“Taco Carnitas”-ish タコ カルニタもどき

This all started when my wife found a package of mini-corn tortillas at Whole Foods (picture #3). Even without opening the package, we can smell the nice corn flavor. I did not make pulled pork but since I had a 1/2 lb of ground pork (left over after making gyoza,) I decided to make something similar to “Taco Caritas”. I made the spice mixture for the pork, salsa, and guacamole. Since we did not have lettuce, I also made shredded cabbage. Instead of sour cream, we used home made Greek yogurt (pictures #1 and #2). It was a bit messy to eat but it was quite good and we liked these corn tortillas.

On the top of guacamole is the Green yogurt (mixed with olive oil and seasoned with salt).

Ingredients (made 4 small taco):
Small corn tortillas (picture #3)
1/2 lb ground pork
Shredded cheese (we used cheddar)
Shredded cabbage (optional)

Taco seasoning (since we did not have chili power I did not use it)
I just mixed; ground cumin, ground coriander, smoked paprika, onion power, garlic powder, cayenne pepper and salt. 

Salsa: (I made this several hours before)
3 skinned Campari tomato, chopped roughly
3-4 sprigs of cilantro, leaves removed and chopped (I used frozen cilantro leaves I prepared previously. This works fairly well. Much better than dried cilantro.)
2 stalks of scallions, finely chopped
2 tsp olive oil,
2 tsp lemon juice (or rice vinegar)
Salt 

Guacamole: (I made this a few days ago)
1 ripe avocado, stone and skin removed and roughly mashed using a fork
2 tsp lemon juice
1 stalk scallion, finely chopped
1 jalapeño pepper, seeded and deveined, finely chopped
1tsp chopped cilantro leaves
1/4 tsp sriracha
Salt to taste

Greek Yogurt dip: (also I made this several days ago)
1/4 cup Greek yogurt (we used the home yogurt my wife makes, strained)
1 tbs olive oil
Salt to taste

Directions:
Warm the tortillas (wrapped in aluminum foil in preheated 350F oven for 10-15 minutes).

In a non-stick frying pan on medium flame, add the pork, spread thin and cook until one side is browned. Crumble the pork and add the taco seasonings and cook until the pork fat is rendered and the meat is  throughly cooked, set aside.

Assemble taco by placing the pork, cheese, salsa, guacamole, greek yogurt and cabbage on the tortillas.
Fold the tortillas and enjoy (messy, though).

For non-authentic taco, this was quite good and filling. For us, the mild heat was just right.

Eggplant, Avocado and Nagaimo Gratin ナスとアボカドの長芋グラタン

I made this dish for lunch one day from what we had on hand and what we need to finish before it went bad. I just winged it without any particular recipe. As a result I was not sure how it would come out but it was certainly edible and quite interesting (in a good way).

The main items are Asian eggplant, avocado and grated nagaimo mixed with an egg (in leu of Béchamel sauce). I also added tomato and shiitake mushroom sautéed with shallot, just because I had them.

Ingredients:
One Asian eggplant (pale purple and long), cut into a bite size by cutting at 45 degree angle as I turned the egg plant (“Rangiri” 乱切り)
One avocado, cut into a bite size pieces similar to the eggplant (I only had half of a leftover avocado).
Nagaimo, about 200grams, peeled and grated
One large egg
3 skinned Campari tomatoes, seeds removed and cut into small cubes
1 tbs of chopped shiitake mushroom and shallot sautéed in olive oil (I made this few says ago mostly from the stems of the shiitake mushrooms)
Cheeses (I used sharp cheddar and parmesan but any melting cheese will do), the amount is arbitrary
2-3 tbs olive oil

Directions:
Sauté the eggplant in 2 tbs of olive oil the skin side down first then brown all other sides (4-5 minutes)
Place the eggplant and the avocado in the bottom of a small Pyrex baking dish.  Add the remaining 1tbs olive oil.
Mix the grated nagaimo and the egg and pour over (see below)

Top with the mushroom mixture, the tomatoes, and the  cheeses and bake for 30 minutes at 350F (I used the toaster oven in convection mode) (see below).

