Category: Cooking

Spring donburi

Simple to prepare, all served at once, colorful and super delicious, I wonder why I don’t prepare some more often! With fresh green peas and snap peas, a bit of pork from Isumi and some Koshiikari from Isumi too, nothing much simple than preparing a delicious spring donburi. For the seasonning just a few drops of soya sauce and some golden sesame seeds. In order to keep the greens soft and tender, yet crunchy at the same time I only washed them and then cook them with a really little bit of water in the same pan with the pork. No additional fat, no salt nothing. For the pork I just cut slices in little bites and cook in a pan until golden and crispy. I serve the rice cooked alone, top with the pork and veggies, add a spoon of golden sesame and only 5 drops of soya sauce just to enhance the taste but not spoil it. One must be careful in using soya sauce because it has a tendency to cover all other tastes,

Vegan patties and cumin baby spinach

I got a nice bunch of fresh baby spinach at the farmers market and wasn’t sure about what to do about it. A salad of course, but lately evenings have been chilly and I wanted to eat something warm. Yet not completly ruined them: like in a tart or in an omelet. So I just washed them and steam them for a few minutes, add some cumin piwder and cumin seeds, that’s it!  I served it with some ripe and sweet tomatoes diced and some grilled cereals patties. Here I use a vegan burger mix. I usually don’t use these kind of products and I should work on my own mix but really this vegan burger mix, slightly spicy is really good, I just don’t look at what are the ingredients inside for once!!

I didn’t use any seasoning with the tomatoes because they are ripe, juicy and swwet, just on the side a bit of curcuma powder and salt and pepper.

Vegan pizza

Rucola instaneously makes feel like eating a pizza, so I prepared a dough and a vegan pizza with just one fresh new onion, 3 fresh tomatoes and plenty of fresh little rucola. A slightly different version of last year vegan, the new onions bringing some creamy texture, perfect with the crisp of the fough. (http://www.tokyoparissisters.com/4hands/2015/4/27/yudgf7c5merf96p9hv0l2f4ajirwid), nonetheless delicious.

Isumi pork 🐷 → Isumi ham

The city of Isumi has a special pork meat called Isumi pork (いすみ豚), what is special about it I can’t really say now but it is for sure delicious, very tender and juicy. But since they grow pork in the area, we were thinking it’s really a pity they don’t make ham (it’s really hard to find good ham in Japan in particular in supermarket in Ohara), until our friend S. visited us yesterday and arrived with some fresh ham, from Isumi!!! Super nice ham!!! So we decided to go and check out the place where to get some, a small meat shop near the railway and Ohara station. They have smoked ham and pepper ham. We tried both and both are amazing! Apparently the pork farm is apparently in Otaki. We will probably go and check what they have soon. In the mean time, we are really happy to have found some really nice ham and had some for breakfast with eggs and buckwheat crepes!!

Saturday in the country

Back to our country house after two weeks, back to our cats and our garden and my kitchen!!! This morning I boiled some lentil to accomodate with whatever I would find at the market. And it was ice-plant and brocoli sprouts for a big salad, together with fresh snapper just grilled and a bit of greens. Perfect lunch after our tennis game and for friends visiting from Tokyo. 

An other dinner at home

What to cook for your friends visiting Japan when you are back from work past 21:00 and everyone is starving? A soba salad with spring veggies of course!!! Spring veggies: asparagus, snap peas, green peas, are very easy to prepare and require very little cooking, just blanching them for 2min. Soba are also quick to cook, so in 15min I can have a dinner plate ready for 4 people. To the spring veggies I’ve added some cucumbers and a bit of brocoli sprout, as for the dressing, I mixed a bit of soy sauce with vegetal oil and just add a bit to prevent the soba for getting too sticky. You can also top the plate with some Japanese salmon, shredded nori…

Improvised dinner for friends

Our friends visiting from Germany spent the weekend with us in Tokyo with daytime busy visiting the city, museums, flea markets, and kabuki, trying some nice cafes too, and evening at home, I’ve cooked for them Japanese as much as possible but not only, in particular for an improvised late dinner at home after a long day out and a fridge almost empty. So I opted for a potatoes and baby spinach salad with tofu and poached egg and topped with sunflower seds and flax seeds. Simple, ready in 10min and delicious!!

A new delicious combination

We were supposed to have friends for dinner last night but A. had a strike of dust/pollen alergy and we had to cancel. I really to cancel invitations but sometimes it really can’t be helped. Instead of a fancy dinner I wanted to prepare something simple and tasty but I really wanted to use my fresh tomatoes and coriander. I hesitated with couscous (too trivial), quinoa (trivial), but then thinking of the sweet taste of quinoa I imagined that sweet potatoes would work not bad either, be less obvious and more “comfort food” for A.. I was a bit skeptical while cooking, how to do it… But in the end I grilled the sliced sweet potatoes in a bit of olive oil, added the tomato and topped with coriander just before serving. Perfectly delicious!

Asparagus risotto

Yes! Spring is here for sure and aspargus start to be seen on the market stands. Nothing simpler and more classic then an asparagus risotto, and still so delicious, I never miss to make one. I used a new onion for the base, for sweetness and melty texture, that I chopped roughly and slightly cook in olive oil. Then I added the rice, and rolled it in the oil until almost golden. Finally added water or vegetables bouillon if you have one. Once almost all the water has been absorbed by the rice, I added the asparagus chopped. And cooked until bright and shiny green to keep then perfectly crunchy. Served right away.

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