Garlic Chive Dumpling ニラ頭饅 or 韮菜万頭

We used to grow garlic chives or “nira” ニラ in our herb garden but it failed in two ways: 1) the garlic chives were very fibrous except when we harvested them very young and 2) they grew like weeds taking over the entire herb garden. The plant had deep roots that were very hard to extract. It was quite a lot of work to get rid of it and we are not completely successful even now. (Digression alert: Some years ago we hired a gardener to do the spring clean up which included the herb garden. When he found out the herb garden contained garlic chives he specified the clean up would include everything EXCEPT the garlic chives.) Although we did make quite a few garlic chive dishes, we gave up growing our own. We have been shying away from even buying garlic chive for a while (besides it is not readily available). Since Weee almost always carries garlic chives, we tried them. They came in quite a large bundle (about 1 lb). We tried it in several dishes and, even though they were fully grown, the garlic chive were not fibrous at all.  We added garlic chives to our stir-fried dishes, soup and as a “ohitashi” ニラのお浸し. We still had some garlic chives left so I started looking for new recipes to use them. I came across a recipe by Koh Kentetsu on YouTube.  I was not familiar with this dish. I am not sure if this is based on a known Chinese dish or invented in Japan but it is apparently very popular. 

A quick internet search indicated that “nira-manju” or “garlic chive dumpling” was “invented” in a Chinese restaurant called “Niramanju Fussa” or “韮菜万頭福生” near the Yokota American military base 横田米軍基地. In any case, I have not tasted or seen the “original”. I made this based on the Koh Kentetsu recipe but I ended up making some changes (in the seasonings, not intentionally. Since I made this dish from memory after I saw the YouTube video). This is in the similar ilk as gyoza 餃子 and shumai  焼売 but maybe even better. We really like the garlic chive flavor and cripsy skin (picture #1). It re-heated nicely in the toaster oven. Since I seasoned the filling adequately, we did not use dipping sauce.

The innovations of his recipe is to use two sheets of store-bought wonton skin to encase the filling and the instructions of how to encase the filling very easily for a home cook. It was cooked exactly like gyoza producing a nice crispy skin on both sides (picture #2) and juicy inside.

Ingredients: (made 10 good-sized dumplings, see picture #2)
1/2 lb ground pork
1/4 lb garlic chive, finely chopped (about 1/5 in)
6-7 medium shrimp, thawed, and minced (optional)
1/2 tsp minced/graded ginger (original recipe used only ginger juice)
1/2 tsp minced/grated garlic (optional,  original recipe does not use this. My wife felt this added too much garlicky flavor)
1 large cap of fresh shiitake mushroom, finely chopped

Seasnings:
1 tsp Shao Xing wine
1 tsp oyster sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp dark sesame oil

20 Wonton skins

Directions:
Add the meat, shrimp, garlic, ginger and seasonings in a bowl and mix well
Add the mushroom and garlic chives and further mix and cover. Let it stand in the refrigerator for a few hours
Using a medium sized ice cream scoop, make balls of the filling and place them on a rimmed baking sheet.
Place the wonton skin on top of the filling balls (I moistened all the edges to make sure it would stick)
Using all five fingers, press down on the edge and turn several times until the sides of the wonton skin adhere to the filling. Then flip it over (picture #3). (If you just steam this, you are making “garlic chive shumai” ニラシュウマイ).

Place the second set of wonton skin on top (I also moistened the outer edges). Using the same process, turn and totally encase the filling to make sure all sides are attached to the filling and each other
Press gently to make a disk (picture #4)

(I covered the dumplings with a plastic wrap and refrigerated 1-2 hours before cooking but this is not needed. I just wanted to have all the dumpling assembled before cooking them in the evening.)
Using a 12 inch non-stick frying pan, I added the vegetable oil with a splash of sesame oil on medium flame and browned one side (2-3 minutes) and turned it over to brown the other side for another 2-3 minutes (picture #2)
Add a small amount of water (about 1/4 cup). Cover with a tight fitting lid to steam for 2-3 minutes or until the steam stops coming out.
Remove the lid and let the moisture evaporate. Keep browning the bottom and the other side with the addition of a small amount of sesame oil toward the end of cooking.

