Dinner fix

Anytime I go to my pilates class I come back late and starving, so I need to fix us a dinner super quickly, and doesn’t require to much attendance to have time to do all I have to in the mean time. Psta are great for that: once they’re in the boiling water you are free for 10min. And before the water was boiling it gives enough time to prepare the veggies for the side. Recently I found that spinach and shiitake go very well along and I like to serve them with pasta, eggs…  The spinach are simply boiled or steamed, the shiitake grilled with a bit of oil (here served with pasta so olive oil). Then I just serve, add olive oil, pepper and ready to eat!!!!! 

Brioches

With the temperature increasing slightly it’s becoming much easier for me to make breads. Normal people living in normal houses don’t have this kind of problem of course, but if your house is a Japanese traditional old house made roughthly of paper, that matters! Now I can knead and I know the result is gonna be nice, so it was high time for a brioche. Usually I cook them in a rectangular pie dish, but this time I wanted them round and golden all over, so I made them smaller and round.

kneading brioche requires a bit more time than bread and your hands get really nasty, but it’s too delicious!!! So for 6 of these beauties, you need, 250g of hard white flour; 40g of brown caster sugar; 6g of salt; 10g of sourdough; 7g of yeast;  3eggs; 120g of butter at room temperature; vanilla. Mix all the dry ingredients, add the eggs and finish with the butter. Knead until smooth and soft. It can take more than 30min. Then keep in a warm place until it has taken a bit of volume (it does not double or whatsoever). Then keep refrigirated for about an hour. On cooking paper, cut in 6, and shape the brioches the way you want; wait an extra 2h; you can then use an egg yolk for a golden finish, and bake at 170 for 25min.

One-plate salad

This morning the farmers market showed me once again that it is not clear which season we’re in!!! The transition seems to take an unusually long time and daikon and cabbages were lined together with strawberries and new wasabi leaves. It gave me the idea to prepare us a warm/cold salad with warm green lentils from France and thick fried tofu, fresh tomatoes and wasabi leaves, with an olive oil and soya sauce dressing and finished with a few sesame seeds!

Little breads for breakfast

There is nothing as such as a good breakfast, prepared just in time and served just when it’s done. In particular, I can’t help but love bread that is just out from the oven, with a good cup of a hot drink and a fresh fruit (from the garden any time it’s possible). It makes the perfect start. Of course baking requires a bit of organization and time but in the end it’s not so difficult and incomparable with anything else you can buy the day before!

As you may have noticed I bske pretty much anything. Even if I am not master in making croissants yet and naad to work on that, I start to be pretty confident on making rye and whole wheat breads. So here is an other variation of the basic recipe, where I mixed 250g of flour: half rye and half whole wheat flours, 120g of water, 14g of sourdough, 3g of yeast, 6g of salt, knead until soft and smooth, then added dry raisins and chocolate chips in part of the dough only. Waited until it has almost doubled, then shaped it and leave all night in a cool place. Before going to bed I scedule a delayed start of the oven so that In the morning I just have to bake them for 10-12min and breakfast is ready!!! Have a nice weekend!

Plum jelly – 梅羊羹

It is extremely rare I cook something sweet for dessert, or I cook dessert at all. Unless we have guests for dinner our meals end sometimes with a fruit, sometimes a yogurt but most often with just a little piece of chocolate. In the trading with our neighbor, fruits from our garden in exchange whatever she has, the other day she gave some plum jam and she told me: “you know, it’s sour, but it’s really good in plum jelly!”. OK then, let’s make some plum jelly (梅羊羹-ume youkan)… Well it’s really simple and it works also with any jam you like (I trued also with my natsumikan jam). You need only a flat recipient, some jam, 1/2L of water and a little bag of agar-agar or 寒天-kanten. Boil the water in a pan, add the jam, then the kanten, stir well while still heating for a few minutes. Set in the flat recipient  and wait for the liquid to cool down, then refregirate. Before serving cut in pieces of the shape you fancy.

Winter → Spring risotto

Warm days with sometimes cold wind and chilly evenings follow each other, the end of the winter veggies overlaps with the beginning of spring veggies so my cooking is largely influenced by the envy of spring food, but the warmth of winter food. So I came up with new vegan risotto recipe with winter red cabbage and spring new onions. The new onions are just starting and are perfect just slightly rolled in olive oil and heated slowly. For the risotto a veggies consomme add the perfect juice and taste. Then just add the onions cooked and the red cabbage and cook 2 minutes under cover before serving while still hot, and add some freshly grated Parmegiano for those who like.

Na no hana quiche – 菜の花キッシュ

With some ricotta I wanted to finish and some na no hana that are just in season I was thinking about making some kind of pasta but finally I suddenly changed my mind and went for a tart. Indeed recently I have made so many ravioli but so little tart that it was time for a change. So I made a simple dough with buckwheat flour, then I prepared a base with egg, soya milk and ricotta cheese, and lay it on the dough, and finally added raw, just washed, na no hana on top, and cooked until just golden.

Croquettes and bonito

I really love cereals and grains but I don’t cook some often enough because usually their cooking is too long for my short cooking time and it’s often difficult for me to plan long ahead. So when I have time to, I can try some new ideas and recipes. Inspired by a picture in one of my cookbooks I wanted to test some vegan croquettes and to do it with quinoa and millet. For the veggies I used in season veggies: carrots and topinamburs. And because the bonito is still in season I seeved it with grilled bonito that was simply rolledin curry powder before, and a few radishes for the color and freshness.

So for the croquettes here’s what I did: first I boiled some millet, then some quinoa. I mixed both. I then boiled topinamburs chopped thinly, and I also chopped thinly a few little carrots (that I didn’t boil). I put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix. Their shouldn’t be too much moisture in the mixture. If it’s the case add some flour I used rice flour). Add salt and pepper. In a greased and heated frypan make little balls of the mixture and flatten then to obtain little galettes. Cook until golden. Can be eaten with just a salad too, or dip in a curry-yogurt dressing…

Marmalade and muffins

The other day seeing the natsumikan trees plowing under the weight of their fruits I decided we needed to harvest them. Our garden is an intricate mess of trees and access to all the fruits was not possible, hopefully the birds will eat some (though with the thick skin it’s not one of the birds favorite). Yet we managed to harvest about 100 fruits!!! This year has been incredible for harvesting fruits: plum, ginko nuts, tangerines, and now natsumikan. They are also super delicious. Usually they be quite sour but this year it’s pure sweetness!!! Yet, it’s too much for just for us. So I’ve given away 2/3 of the fruits, made marmalade with half of the remaining fruits, and kept the rest for eating raw. For the marmalade I used the seeds of an apple to gelify and it worked super well. And since we have now delicious marmalade to eat, We just needed something to spread it on, so this morning I made English muffins. So simple and so delicious!!!

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