Let it stand for 5 minutes and serve (the first picture).

I was not sure the grated nagaimo and egg ratio but it came out ok. This is a sort of healthy Béchamel sauce substitute. The eggplant and avocado went well together. The next day, we placed the remaining dish in smaller individual ramekins and added a bit more cheese and toasted it in the highest setting. It heated up very nicely.

Chicken Quesadilla チキンケサデア

This is a dish we made for lunch one day. We were inspired by the recipe called “Smashed burger taco” which appeared in the Washington Post. We really did not follow the recipe at all except for the idea of spreading the meat thinly over the tortilla. Since we had  about 3-4 oz of ground chicken, we used chicken instead of beef. For the rest we made it like a quesadilla. We topped it with our usual, guacamole and sour cream. Although I seasoned the meat with cumin, salt, black pepper and freshly ground nutmeg, the meat did not have a really strong flavor. I also added finely chopped Vidalia onion and mayonnaise (to compensate for the lean chicken meat).

We made two sets and cut it into wedges. We ate three slices which was more than enough for us. The rest is a snack for later.

Ingredients (made two sets of quesadilla)
4 soft wheat tortillas
4oz ground chicken
1/2 small sweet (Vidalia) onion, finely chopped
1 tsp mayonnaise (optional)
Salt, black ground pepper, cumin, and nutmeg to taste
Cheeses (we used cheddar, fresh goat, and smoked gouda), the amount is arbitrary
1-2 tbs light olive oil

Directions:
Mix the chicken, onion, seasonings and mayonnaise in a bowl and mix well. Spread half of the meat mixture on the each tortilla and spread to the edge (#1)
Heat up frying pans (I used two pans to cook them simultaneously) on medium heat and add the olive oil.
When the oil is hot, add the tortilla with meat side down (#2) and cook for 1-2 minutes then flip over (#3)
Add cheeses (#4)
Place another tortilla on the top. Press gently with spatula (#5)
When the cheeses have melted (1-2 minutes) flip and cook the other side for 1-2 more minutes (#6)

Served it hot with topping of guacamole and sour cream (first picture). Since the meat layer is thin, it adds subtle umami but if you do not pay attention, you may not notice of the meat (especially since we used the chicken). We added a lots of cheeses which made this very cheesy. The tortilla added a nice crunch. Very satisfying lunch.

P.S. We had this later as a snack after heating up in the toaster oven. It tasted better with the chicken flavor more pronounced. Also, the shape was better kept and easier to pick up and eat.

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.

Avocado Panna Cotta アボカドパンナコッタ

 My wife is into panna cotta and aspic. She has been collecting panna cotta recipes and some days ago, she made basil panna cotta based on one of those recipes since we have a small forest of basil on our kitchen window sill. Although she followed the recipe, it called for way too much gelatin. The end result congealed all right—in fact it solidified. It tasted pretty good. The basil flavor really came through. But it was extremely hard in texture and would have bounced like a tennis ball if dropped.  After struggling with it for a while we declared it inedible and threw it out. Somewhat in despair over the less than successful basil panna cotta she went back to the collection of recipes and decided her revenge panna cotta would be the one that  featured avocado. (Even this recipe called for too much gelatin. After the experience with the basil panna cotta and consulting the panna cotta recipes that were successful, my wife has decided the “rule-of-thumb” she will use is 1 tsp of gelatin for every 2 cups of liquid. So she reduced the amount of gelatin for this dish accordingly.)  It came out perfectly. The consistency was very creamy and with a good flavor of avocado. She made this in a small glass jar with cork lid and it was just the right amount. This is a perfect light dessert.

This recipe is from on-line but as usual, she made significant modifications.

Ingredients: (made enough for 6 small jars)
500 ml.milk
75ml cream
1 tsp. gelatin
1 ripe avocado
23 g. Sugar
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

Directions:
Bloom the gelatin in the cream. Put the bloomed gelatin in the top of a double boiler and heat until it melts. Slowly add the milk and sugar. Allow the mixture to come close to boiling stirring constantly until all the gelatin and sugar are dissolved. Allow the mixture to cool. Add the vanilla. Pour all the mixture in an immersion blender tube container together with the avocado meat. Blend until smooth. Sieve the mixture to ensure smooth and creamy texture. Then pour the mixture into a mold or ramekin. (In this case small jars as shown in the picture below.) Chill for at least 2 hours before serving.