This is a really nice dish and easier to make compared to gyoza (because you do not have to clip the edges). A good amount of garlic chive adds a nice flavor (my addition of garlic was a bit too much for my wife, I will omit it next time). This is a perfect small dish with drinks.

Shrimp Shumai 海老焼売

This is my third attempt at making “shumai” 焼売 dumplings.  In the previous 2 attempts the dumplings fell apart when I cooked them and I ended up with cooked ground meat and separated dumpling skins which served almost as pasta. This time, everything worked. The dumplings held together and I made some decent shumais. I made this for a lunch and served them with pickled daikon, cucumber, blanched sugar snaps, braised burdock root きんぴらゴボウ (kinpira), pumpkin salad (curry flavored) and braised eggplant in miso sauce. I served the shumais with Japanese hot mustard and a mixture of rice vinegar and soy sauce (picture #1). The wonton skin stayed with the filling. The filling was the combination of shrimp and chicken with minced onion and garlic chive which worked well.

The shumais are rather large and cutting them in half made it easier to eat (picture #2). I left some shrimp in large pieces (they can be seen in the cut surface toward the top.

Ingredients: (made 20 shumais)
Shrimp about 100g, thawed and hand chopped making a mixture of finely chopped and small chunks
Ground chicken 150g (this was breast meat)
1 Onion, small. finely chopped
4-5 stalks of garlic chives, finely chopped (optional)
20 Wonton skins

Seasonings:
2 tsp potato starch
2 tsp oyster sauce
2 tbs Shaoxing wine (optional)
2 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1/4 tsp grated ginger

Directions:
Mix all the ingredients for filling (except the wonton skin) and the seasonings in a bowl, mix well.

I tried three different ways to assemble shumai:
1. Place the skin on your palm and spread the filling using a silicon spatula  leaving only the rims of the skin. Inverse it on the tip of the spatula and squeeze to foam shumai.
2. place the balls of filling on the cutting board and place the skin on the top. Using five fingers, squeeze the skin around the ball of the filling and pick it up and form shumai, and
3. Place the skin on your palm and spread water using a finger and then place the ball of filling. Squeeze to make shumai. 

For all three methods, make sure the bottom is flattened and the tip of the shumai is squeezed to make it narrower than the bottom (#1 and #2 in the composite picture). This time, all three methods worked and the skin did not separate from the filling. I am not sure why this was. In any case, place the shumai in the steamer basket and steam for 10 minutes (#3 and #4 in the composite picture).

This was a success! The addition of shrimp (combination of finely chopped and small chunks worked well adding taste, and texture).  I added garlic chives since I had some fresh ones from Weee. They did not add much flavor but added nice green specks (picture #2). I served this with Japanese hot mustard and a mixture of rice vinegar and soy sauce (picture #1).

Happy New Year 2024 明けましておめでとう2024

Like the last year, we put the New Year’s decoration including “Kagami-mochi” 鏡餅 and dragon or “tatsu 辰” zodiac figurines shown in the picture #1 in the room we spend most of our time rather than in the tokonoma 床間 in the “tea-room”.  Upon waking New Year’s day, we learned of the magnitude 7.6 earthquake that hit Ishikwa prefecture 石川県. We hope for the wellbeing of the people affected.

On New Year’s eve, we started the evening with a plate of assorted sashimi, most of the sashimi came from “Riviera Seafood Club”, our most recent favorite source of “home freezer” sashimi or sashimi that we can store in the freezer here at home and thaw at any time we want sashimi. Since the portions are smaller than sashimi we can get from other sources, we can eat more than one kind of sashimi at a time. On the New Year’s plate (picture #2) we had chutoro tuna 中トロ, hamachi はまち, scollop ホタテ, and octopus leg タコの足 (which was from D’artagnan). I added wasabi with chopped wasabi plant stalk (from tube) and yuzu kocho 柚子胡椒 (from tube).

On New Year’s day, we had only coffee (cafe latte and macchiato with a bit of steamed cream) rather than our usual breakfast so we wouldn’t be too full for the large lunch we planned of “Ozhoni” お雑煮 New Year’s soup. As usual, I served the soup in real lacquer ware bowls (gift from my mother many many years ago) with a side of some New Year’s dishes I made (picture #3).

