The end of the rainy season coincides with the beginning of the true summer days. The cicadas start singing full blast, the dusks and the dawns vibrate with the beautiful and typical sounds of the かなかな蟬kanakanamushi (Tanna Japonensis), probably above all my favorite animal sound… the humidity goes slightly away and the heat climbs up to another level… it’s a short time of the year that lasts just a very few weeks, before the typhoons arrive. The heat brings some kind of slowness to our home, and some restlessness because all I think about is going swimming. But there is much to do too.
What do you think is the very first thing I do when the rainy season ends in Japan?
Well… it’s easy, it’s drying my umeboshi. Gently taking them out of the brine on a nice morning one by one and lining them in the sun. Turning them and doing it another day. I must say that I am getting better at picking plums and the worries of the first attempt are now all gone and I am more confident. This year for the first time I also added red shiso to some and I am quite please with the result.
So if you had pickled plums this year, it’s gonna be about time to dry them and enjoy them. Keep the brine for the summer energy drink. Add a bit to a large glass of water to pack on salt and minerals.
In search for new inspirations and continuing with these inspirations from our travels around the world, after Italy (which I must say was an easy one!!!) I decided we would travel back to Malaysia.
A long long time ago we traveled to Malaysia for a few days in Kuala Lumpur and then north to Langkawi. In Kuala Lumpur we were super lucky to spend time with some local acquaintances that were total food fans and introduced us to all the possible food that exist there, discovering the Malay, Indian, Chinese… influences of this very original cuisine. I came back from our trip with a cookbook in our suitcase. A book in the end I enjoyed looking at but barely made any recipe from because I’m always missing an ingredient…
This time I decided I wouldn’t care and would just do with what I had, assuming that what I don’t have in my pantry is something I don’t like much. Hopefully, recently I bough some jasmine long rice as a change from round Japanese rice, because this is probably what would make the most difference. So I did a super simple rice recipe. Of course I didn’t have all the ingredients and adapted it to our taste. I served it with some vegetables simply cooked in a bit of coconut cream.
The recipe was mentioning that it is traditionally served for weddings. But I am simplifying it so much that I don’t even want to use the original name of the dish to call the recipe I have prepared. Yet the degree of satisfaction for that recipe was really high so I invite trying it!
Fragrant rice Malasia-style (4 servings)
300g of basmati or jasmine long rice
350g of water
20g of butter
2tsp of ground cardamom
1tsp of coriander seeds
1 stick of cinammon
2 star anises
2tsp of soya sauce
a pinch of salt
The first thing to do is to prepare fragrant water. In a small pan, heat the coriander seeds, the cinnamon stick, the star anise and the coriander for a few minutes. add 50g of water and bring to a boil, add the butter and keep heating until half of the liquid is gone. drain to keep the water and remove the spices. Keep the spices for decorating.
In a pan set the rice, top with 300g of water, add the fragrant water you just made, the salt, and the soya sauce. cook undercover at low heat until all the water is gone. Stop the heating and keep everything in the pan, under the cover for another 5minutes before serving. use the spice for decorating if you want to.
I need to go outside of my comfort zone in the cuisine… but I don’t know how…
Making ravioli, pancakes, scones, quiches, breads etc… has become such a routine and is so effortless that I miss the challenge. Because, yes indeed, I am a challenger. Whether it’s at work, on the court, in the ocean, or in front of my sewing machine I like challenges. That’s how I ended up registering to a bodyboard school last year and I still enjoy learning to ride waves better and to spin on my board! That’s why I enjoy sewing (and here the challenge is massive!!!) . But recently cooking has been more functional than challenging. Even the steam buns, the bread in a pan etc… are now basically classics and I rush them between two meetings!!
Since my main source of inspiration : experience and local sourcing during our trips has dried up in the past 18months, I have decided to use my imagination and my recollections of some our trips. First stop: Firenze of course! I remembered these gigantic sandwiches they would sell in something resembling focaccia (scaccia in Florence) and I never tried because it is just too gigantic and there was too much fat left on the ham (I have always hated meat fat) and since I just bought some prosciutto it was the perfect timing. So I baked a plain focaccia, and decided that we would have a savory breakfast.
Trying a new type of breakfast: focaccia, prosciutto and fresh tomatoes and peach…
And then because I made a rather giant focaccia we went for it again for lunch, this time in a real panino version with grilled vegetables. (Top picture)…
It wasn’t much but it was a change. Not yet far away from the comfort zone, but new enough!!!
Every time I think I have seen all the possible greens they grow in Isumi, every time I happily discover a new one. I am most attracted by greens and naturally when I see a new leaf on a shelf I can’t help buying it.
This time our local farmers market surprised me with hiyuna – ヒユ菜 apparently amaranth leaves. A nice green leaf, very tender and mild in taste. It is so mild in taste that I found it fits perfectly western cuisine, despite its Chinese origins! While most recipes I found were stir fry pr soup, I used the nice green leaves for omelette or pasta sauces. A bit like spinach. No wonder why one of their name is Chinese spinach!! And a rapid look at its nutritional value showed that this little leaf is packed with iron, potassium and several vitamins, another good reason to enjoy it.
