As the summer fades away, autumn days are slowly settling in. Autumn in Japan does not mean yet fallen leaves, cold mornings etc… we’ll have to wait at least another month for that! October is usually a fair month with warm days and just chilly enough evening and mornings to enjoy a walk or a bicycle ride. The food stalls start changing in colors and products too. The new rice harvested in August, the pumpkins and kabocha, the lotus roots… of course some of the summer food will still be around for a while: the super ripe tomatoes, the last crunchy cucumbers…
Combined together late summer and early fool ingredients are perfect such as in this pasta recipe below: tomatoes, butternut, lotus root… simple but delicious.
With the more chilly evenings, it is nice to curl under a little blanket and eat a warming dish, warming by its color and flavors. So I prepared a slightly spicy soup with fresh vegetables and chicken meat-balls, in a bouillon of spices and fresh lemongrass. Here is my recipe, it’s super simple!! Hope you’ll like it!
Spicy soup (2 servings)
1 carrot
1 2cm slice of butternut squash
A handful of green beans
100-150g of chicken breast grounded
1 tsp of potato starch
1 pinch of turmeric
1 pinch of chilly pepper
1 pinch of coriander
1 pinch of salt and pepper
1 leave of fresh lemongrass
100g of vermicelli or thin noodles (optional)
Actually you can adjust the vegetables to what you have around… I sliced the carrot with the peeler to obtain very thin slices, but you can also do a julienne or small stick… it’s up to you…
So in in a large pan I heat 1L if water, add the vegetables and the spices. Then in a bowl I mix the meat and the starch. Make small balls (1.5-2cm diameter) and toss them in the boiling bouillon. After 10min all is ready. 5min before eating I add the noodles. They cook very quickly and you don’t want them to become thick and too soft. Serve immediately. Yes… that’s it!!!
Well… while this week has been crazy busy with work, I also was very excited with my sourdough experiment… and things turned out almost as I expected they would… with utter fun when Lois grew and foamed and in utter disappointment when it stopped, finishing in a nauseous mess that stunk like I couldn’t imagine it would. Sourdough is not for me, I knew it…
Lois on the 2nd day, gently bubbling
I read books, blogs, websites about sourdough before starting (it took me 5 years to get ready for the commitment!!!!) and while I was observing it growing. I wanted to do right, not to waste precious time and resources. Then I was almost desperate when it started to stink, read even more about all the possible tricks, tested them all: sugar, malt, fridge, not fridge, more food, more mixing, rest, splitting it and starting afresh… nothing seemed to have worked truly. Almost 1kg of mixture went down the drain in a terrible smell. The rest is sitting in the kitchen in a desperate hope I can still save it. The smell is gone but no foaming and bubbling as I thought it would… part of the passive mixture was used for pancakes this morning…
But before things went south I had on the third day just enough to make a tiny bread to test it when it was still good! And damned! Even if I rushed it a bit ( temperature went down with the rain so the rising was too slow for the impatient me!) the crust was perfectly crusty, the crumbs were moist and soft, and the taste of whole wheat and sourdough was amazing. Enough to keep me trying to save what is left of Lois… so now I am in this terrible situation where I want to stop hoping I can grew a stable relationship with my sourdough, but I can’t take the final decision to trash it all, as the taste of sourdough bread was so perfect…
Who said that cooking Japanese cuisine was complex???
I have the simplest and most delicious recipe of miso soup for you today and an ultra easy ochazuke recipe. Of course both require basic Japanese ingredients: dashi, and miso for the first one, and Japanese rice, dashi and umeboshi for the second one. Indeed now is the time rice harvesting in Isumi is just finished new rice of this year harvest is now available. Delicious brown rice, slowly cooked to be just perfectly soft goes perfectly well in ochazuke recipes I find, almost better than plain white rice.
For the dashi of both recipes you can choose from katsuobushi, ichiban dashi, konbu dashi or shiitake dashi. Personally I love ichiban dashi. Ichiban dashi 一番だし is a basic in Japanese cuisine and particularly in cha-kaiseki 茶懐石, so I mostly make ichiban dashi, so let’s start with its recipe.
Ichiban dashi – 一番だし
1L of water
15g of katsuobushi blakes (not too thin)
15g of konbu
In a pan set 1cm of water, add the konbu and bring to a boil at low heat for 10min. Add the bonito and the rest of the water. Keep boiling at low heat for 5 minutes. Let rest and filter. Your ichiban dashi is ready, you can use it as a base for soup, cooking vegetables, fish, tofu, rice etc…
With the dashi made, we can then move to the other recipes. First the eggplant miso soup. Then below the ochazuke.
