Fennel, Orange and Barley Salad

I like fennel very much. It is a popular vegetable in Italy. Today, I cooked it with oranges. They make a good combination. And I also like barley's texture. This salad definitely refreshes you.

comment from Mrs.P.

The fennel was delicious. I had never had it before because I thought it would taste like licorice ( not my favorite ). It's wonderfully fresh tasting with the orange and the crispy/chewy texture are great with the barley!

ingredients

1 fennel bulb sliced ( keep a few leaves for topping )

2 oranges cubed (cut off the both ends and pare the skin). Keep their juice ( squeeze the juice of the flesh left with the skin ).

1/2 cup of barley

1/3 cup of minced parsley

extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, sea salt, black pepper

directions

Sprinkle 1/2 teaspoon of salt on the fennel, mix it lightly, and keep it in your fridge for a while.

Boil the barley until soft and drain. Put 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil, a pinch of salt and pepper on the barley and cool it.

Put the diced orange, 1 tablespoon of olive oil, salt and pepper on your bowl and mix.

Squeeze the fennel and put it into the bowl. Add the orange, the barley, the parsley, 2 pinches of salt, 1 tablespoon of olive oil, 1-2 teaspoons of balsamic vinegar, the orange juice, a pinch of pepper and mix well. Dish it up, put the fennel leaves on the top.

Miso soup and Mushroom pilaf

I often cook Miso soup, especially potato and onion. My husband loves it.It is a very usual dish in Japan.
As you know, Miso-paste is made from soy beans. Normally we cook Miso soup with kombu( dried-kelp) and dried-fish stock. In the old days, Japanese people ate only rice, vegetables and a little bit of fish. So Miso soup was very important for providing protein. Kombu, dried-fish, miso - each of them has a lot of amino acids. We have a term in Japan for protein, UMAMI, which is one of the five generally recognized basic tastes. Of course, I couldn't use fish for vegan so I cooked it with kombu and dried-shitake mushroom. Dried-shitake also has a good amino acid. you can make good soup by mixing different kinds of amino acids.
Fall is the season of Mushrooms in Japan. People often eat Mushroom rice in this season. The changing of seasons is quite noticeable in Japan. We love to transport the sense of the seasons to the table. So I also cooked Mushroom Pilaf today.

comment from Mrs. P.

I never had miso soup with potatoes - what a wonderful surprise!
The Mushroom rice is rich tasting and fragrant!

Miso Soup - potato, onion and carrot
ingredients
2 medium size white potatoes, chopped
1/3 cup of carrots, sliced
1/4 medium size onion, sliced
1 piece of green onion, minced
4in. of kombu wiped with a moist paper towel very gently (you can choose 1 teaspoon of kombu-tea powder 0r 1 teaspoon of kombu-dashi powder )*
4.5 cups of water ( If you choose the powder you need 4 cups of water)

2 pieces of dried shitake mushroom soaked in 1 cup of water (2 - 8 hours) - use 2/3 cup of stock for Miso soup and keep 1/3 cup of stock and the shitake mushroom for pilaf
2 - 4 table spoons of white miso*

*kombu-tea powder : http://www.marukaiestore.com/p-492-gyokuroen-konbu-cha-19oz.aspx
*kombu-dashi powder : http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/riken-dashi-kombu-1-4-oz
*about miso : http://vegangifts.blogspot.com/2009/09/tomato-wakame-miso-bread.html

directions
Put the kombu and the water in your pan and leave for 1 -3 hours. Bring the pan on middle heat and warm it up slowly. Take off the kombu just before it starts boiling. Now you get kombu stock ( Kombu-Dashi ). The method is not easy even for Japanese. You have to chose good kombu, have to wipe it VERY gently, have to control the temperature, etc., but don't worry.....you have the POWDER!! Put the powder and the water in your pan! That's all. You get kombu stock.
Any way... put the potato, carrot, onion and 2/3 cup of shitake stock into the kombu stock. If you don't cook mushroom pilaf, add the soaked shitake mushroom, sliced. Bring the pan on high heat to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer until the potato becomes soft. Skim off the scum and turn off.
Put 2 tablespoons of miso in your small bowl, bring a bit of ladle soup from the pan, put it into the bawl and dissolve the miso well. Put it into the pan, stir and sample it. If you need more miso, add more miso in the same way to taste.
Just before serving, heat on low, turn off just before it starts to boil and put in the green onion. (Never boil miso! It makes it lose its flavor.)