I also found it was easy to prepare, and it goes very well with eggplants as in the picture below. And with tomatoes as in the other picture below. Enjoy if you find some!!!
In Japan okara is a very easy to find and very cheap product. Indeed, as it is a by-product of soya milk and tofu, there’s quite a lot of it. Up-cycling it in your cooking is also very easy. Apparently it has a good nutritional balance, but what I like with it is the little something different it brings. Added to an omelette for example it makes it extra fluffy and slightly pancake like. In a batter it adds some texture and firmness. Okara flavor is usually very mild and it is really the texture it adds that is interesting .
Okara: soya pulp after pressing to make tofu or milk
Okara is used in traditional recipes such as u no hana, or often in croquettes. I had times when I bought some often, but it was months if not years I didn’t. Probably because I liked one specific brand that was sold near the university but the shop selling it has closed and Has been replaced by another one that don’t have it. So when we went grocery shopping the other day at the local store and with the tofu there was fresh okara from the tofu maker I jumped on the occasion. I made some of the usual recipes aforementioned, but I really wanted to test okara in sweet preparations. I opted for chocolate muffins. I simply added okara instead of part of the flour. Added chocolate chips for the tiny ones and made a melty chocolate heat for the larger ones. And bet what…??? A. just loved them!!! And so did I!!!
On a rainy Sunday like today we met with what would be our little hideaway and resting place. (More about how we ended up here here)
Hydrangeas in our garden
The few things that I found charming as soon as we arrived was the hydrangeas, in full bloom under the rain, with their vibrant gradation of blues and purples. The abundant plum trees covered with fruits, and the lush green of the Japanese maple trees, the gingko, the pine and the azaleas. Everything that makes a Japanese garden, Japanese. I obviously didn’t see many thing that were also there: the loquat tree, the strawberry tree… After 8 years I now know pretty much all, even if I am uncertain about the 3 or 4 different types of plums we have, and every year I harvest more fruits than we can process! In particular the plums and the strawberry tree fruits. So I give away a lot. This year 15kg of plums went to my secretaries at the university!!! And used 5kg for syrup and 3kg for umeboshi. The rest is for the birds, the worms and the ants ;).
June garden harvest: plum, loquat, potato, strawberry tree fruits
After years of struggle making umeboshi and failing, I realized umeboshi are not so difficult to make if you have the proper instruments. I use to make them with whatever I had, before investing in a proper pickle box, that is wide enough and has a lid with a spring where you can apply sufficient pressure and get rid of the heavy stone, the overflowing ume juice and the failure… largely due also to the fact that I cannot check them every day. So if you plan to make umeboshi I highly recommend you invest in the proper recipient. I use a pickle box called Picre.
Umeboshi
2kg of Japanese plums (yellowish rather than greenish)
360g of salt
If your plums are really hard or toi greenish, dip them in water a few hours before starting.
Wash them and pat them dry carefully. Remove the stems.
Sterilize your recipient. It should be 3-4 times the volume of your plums to avoid overflowing accidents. Set half of the salt in and create an even layer. Organize the plums on the layer in order to remove space between the fruits as much as possible. Sprinkle a bit of salt. Create a new layer on top remove space as much as possible between all fruits. Sprinkle salt and repeat until all plums are well organized in a compact manner. Sprinkle the remaining salt on top.
Sterilize the lid and set on top to gently squeeze the plums. Set a heavy weight or pressure on top. After a few days the liquid from the plum will start to be released and a brine will be created. This is umezu. A precious liquid to use for pickling, energy drinks etc… after a week, the liquid should be about the height of the plums. It will continue rising and can be 2-3 times the height of your original plums height hence why choosing a recipient big enough.
Leave that way until the end of July. And see you then for the next step!!!
Plum work: after overnight in the water, day 0, day 7
Ravioli… oh! It’s been really a while I didn’t make ravioli… it was high time to fix that… but with all we got from the local shops I wasn’t sure about what use for s filling: korinki and cream cheese, asparagus, eggplant, or flounder… after a certain thinking I had in mind flounder in a sort of bouillon and served with rouille… I was thinking of my own special way of making bouillabaisse… but then something came up at work, upset me and I was working instead of cooking… the dough was ready, the flounder grilled, but neither the bouillon nor rouille were to be done anytime soon… and the clock was ticking and A. was hungry… and past 21:00 I had to go back to the kitchen. Except that now it was too late for a fancy dish… So I ran in the kitchen garden, chopped some fresh parsley, add it to the fish and decided that would be it. Rolled the ravioli dough, filled them in tiny size, and while I was poaching them I felt it was missing something, so I added some asparagus, a fragrant olive oil and that was it.
