Tuna, asparagus and poached egg 鮪漬けの炙りとアスパラガスの温玉添え

The type of tuna sashimi blocks 鮪の刺身の冊 I can get at our Japanese grocery store is limited to frozen ahi or yellowfin tuna キハダマグロ, which was treated with carbon monoxide to give it a bright red color (carbon monoxide sounds bad but it is no health hazard when used on food like this). I always keep a tuna block in our freezer "just-in-case". I have to rotate the stock every several months since unlike wine, the tuna does not improve with time.  Since I bought a new tuna block when I stopped by our Japanese grocery store this weekend, I took the old one out of the freezer to thaw. I have posted  many times how to make this low-quality tuna sashimi palatable. One of the ways is to make "Zuke" 漬けor marinated tuna.  So, I sliced half of the tuna sashimi block and marinated it in a "Goma-dare" ゴマだれ (see below) the night before. This time, I did not do "Yubiki" 湯引き or cooking the surface by dunking it in boiling water and then ice water to halt the cooking.  I was not sure how I would serve this "zuke maguro" (marinated tuna) until I learned we were starting the evening with red wine. Then the "path" became pretty clear;

I had to come up with something that went well with red wine.  This dish was the result. I was inspired by  this picture in one of the food blogs I follow. This dish is grilled asparagus, poached egg with grated Pecorino Romano and botargo.  Since I did not have botargo or karasumi からすみ, I omitted it and used grated Parmigiano-Reggiano instead of Pecorino Romano. Seared zuke tuna is my addition. I poached the eggs as I posted before. 

Since I prepared green asparagus that morning, this was an easy dish to put together once I decided what I would make. 

Tuna preparation:

1. I thawed the frozen block of tuna overnight in the refrigerator. I sliced half of the block into half inch thick slices.
2. This time I made "Goma-dare" for marinade.  I first dry roasted white sesame seeds in a dry frying pan (1 tsp) until slightly darkened and fragrant (the sesame was already roasted but re-roasting it add much more flavor). I ground the seeds in a Japanese Suribachi すり鉢 mortar. I then added mirin, sake and soy sauce in a ratio of 1:1:2.
3. I placed the tuna and the marinade in a Ziploc bag to make sure all the surface of the tuna was covered with marinade and removed as much air from the bag as I could. I sealed the bag and kept it in the refrigerator overnight.
4. The next evening, I took out the tuna slices, blotted the excess marinade from the surface (picture below) and cut one slice into two.

I thought searing one of the surfaces would add texture and a beef-like flavor which would go better with red wine. I seared the pieces two ways; one by using a kitchen blow torch (those are the ones with the black specs in the picture below) and the other seared in a frying pan with melted butter (the shiny ones on the tops row and right of bottom row).  

Asparagus prepration:

I got thick spears of green asparagus from our grocery store. I removed the bottom by simply bending and breaking it. Using a vegetable peeler, I peeled the bottom half of the skin and blanched the stalk in salted water. Just before assembling this dish, I quickly sautéed it in melted butter and seasoned with salt and black pepper.

Assembly:

I cut the asparagus on the bias into 3-4 pieces. I arranged the pieces to look like a whole uncut asparagus spear, resting diagonally on a square plate. I arranged the two kinds of seared tuna squares on one side of the asparagus and placed a poached egg on the other side. I grated Parmisiano-Reggiano on top.

This dish followed my octopus carpaccio and we enjoyed it with a glass of Louse M. Martini Napa Cab as before. The tuna was seasoned well from the marinade and became firmer than non-marinated tuna. Searing added beef like flavor but we could not tell the differences between torched vs. pan seared. The combination of runny warm yolk and asparagus cannot go wrong. This dish really went well with the California Cab we were having.

Asparagus with poached egg アスパラガスとポーチドエッグ

This was an impromptu dish I made one evening. This dish came about because I found Davidson's pasteurized eggs at our near-by gourmet  grocery store for the first time early in the day. (I was glad to find them in such a convenient location. Previously we had to go to another grocery store that was a bit far-away). Since I already had blanched green pencil asparagus prepared, I came up with this dish.

I poached the egg and it had a runny yolk (I could make it runny because I was using the Davidson's pasteurized eggs I just got).

Before eating, we just broke the yolk and used it as a sauce. I also served freshly baked baguette to mop up the yolk.

I first sauteed the blanched tops of the green pencil asparagus in butter seasoned with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile I poached the pasteurized eggs as I posted before.

I placed the asparagus in a small bowl and put the poached egg on top. I sprinkled a bit of Kosher salt on the top. This was a very nice dish, egg and asparagus are always a good combination.

Pork belly wrapped fig and asparagus イチジクとアスパラのバラ肉巻き

It was another rather nice day in Washington DC and we decided to grill outside. I was sent by-she-who-must-be-obeyed to the near-by Whole food market to get fresh whole fish. I got fish (trout, nothing else looked great). While there I could not resist buying sliced pork belly or "Bara-niku" バラ肉 which is a very common cut in Japan but we can get it only at this store around here. It is essentially "raw" (as in not smoked or cured) bacon meat. Since we were grilling our trout on a charcoal fire, I decided to make skewers using the pork belly. I was not thinking of any specific recipe but, since I also got mission figs at the same store, I decided to wrap the figs with pork belly. I first cut the figs into quarters and then wrapped them and skewered them for grilling.

I also had pencil asparagus already blanched and ready to go, I wrapped them in pork belly as well (below picture). I seasoned it salt and pepper before grilling.

I am sure this is not good for you but grilled pork belly with crispy edges and sweet figs inside (grilling enhanced the sweetness of the fig) cannot go wrong. My wife asked me to grill the pieces more after fig/pork belly was removed from the skewers to make all the surfaces crispy even the ones between the pieces on the skewer.

