Tag: broccoli

Over excited…

not about the fuss about this damn virus, nor about my duty as exam supervisor at the university entrance exams… but there are many things going on around me that have gotten me very excited recently. First, spring is coming and with it the new greens are on their way for sure. Then, it is time to start preparing seeds for the kitchen garden. The potatoes are on their way, sprouting, and I have started to prepare the kitchen garden soil. Now, I need to see what I will grow this year, with the lessons learnt last year: fennel, beat, peas, chick peas…

After a long pause in my sewing activities I am back at it, and discovered mistakes I made in my last yukata so now fixing them to have it ready for the warm days. I am thinking of sewing a obi myself this time, but right now with the stupid virus, I still prefer not to see my 89yo teacher.

Last year we started to use bamboo we cut with our neighbors, and I really loved it. This year A. has decided to take it to the next level. Equipped with a bamboo cutter, we are now making our own slats and then the possibilities have expended. We have started with a simple fence…

OK! All this may not be too exciting for most people but for me it is! Spending the day outside cutting, sawing, arranging the slats… was really fun and I can’t wait to do the other fences!!!

I got excited last night when after a few days if minimal cooking I finally decided to do something for our dinner: the spicy noodles soup I made for myself sometime ago and that A. hadn’t had a chance to try.

I replaced in the former recipe the coriander seeds by some fresh coriander as they start selling some at the farmers market and I made the noodles with 120g of flour for the two of us. And I had a bit of broccoli I wanted to use so I cut it in small bites. That was a big success and A. liked it as much as I did!

Oh… and there’s a final reason I am quite excited… it’s our forthcoming moving… more coming soon about that… but this is one of the thing on top of work that has kept me pretty busy!!! And now it’s getting real!

White miso for the winter

There exists miso for each season and if red miso is for the summer, white miso is the one for the winter. I learned that at my cha-kaiseki cuisine classes a few years ago. And in an attempt to make some vegan pie crust I was tempted to replace butter by the creamy white miso, with a little addition of vegetal oil. The color is unchanged since the miso has almost the color of butter. The kneading is very easy, the rolling too, though it is more like olive oil base pie crust, it breaks easily, but it is easy to repair too!! I was worried it would be salty but it wasn’t (opening to not only savory quiches, but sweet pies and tart too) and it bakes in a very crispy manner. So the vegan pie crust with miso was perfect. Something I will use again for sure as it is sometimes easier to find miso than butter in Japan and the taste of miso was very mild rather that of olive oil.

As for the filling I used leek, spinach and broccoli with tofu and eggs. I haven’t found something to replace the eggs in the quiche yet… If you have ideas, I’ll be happy to try…

Miso pie crust (for a 20cm, thin crust)

– 150g of flour

– 5tbs of white miso

– 1tbs of vegetal oil

– 1tbs of water

Mix all the ingredients together. Roll and bake or fill and bake… that’s it!!!

Plating

We say in French “les jours (les semaines, les annees…) se suivent mais ne se ressemblent pas”  (days (weeks, years…) follow each other but are never alike) and this is so very true these days for me! Not that I complain about it, but there is very little routine. One day it snows, the next is warm; one day I have intense discussions at work with many different experts, the next I spend in paperwork and administrative tasks; one day I spent writing and reading articles, the next listening to students presentations; one day I run errands and meetings in the city, the next I’m seated 12h in my office… and one day I’m in Tokyo, the next in Italy or in France… It’s a captivating work I do and I’m grateful for all it brings, even a short interview in a French peridocal! But honestly this is not making me better at plating, this is a constant observation. Regardless how my recipes are yummy-easy-healthy. The problem is that I seriously don’t know how to improve it. When I look at my IG feed I feel sorry but I use only my best shots… but when I look at my picture album, I see all these delicious tests I made that I will never dare sharing… For example this amazing plate I made with wild hijiki, grilled swordfish, tomato and caper sauce… deliciously half indeed but the pictures are so bad: lighting, plate, plating… all wrong… Or this broccoli and fukinoto bulgur dish (this one is borderline so I decided to share it… but honestly I hesitated a lot before showing it… but fukinoto are seasonal and the season is right now, and the mix with the broccoli was really great… so at some point I wanted to share it.. because there are so many ways to eat local and seasonal staples that change from the traditional ones. For example fukinoto is mainly eaten in tempura, in miso soup or pickled in miso… but in kind of risotto like this recipe it is also really great! You’ll find the recipe below. And if you have plating advices for daily life food, pleeeeaaaaase let me know!!

Bulgur risotto with fukinoto  (for 2 people)

– 100g of bulgur (I use fine one for it cooks slightly faster) 

– 8 fukinoto of medium size. If they are large 4 or 6 is enough

– a piece of broccoli

– water

– olive oil, salt and pepper  

In a pan grease with olive oil and heated pour the bulgur, start cooking at high heat while stirring for 2 min. Lower the heat, cover the bulgur with water and add about 50% more in volume than the bulgur. Wash the broccoli, the fukinoto. Cut them (if the fukinoto are small don’t cut them). When the water in the bulgur as decreased and is no longer visible add the broccoli and cover, 2min later add the fukinoto and cover for 3 more minutes. Add salt, pepper, olive oil and stir before serving.

Quick pasta!