This year, I precooked all the vegetables and proteins that went into the soup. This included “gobo” burdock root 牛蒡, shiitake 椎茸, shimeji しめじ and wood ear 木耳 mushrooms, carrot 人参, daikon 大根, and “kinu-saya” 絹さや snow peas. The protein included sous vide chicken breast (a few slices) and poached shrimp. As usual, I encased the “mochi” 餅 rice cake in “abra-age” 油揚 deep fried tofu pouch (peaking out of the bottom right of the soup bowl). I made the broth from the dashi packs I usually use as well as by poaching the shrimp in the dashi broth. I seasoned it with x4 concentrated Japanese noodle sauce. By precooking the vegetables and the proteins, I had better control over cooking everything just right. It also made it possible for me to make a better arrangement of the ingredients in the final soup bowl serving. Just before serving, I added frozen yuzu zest which added a nice yuzu 柚子 citrus favor (picture #4).

The side dishes (picture #5) included the usual New Year’s dishes I like to make including: salmon kelp roll 酒の昆布巻き, salmon “Russian” marinade 鮭のロシア漬 garnished with “ikura” イクラsalmon roe, daikon namasu  大根なますand poached shrimp.

We also had a few small glasses of  sake with this as a libation to the New Year. Now, this evening we will be hitting the Sushi Taro Osechi box すし太郎お節箱. The below is a preview (pictures #6 and 7).

We expect some good New Year’s feast to come with the osechi box. Already salivating!!

Quail egg fry and Scotch eggs うずらの卵の串揚げとスコッチエッグ

We started using quail eggs ウズラの卵 from fresh eggs that we boil rather than using canned ones since the quality is much better. We can get fresh quail eggs from three sources; Weee on-line Asian grocery delivery service, our local Japanese grocery store (not always) and Whole Foods. Fresh quail eggs have their own problems, however. 1. It is difficult to judge if any eggs are cracked unless it is leaking the white or otherwise quite obviously damaged, 2. while boiling some quail eggs develop the cracks and 3. It is not easy to peel the shell without taking off some of the white. So the yield is 70-80% on good days. In any case, we got a dozen eggs and ended up with 10 boiled quail eggs (that is 83%!). I made mini Scotch eggs with the quail eggs and ground chicken. I also made “fried boiled eggs” (i.e. boiled quail eggs that are breaded and then deep fried). As a starter for one evening, I served half a Scotch egg, fried boiled quail eggs, fried shrimp heads from our Tako Grill take out and marinated or “zuke” tuna and hamachi sashimi. As a vegetable, I served “asazuke” 浅漬け of cucumber, nappa, daikon and carrot. I initially served with green tea salt and wedge of lemon. My wife requested “Tonkastu-sauce” as well.

I skewered two fried quail eggs with a tooth picks (shown under the shrimp head) emulating “Kushi-age” 串揚げ, Japanese breaded fried items on skewer, which is a classic Izakaya item.

How to prepare boiled quail eggs:
Add quail eggs to a pan of cold water on medium flame, as the water gets warmer, gently start stirring the water which helps to center the egg yolks. Once the water starts boiling turn down the flame and boil for 3 minutes. Immediately cool in ice water

Quaril egg Scotch egg:
Ingredients: Made 5
8 oz ground chicken (or beef or pork)
5 boiled quail eggs
1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
2-3 shiitake mushrooms, finely chopped
freshly grated nutmeg, black pepper and salt to taste
1 tbs olive oil
2 tbs Panko bread crumbs

For breading
Flour or potato starch
1 egg beaten mixed with 2-3 tbs water
Panko bread crumbs
Peanut oil for deep frying

Directions:
Sauté the onion and mushrooms in olive oil for 2-3 minutes, let it cool to the room temperature
Add ground chicken, panko and the seasonings, mix well and knead by hand (if too loose add more panko and/or potato starch).
Coat each quail egg in potato starch
Divide the meat mixture into 5 parts and make an oval 1/3 inch thick on your palm.
Place the egg in the center and encase it with the meat mixture to make an oval sphere (or ellipsoid)
Bread the sphere by coating in the potato starch (or flour), the egg water and the panko bread crumbs
Deep fry at 180F for about 5 minutes or until the bubbles become small
Cut in half and serve

This was quite good. The fried quail egg had a nice crunchy outside and the inside yolk was velvety smooth. The overall flavor was very nice too. It would have been easy to eat many more. The little Scotch egg was just the right amount as an appetizer for us. (We find the Scotch eggs made with regular hens eggs are too big.

