but it's packed with a wonderful mix of flavors. Try it with rice, in a bento or alongside a bigger meal. So tasty and so easy to enjoy.

Try these other Japanese favorites:

Chashu pork, perfect to add to ramen, serve with rice and more.
Sunomono, Japanese pickled cucumber salad - refreshing, easy and another tasty bento option.
Chicken yakitori - simple glazed chicken skewers that are perfect for snacking on.
Plus get more Japanese recipes in the archives.

Japanese spinach salad, horenso gomaae, in a bowl viewed from overhead.

Print Recipe