Scones forever!!!

There are so many things I love to eat and so few meals and time to eat them all, that I end up forgetting a few things I love. Last weekend I decided to catch up with these. So I prepared avocado rice bowls, quiche and scones. When it comes to scones I usually have in mind something for breakfast or tea-time, but this time, as we went surfing and then were busy fixing things in the house I only get to the kitchen around 18:30… and given the cold weather this weekend it was probably too late for bread. So I decided to prepare scones. And since it was almost time to think of aperitif snacks I went for two recipes.

Both use the same base. One is sweet with yuzu harvested in our garden, the other is savory with pancetta and shiitake. It is very simple and by simply changing the size or shape of the scones it can feel very differently.

Scones

– 180g of flour

– 50g of butter

– 1tsp of baking powder

– a pinch of salt

– milk (quantity will slightly vary depending on flour quality, temperature etc… but usually not more than 200ml)

In a bowl mix the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the butter cut in small pieces and start kneading. Add milk little by little until the texture is smooth but not sticky. Form a 5cm diameter stick and leave to rest for 30min.

For the yuzu scones:

– 1 yuzu

– 2tbs of brown sugar

– a handful of flour

Wash the yuzu and dice thinly the skin. Add to the dough. Extract the juice roughly and add to the dough. Add a bit of flower if the dough becomes too sticky. Roll 2cm thick, cut to desired shape and size and bake for 12-20min at 180 depending on shape and size.

For the shiitake and pancetta scones:

– 50g of pancetta

– 1 or 2 fresh shiitake

– 1 tsp of salt, pepper

Chop the pancetta, wash and chop the shiitake. In a small pan heated at medium- high heat add the pancetta, stir gently until the fat starts to melt, add the shiitake, and stir once in a while. Cook like this for 5min. Add the cooked pancetta and shiitake to the scone mix, add salt. In really needed add a bit of flour. Add ground pepper generously. Roll 2cm thick, cut to desired shape and size and bake at 180deg for 12-20min depending on size. Enjoy!!!

Actually you may want to add some grated fresh parmigiano in the mixas well…

December 4, 2019

SUP on the Isumi river

Three years ago we went to visit surfer friends in Chigasaki and took us paddle boarding on the ocean. It was great experience and I really enjoyed it. What I loved is that you can surf waves if any, otherwise you can just explore places and move around basically like on a canoe. Since then we’ve been thinking of buying a paddle board but given the space we have and the car we have, it has never been further then looking at a few websites… we then start looking for places where to paddle in Isumi and found the little SUP club and their initiative to clean the Isumi river. Once a month they organize a SUP cleaning cruise so we finally registered for the October one. Honestly, rivers in Japan are not looking too clean: I have serious concerns about the chemical quality of the water and I don’t think that there is an actual check and I would not swim in any except for mountain streams. I may be wrong, and hope I am. Nonetheless my target was not to fall in the water at all. The Isumi river is a beautiful winding river in a quite deep gorge sometimes with no real accessibility, so boat, canoe and paddle board are the only way to discover its surroundings and it’s really nice to have a different perspective. Just after the rain has stopped we gathered at the SUP club and we headed to the river bank all equipped. 7 people, 3 boards and a canoe. The trash along the river is just infinite and the cleaning we’ve done is a drop in the ocean. And they clean every month… cleaning properly would take forever and many more people… yet it was fun and interesting to join that event which I highly recommend and I think we will definitely go again. The people at the SUP club were really nice and it was a great fun.

After that we felt quite hungry and tired and skip our tennis practice for once, but we didn’t skip the 5 o’clock tea with a little reinvigorating snack: crepes. Crepes are the easiest and fastest snack to prepare and it is easy to make just a few. Here is my recipe.

Crepes (makes 4 25cm crepes)

– 70g of flour

– 1tbs of sugar

– 1 egg

– 1/3l to 1/2l of milk or whatever liquid you want (water works too)

– butter to grease the pan

– filling of your choice: chocolate, sugar, butter, jam, lemon juice, honey…

In a bowl mix the flour, sugar and egg, then add the milk little by little to obtain a rather liquid and smooth texture. If not enough liquid add a little more (this will depend on the size of the egg).

Heat the pan and grease it with butter. When hot pour a thin layer over the all pan. Cook at medium to high heat, flip once, add the filling and fold, serve and eat. Repeat.

October 21, 2018

Red miso – 赤味噌

When the weather gets warmer the delicious little cucumbers are back and they are the perfect food to snack while waiting for dinner. I usually just wash them and cut them in sticks, but when I want a little extra I like to prepare a miso paste. There are different types of miso of course and all of them with different taste and features: granulous vs smooth, white vs red etc… Depending on what they are made from and how long they have fermented. At the cha kaiseki class I learned that white miso is used in winter and red in summer, because red miso has fermented longer, it is stronger in taste and saltier, which accomodates perfectly with summer veggies and fishes. So for my little snack paste I use 1 tbsp of red miso that I stir with 1tsp of vegetal (neutral) oil and 1 or 2tsp of water (depending on the consitency you expect: sticky or creamy). I stir until homogenous and serve with my little cucumber sticks. It actually is also delicious with carrots sticks and daikon sticks!

May 13, 2016

Italian taralli

A few years ago I received this amazing book for my birthday. It is a real jewel to cook Italian with the very basic pasta and classic recipes in the first half and some more elaborated recipes presented by chefs and by regions, that utilize the classic ingredients of the first half. I like that book very much and it’s been of great help when preparing pasta, gnocchi but it is so thick that Even if I have tested and noted a few recipes there’s a lot more to do. And each time I open it I find a new recipe I want to try.

With all this rain I had the time to browse this massive book and test a few recipes. The first one is taralli from Puglia. It’s a simple recipe a bit like gressini but much simpler and really delicious.

To prepare 6 little taralli, which is a good number for 2 people snacks, I used 100g of flour, 25ml of water and 25ml of olive oil, and a bit of salt. Originally taralli seem to be flavored with fennel seeds, black pepper, olives… Since I had none of these I used caraway (carvi) seeds and that was working real well. I have the impression that just salt might be good too. So, in a bowl you mix all the ingredients well. Then wait about 30min.

Prepare a saucer with boiling water, and preheat your oven at 220deg. Roll the dough in a long and thin lace shape of about 1cm diameter. Cut the lace each 6cm and have the two extremities overlap to make like a ribbon shape. Lightly squeeze the overlapping to close the shape. Dip them in the boiling water form 1min. Dry them on a clothe, line them on a cooking paper sheet or on a oven dish greased with olive oil and bake until golden (15min~). It’s ready to eat, warm or cold.

July 6, 2015

Oat bran mini pancakes

Sometime it’s nice to have a drink and a few snacks to go with but no junk, no nuts nor cherry tomatoes…

As I mentioned the other day, I quite addicted to making pancakes and similars. It’s really super simple, it takes a few minutes and it is possible to create any variation. So today I made some salty oat bran mini pancakes to top it with whatever you have: here melted cheese and French pâté (not for me the pâté of course!!).

The base for the pancakes is made of plain flour, oat bran, baking powder, salt and water. I adjust the quantities of flour and water to obtain a not too smooth mixture so that when I bake it in the pan the shape won’t collapse and I don’t need circles.
And you, what kind of pancake addict are you?

February 4, 2015