New Divided Plate and 9 Otoshi Appetizers 9つ仕切り皿にのせたお通し9種類

This is on the theme of multiple small “otoshi” appetizers. Previously we used a 5 segmented plate to serve 5 appetizers. A few days ago, I found a 9 segmented square plate available on Amazon which was reasonably priced so I got two. I thought it would be hard coming up with 9 appetizers but I managed it with 8 dishes I made. The ninth dish was an exception since I didn’t make it. It was the fried shrimp head which came from Tako Grill when we had our sashimi/sushi take-out. (Shrimp head is a by-product of “botan-ebi” 牡丹海老 sashimi/sushi). In any case, I was surprised that once I started thinking otoshi I was on a roll and could have served two or three more appetizers if I wanted to. This was a nice start of the evening but even very small dishes are filling for us and we ended up with a  “shime” 〆ending dish after this.

In the 1st row, left, is a sugar snap in salt broth スナップ豌豆の塩びたし. We used to be able to get decent sugar snaps from our regular grocery store but recently, we have had to go to gourmet grocery stores to get decent ones This was crunchy, sweet soaked in salt dashi broth.

In the 1st row, center, are cucumber onion salad and stir fried shirataki, jalapeño pepper and enoki mushroom.

In the 1st row, right, is the cheese curd my wife made  but instead of jalapeño pepper, she added “Yuzukosho” 柚子胡椒, soy sauce and cream. I added a dab of yuzukosho on the side to provide an added “schmear” of yuzukosho flavor if desired.

Tsukune on a slice of lotus root 蓮根つくね.

“Uni-shuto” ウニ酒盗 from Maruhide. As I stated before this is the best uni aside from fresh uni. I served it with cucumber and perilla leaves.

I refried the shrimp head kara-age which was part of take-out from Tako Grill a few days ago. Shrimp head has a good amount of meat and is very crunchy but you have to be careful how you eat the prickly legs so as to not injure your mouth.

Recently, we discovered that Whole Foods carries fresh quail eggs. We really like boiled quail eggs. Although we can get canned boiled quail eggs, boiled eggs prepared from fresh quail eggs are much much better. I served it with marinara sauce, basil and sprinkle of salt.

Blanched asparagus with sesame mayonnaise. The dressing is a mixture of mayo, Japanese sesame paste or nerigoma 練りごま and soy sauce.

Salmon salad. My usual. The dressing is mixture of mayo, Greek yogurt and Dijon mustard.

We really like our new plates. If I serve 9 appetizers for two of us in small bowls, we have to wash a total of 18 bowls but here we had to wash only two plates. We really like the many small dishes we had here; true Izakaya-style.

Udon and Shrimp Stir-fry エビ入り焼きうどん

This an impromptu stir fry of udon noodles or “Yaki-udon” 焼きうどん I made for a lunch one day since we had cooked udon noodles. We did not have a protein readily available (we had frozen chicken and pork but they would have required time to defrost). So, I decided to use frozen shrimp which can be thawed quickly. In addition, since we had home pasteurized eggs, I added a fried egg with a runny yolk. This was not based on any recipe but it came out OK.

The egg could have been a bit less cooked but it had a somewhat running yolk. I seasoned the dish with oyster sauce and soy sauce. The oyster sauce (Kikoman brand) was a bit on the sweet side but it tasted pretty good.

This is not really a recipe but just a record of what I did. I just used what ever vegetables were available in the fridge.

