Prosciutto-wrapped Haddock 生ハム巻きハドック (コダラ)

Haddock is not fish we usually cook but we had some in our freezer which we received as part of a “white fish sampler” from Vital Choice. Although we finished all the “Chilean sea bass” and almost finished all the “sable fish or black cod”, sole and haddock were left behind. So we decide it is time to try the haddock. I was not familiar with this fish in Japan but the Japanese name is reportedly either “Kodara コダラor montuski-dara 紋付ダラ”.  From our previous experience, haddock is not our all time favorite. If you are going for “cod family”, true cod is much better. Then, my wife found this recipe for “prosciutto-wrapped haddock”. We thought wrapping in prosciutto may give the haddock an additional dimension and make it a bit more interesting. The original recipe was a “baking pan” affair in which the main and side dish are cooked in a baking pan in the oven. I decided to cook the haddock as well as the vegetables in a frying pan. The haddock was much better this way but still faces stiff competition from Chilean sea bass and sable fish. As a side I cooked green beans, shallot and skinned Campari (or cocktail) tomato in the same frying pan I cooked the fish.

Ingredients:
One filet of haddock, thawed and cut into two small servings, skin removed (I removed the skin but skin is very delicate and probably not need be removed).
Prosciutto, enough to wrap the two filets (2-3 slices)
Black pepper
Olive oil and butter

For the side
10 green beans, blanched
1 shallot, sliced 
2 Campari tomatoes, skinned
Olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Season the haddock with pepper (but not salt since prosciutto has enough salty flavor), wrap the filets with the slices of prosciutto 
In a 10 inch non-stick frying pan, add the olive oil on medium flame. When the oil is hot add the shallot and sauté until lightly caramelized, add the green beans and tomato and cook for another minute, season with salt and pepper
Push the vegetables to the side to make space in the center of the pan. Add the olive oil and butter and place the prosciutto wrapped filets
Cook one side for 1-2 minutes, turn it over and cook another minutes or until done.
Serve it with the side of the vegetables and wedges of lemon.

This is not bad. It really “kicked-it-up-a-notch”. But if we have a choice we would choose other fish. We may try this with true cod or halibut.

Simmered Dried Daikon Threads 切り干し大根の煮物

I realized that I posted this same dish 14 years ago. Although the statute of limitation may have passed I am re-blogging this recipe. This is because in the intervening years additional sources of Japanese food items which previously were not available have become available and I recently got a new package of “kiriboshi daikon” 切り干し大根 (*digression alert) or “threaded and dried daikon” from “Japanese Taste”. So I decided to make this traditional dish (picture #1).

*”Kiriboshi” is an example of  Japanese language form referred to as “rendaku” 連濁 or “sequential voicing”. In sequential voicing, when two words are combined to make a compound word, the first consonant of the second word which would generally be “unvoiced” which is called “seion 静音” in the combination becomes “voiced” i.e. when pronounced you can feel your vocal chords vibrate. In this example, kiri 切り(is an adjective for the state of being cut) and hoshi 干し is an adjective for dried. In the process of making a compound word meaning cut and dried “kiri+hoshi” becomes “kiri-boshi” i.e. the h in hoshi remains silent or unvoiced so it becomes b which is voiced which is called “dakuon 濁音”. This is a common thing in combined words in Japanese. (This is Japanese grammar 101/102 the short course—enjoy). 

I served this as a part of starting appetizers. This is a very gentle slightly sweet (from the dried daikon. The drying process makes the daikon sweeter) taste was enhanced with “Umami” of kelp and bonito broth. In the picture below, the dish on the right is salmon kelp roll, blanched sugar snaps and skinned Campari tomato. The kelp for the salmon kelp rolls is called “Hidaka kelp” 日高昆布 from Hokkaido. It has a nice texture. I got this also from “Japanese taste”.

Ingredients:
1 package (30gram) of “kiriboshi daikon”, washed and soaked in water to hydrate for 30 minutes and drained. The excess water (the daikon) squeezed dry.