What’s worst than being super hungry at past 23:00 after a busy day at work? At the moment the business from work goes down and I’m on my way home, my stomach is crying for something to eat, quick!!!! And A. is in a no different mood! In that case dry pasta are a great help. Boiling them while preparing something to eat them with takes not much than 15min, that’s one of the fastest and simplest meal I can cook! Of course, I always have some fresh vegetables in the fridge, whether it’s mushrooms, spinach, squash in winter, or zucchini, tomatoes, eggplants in summer…

For this time I had broccoli and spinach. Perfectly simple, green and tasty! And I have a beautiful piece of Parmigiano Reggiano that I bought in Rome, to make the final touch. 

Broccoli and spinach pasta (for 2): 

– 125g of dry pasta of your choice

– a large handful of broccoli  

– 1 bundle of spinach

– olive oil

– salt and pepper 

Boil the water for the pasta, in the meantime wash the spinach and broccoli and chop them. In an olive oil greased pan start cooking them, add just a bit of water and cover. By then the pasta should be boiled, drain them and add them to the vegetables, add some more olive oil, salt and pepper, stir and serve. Top if you like with gratted Parmigiano. Serve and eat immediately!!!

Be careful not to overcook the veggies, the broccoli must stay slightly crispy. 

Shopping spree!

With our new work schedule, we finish work quite late on Friday evening and leaving for the country at 23:00, in the cold evening, empty stomachs and drained from the week is not too tempting, so we prefer to wake early on Saturday morning and leave quickly. In the winter fewer people go surfing and golfing that early so it’s not jammed. It is great to drive by day to enjoy the scenery, and we also can stop on the way at local shops we usually don’t go too often. Saturday we stopped at Wakuwaku in Otaki, a shop selling a lot of local products and fresh veggies and fruits, as well as some fish and local pork. Actually we haven’t been for the whole summer, and since we last went they had a total refurbishment and new branding with more organic products too. And it was just crazy! On top of the regular fresh fruits and vegetables I regularly buy, I also bought different types of miso, dry fish, block ham, sausages and locally made rice pasta. They also had tones of preparations such as small fish or shrimp cooked in soya sauce, with walnuts… pickles, tofu… and they had a lottery where I won an other bag full of dried sweet potatoes, rice crackers…

The thing I was the most tempted to try right away was the rice pasta from Isumi. I decided to cook them in a wok of vegetables, with chrysanthemum and sausages. So I boiled and drained the pasta, and kept in cold water. In a wok slightly greased I added 4 little sausages chopped, one red carrot cut in rectangles, a handful of brocoli, a handful of cherry tomatoes, and the petals of two yellow chrysanthemum flowers. Once the sausage were ready, I added one table spoon of soya sauce, then added the drained pasta and stirred well. Served immediately with an other chrysanthemum flower for decor. Simple and delicious!

Have a great week! 

Miso-lemon dressing

Recently it has been quite difficult to find gnocchi in our usual grocery stores, and gnocchi were our staples for late Friday dinners when we arrived in the country. So I have had to find a replacement. Today I tried soba (buckwheat noodles) that I prepared with plenty of greens and I decided to serve them not with some regular sauce made from soya sauce such as tsuyu, but rather a white miso base. And since I had some fresh lemon I also used it. The redult was even better than I expected. The sweet white miso and the lemon are a super match. The lemon taste is very present, cancelling the sweetness of the miso and the miso softening the bitterness of the lemon. So here is my recipe for 2 people.

– 200g of soba noodles, I use 100% buckwheat flour noodles

– 4 tsp of white miso

– 1/4 of lemon  

– 1 tsp of soya sauce

– brocoli, brocoli sprouts, green beans, baby spinach… asparagus, green peas, horse beans… are all good too

Boil a large amount of water to cook the soba. In the meantime in a heated pan slightly oiled cook the washed vegetables. The much remsin crispy, so don’t over cook them. In a bowl mix together the miso, the lemon juice, the soya sauce.  Serve ghe noodles in a large bowl, add the miso dressing and stir well, add the vegetables. Eat right away and have a beautiful weekend. Isumi is under the rain, and work for the museum exhibition is what I have to do today!

One-plate lunch from the country

I love to prepare one-plate for lunch, in particular when we have friends visiting. It is easy to prepare and to serveat anytime because the vegetables can be cooked very quickly and the rice, the meat etc… can be kept warm or re-heated very easily. So when the time comes to eat I just need a few minutes to prepare the plates. So simple with some seasonal vegetables grilled and deglazed in soya sauce, a piece of pork filet for the meat eaters, rice, and of course some umeboshi, some pickled Chinese cabbage…

Spring veggies quiche

Too happy with last week Japanese style quiche I’ve continued for our guests this week with a spring version. I’ve made the dough with buckwheat flour which makes it really crispy and for the veggies I used new onion, broad beans, snap peas and broccoli.

3 types of cabbage tart

At the local farmers market the other day I found beautiful cauliflower, romanesco and broccoli. Having all them together I couldn’t help but cook something mixing it. I love the idea of having ingredients close in shape but different in taste and color, and the first idea that I had was to make a tart with a piece of each. And becauseI really love the idea of mixing Japanese flavors with western ones I decided to add in the base some katsuobushi flakes. For the dough, I opted for a classic sable dough. A perfect balance.

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