Ingredients (for 2 servings):
One bundle of dry udon noodles, cooked according to the package instruction
6 shrimp, thawed, shelled, seasoned with salt and coated with potato starch
One medium onion, thinly sliced
Several leaves of cabbage, cut into small rectangles
5-6 green beans, blanched, cut into 1 inch segments
1 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp chopped ginger
1 tbs peanut oil and 1/2 tsp dark sesame oil
1 tbs oyster sauce
1 tbs soy sauce

1 tbs dried “aonori” 青のり powdered seaweed for garnish
Two pasteurized eggs, salt and pepper to taste and olive oil for frying

Directions:
Heat a wok and add the peanut and sesame oil, cook the shrimp, 30 seconds on each side, set aside
Add more oil and cook the ginger and garlic. Stir for a few seconds, add the onion and cabbage, cook 1-2 minutes or until the vegetables are soft.
Add the noodles (you may want to add a small amount of water), stir until warmed.
Add back the cooked shrimp
Add the oyster and soy sauce and stir for one more minute

In another frying pan on medium flame, add the olive oil and the eggs. Cook until the edges get slightly browned, place the lid on, cut the flame and let it steep for 1 minute.

Serve the noodles and shrimp and garnish with the aonori (You could also add pickled ginger and sesame seeds) and top with the fried egg.

Crab Cake with Shrimp Mousse エビ入りクラブケーキ

We really like  crab cakes and make them every-now-and-then.  We bought an 8oz container of pasteurized lump crab meat some time ago and decided to make a crab cake (other choices would include a California roll or cream crab croquet). I usually make crab cakes without using much in the way of binders (just mayo, Dijon mustard and a small amount of bread crumbs). My philosophy is the less binders/fillers the better to let the taste of the crab shine through.  But sometimes this technique makes it difficult for the crab cakes to keep their shape while cooking (especially flipping). I remembered seeing a recipe using shrimp meat (mousse) as a binder. I looked for the recipe and came across a video from America’s test kitchen demonstrating how to use shrimp as a binder for crab cake. As usual, I made some modifications but we really like this version of crab cake. You do not taste the shrimp and the crab cakes stay together without adding any unwanted texture or flavors. Of course, using a good lump crab meat is important to making a good crab cake. I served it with coleslaw I had just made and blanched rapini.

The original recipe calls for breading but I did not do that. I did, however, add a small amount of bread crumbs (panko) to the crab mixture.

Ingredients (makes 4 small cakes):
8oz (270gram) lump crab (#1)
2oz (57gram) shrimp (about 1/4 the weight of the crab), thawed and cut up into small pieces
2-3 tbs cream
1 tbs Dijon mustard
2 tbs Panko bread crumbs
1-2 tbs olive oil
1 stalk of celery, finely diced
1 small shallot, finely diced
1 small Jalapeño pepper, seeded and deveined, finely diced (optional)
1 tbs olive oil for sautéing the above
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Sauté the celery, shallot, and Jalapeño pepper in olive oil for several minutes, season with salt and pepper and set it aside to cool (#2, on the bottom of the bowl)
Add the shrimp in a small food processor (I used a cylindrical container with an immersion blender), add the cream and process to make a smooth mousse and add to the vegetables and crab meat (#3)
Add the Dijon mustard and Panko bread crumbs and gently fold to mix (#4)
Form 6 small disks (#5) and refrigerate at least 30 minutes
Cook crab cakes with olive oil on medium flame for 2 minutes for each side (#6)

This is a great recipe for making crab cakes. The shrimp moose does a good job of keeping the cakes together without adding unwanted texture or flavors. It does a better job than just mayo. We will adopt this recipe as our standard recipe for crab cakes.

Chawanmushi with Wood Ear and Enoki Mushroom 新鮮キクラゲとエノキ茶碗蒸し

This is not a new dish just a variation on an established one but the variation came out rather nicely. Since we received fresh wood ear and enoki mushrooms 木耳、榎茸 some days ago when we got some groceries delivered from the Asian grocery store “weee”, that we tried for the first time,  I needed to use up the mushrooms. I decide to try this combination in chawanmushi 茶碗蒸し. I served this cold and topped it with ikura slamon roe and strips of nori seaweed.

The picture below is before I put on the topping. You can see a piece of shrimp, as well as the wood ear and enoki mushrooms.

