Chilly!

Autumn weather is finally coming to Tokyo, which means some beautiful weather mainly and also some rain when there is a typhoon. The temperature is also changing a lot and tonight is quite chilly and rainy, so a warm dinner was naturally my only option. This is the season for delicious Hokkaido autumn salmon 秋鮭, when the fishes come back to their original rivers. They sell it in quite large filet pieces, so I usually use it for two or three different recipes. This time I decided to prepare it in a kind of soup, very likely inspired by my nordic cooking book but with common Japanese ingredients.

Autumn salmon soup 

 – a piece of fresh autumn salmon

– 1/2 sweet potato  

– a large handful of mulukhiyah  – salt and pepper. 

First grill the salmon, in the pan in which you want to make the soup, on both sides. Then remove the skin and cut in pieces and pit back in the pan. Actually rather than cutting I simply used a spoon and broke the salmon. Cut the sweet potato in dice and in a pan. Add salt and pepper. Start cooking while stirring. Add 1/2L pf water. Cook under cover until the sweet potato is soft. Add the washed and cut mulukhiyah. Cook a few more minutes. Serve while hot.

Some kinds of pizza

I can’t realize that we are moving in 10 days. It’s seems so far away and so close at the same time, there is so much at work at the same time that it is hard to realize. I’m quite excited because I will have a new kitchen to play with and a bigger oven in Tokyo than my mini one. At the same time I will bring my mini oven to work, which means that I could cook more at work!!! Speaking of ovens, recently I’ve been making things that look like pizze but are not trully ones. May be I was inspired by the macrobiotic aburage (fried tofu) pizza I saw on IG by @rikako.salon_de_r. Once I made the base crust was a pie crust with whole wheat flour, topped with tomatoes, eggplants and red bell peppers, rosemary and olive oil (bottom picture). The second time I made a fougasse or focaccia preparation then topped it with blanched spinaches, cherry tomatoes and for those who like, fresh mozzarella from Isumi (top pictures).

These are perfect for still hot sunny days of September, using the last of the summer vegetables, good eaten just out of the oven or cold. 

Brown rice

When we are in Isumi I like to go to Rice Terrace restaurant for a macrobiotic lunch outdoor, but I don’t like to go when it rains because the whole place is designed to enjoy being outside and there are usually too many families and it can become very noisy. Luckily we found an other macrobiotic cafe, opened not far away, by a young guy that use to work at Rice Terrace. His cafe is a small simple and usually quiet place and he makes a wonderful colorful soup curry that I love when it rains. What I love with Japanese macrobiotic cooking is the brown rice, the herbs and spices on top of the fresh seasonal ingredients (that I cook all the time). I try sometimes to cook macrobiotic at home: ie. replace the white rice or pasta… by brown rice, and add a few more spices and herbs. This time I made a leftover preparation with the vegetables that were left on the fridge: spinach, ripe tomato, sweet potato. I just added some anis seeds and cooked everything in a pan with a very little bit of oil. Added to the cooked brown rice, that’s it… my version of macrobiotic super simple meal!!!

Red quinoa

I’m on a mission to finish every single pack of rice, pasta, cereals and legumes that is opened and sitting on a shelf or in the fridge half empty. Yes! I keep pretty much everything in the fridge: flour, cereals, rice… to keep them longer (it prevents damages from high humidity and high temperatures in the summer, and low temperatures in the winter) and it allows to avoid pests since they are all organic or natural products and I am tired of food with bugs (more generally in the food that I buy in France…). I’m trying to empty my shelves as much as possible before we move to our new apartment in Tokyo, and same in the country house, just to clean my cupborads and fridge.

So I had a half pack of red quinoa to use. One thing I love to do with quinoa is some kind of croquettes. I cook the quinoa and then mix it with 2 eggs, some chopped vegetables: spinach, bell pepper, zucchini… and whatever else. This time it was some yellow bell pepper and a piece of Hokkaido salmon that was leftover from the previous day. I added some curry powder and some nutmeg, salt and pepper and cooked on both side in a greased frypan until crispy. I served them with some blanched okra, but any green is great. A light yogurt sauce with herbs can also be great.

And I was still having some extra quinoa, so for the next meal I prepared a vegan soup. Simply quinoa, sweet potato, butternut squash and shiitake, and again a bit of curry powder.  Finished with two shishito.