Mushroom pilaf - soy sauce flavor
ingredients
1.5 cups of Japanese rice
2 - 3 cups of various fresh mushroom sliced ( I cooked clam shell mushroom, white mushroom and brown mushroom)
1/4 cup of chopped carrot
1 clove of garlic sliced
3 teaspoons of minced parsley
1 table spoon of extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon of white wine
1 table spoon of soy sauce
1/2 tea spoon of kombu- tea powder or kombu-dashi powder
a pinch of sea salt
1.5 cups of water
2 soaked shitake mushrooms, sliced and 1/3 cup of shitake mushroom stock ( These were kept from the "Miso soup" recipe )

directions
Put the garlic and the olive oil in your heavy, lidded pan. Bring it to low heat and fry the garlic very slowly until golden. Put the mushrooms in the pan, up the heat to medium high, and fry lightly. Add the rice and fry until rice becomes translucent. Add the white wine and stir it lightly. Add the water, the shitake stock, the shitake mushroom, the carrot, the soy sauce, the kombu-tea powder (or kombu-dashi powder ) and the salt. Put the lid on the pan, bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer for 12min. Take the pan off the fire and let it steam for 10 min. Put the parsley in the pan and mix well gently.

Fried Tofu Sticks - curry flavor

I cooked Fried Tofu Sticks for their Bento. This time, I made it as curry flavor.
It is suitable for bento because it has no liquid and still good after it gets cold.

comment from Mrs. P.
My husband loves these Tofu Sticks! He likes to dip them in Garlic-Soy Sauce.

ingredients
1 pack firm tofu (12 - 14oz)
1 tablespoon of curry powder
2 tablespoons of purpose flour
1 tablespoon of corn starch or rice flour
sea salt, vegetable oil for frying

directions
First of all, you need to press the tofu to drain its moisture. Usually, I use same-sized square baking dishes ( they work well to press because they have flat bottoms ). Wrap the tofu in your paper towel and place on the dish. Put another dish on it and put something heavy as weight ( 1 gal water bottle, a kettle of water or something else) on the dish and leave it 1 - 3 hours until the tofu loses 1/3 - 1/2 its original thickness.
Cut the tofu into 10 - 12 sticks. Sprinkle the curry powder all over them. Mix the two kinds of flour well and sprinkle it all over the tofu.
Put the oil depth of 1/4 - 1/2 in. in your large frying pan and bring it medium-high heat. Put the tofu gently into the pan after the oil becomes hot and fry each on both sides until crisp. You can get a nice crisp if you raise the heat to high for a moment just before you bring up the tofu from the pan - a low temperature just makes them oily.
Place the tofu on your paper towel to drain some oil. Sprinkle the salt on all over the sticks to taste.
These are good for dipping in ginger-soy sauce, if you are not satisfied with salt alone. Put a teaspoon of chopped fresh ginger into 3 tablespoon of soy sauce ( or Garlic-soy sauce : see previous post ). It is easy and yummy!!
You can keep fresh ginger in your freezer. It is easy to grate with your plane grater (grater/zester). I always have some in my freezer.

Guacamole with lentils : Vegan's Steak Tartar

It was a surprise to me. Because I intended to have made a steak tartar for vegan, I hadn't thought that this dish was a guacamole until Mrs. P. called it "guacamole". How stupid of me! I got the idea for this dish from the recipe of a Japanese chef. The chef also called her dish "Steak Tartar for Vegetarian". So I had forgotten existence of "guacamole".
Yes, It is a variation on guacamole, of course. It has avocado and onion but it doesn't have any tomatoes, chili and lime juice. In compensation, it has a lot of lentils and mustard.
I dished up it as heart-shaped. Isn't it cute? When I cooked it for Mr. & Mrs. P. as Bento, I put it in the box as heart-shaped, also. When they opened the box it had already lost its shape. So we have been calling the dish "Broken Heart". It doesn't sound very happy.

I think it needs "a new name". Do you mind if I call it "Vegan's Steak Tartar."?

comment from Mrs. P.

This is intriguing! I close my eyes with every bite to savour it.

Ingredients

1 large size avocado sliced

1/4 medium size onion minced

1 cup of boiled lentils

3 - 5 tablespoons of prepared coarse ground mustard (my recommendation is a country Dijon.)

4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil

3 tea spoons of white wine vinegar

salt and black pepper

some sprigs of fresh Thyme (if you need for decoration and flavor.)

some slices of your favorite bread toasted

directions

First of all, let's make a dressing. Put 2 pinches of salt and a bit of black pepper into your big bowl and add the olive oil, the mustard and mix well. Add the vinegar and blend well and leave it.