This panna cotta was the perfect consistency. It was congealed but very tender and smooth. It just melted in the mouth. The flavor was very subtle and sophisticated. The taste of avocado came through and went well with the subtle vanilla. My wife felt very relieved and vindicated. From here on out: 1 tsp gelatin for every 2 cups of liquid. 

Chicken with Avocado miso dressing アボカド味噌ドレシング

We used to subscribe New York Times Cooking. It was rather expensive for just the cooking section so we eventually cancelled the subscription. In any case, this is a recipe called ”Creamy Avocado-miso dressing” and it is from NYT Cooking. Since we had ripe avocado on hand and the recipe uses miso, we deemed this worth a try. This was supposedly  “salad dressing” for “hearty” greens, a warm grain bowl or grilled vegetables. We tried it as a topping for the homemade cheese wife made and as a dip for blanched cauliflower. Both tasted good. When we thawed a sous-vide cooked chicken breast, in addition to my traditional shredded chicken dish using sesame dressing, as per my wife’s suggestion, I made half of the shredded chicken with the avocado miso dressing. In the picture below, the left is with sesame dressing and the right is with avacado-miso dressing.

I used fresh cilantro leaves to garnished the dish made with avocado dressing.

For the one made with sesame dressing, I garnished it with white sesame.

The sous-vide cooked chicken breast is perfect for this type of dish. The meat is soft and moist.

Ingredients:
1 ripe avocado, halved and pitted, flesh removed from skin
1/4 cup lemon juice (I used Meyer lemons since I had them).
2 tbs olive oil
1 tbs vinegar (I used rice vinegar)
1 tbs white miso (I used “awase-meso” which is mixture of red and white miso).
1tbs honey
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp black pepper

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in a mini-food processor and blend until smooth (shown below).

This is a very nice dressing and we definitely taste the miso. The avocado takes a back seat but works well with the bright taste of the lemon and vinegar. We think this works better as a dip for vegetables. (We also had it as a dip for crackers and that worked very well too.) For the chicken dish, we think the sesame dressing goes better.

Renkon "hasami-age" with avocado and cod roe アボカドとたらこのレンコンはさみ揚げ

My wife found an interesting YouTube series called "Kimono Mom".  A former geisha retired early got married, had a daughter, and now became a YouTuber showing Japanese cooking. She has many followers. In any case, we watched some of her episodes. One of the dishes she showed was "Hasami-age" はさみ揚げ meaning stuffing sandwiched between two slices of renkon 蓮根 (lotus root). The “sandwich” is then battered and deep fried. This is a common way of using renkon and I have previously posted such a dish.  The stuffing is usually meat especially chicken. Kimono Mom used a mixture of avocado and spicy cod roe called "mentaiko" 明太子. I happened to have a fresh renkon which I got from Tako Grill (besides packaed and frozen Japanese grocery items, Tako Grill grocery section now has some fresh Japanese vegetables and even sashimi blocks). I did not have "spicy" tarako but I did have frozen tarako. I could make tarako spicy by adding Sriracha. So I have everything to make this dish.

I also had fresh Japanese "shishi togarashi" 獅子唐辛子 pepper. So I just fried it as a side. I served the renkon dish with a wedge of lemon and green tea salt.

This is a rather unique and good dish. The renkon remains crispy and the avocado creamy with salty and lightly spicy (I did not add too much Sriracha) tarako flavors come through.

Ingredients: making 6.
One segment of fresh renkon, peeled and sliced (about 1/2 to 2/3 inch thick, I got a total of 12 slices).
6 perilla leaves
One sac of tarako, roe scraped out from the sac (#1)
One ripe avocado, stone and skin removed (#2)
Sriracha or other hot sauce to taste

For tempura batter
1/4 cup cake flour plus a bit more for dredging the renkon slices
1/4 cup carbonated water

Oil for deep frying

Directions:
Mash and mix the avocado, tarako with the sriracha hot sauce to taste (#3 and #4).
Lightly dredge the renkon slices. Put on a perilla leaf and then 1/6 (2-3 tsp) of the stuffing (#5).
Top the stack with another slice of renkon. Press lightly to secure (#6).