I made this exactly as before (3 eggs which is about 150ml and 450ml seasoned dashi broth). Steamed on high for 3 minutes and low for 30 minutes. It came out perfectly. This is not spectacular but the combination of wood ear and enoki gave contrasting texture and subtle flavors. The best thing is that I used up both sets of mushrooms.

Shrimp and Avocado Croquette エビとアボカドのコロッケ

This is another variation of Japanese potato croquette. I have already posted quite a few variations on this potato theme previously. I got the idea of adding shrimp and avocado to a croquette from watching one of the YouTube episodes. Since my wife had made mashed potatoes when we cooked chicken in the Weber grill a few days ago and we also had a ripe avocado which had to be used quickly, this was a no-brainer. I served this as an appetizer one evening with a side of Tonkatsu sauce. On the cut-surface, you can see pieces of the shrimp and avocado.

Ingredients (this made 9 small croquettes):
6 large shrimp, thawed, shell and vein removed, cut into bite size, salted and sprinkled with sake (#1).
1 ripe avocado, skin and stone removed and cut into bite-size cubes, tossed in juice of a half lemon (#2)
Mashed potatoes (I used the mashed potatoes my wife made (#3). (The amount is uncertain but they were made from 2 russet potatoes wrapped in aluminum foil cooked in the Weber grill when we cooked two small chickens. We ate a small amount of the potatoes with some of the chicken for dinner the night of the barbecue. My wife added butter, cream cheese with onion and chive, and seasoned with salt).
Flour, egg and panko bread crumbs for dredging and breading

Oil (I used peanut oil) for frying.

Directions:
Mix the mashed potatoes, avocado and shrimp (#4)
Portion out the mixture (I used an ice cream scoop) (#5)
With hands wet with water, press and form an oval-shaped disk.
Coat with the flour, egg-water and Panko bread crumbs for frying.
Refrigerate for a few hours before frying (or freeze)* to prevent the croquets from exploding while frying.
Fry for 2-3 minutes each side (#6)
Drain and serve immediately or heat up in a toaster oven after placed in the refrigerator for later consumption.

*I made this twice. The first time, I just refrigerated the mixture for one hour before shallow frying. It was mostly OK but some of the croquettes crust did not remain completely intact. The second time, I froze the breaded croquettes overnight and deep fried them without thawing which produced a much better result.

The contrast of the shrimp’s firm and avocado’s soft and creamy textures makes this croquette very nice. The potatoes served as a nice creamy background for the shrimp and avocado. The breading provided a very satisfying crunch juxtapose to the creamy filling. We really like this croquette.

Happy New Year 2023 新年おめでとう御座います2023

It is morning of the first day of 2023. The past year was marked by many events; not the least of which is the still lingering COVID-19. In any case, here is the “Kagami-mochi” 鏡餅 New Year’s decoration. It is  accompanied by various rabbit figurines because this is the year of the rabbit according to the Chinese zodiac. We usually place the new year’s decoration in the tokonoma 床間 alcove  of  our “tearoom” in the basement but this year, we decided to place it in the room where we spend most of our time to maximize our enjoyment of the collection.

As usual, the highlight of our new year is the Sushi taro osechi box 寿司太郎お節箱. We drove down to Dupont circle and picked up the Osechi box and hand-cut soba noodles “toshikoshi soba” 年越しそば (which we usually enjoy the 2nd day of the new year). For many years, we traditionally have our regular breakfast of Cafe Latte with yogurt and breads and have the New Year’s “Ozouni” お雑煮 soup for lunch. I also served a few items I made. As always, we wheeled out the real Japanese laquer ware bowls my mother gave us a long time ago.

As usual, we encased the mochi in a fried tofu pouch or “abura-age” 油揚げ (in an effort to make the eating experience a bit more manageable). It is at the bottom of the bowl so you can’t see it in the picture. I cut the carrot into a flower-shape and the daikon into a ginko leaf-shape. I also added burdock root ごぼう (the white rectangular object in the picture), shiitake mushroom, shrimp, flower-shape gluten cakes or “fu” 麩, snow pea, scallion and yuzu zest (frozen). I made the broth from dashi packs, a bit of mirin and x4 Japanese noodle sauce.