And you know what: flounder x parsley was a killer filling and I will do again!!! A creamy sauce could have worked fine as well I reckon…
I call summer vegetables the ones I have grown up with: tomatoes, zucchini, eggplants, melons… while here they are for most of them early summer vegetables as they are not endemic. For instance the zucchini season is at its peak now and will end very soon normally. Except that this year the rainy season is rather dry so may be we will have zucchini for longer… that would be good!!! Maybe I won’t have to struggle finding zucchini in the middle of summer to make a good pesto soup!!!
Anyway, at the moment I enjoy cooking them in various ways as long as I can find them. I cook them with my “traditional” or classic recipes but I am also investigating new ways of cooking them. I found that zucchini and green beans go very well together and I came up with a few new nice recipes, super simple and easy to make as I am quite busy these days with several projects on the run… Let me share two recipes here today: a simple savory tart and a vegetable curry-rice. I hope you’ll like them!
Savory tart
For the pie crust: 150g of flour, a pinch of salt, 3tbs of olive oil, water
2-3 zucchini depending of the size
A handful of green beans
150g of ricotta or cottage cheese
Fresh basil
Prepare the dough as usual, and roll it for your pie dish.
Wash the vegetables. Slice thinly the zucchini (with a mandolin if you have one) and set on the dough. Cut the green beans to 2-3cm long pieces and add on top. Crumble the ricotta or the cottage cheese, chop the basil and sprinkle on top. Bake 40min at 180deg or until golden. Enjoy hot or cold.
Veggie curry-rice
1 large zucchini or 3 small (better)
1 large ripe tomato
1/2 onion
10 green beans
Japanese white rice cooked
1tsp of curry powder
1/2tsp of cumin powder
A pinch of salt
Wash the vegetables. Cut them in bite size. In a pan greased with a bit of oil add the vegetables. Cook for 5 min at high heat then lower to medium. Add the spices. Cook another 5-10 min until you obtain the level of moisture you want. Personally I like rather soupy so that the rice can suck it in. Serve with the Japanese white rice and enjoy while hot. (Top picture)
If you have ever eaten curry-rice in a restaurant you surely have eaten the little white pickle served with it and then you have eaten pickled rakkyō 薤. A little vegetable that looks like a shallot a bit and is often called Chinese onion. I love the crisp and fresh taste it has and it’s hard to stop eating! A little like French cornichon, but less sour and salty!!!
The season for fresh rakkyō harvest is right now and it is fairly easy to find in coop and farmers markets. Pickling them is rather simple though washing and pealing is a bit tedious and you have recipe several options.
The easiest one is to use a prepared ready to use “rakkyō su” which is a mix of vinegar, sugar, dashi that is chiefly used for pickling rakkyō but can also be used for other preparations such as curry onion pickles. Though I am not necessarily a fan of ready to use products, they are a good way to start when you are unsure of the result and what you do and want to maximize success.
Other methods are to prepare your own brine for pickling the rakkyō. One recipe I have in an old Japanese cookbook is quite lengthy and probably the most genuine one, yet I couldn’t find a similar one anywhere, so I tempted to share it with you. My rakkyō are still in their first week of picking so I don’t yet the result… we’ll see!!!
So first the recipe for a quick sure outcome, and then the lengthy one. Choose the one you prefer!
Easy-peasy pickled rakkyō
1kg of fresh rakkyō
1 bottle of rakkyō su らっきょ酢
Start by washing the rakkyō and removing the first layer of skin to obtain a smooth and shiny surface. Remove the hard base and top too. Bring a large pan filled with water to a boil and throw the rakkyō in for one minute. Drain and pat dry the rakkyō.
In a sterilized bin put the dry rakkyō and cover with the rakkyō su. Close the bin with a lid. Leave to rest for 14 days. Shake the bin 2 times per day on the first 3 days. After 14 days enjoy!
Classic recipe of pickled rakkyō
Brine for pickling (used 14 days later)
2 cups of rice vinegar or other white mild vinegar
300g of sugar
1 cup of white umezu (brine of the umeboshi unflavored with shiso), can be replaced by 1 cup of vinegar + 1tsp of salt
1/2 cup of mirin or konbu dashi
5 dried red pepper (optional)
Pickling step 1
1kg of fresh rakkyō
30g of salt
4tbs of vinegar
1l of water
Start by washing the rakkyō and removing the first layer of skin to obtain a smooth and shiny surface. Remove the base and top too.
In a pan, set the water, salt and vinegar and the prepared rakkyō. Bring to a boil and stop right away. Drain and pat dry and put in a bin or a pickle-pot. Cover with the brine you made or of commercial brine. If you can set a heavy lid, otherwise everyday shake the bin. Wait for two weeks.
Pickling step 2
After two weeks drain the rakkyō and set them in salted water for 3-4h. Renew 2-3 time the water. Then set to dry in the air for half a day. Ideally in the sun, but any well ventilated place will do.
Finally prepare the brine by mixing all the brine ingredients together (but the red pepper) and bring to a boil. In a sterilized bin put the rakkyō and cover with the brine. Add the red pepper if you plan to use some.
Now it’s ready. Rakkyō in brine should keep a year or so., so enjoy!