Put the avocado, the onion and the lentils on your chopping board, chop them well and mix until the avocado becomes smooth.

Put it into the bowl which has the dressing and mix.

Dish up in your style with the toast.

Squash became a pasta!?

It looks like a Tagliatelle but it has only vegetables. Both the look and texture are delightful.

You can add some boiled Tagliatelle, of course. It would be fun to have both the twisted pasta and the pasta-like squash.

comment from Mrs. P.

I love pasta and this is as satisfying as the 'real thing'!!

ingredients
1 yellow summer squash
1 green zucchini ( you can choose 2 yellow summer squashes or 2 green zucchinis)
10 cherry tomatoes cut in half
1 clove of garlic
a pinch of crushed red pepper
extra virgin olive oil, sea salt, black pepper

directions
Wash the squashes well and pat dry. Remove both ends. Using a peeler, make 1/2 inch-wide strips the length of the zucchini. Stop when you begin to reach the seeds.
Put 2 tablespoons of olive oil and the garlic in your frying pan. Bring the pan to low heat and fry the garlic very slowly. After the oil boils, add the red pepper and fry until the garlic becomes golden.

Turn up the heat to medium-high, add the tomatoes and fry, crushing them to get their juice. After the tomatoes become soft, add the squash and fry until the zucchini becomes soft.
Season with the salt and the black pepper.

Garlic - Soy sauce

This is a very useful seasoning. It has a rich flavor.

It is good for dressing, fried rice, curry and so on. I often use for "Fake Chicken" (the previous post). Easy and savory!!

ingredients
7 - 12 cloves of garlic
1 cup of soy sauce

directions

Put the garlic into a clean bottle and add the soy sauce.
That is all!! You can use after one week and can keep up to 1 year in your fridge.

Fried Tofu named "Fake Chicken"

This is the dish we call Fake Chicken. It looks just like a Japanese fried chicken and is, of course, yummy!!
The idea is from "ooLife organic recipe" : http://oola.cocolog-nifty.com/. Ms. ooLa is a famous cook and blogger in Japan. She has a great talent and beauty!! Thank you so much, Ms. ooLa!!

comment from Mrs. P.
"M-m-m-m-m-m-m-m!"

That's the sound my husband makes when he sees Fake Chicken in our bento! He loves tofu and this is his favorite!

ingredients
1 pack of tofu, frozen in its package in your freezer. (Buy a plastic-tubed, refrigerated tofu, not the paper-boxed kind found on the regular grocery shelf.)
4 tablespoons of rice flour
4 tablespoons of coconut milk
1.5 tablespoons of soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon of cumin powder
a clove of garlic minced

vegetable oil - for frying

*dressing
3 tablespoons of soy sauce
3 tablespoons of lemon juice
1 tablespoon of white sesame seed crushed by your finger
1/4 teaspoon of kombu-tea or kombu-dashi powder

1 tablespoon of water

1 teaspoon of sesame oil

directions
Let the tofu defrost (under the running water, in hot water or leave it in your fridge 1day etc., - you can chose your way).

Put the garlic into the soy sauce.
Cut the tofu in 9 -12 pieces. Grasp each piece and press tightly to completely drain off the water.

Put the tofu in the mixture of the coconut milk, the cumin powder and the garlic/soy sauce. Mix them gently and leave it for 5min.

Sprinkle the rice flour all over the tofu and deep fry the pieces in 360-degree oil until the surfaces become crisp.

Put them on your favorite salad. ( pictured is a baby spinach and shredded carrot salad.)
Mix the dressing ingredients and sprinkle it over the dish.

Fake Chicken is also good for dipping with your favorite sauce. Ms. ooLa 's recommendation is a sweet chili sauce. Mine is a Ponzu sauce : mix all of the ingredients of *dressing except the sesame oil.

Crazy food town Osaka-city!!

It is a symbol of Osaka (?) "Gulico" - the character of candy brand.

Osaka is well-known as FOOD, COMEDY and beautiful sunset.

Osaka people love flashy. Every restaurant fights fiercely on their display.

People enjoy all night.
Every display looks like a comedy. Funny!!!

Today's my lunch: in Kyoto

My friend and I went to a fantastic French restaurant in Kyoto.

Every thing was amazing and we were knocked out!! So I forgot to take the pictures of appetizer and soup. both of them were gorgeous, unique and elegant.

Zen Temple in Japan

I went to Kennin-ji, the oldest Zen Temple in Kyoto.

