Improvised dinner

Having always a fridge ready with fresh veggies is just perfect when you want to prepare an improvised dinner for a friend stopping by. I had in mind two menus after checking its contents, a vegan-mexican or a Japanese one-plate dinner. Vote has decided for Japanese and so it was a simple rice with katsuobushi and veggies in soya sauce. For the veggies I used what I had in the fridge: carrots, turnips, potato, purple sweet potato and broccoli (they had this massive-beautiful-just cut broccoli the other yesterday at the local farmers place near the university that I couldn’t resist). I wash and cut them (recently I seem to like sticks over slices). I first cook at high heat in a bit of olive oil, then I add a bit of soya sauce and water and cook under cover until the potato is cooked. The rice is just plain white rice to which I add katsuobushi thin flakes after cooking.

Macrobiotic Sunday lunch

Beautiful weather this Sunday morning, so we woke early and spend most of the morning in the garden cleaning and grooming shrubs, by the time we were hungry it was cloudy and chilly, so I decided to cook us a warm lunch and got once again inspiration from my macrobiotic recipe book. It’s a simple collection of veggies and koyadofu that are first cooked in water and soya sauce, then lightly fried and serve with rice.

In my version for 2, it is 2 pieces of koyadofu, 1 carrot, 1 purple sweet potato, 1 shiitake, and the rice is brown rice to which I added red rice, black rice and barley. I cut the veggies in four and boiled them for 7min in one cup of water where I added 1 table spoon of soya sauce, I also cook the koyadofu with the veggies. Then I removed them from the water and let them rest on kitchen paper to drain the excess of water. Then I roll them in rice flour and lightly fry them, and serve them directly with the rice.

Macrobiotic dry curry

As I was mentioning earlier, we found close to our home in Ohara, a macrobiotic local kind of small community where they have a cafe and a tiny shop. We had lunch there and it was delicious, and after we went to check out the little shop and I found this book: “whole rice & veggies on plate meals”, which was written by people from the community, and which presents seasonal recipes all gegan and somehow macrobiotic, or what they call “soft macrobi”. Perfect for me who enjoy the vegan food but don’t becessarily adhere to macrobiotics: I hate imposed rules in particular when it comes to food. I have my own, I like them and I think they suit me well. Well, this book is a treasure trive of midern Japanese recipes and I really enjoy looking at all the recipes and in particular the ones using ingredients I seldom use or buy. Coincidently, some time ago, a friend traveling to Koya brang us back some Koyadofu, a kind if dry tofu that can be rehydrated and used in several preparations. So I jumped on the occasion to prepare the first recipe I found with Koyadofu: vegetables dry curry. Dry curry mesns that there is no thick sauce like in regular Japanese curry.

The recipe is awfully simple, I had most of the ingredients but not all, so I replaced them and interpreted my way. For 2 You need 2 blocks of Koyadofu, 1 green pepper, 1 potato, 1/2 onion (I used a red onion), 1 tomato, curry powder, carvi seeds, cinnamon powder, salt, pepper, 1 tbs of miso, 1 tbs of apricot jam (I used kaki jam), a bit of soya sauce and s bit of oil. First cut all the veggies in 5mm cubes, the tomato can be cut in large chuncks. Rehydrate the tofu in hot water, drain roughly. In a pan with oil, cook atlow  heat the veggies, but the tomato, add the carvi seeds and the curry powder, the cinnamon. In a mixer, mix the tofu, the jam, the miso, salt pepper, soya sauce. Add the mixture to the veggies, cook until almost dry. Serve with rice. I serve with a mixture I made of whole rice, black rice, red rice, barley and white rice. Super delicious, but not very picturesque I reckon!!!!

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