The accompanying dishes (from left to right) are all listed in “Norio’s New year dishes”. They are: chicken squares with gorgonzola cheese and dried fig, salmon kelp roll 鮭の昆布巻き, datemaki omelet 伊達巻, and salmon Russian marinade. (This year I made some modifications to the marinade by adding Dijon mustard and dill). Of course it wouldn’t be an adequate celebration of the first day of the New Year without at least a token glass of sake. This year it was our house favorite Tengumai Daiginjo 天狗舞大吟醸. The soup and these items were pretty good if I do say so myself.

Although we did not tap into the osechi box, here is a preview of what to expect when we eagerly dive in this evening. The picture below shows the first tier. Although many goodies are hidden below the items we can see, we can spot our favorites like “karasumi” 唐墨,  “mushi uni” 蒸し雲丹 and “Kazunoko” 数の子.

The second tier also has our favorites such as “Ankimo tofu”, “Ikura” and duck breast.

We are repeating ourselves but it is so wonderful that we are able to get this incredible osechi from Sushi Taro. We will be enjoying these delicacies over the next few days.

Take-out sashimi from Tako Grill タコグリルからのテイクアウト

We have been taking out omakase sushi and sashimi 刺身と寿司おまかせ from Tako Grill since March of 2020 after it closed for dining-in. I have posted a few of these take-out sashimi and sushi dishes. I usually re-plate them on two plates for one serving each. I usually use rectangular plates but this time, I used round plates we got recently which are currently our favorite.

Today’s sashimi was Oo-tro tuna 大トロ, hamachi はまち and botan-ebi ボタン海老 (could be Argentinian red shrimp). All were quite good. I also use all the trimmings such as the daikon or perilla from the take-out box.

I re-arranged the uni and squid sashimi  rolled in perilla leaves ウニとイカの刺身大葉巻き into a small dish with julienne of perilla 大葉 and nori 刻みのり, dressed with wasabi-jouuyu ワサビ醤油.

We also got 4 deep dried shrimp heads (extra benefit of Botan ebi sashimi) which were also great. We got nearly filled up with these assorted sashimi but we finished with the serving of sushi  (including one California roll with real lump crab) that was the last part of the take-out. We really enjoy this sashimi and sushi feast at home with cold sake. It is a great to kick back, relax and enjoy our meal with sake libation in the comfort of our home without having to worry about a drive back from the restaurant through traffic. 

Tempura 天麩羅

I have posted quite a few tempura dishes. But I have  not made tempura for a long time. My wife wanted to have chicken kara-age 唐揚げ and I had marinated chicken thigh for “Kara-age” but I needed  to use new oil since I discarded the old reused peanut oil the last time I made a deep fried dish. Since fresh clean oil is best for making tempura, as my wife’s suggested, I made a few tempura items before frying the kara-age. I made, shrimp, shiitake and green beans tempura.

I am a bit out of practice making tempura and I made the batter a bit too thin but it came out OK. (Although not great especially for the shrimp.) I also re-fried the shrimp heads we got as part of take-out from Tako Grill. They came out very nice and crispy (better than heating them up in the toaster oven).

I served this small assortment of tempura with green tea salt and a wedge of lemon. After this, I cooked up the chicken kara-age. For dredging, I used half-and-half mixture of rice flour (“mochi-ko” 餅粉) and potato starch (“Katakuri-ko” 片栗粉) which was really good and produced more crunchy crust as compared to my usual potato starch.

Shrimp in spicy mayo sauce エビマヨ

 My wife found 4 frozen good-sized shell-on shrimp from Great Alaska Seafood, lonely and tucked hidden under a number of other items in the freezer door shelf. She asked me if I could make something with them. I am familiar with popular Japanese shrimp dishes called “Ebi-chiri*” エビチリ and  “Ebi-mayo*” エビマヨ. (Japanese are very fond of two condiments; ketchup and mayonnaise).  I got an inspiration from these dishes and made this (slightly) spicy mayo sauce for the shrimp. I also added blanched sugar snaps since I had them.