Heat the oil to 320F.

Mix the cake flour and cold carbonated water to make a relatively thin (like crepe batter) tempura batter.

Dip and coat the renkon “sandwich” and deep fry (#7) for fa ew minutes on one side. Turn it over and cook another few minutes then drain (#8) and serve.

I served this cut in half with a wedge of lemon and the green tea salt. We really like this dish. This could be good with beer but since we do not drink beer, we had it with cold sake.

Big eye tuna sashimi 4 ways めばち鮪刺身 四通り

When we got firefly squid from Regalis food, we also got 3 lbs. of fresh bigeye tuna sashimi メバチマグロ (akami 赤身). Since this was too much tuna sashimi for us to finish in one sitting, I divided it into 4 portions. We finished one portion fresh. The remaining three portions were vacuum packed and frozen.  Over time we have been enjoying the frozen portions and finally we came to the last one. Although this tuna tasted fairly good, certain portions, including this last one, were very “sinewy”.  So I had to tailor the dishes I made to make the sinew less noticeable. The dishes I made are shown in the next picture. The upper row from left to right are “yamakake” やまかけ, “sashimi” 赤身刺身, tuna with avocado cubes マグロとアボカドの角切りand the lower row is imitation “negitoro” 擬制ネギトロ. I did a similar combination of dishes using frozen yellowtail tuna but these made with big eye tuna were much better.

 

For the yamakake, I marinated  cubes of tuna for several hours in concentrated (x4) Japanese noodle sauce and also added soy sauce with dissolved wasabi to the grated nagaimo. I topped it with thin strips of nori. This is a classic and also sort of filling because of the grated nagaimo.

I chose the portion with the least sinew and made a small serving of straight sashimi. It was quite good.

This is another dish I make often. The dressing contains chopped garlic, soy sauce, sake, and dark sesame oil. The similarity of textures of tuna sashimi cubes and avocado works well. Since I did not have fresh chives, I used the green part of scallion for garnish.

Finally, imitaion negitoro. The combination of mayonise and tuna cannot go wrong. As usual, I left a half portion of tuna in small cubes and mixed it with the more finely chopped tuna with mayo, Japanese noodle sauce and chopped scallion. I served this with slices of cucumber (American minicucues) and small rectangular  sheets of Korean nori 韓国海苔. We made small nori rolls with the cucumber and negitoro. This is really great and also filling.

After finishing these 4 tuna sashimi dishes, we enjoyed  “edamame” 枝豆 and assortment of Japanese rice crackers and few more cups of cold sake and we were quite full.

Red wine "Zuke" tuna and avocado 鮪の赤ワイン漬けとアボカド

This is part of the continuous effort to use frozen items before they get too old. In the freezer I found this sashimi tuna block which was labeled “best used by August of 2019”. (At July 2020 it was one month short of being a year past its “best by” due date—not too bad). This is one we got from the Japanese grocery store. Recently we tried a similar yellowfin tuna "saku" sashimi block from "Great Alaska Seafood" and I noticed it seemed to contain less water than the ones from the Japanese grocery store. I knew this one would have a high water content, so I thawed it on a rectangular plate lined with paper towel, uncovered, in the refrigerator. The paper towel was soaked when it finished thawing. I made "Negitoro" ネギトロ in the evening. The next evening, from the remaining half, I made this variation/combination of "Zuke" 漬け and "Tuna and avocado cubes" 鮪とアボカドの角切り. Using red wine in the marinade was inspired by the recipe I saw on-line  (In Japanese) and similar in idea to chicken liver simmered in red wine.

I garnished it with chiffonade of perilla and some white sesame.