Eggplant miso soup (for two servings)
2 little Japanese eggplants
1 tbs of miso
600ml of dashi
a bit of neutral frying oil
Wash and cut the eggplants (see top picture fir cut). In a frypan greased with the frying oil, cook the eggplants until just golden and soft, serve then evenly in two large miso soup bowls.
Heat your dashi if it was prepared ahead, or use the one you just prepared. Top the eggplants with the dashi. Set half a tbs of miso in each and stir gently. That’s it!!!
Simple ochazuke (2 servings)
1 cup of Japanese brown rice or white rice cooked
400ml of dashi
2 pickled plums
1 bundle of komatsuna or other green (water spinach, spinach…)
Serve the rice in a large bowl. Heat the dashi. In the meantime wash the green vegetable, cut in 5cm long and blanche. Drain well.
Top the rice with the vegetables, then serve the dashi, add the pickled plum. That’s it!
While we are celebrating the 8th anniversary of the purchase of our country house, I thought it was time to reflect a bit on how this purchase has modified our lives, probably more deeply than we could have expected or maybe realized and in many ways how this house and its surroundings have changed my shopping and cooking habits, and play now a central role.
Here’s the quick story on how we bought a house in Isumi. After a few years living in Tokyo, we realized that with earthquakes, and the real estate in the city it wouldn’t be reasonable to buy a house there… yet… owning a Japanese style house was something we fancied, and we spent hours day dreaming on the catalogue of country houses and properties of furusato.com, a website that sells all kind of properties in remote Japan. The seed was there. Our friends’ house and their life style in Tsunan probably helped a lot in making the idea grow, and one day, out of the blue in June 2012 we went to visit one house in Yokosuka… ocean view, pool, but not quite it… the next Friday, A. sends me a link, I call the real estate agent. Appointment to visit the next morning. It rains as usual in June, the hydrangeas are blooming, the garden is a mess of lush greens, the house needs serious refurbishing and reform but no serious work. This is it! For the sake of pleasing the agent and being sure of our choice we go to visit another one, but our minds are all set. This is the one! And in a snap the deal is done.
The day we bought our house in Isumi
We often work like this. We mature something for a loooong time, but when we’re set we’re set, and never regret. It took us 3 years to decide to buy our first car, 1 test drive to settle, it took 7 years to decide to buy a country house in Japan, 5min to settle.
So now that’s when things get even better than we could have ever imagined… Every year has its reforming and embellishments. Of course we were not totally stupid on our choice. We decided to pick a house in a not too touristic place (avoiding the big weekend crowds of Hakone, Karuizawa, Hayama…), quite rural, and nearby the ocean. And 100km away from Tokyo, so that the driving wouldn’t get too long. While our plan was to go every once in a while, we quickly got addicted to being there, the space, the light, the green, the quietness. Keeping yourself busy with something in the garden or in the house is something that is priceless. Being outside, in the open air, surrounded by greens or the ocean made me stronger, and more confident. It also has given me a lot of time to think, while the hands are at work trimming and pruning, about the career moves I wanted to do or not do, to understand where and when I was in perfect equilibrium. It also constantly makes me question what I do and why. This country house and the life we live there show me the absurdity of our societies and help me understand its profound problems. Of course it doesn’t give any answer, there is no magic here… just learning to observe more, be more patient in the kitchen garden, manage frustration when a parasite destroy your crop…
All these changes happened slowly, when we discovered little by little the communities living there, the amazing resources, the many enthusiastic and passionate people we meet. We learn about Japanese wood craft, we learn earthware craft, we learn about farming. We now live on food that is produced right there (some people challenge themselves to live on food that comes from less than 100miles, we could say that most of ours comes from less than 10miles, and we don’t even need preserves as each season has its harvest!!!). Isumi is rich in all kind of food from vegetables to fruits, sea products and cattle farming. The dairy, the eggs, the seaweed, the fishes, the pork, the rice are incredible… there is a community of permaculture farmers and organic farmers… Living in Tokyo had given me such a limited choice of food and quality, even when I was shopping at local farmers near work, they didn’t have the choice we can have here. Living in Isumi, I discover new greens every season!!!