Chestnut rice – 栗ご飯

We are lucky to have a chestnut tree in the garden, but for the past 5 years I never managed to harvest any chestnut because it was too late once they’ve fallen and bugs git them, they were falling to early with typhoons… This year I miraculously managed to harvest about half a dozen of beautiful ones. Nothing much, but enough to make a classic Japanese recipe: chestnut rice. It os a simple autumn delight and it is very easy to prepare. First boil the chestnut for about 30min to 45min. Then peel them completely. In a pan, or a rice cooker, wash the desired quantity of rice (I usually cook 1cup for 2), add 3 boiled and peeled chestnut per serving. You can keep them entire or break them in smaller pieces. Cook the rice as usual. Once cooked stir and add a bit of salt. That’s it!

Baking bread

I haven’t posted any bread recipe recently but that doesn’t mean I haven’t baked any! I have baked a lit of fougasses this summer for our visiting friends. Of course for breakfast I have cooked more pancakes than ever, but bread is still one of my favorite. All warm, just out of the oven, the smells that mixes with A. freshly ground coffee is that of perfect Sunday mornings. After almost 3 years of making bread regularly now I rarely use my recipe book anymore, unless I am doing something fancy, and I just mix my various flours and seeds… in different combinations that all end up being perfectly delicious. Recently I bought a lot of organic whole wheat flour and some local spelt, buckwheat… flours so I’m enjoying making some mixes, to obtain a rich dark bread that suits very well jam, honey, butter, cheese and ham. Adding seeds: flax, sunflower, pumpkin, sesame; nuts or bran: oat or wheat add a lot of texture to the bread and is also very nice. This time I made a very simple 80% whole wheat-20% spelt and it was really delicious. For the rest of the recipe details please check that post, or look for “bread” in the search tool. You can also click on “bread” in the list of tags just below.

Butternut squash…

Since last autumn there has been a lot of butternut squash on the shelves at the farmers market, really a lot! I love to cook it because the taste is more subtle than that of kabocha. So since we came back from the summer holidays I have cooked plenty: in lasagna, in cold soup, in risotto, there is also ravioli… Since the summer seems to be completely finished: no very hot days anymore and the nights are almost chilly, it is a perfect ingredient to make the transition to autumn cooking. Last night I prepared it in a new variation. Instead of steaming it I cut it and cooked it in a bit of butter in frypan with fresh sage from the garden. I used it to accomodate some simple tagliatelle. Of course you can replace butter by olive oil, but sometimes it feels like cooking with butter. Add some fresh sage of top and some black pepper.

I wish you a happy September and a great week!

Soba salad

I’ve been so busy at work running from one place to an other and with some tension when our robot was making its debut on stage, and with the moving that I barely cooked and even barely thought about writing a post to share with you a delicious recipe. .. for which I must apologize!

But as little as I cooked I still found some very nice combinations for a simple Japanese meal that can be prepared everywhere else than Japan since the ingredients are easy to find. What you need is a pack of dry soba noodles (I use only 100% buckwheat flour noodles, but it’s up to you), some green beans, a few fresh okras, some spinaches or mulukhiyah, a piece of fresh cod fish, soya sauce, 1 kabosu or 1 lime. That’s it! Blanche the spinach, the okra, the green beans and bath them in very cold water. Grill the cod in a slightly greased frypan. Boil the soba and bath them in cold water. Squeeze the kabosu or lime, add the same volume of soya sauce. In a bowl add the soba well drained, dry with a cooking cloth the vegetables, cut them and add to the soba. Top with the cod that should crumble. Finish with some dressing. Enjoy! 

Tofu cheese cake

About 10 years ago, my parents came to spend some time with us and my mother absolutely wanted to cook some Japanese dessert. I didn’t have much Japanese cooking books that were not in Japanese, so the best I could offer was this book I already introduced some time ago. 

There are very few recipes of desserts but one that pleased everyone: tofu cheese cake. Of course we didn’t really follow the recipe, and add different flavoring. But the basic recipe was simple and the result never disappointing. Last night I was looking for a dessert recipe, and when I saw some tofu in the fridge, I remembered that recipe and decided to try it again. And this time was not different. A simple tasty and healthy dessert!!! 

Tofu cheese cake (for 4-6 people)

– one block of tofu drained, recipe said momendofu (hard), but I used kinudofu (silky tofu)

– 5tbs of flour or cornstarch

 – 3 eggs

– 6tbs of sugar

– flavoring: vanilla, lemon juice, lemon zest or macha or spices of your choice (I tried with cardamom) 

 Preheat the oven to 180deg. In a bowl, mix the tofu with the flour, the egg yolks, and 3tbs of sugar, the flavoring. In an other bowl beat the whites until stiff and the sugar and continue beating until silky. Add this mix to the previous one delicately.

Line a pie dish or an oven dish with cooking paper, and then pour the preparation in. Cook in the oven about 30min or until golden.

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