Ingredients: (appetizers for two)
1/2 block of sashimi tuna (in our case, frozen yellowfin), thawed if frozen, cut into small cubes
1/2 ripe avocado

Marinade:
3 tbs red wine (I had an open California cab).
2 tbs soy sauce (I reduced the soy sauce from the original recipe)
1 tbs mirin
1/4 tsp dark sesame oil

Directions
In a Ziploc bag, add the marinade and tuna cubes. Remove the air as much as possible and let it marinate in the refrigerator for a few hours (in my case, it was close to10 hours).
Just before serving, take out the tuna cubes, blot off the excess marinade using a paper towel.
>Remove the stone and skin from the avocado, cut into bite-sized pieces, dress with either lemon juice or yuzu juice (to prevent discoloration, I used yuzu juice from the bottle).
Mix the tuna and avocado in a bowl ( I added a few more drops of Yuzu juice).
Serve on the perilla leaves and garnish with a chiffonade of perilla and some sesame seeds.

This was pretty good especially considering that the frozen yellowfin tuna which was passed its prime. I thought we would add soy sauce when we ate it but the tuna was nicely seasoned and there was no need to add soy sauce. Since it was marinated in red wine, this could have gone well with red wine but we had cold sake.

Acorn squash avocado muffins スクワシュ、アボカドマフィン

This muffin came about because we had a small amount of left over cooked acorn squash and a very ripe avocado.  Amazingly, my wife found a muffin recipe which used both these ingredients. The original recipe called for butternut squash but my wife (the wizard of substitution) thought the cooked acorn squash would work just fine. This recipe seemed such an implausible combination of ingredients she just had to make it.

Ingredients: makes 12 muffins (This is based on a recipe found on line but my wife changed a few items because of ingredients we had).

1 cup of cooked acorn squash (to cook the squash, cut in half, remove the seeds, place the cut side down on a cookie sheet and bake at 350F for 30 minutes or until it becomes soft then scoop out the cooked meat).
2 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cup almond flour
1 tbs baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup sugar
4 eggs
1 small ripe avocado, skin and stone removed and mashed (about 1/2 cup)
1/2 cup Greek yogurt
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 almond extract
2/3 cup milk

Directions:
Combine the wet ingredients (#1) and the dry ingredients (#2).
Mix the wet and dry ingredients in a bowl with a spatula until well combined (#3)
Place the batter in muffin tin (This filled 12 wells) (#4)
Bake 350F for 25 minutes (#5 and 6).

After tasting this muffin you would never in a million years guess that is was made with squash and avocado. The flavor was slightly sweet with a hint of cinnamon and maybe (if you really really looked for it) a slight hint of avocado. The texture was moist with a fine crumb--a very nice breakfast muffin. If we hadn't made it ourselves we never would have believed it.

Hanami 2020 #3 with Uni and tuna from Catalina ３日目の花見、カタリナの刺身

After we had our first hanami celebration meal of Tako Grill take out, we received some shashimi items from Catalina Offshore products. It is rare now-a-days that they have gold uni from California but they had it and I ordered it with Pacific bluefin tuna loin, salmon and "ankimo" Monkfish liver. The fish arrived Saturday and we had our second hanami of tuna sashimi and a half of uni that evening. The other items contributed to the third continuation of hanami. I prepared half of the uni as "shio-uni" 塩うに or salted uni. The uni arrived in this plastic container which works much better than traditional wood tray.

The uni was nicely formed (not fragmented or dissolved). It was a nice orange color. Its been a while since we had uni from Catalina. We have been getting some uni from Maruhide but this one was pretty good.

I enjoyed half as sashimi and prepared the other half as "Shio uni" or salted uni. I read that this was a very usual preparation in Aomori prefecture 青森県 which is the norther most part of the main land Japan, "Honshu"本州. Most of the recipes (all in Japanese) call for 100 grams of uni and 12 grams of salt. Place the uni slightly apart in a flat sealable container lined with a paper towel, and sprinkle with the salt (see below). I put on the lid and placed it in the refrigerator for three hours. After three hours, moisture came out and was absorbed by the paper towel. Since we were going to consume the uni the next day, I just move the uni to a smaller sealable container. If you use a sterilized container (a glass jar sterilized  in boiling water, cooled and dried), the uni should last at least 1 week in the refrigerator).