Having a lot of variety in food is nice, learning how to prepare it is just even better. Thanks to new friends and neighbors I have shared so much. My 89 year old neighbor teach me not only to sew, but also to garden and to cook or prepare local products such as umeboshi. Our other neighbors and friends too. We make umeshu together, miso, we exchange seeds…
Yet one thing was missing from the city: the good bread shops from Tokyo for our breakfast. And that’s when I took on baking bread. At first it was just a once in a while thing. It was tedious, not always very successful but I didn’t give up. I studied, and tried over and over. I enjoy the kneading, the shaping, the eating! I also teach friends about some local French breads making…
The other thing I learnt to deal with was the uncontrollable humidity/dryness and heat/cold in the house that prevent you from being able to keep any non Japanese staple longer than 6 months. Forget about having a bag of almonds or cookies in your pantry, they turn bad in no time. Who cares I’d say… I realized that making pancakes, crepes or scones takes only a few minutes and they are much more healthy and delicious!! Making cookies also is just that simple too!
So this little house with its green surroundings has been the source of a constant amazement and bliss, every single second I think about it, even when I am worried about it when a typhoon passes or the earth shakes, I feel it was a very good decision and we got lucky. Japan (but not only) countryside is full of surprises and being able to discover and experience it in deep is now an essential part of our lives.
Now why didn’t we make a bold move to the country is another question I’ll answer later…
Well, well, well… the rainy season doesn’t seem to clearly end this year again, turning the garden into a jungle, with the heat and a few hours of sun somehow everyday and the season for summer fruits has truly started. Be it melons, peaches or blueberries, the freshness and sweetness of all is a joy every morning for breakfast, eaten simply raw.
It is also the time of the year we spend most of our free time at the beach swimming, bodyboarding and surfing, and we need a solid five o’clock tea with something to eat. When it’s hot I don’t feel like standing in front of my cooking range flipping crepes, I prefer a ready to eat summer fruits in tart, clafoutis, cobbler or crumble. Blueberries are a good ally for any of the aforementioned preparations. But my favorite of all is a simple tart with a sablé pie crust, topped with fresh ripe delicious fruits. I love when it bake to see the dark fruit juice turn into syrup and make a thick layer. I like simplicity.
But after I prepared this simple blueberry tart the other day, A. argued that the tart with custard is better. I assume he wanted to tease me just to be sure to have another blueberry tart soon enough… and it worked well for him!!! The week after I was preparing a custard cream version of it.
I love custard too, but to be honest I find that baked blueberries in their juice are much nicer than raw ones… So while I loved both I still have a preference for the simpler version. What is your favorite???
Blueberry tarts
Simple version
150g of flour
30g of sugar
50g of butter
Water
Blueberries
In a bowl combine the ingredients but the blueberries. Make a dough and roll it to the size of your pie dish.
Cover with the fruits washed and patted dry. Bake in the oven at 190deg until crust is golden and fruit juice is thick.
Custard version
Same as above
1 egg yolk
1 cup of milk
1tbs of flour
1tbs of sugar
Vanilla (2cm of a pod)
Make the dough as above, roll it and set in the pie dish. Put an oven proof weight on it, and bake until golden at 190deg.
In the meantime make the custard: in a bowl mix the sugar, the egg yolk, the flour, heat the milk, add and stir well, and cook while stirring until creamy (I like my custard very creamy not hard… but adjust the quantity of milk depending on your liking. For that boil a smaller quantity of milk first and while stirring and cooking add a bit of milk once in a while until you obtain the desired thickness. Remember it will thicken further when cooling down)
Spread the custard on the crust, add the washed and patted dry blueberries, that’s it!!!
When I make pasta for ravioli I always end up with a significant amount of pasta that has been floured and roll and is unsuitable for making ravioli again. It has become to dry. Usually I would just keep it that way, cut in squares and boil it or fry it as a little bonus or for finger food with a drink. But recently I have been really attracted to making shorter pasta like troffie, orecchiette, gnochetti… and seeing video of Scusatema on IG really inspired me to make the step and test… the ravioli rolled pasta is a lot drier and hard than the original pasta and I thought it would be perfect for the test. I have little cooking equipment, and thought my little gnocchi board would be good for that.
So I assembled all the remaining pasta in a ball, rolled it in a long stick.
Cut the stick in small pieces, and started rolling them on the board. That went just perfectly. No meed for additional flour, no sticky parts and beautifully shaped gnochetti came out one after the other. Bonus it is super relaxing to do this little gesture to roll the pasta on the board and see them pilling in front of me.
Since I made only a small amount instead of boiling them I cooked them in a little pan with olive oil and a bit of water, and waited for the water to go before lightly frying them, and served them as a little snack.
For sure I will make short pasta again soon! That was so nice!!
Ohoh! Exploring new possibilities with edamame will last the whole season!!! This recipe of fougasse came naturally to my mind as I love to bale fougasse for summer evenings drinks or summer lunches when I need something quick.