*Digression Alert:  Ebi-chiri was supposedly invented by Chin Kenmin 陳建民 (the father of Iron Chinese Chef Chin Ken-ichi 陳健一) based on a Sichuan dish called 乾焼蝦仁 modified to suit Japanese taste. The origin of “Ebi-mayo” appears less certain but it was based on an American Chinese dish of shrimp with Aurora sauce (mixture of ketchup and mayo) which was improved upon by a Chinese Chef in Yokohama. There are many variations of these two recipes.

This dish was impromptu but it came out rather well for a small appetizer. Despite the fact the frozen shrimp had been abandoned for some time in the freezer door shelf they tasted very nice; no iodine flavor and good firm texture.

Ingredients: (two small servings)
4 shrimp (I used 4 shell-on frozen shrimp), thawed under running water, shell removed, brined in cold salted water for 5 minutes, washed in cold running water and patted dry
Olive oil for frying

Sauce (mix the ingredients in a small bowl)
2 tsp mayonnaise
2 tsp Greek (strained) yogurt
1/2 tsp Sriracha or any other hot sauce such as gochujang

Directions:
Lightly salt the shrimp and cook in a pan with olive oil, turning few time for total of 1 minute.
Set aside the shrimp
Add the sauce warm it up and then put back the shrimp, add the sugar snaps
Serve immediately.

Brining in salt water brought back the shrimp's briny taste and texture (“puri-puri” プリプリ in Japanese). This is perfect with either wine or sake. I should make this dish more often.

Carrot soup with shrimp エビ入り人参スープ

 This is an impromptu dish I made one weekend for lunch. We bought a bottle of carrot juice sometime ago with the intension of making the carrot curry shrimp dish. But I did not have a chance to make it and the carrot juice passed “used best by” date by a few weeks. Not to be deterred by a “hypothetical (?)  best by” date wife cautiously tasted it and declared it perfectly good. She suggested using it to make a carrot soup. So, I came up with one based on what we had in the refrigerator.  I added boiled shrimp to the soup and served it with a potato muffin my wife made some time ago.

I made the soup the day before I served it. When I served it I added some cream and warmed it up. My wife suggested adding shrimp which was in line with the carrot shrimp curry we were originally planning to make. This was a perfect suggestion since we had frozen shrimp which was also past its “best by” date. The shrimp was shell-on. I gently poached them shell on in salted water with some sake then removed the shell. I garnished the soup with chives.

This is not following any recipe and I just winged it.


Ingredients:
450ml (15.2oz) bottle of carrot juice
4 medium carrots, peeled and cut into small cubes/coins
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 parsnips, peeled and cut into small cubes/coins (I added this because I had it and it was passing it’s peak)
2 small red potatoes, peeled and cut into small cubes
1/2 tsp fresh ginger, peeled and chopped finely
1 cup (or just enough to cover the vegetables) chicken broth
1tbs olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

6 shrimp, poached and shelled (optional)

Directions:
Add the olive oil in a pan on medium flame, add the onion and cook for several minutes or until soft but not browned. Add the carrot, parsnips, potatoes and ginger. Add the chicken broth to just cover the vegetables. Simmer for 30 minutes or more until all the vegetables are soft. Add the carrot juice and cook for a few more minutes. Using either a food processor or immersion blender, process until the soup is smooth. Season with salt and pepper.


Just before serving, add the cream to your liking and warm it up. Add whatever topping and garnish.

This was a good soup especially since I made it not using any recipe. We did not taste the ginger but the taste of parsnips came through. There was enough carrot flavor to tell this was a carrot soup. It went well with the potato muffins and was perfect lunch.

Mixed seafood fry 海鮮フライ

This is our effort to clear up some frozen seafood inventory that has been in our freezer “long enough”. Among the items in danger of exceeding their allotted time were  scallops we got from Great-Alaska-Seafood and Pacific Oysters we got from Vital Choice wild seafood. I added shrimp also from Great-Alaska-Seafood to these items so that I could make a mixed seafood fry.

The picture below is not one of my better jobs at presentation, but hot out of the oil, these fried items were great. I served them with homemade Pa Dutch coleslaw, Campari tomatoes and wedges of lemon.

Although the scallops had freezer burn, I carefully shaved it off before cooking. Despite that, they tasted good. We should not be eating this type of fried food too often but when we  do, we  really enjoy it.