In any case, I forgot to take a picture when we had this the next day. To serve it I made a bottom layer of thinly sliced mini cucumber on a plate and put the salted uni on the top. We folded the cucumber and uni into single serving seasoned nori sheets 味付け海苔 and enjoyed the combination of flavors. The uni became bit more creamy with more intense flavor. Definitely I will use this technique to preserve and enhance the flavor of uni in the future.

In any case, we had the remaining tuna two ways; one is tuna cubes with avocado 鮪とアボカドの角切り(seasoned with finely chopped garlic, sesame oil and soy sauce).

Another was just straightforward tuna sashimi with blanched broccoli with sesame dressing ブロッコリーの胡麻和え, salt broth snap peas スナップ豌豆の塩びたし, Japanese omelet 出汁巻 and "asazuke" 浅漬け of cucumber and daikon.

In any case, we had a very good 3rd hanami.

Six "otoshi" appetizers お通し6種類

Although I secretly aspire to come up with 6 appetizers to start a meal like we enjoyed at two special izakayas, "Suiko" 酔香 or "Shuhai" 酒杯  in Japan, my appetizer count usually falls short. But one evening I found I could fairly easily come up with a set of 5 appetizers.  After giving it some thought I realized I could make one more for a total of six. Yay! The extra dish, however, did not make the group pic. Its portrait is, nonetheless, shown below.

The upper row from left to right are Chinese-style squid salad (store-bought) with my sugar snap in salt broth, grilled fish cake (store bought) with blanched broccolini dressed in mustard soy sauce, Russian marinated salmon (leftover from the previous evening). (It had been marinading for 2 days by then). The lower row from left to right are octopus leg, cucumber slices and Campari tomato dressed in sumiso sauce and "mizuna" oshitashi 水菜のお浸しtopped with bonito flakes.

Although it missed the group picture, the sixth appetizer was; salmon sashimi and avocado cubes dressed in soy sauce, sesame oil, chiffonade of perilla and finely chopped garlic. The salmon was leftover from the prior evening. I made a slight modification by salting one side and searing it with a kitchen torch before cutting it into cubes. This added an additional grilled flavor and slight crusty texture.

The dish shown below is Chinese-style squid salad 中華風イカサラダ  bought at our Japanese grocery store. The variation of this appears to be available at Catalina offshore products as well.

Below is a small deep fried fish cake which is almost always available at our Japanese grocery store. This appears to be locally made and is pretty good. We heat it up in the toaster oven. I dressed blanched broccolini florets with mustard soy sauce (I now make several Japanese sauces in small squeeze bottles and store them in the refrigerator for instant use).

This was leftover Russian marinaded salmon I made the night before. This marinaded a total of 2 days and was almost completely "chemically" cooked but the onion was better now (marinating just overnight,  the sweet onion was a bit too raw). I topped this with salmon roe and garnished it with perilla.

The dish below came about due to a mistake I made. I thought I got a bunch of edible chrysanthemum 春菊 but instead it was Japanese mizuna 水菜. I blanched it very quickly for 20 seconds, drained and cooled it down by fanning and squeezed out the moisture (I did this in the morning and kept it in a Ziploc bag in the fridge.) I made this to "ohitashi" お浸し("hitasu" in Japanese is to "soak", I made the sauce with equal parts Japanese dashi and concentrated noodle sauce and  "soaked" the mizuna) and topped it with bonito flakes. My wife preferred edible chrysanthemum but this was different and nice in its own right.

We still had the tip portion of the octopus leg left over. I just cut it up into small chunks and mixed the pieces with vinegared cucumber slices and quartered Campari tomato and dressed in sumiso (from the squeeze bottle I prepared earlier).

So with the help of store-bought and leftover items from the previous evening, I finally made a set of 6 appetizer to start the evening--mission accomplished!

Avocado prosciutto muffin アボカド プロシュート マフィン

I had an excess of ripe avocados. I asked my wife if she could use some. As she is a devotee of muffins, she found this avocado bacon recipe on-line. Since we also had an excess prosciutto, she modified the recipe to avocado prosciutto muffin. This turned out to be a great and unique muffin, a complete breakfast.