It has beautiful gardens and wonderful arts.

the second picture is my favorite "The Wind and Thunder Gods".

The last one is Hatto - Dhama Hall. The front facing altar enshrines a seated image of Shakyamuni Tathagata and attendant statues of the Buddhist priests Mahakasypa and Ananda.

The painting on the ceiling is "Twin dragons" (11.4m by 15.7m). Amazing and powerful!!

Japanese Temple

Today, I went to Hgashi-honganji Temple.

It was just 5min. walk from Kyoto-station (first picture-very modern) to the temple.

I had lived in Kyoto but it was a first time to go to the temple. Because It is different from my denomination. Higashi-honganji is a head temple of the Shin sect Buddhism Otani party. I am a Shingon-esoteric Buddhist. However most of Japanese people don't mind such a thing. I went to there just sightseeing. It is under repair but still fabulous. I enjoyed Buddhism quiet and spirits.

The last picture is a ginkgo tree's fruits. We had a typhoon last night, so they dropped. You can eat these nuts roasted. Yummy!

Japan!! Japan!! Japan!!

It was rain today, but it still was beautiful!!

How clean Gion street is!!

Today's our lunch. It was too delicious to take a picture.

Every dish is half eaten.

I am in Kyoto now. Kyoto is a beautiful ancient city in Japan.

I enjoy delicate and elegant foods and gorgeous hospitality.

Quiet, graceful, spiritual and exciting!!!

Stuffed Tomatoes

This is the "too tall Stuffed Tomato"
that I cooked for Mr. and Mrs. P., If you don't understand, please read the previous post

"Bento Box! It's so smart!".

comment from Mrs. P.

This is the perfect summer treat - Light, tasty and satisfying! Thank you!

ingredients

4 medium fresh tomatoes
(scoop out the insides and keep the tomato cups in your fridge)

1 clove of garlic sliced

1/4 medium onion minced

a pinch of dried crushed red pepper

1 cup of rice (Italian or your favorite)

3 tablespoons of pine nuts
1/2 kombu-tea powder or kombu-dashi powder*

1 cup of water

some fresh basil (for topping and for the rice)

Extra Virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt, black pepper

*Kombu-tea (konbu-cha) :
http://www.marukaiestore.com/p-492-gyokuroen-konbu-cha-19oz.aspx

Kombu-dashi powder :
http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/riken-dashi-kombu-1-4-oz

direction
Put 1 tablespoons of olive oil and the garlic in your heavy, lidded pan. Bring the pan to low heat and fry the garlic very slowly until golden. Add the onion, turn up the heat to medium and stir the onion until soft but not brown. Put in the rice, red pepper and stir until the rice becomes translucent. Add the tomato pulp which you scooped, the water, kombu tea or kombu-dashi powder and a pinch of salt. Put the lid on, turn up the heat to high, bring to boil, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 min. take the pan off the fire and let it steam for 10 min.
Bring a frying pan to medium heat. Cook the pine nuts with 1 tablespoon olive oil until golden and salt. Put the pine nuts with the oil, some torn basil on the rice and mix gently.
Sprinkle salt and black pepper on the tomato cups. Stuff the rice into the tomatoes with your spoon. Put it on your plate. Drizzle a bit of olive oil and balsamic vinegar around the tomatoes. Put the basil leaves on the tops.

Bento Box! It's so smart!

Bento box is a Japanese lunch box.
I sometimes cook for Mr.and Mrs. P. in bento style.
Mrs. P. loves this bento box.
It was given to me by my mother-in-law about twenty years ago! However, it looks like almost new because we didn't go on picnics very often. I completely forgot I even had it until I started to cook "bento" for them just three months ago.
It serves two persons, has two containers, two plates and two forks. You can stack up these containers when you have your food in them, and can fit one inside the other when they are empty. You can also carry it with its clever belt in both instances. How smart!

One day, I cooked Stuffed Tomatoes for them, but the tomatoes were a bit too tall to put into the bento box. So I chose other ordinary containers.

When she saw the containers, she said,

"Where is my bento? I miss my bento box!"
The bento box finally won recognition!!