The asparagus joined in later.

We enjoyed this delectable pork belly as a starter with a red wine.  We then started on our trout. This time, I simply salted them (after scaling).

We really enjoyed the simply prepared trout. We did not need any thing else with the fish. Salt and charcoal fire really make the fish taste good.

As an ending dish, I made our usual grilled rice balls but this time, I made sweet miso sauce (miso, sugar, mirin) and brushed it on towards the end of the cooking (below).

I happened to make beer pickles the prior weekend and served it (daikon, carrot, and cucumber) on the side.

The daikon was the same extremely "hot" one we tasted as grated daikon and was very spicy even as pickles. I sort of liked it but my wife thought her stomach could not take it.

Easter Brunch イースターブランチ

This year Easter came very late. By Easter, it was finally getting warm and we enjoyed this Easter brunch outside. My wife made two kinds of hot cross buns several weeks ago and froze them. They were very good, so, we could not wait until the holiday and we have been eating them for some time but luckily we had some left for Easter. We had a hot cross bun, sautéed hot smoked pork (smoked in the Weber some days ago) and special creamy scrambled eggs.



The presentation above leave something to be desired but once you open the egg-shaped glass container. The color of bright yellow, green and red are indeed colors of spring.



This is slight modification of creamy scrambled eggs which was reportedly served to Queen of England a few years ago when she visited Virginia (we are not sure if she tasted it but this dish was created by Patrick O'Connor of Inn at little Washington). He did not add salmon roe just asparagus tips.



Creamy scrambled eggs:
Pasteurized shell eggs: I used home-pasteurized egg using my Sous vide machine. I am not going to cook eggs completely, using pasteurized eggs are safest. Since we god three pasteurized eggs in the refrigerator, I used all three for two servings.
Heavy cream: 2 tsp
Salt and white pepper. to taste.
Butter: 1 tsp

I beat the eggs with the heavy cream, seasoned with salt and white pepper. Although I could have just used a non-stick pan, I decided to use a double boiler. I set the lower pan on low simmer and melted the butter in the upper pan. I then added the egg mixture and started stirring/scraping using a narrow silicon spatula until the eggs were creamy but not over cooked (3-4 minutes). I tasted and added a few more grain of salt. I placed the scrambled egg in the egg shaped Japanese glass container, garnished with blanched green asparagus spear and salmon roe.

This was very creamy and the salmon roe added an additional saltiness. Perfect for a warm Easter Sunday repast.

Asparagus green and white グリーンとホワイト アスパラガス

This is a “nothing” dish but we enjoyed it as a drinking snack. The seasonality of asparagus has been somewhat lost since Peruvian asparagus is readily available in the United States in winter*. Coming from Hokkaido where fresh asparagus indicates the beginning of late spring moving into summer, I miss the anticipation and excitement inherent in the seasonality of the dish. But the fact we can enjoy fresh asparagus all year long provides some compensation. Although green asparagus are very popular, white asparagus is not as widely appreciated. When I was a kid white asparagus only came canned which is rather awful compared to fresh. I have posted about white asparagus before but I made a slightly different dressing for it this time.

*factoid: Believe it or not asparagus have been an “integral” part of the U.S. war on drugs. Under various free trade agreements with Andean countries particularly Peru, asparagus were imported to the United States duty free or with reduced tariff. It was thought this would provide incentives to produce asparagus rather than drugs. (I privately suspect they produce both now). Prior to these Agreements, as was the case in Hokkaido, asparagus were  only available in the United States in late spring early summer. Peruvian asparagus are also produced in Peru in the spring. Since the production occurs south of the equator, however, Peruvian spring/summer is our fall/winter. As a result asparagus are available in the U.S. all year round: from the United States in spring and summer and Peru south of the equator in fall and winter.



I quickly blanched the green asparagus tips (for a few minutes) and then cooled them (by spreading them on a paper towel in a cool place) and served with sesame dressing (Thicker bottom stalks were made into asparagus soup).  The sesame dressing is a mixture of white sesame paste, 1 tbs, sugar 1/2 tsp, soy sauce 1-2 tbs and rice vinegar 1/2 tsp).

The while asparagus can be a bit tricky to cook. First, I removed the bottom of the stalk by snapping it off by bending (where ever it snaps, that is the right spot). I then used a vegetable peeler (Europeans have a special white asparagus peeler) and removed the outer fibrous layer, preserving all the peels. The white asparagus tends to be very brittle and often breaks when it is peeled. The best way to prevent this is to use a sharp peeler and also place the asparagus on a flat surface such as a cutting board and rolling it as you peel. I placed all the peels and root ends as well as peeled white asparagus in a large frying pan with enough water to cover everything (I used filtered water from our home reverse osmosis device). I did not add salt (since I would be reducing the liquid). I cooked it on low flame for 1 hour (could be less depending on how well you peel and how fibrous the outer skin of the asparagus). After taking out the asparagus, I kept simmering the scraps and peels until the liquid was 1/3 of the original amount (the resulting liquid is full of white asparagus flavor). After staining through a fine meshed sieve, I kept this reduced broth in a sealable container for later use.

The first night, I served the asparagus warm.  I heated the cooked spears in a small amount of the asparagus broth. After they were heated through I removed them from the pan and set them aside. I then finished the sauce by adding butter, cream, and seasoning it with salt and white pepper. I then poured the sauce over the asparagus. This is very good for warm white asparagus.

The second time I served the asparagus (picture above), I used the broth to loosen mayonnaise to make a sauce for cold white asparagus. Adding, the concentrated white asparagus both really makes a difference. Although this was not early summer, we still enjoyed the asparagus.