This is the cut surface just cooled down to room temperature after coming out of the oven, You can see the melting cheese, avocado and prosciutto. Unfortunately, this is a rather rich muffin with eggs and cheese as well.

Ingredients (makes 12 muffins):
3 cups flour (#1)
2 tbs baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
4 1/2  tsp sugar
1 pinch cayenne pepper (#1)
1  1/2 cup grated cheese; we used a mixture of smoked gouda, sharp cheddar and pepper jack cheeses (#2).
2 tbs chopped chives
4 slices prosciutto, cut into small pieces and cooked until crispy (#3).
113 grams (whole stick) of unsalted butter melted
2 eggs
1 1/2 cup milk
1 avocado, stone and skin removed and cut into small cubes (coated with lemon juice to prevent discoloration) (#4)

Directions:
Combine the flour, baking powder, salt, sugar and cayenne in a bowl. Shred the cheeses. Cook the prosciutto until crispy. Cut up the avocado and coat with lemon juice so it doesn't discolor.
In another bowl combine the egg, butter and milk. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix until combined. Fold in the prosciutto and avocado #5. Scoop into a heavily greased muffin tin. Cook in a 400 degree oven for 18 to 20 minutes #6. Let cool for 5 minutes and remove from the muffin tin.

These muffins are a meal in themselves. They are decadently delicious. We would never have considered adding avocado to a baked good but it maintains it's shape and consistency. It adds a nice moist texture element. The smoked cheese did not melt completely while the other cheeses amalgamated into the bread. This added yet another texture element and burst of flavor. We will be making these again.

Sashimi salmon four ways 刺身用のサーモン

We found frozen salmon for sashimi and boiled octopus legs in our freezer. I bought these items from Catalina offshore products last December for the 2019 New Year's celebration. At that time we also got frozen tuna sashimi which we ate soon after it was purchased for New Year. The piece of salmon was quite large and we had enough other food for the New Year. It ended up uneaten and stored in the freezer. In addition, I had purchased the frozen octopus legs as a kind of "insurance policy" in case, as has happened some years, we could not get the octopus legs for New Year from our Japanese grocery store. This year we were able to get it, however. So, the extra octopus joined the huge piece of salmon in the freezer. As my wife so aptly pointed out 'frozen fish, unlike wine does not improve with age', we decided to enjoy the salmon and octopus while we could. Since the salmon sashimi was 1 lb (which is a lot of sashimi salmon for the two of us), I  had to come up with a plan on how to use it up. These are the several dishes I came up with. The first dish was a no brainer; sashimi. I added some Japanese dashimaki omelet だし巻き卵, which I had made earlier, and green beans with sesame dressing.

This salmon was not fatty but was quite good. I arranged it into the shape of a rose.

The boiled octopus was sliced thinly in a wavy cut as usual. I made sumiso sauce to my wife's specification (not too vinegary). I thought it was a bit more chewy than the octopus we usually get from the Japanese grocery store but it tasted very fresh (not fishy at all).

The second salmon sashimi dish was very similar to what I posted before. Just in case we needed some spiciness, I served it with Japanese red pepper paste (from a tube).

The dressing was a mixture of lemon juice, sesame oil, soy sauce and garlic. I mixed in finely chopped chives as well.

The third dish was instant Gravlax. Instead of vodka I used gin this time. It added, of course, a gin-flavor. I thought this might be too strong but my wife liked it. Since we ate it all before I remembered to take a picture I am using "stock footage" by posting a previously posted old picture.

The fourth dish was Russian  marinated salmon. Since I was using sashimi-grade salmon, I served it partially cooked, after only one day in the refrigerator. (I usually leave it three days in the marinade to make sure the salmon is fully ”chemically” cooked). The center of this salmon was still raw which added a more delicate fresh flavor. (Again I did not take pictures and I'm posting an old one here).

Since the gravlax and Russian marinated salmon stayed eatable longer than sashimi, we enjoyed these two items for a few days and finally  finished the salmon sashimi block. This was a tough job but somebody had to do it.