In Japanese bread shops you can sometimes find edamame and gouda breads, and I like them very much, but the idea of a simpler version (without the gouda for A.) and with olive oil and salt tempted me a lot, that the last batch of edamame I had was used to that purpose.
The result is really nice but my recipe needs a little improvements to emphasize more the edamame. So I am sharing with you the improved version but not tested yet… but I am sure it will be delicious.
Edamame fougasse (makes 1 bread)
200g of flour
3g of yeast
7g of salt
Water
Olive oil
A handful of boiled, shelled and peeled edamame
I only use fresh edamame, so the recipe starts by boiling the pods in salted water. Once boiled and cool, shell and peel them. Add a bit of salt.
Prepare the dough of the fougasse: mix the flour, 5g of salt, the yeast, add 2tbs of olive oil, and water to obtain a soft, silky and smooth dough. Add the edamame and knead a bit. Let rest for it to rise. Once is has started to rise you can work it in the shape of the fougasse, and let rest about 30-60min depending on your room temperature.
Bake at 230deg until golden. When out of the oven spread a thin layer of olive oil and sprinkle a bit of salt. That’s it!!!
Breakfast, as I often say, is my favorite meal and I would never skip it!!! But it wasn’t always the case, it took me twenty years to be able to eat breakfast… Probably because waking up early to go to school wasn’t adapted to my sleep rythme and I’ve never been a morning person… When waking up to the alarm (which I try not to do too often anymore) I am in an autonomous mode for a (A. would say loooong) while. When I first started eating breakfast, I was in college. At first when I was still home, my father would bring my breakfast to me, no kidding!!!! My breakfasts consisted in things that are really easy to serve without preparation: muesli with milk, a pack of fruits compote, a glass of fruit juice and a large cup of tea. I kept the same routine when I moved out. It could be made easily, but I took it in my room on a silver platter, beautifully organized and served. That was part of the routine of making it enjoyable, together with listening to music and getting ready.
We kept a similar routine for a long time, but slowly replaced muesli by bread or equivalent that we would buy, and the compote by fresh fruits. We also got ridden of the fruit juice. I also adapted my schedule (that I am lucky I can control 99% of the time) to something that fits more my morning slowness, by allowing more time to breakfast and avoiding morning craziness. So that now we don’t buy bread anymore, or only croissants or pain de mie from artisan boulangers once in a while. I bake it most of the time or I prepare pancakes or scones. The music is still an important aspect of our breakfast!
I have endless variations of bread recipes that I am now all trying with the respectus panis approach: with not enriched flour, little salt, little yeast. It works great!!! And I found that it is even more adapted to our schedule as now I prepare the dough in the late afternoon, let it prove a few hours, shape the bread in the evening, put it in the fridge, and in the morning bake it for 20-25min depending on the size and type, which is just perfect for a out of the oven bread for breakfast!!!
The bread in the picture is one of my favorite: 4/5 of plain white flour (I am testing organic Japanese flour providers from different regions of Japan, preferably closer than Hokkaido, I’ll keep you posted once I have found something really nice), and 1/5 of roughly stone grounded whole wheat flour that has a lot of coarse bran in it. It gives the bread an interesting texture and a subtle flavor. I bake it low in the oven hence it doesn’t have the golden color on top, but on the bottom!!!!
While this breakfast routine is what I find the easiest to go with every morning, I like both savory and sweet breakfast. Eggs, bacon, cheese, salad, avocado toasts, honey, jam… everything makes me happy! But there is one thing I never prepare but I love dearly is a true Japanese breakfast… I promise a post on Japanese breakfast and a few recipes in a few weeks!!!
I’m a big fan of cooked eggs and always have been. I recall the soft boiled eggs with bread and butter of my childhood, the omelettes, with cheese, potatoes or wild asparagus or wild mushrooms… going to the chicken farm near my grand parents home to get fresh eggs… this love for eggs hasn’t changed a bit over time, now I still love eggs. Poached, sunny side, scrambled… every mean is great. But recently I rediscovered home made hard boiled eggs. In Japan they can easily be bought in convenience store and I’ve been eating one, once in a while, as an afternoon snack for a long day, but I rarely if not never boiled my eggs… I don’t know why… hard boiled eggs are super convenient: they keep easily, transport easily and are delicious… but the recipes now I love the most with hard boiled eggs is in a dressing for vegetables or pasta.
Chopped thinly, mixed with olive oil and mustard this a must to dress a potato salad for example. Or like in today’s recipe, with basil and olive oil, to dress some pasta and green beans. The variations are infinite as eggs accommodate well with so many things: parsley, basil, olive oil, mustard, mayonnaise, curry…
Count one egg for 2 servings, and have a good week!!!