Wakame Tomato Miso Bread

Today, I have a lot of gorgeous tomatoes from Ms. G.,
so I cooked our favorite breads. Easy and healthy!
The recipe is from "vege-dining"*
Thanks Ms. Izumi, you are a genius!


comments from Mrs. P.
This is a wonderful bread! Moist and Savory!
The wakame is an unexpected treat!


ingredients
2 medium fresh tomatoes crushed
2 tablespoons of Dried Wakame flakes*
1 table spoon of White miso paste*
1 cup of all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons of baking powder
*See notes below.

direction
Mix together the tomato, the wakame and the miso. Add the flour and baking powder, and mix them.
Divide your dough into 6 and drop by your table spoon on the parchment-paper, leaving an inch between.
Bake them in a 425 degree for about 10 min (or until wooden skewer inserted near center comes out clean).


about Japanese foods
*Wakame is a kind of seaweed. It is good for your health. you can get : http://www.amazon.com/Fueru-Wakame-Dried-Seaweed-1-76/dp/B000FKF4OC/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=grocery&qid=1253214742&sr=1-4
If you don't have wakame you can make the bread without it. Put some pine nuts or pistachio nuts to make up for wakame. It also would be good!

*We have plenty kind of miso paste in Japan.
You can sort them by degree of maturity. The most mature one has dark color (almost red), middle one has light color (brown-yellow) and young one has really pale color (yellow-beige). Most people in US call middle one "White miso". We don't call it "White miso". For Japanese, "White miso" means "Saikyo-White miso" which I used in "Miso flavor Gratin." It is a little bit too complicated, so I decided to call them "Red miso", "White miso" and "Saikyo-White miso" in this blog. Most of the time the miso paste sold in ordinary markets is White. If you have miso paste now, I think your one is probably "White miso."
Which means I used White miso for this bread. This is the one :
http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/maruman-organic-white-miso-26-4-oz

*vege-dining :
http://izumimirun.exblog.jp/10807879/

Gift from Ms. G

Beautiful!!!

Miso flavor Gratin

This picture is a dish of Zucchini/Tomato Gratin. I cooked Zucchini/Spinach Gratin for them.
Both of them are good. If you have eggplant (sliced, fried and salted,) you can make Zucchini/Tomato/Eggplant Gratin.*
It would be good!

comment from Mrs. P.

m-m-m-m-m......

It was amazing!

My husband couldn't stop eating.

Soy-milk and Miso?

It browns just like cheese.

ingredients

2 medium zucchini sliced in 1/4" rounds

1 bunch of spinach (or, 1 tomato diced)

1/4 onion minced

1 clove of garlic minced

1 tablespoon mushroom powder*

1/2 teaspoon of kombu tea powder or 1/2 teaspoon of kombu dashi powder*

1/4 cup water

1 tablespoon of flour

1.5 cup of soy milk

2 tablespoons of white miso*

2 tablespoons of bread crumbs

extra virgin olive oil, (some fresh basil,) salt and black pepper

*See notes below.

directions

Fry zucchini with 1 tablespoon of olive oil until translucent on both sides. Remove from pan and lightly salt.

Boil your spinach for 1 minute, immerse in cold water and squeeze dry. Dress it with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, a pinch of salt and black pepper.

(or dress diced tomato with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, bit of basil, a pinch of salt and black pepper.)

Spread 1 teaspoon of olive oil on your medium size baking dish.
Alternate layers using 1/2 of the zucchini, the spinach, and remaining zucchini.

Stir shitake powder and kombu tea powder into the water.
Dissolve miso in the soy milk.

Bring a frying pan to medium heat. Cook the onion with 1 tablespoons olive oil until soft but not brown. Add the garlic and fry lightly. Stir in the flour. Add the shitake/kombu water and stir. Put in the miso/soy milk and simmer while stirring until it thickens. (Season with salt and pepper if you need after tasted.) Pour it into your baking dish over the vegetables.

Sprinkle the bread crumbs on the top.

Drizzle a bit of olive oil on it.

Bake it in a 450 degree oven for about 15 min
or until golden .

* If you make Zucchini/Tomato/Eggplant Gratin, you need 1 medium zucchini, 1 tomato and 1 small eggplant.
In this case, it is good to put the eggplant on the bottom, the tomato on the middle and the zucchini on the top.

about Japanese foods
*The white miso is called "saikyo-white miso." It is a little bit sweet and smooth.
This is the one which I used. Very good! If not available locally it may be purchased from:http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/saikyo-white-miso-18-oz

*It isn't easy to get kombu-tea in US. However, you can get Kombu-dashi powder easily from:
http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/riken-dashi-kombu-1-4-oz

*If you get Japanese dried shitake mushrooms, let's make the powder with your food processor and keep it on hand so you can make beautiful soup stock easily.
If you don't have dried shitake mushrooms, you can choose fresh mushrooms. Mince some and put it into the pan with garlic.