One sheet (a full size one) deep dried tofu or abura-age 油揚げ, soaked in hot water and squeezed dry, cut in half lengthwise and cut into thin strips.
One medium carrot, peeled, sliced thin on bias and then julienned.
Kelp and bonito broth, enough to cover the above ingredients, about 200ml.
2 tbs x4 concentrated Japanese noodle sauce (or 1 tbs each soy sauce and mirin).
1 tsp vegetable oil and a splash of roasted sesame oil
Green beans, blanched in salted water for 3-4 minutes, the amount arbitrary

Directions:
Add the vegetable oil with a splash of roasted sesame oil in a sauté pan on medium flame.
Add the carrot and stir for a minute, add the daikon and abura-age, stir briefly
Add the broth to cover the ingredients and simmer
Season it with the noodle sauce (or the soy sauce and mirin), simmer for 30-40 minutes until the liquid is mostly reduced
I did not cook green beans with the rest of the ingredients because they were very good green beans and I did not want to over cook them. I just boiled them for 3 minutes to cook them but keep them crunchy. Before serving, slice the green beans on bias and garnish.

This is a nice seemingly simple dish which actually has fairly complex combination of flavors and textures. The daikon is slightly chewy and the abura-age has a rough texture and almost tastes like meat. Perfect for a small appetizer. 

Yakitori de le Canard 鴨ささみで焼き鳥

Last time we had duck tenders as a cutlet, we said we will make Yakitori using the duck tenders (a.k.a. “Yakitori de le canard” 鴨焼き鳥). Finally we managed to do it. I thought about how to prepare it and decided to marinate it and then cook it in the toaster oven. Since it is duck, and Japanese generally think “kamo” or duck goes well with “negi” or onion more precisely Japanese “tokyo” scallion I also served grilled onion. (digression alert *). Since we recently got some really good green beans (which doesn’t happen all that  often), I also added blanched green beans on the side. The combination worked well and “Yakitori de le canard” was a great success (Picture #1).

* The Japanese expression is “鴨がネギを背負ってくる” meaning “duck flies in with onion on its back”. This expression is used when something fortuitous happens in your favor with little or no effort on your part. Or (if you are a conman) it refers to the perfect victim coming to you with money outstretched in their hand.

Ingredients (2 small serving of 4 duck tenders per serving)
8 Duck tenders
One medium onion cut into small wedges
2 tbs Ponzu soy sauce (from the bottle or equal mixture of citrus juice and soy sauce)
2 tbs sake

Directions:
Mix the sake and ponzu in a ziploc bag, place the duck tenders inside and remove as much air as possible and let it marinate overnight in the refridgerator.
Drain the marinade and pat the surface of the tenders dry
Skewer the tenders using a bamboo skewer (picture #2)
Skewer the onion wedges (picture #2)

Line the toaster oven tray with an aluminum sheet. Place the tenders and onion on a metal grate over the sheet and broil the duck tenders and onion 5-7 minutes per-side turning once until done (picture #3).

This was a good “yakitori”. The marinade (sake and ponzu) made the duck meat very tender and flavorful. I may have over cooked it a bit and the meat was lightly dry. the sweet onion went well with the duck. Next time, I can skip the skewering and  cook it in a frying pan.

Rescued green bean soup グリーンビーンズスープ

We like green beans but only when they are good i.e. crunchy but not fibrous with an almost sweet fresh flavor. Good green beans either steamed or boiled a short period of time can be crunchy but not fibrous and they are wonderful. But some green beans no matter how long you cook them remain so fibrous no amount of chewing will get through them. There is no way of knowing ahead of time (before you buy them) which category the green beans belong to. We mostly gave up getting green beans and sugar snap beans from our regular grocery store for this reason. We have had a much better chance of getting good ones from our gourmet grocery stores. But even that fails sometimes. This was such an occasion. The green beans were still unpleasantly fibrous after they were cooked. Since we had our Vita-mix out for another reason, we decided to give the beans a whir in the Vita-mix to see what would happen. It turned out the resulting paste/puree no longer classified as fibrous and it had a very nice green bean flavor. We kept the puree in a plastic container in the fridge but did not quite know how to use it. My wife suggested making a soup/potage. I obliged. We ate it for lunch one day. It turned out it was quite a decent soup. We will call it “green bean rescued soup”

My wife had just baked some muffins as an “apricot muffins rescue”; the fresh apricots were too mushy to eat. As part of what is turning out to be standard food rescue protocal she introduced the offending apricots to the Vita-mix and viola, she had apricot puree which she added to the muffin batter. So we had a lunch of the apricot muffin, green bean soup, sous vide chicken salad with mango, sugar snap in salt broth, corn, roasted pepper, edamame and bacon salad.

There is no recipe for green bean soup but just for the record.

Ingredients:
1 bag (32oz) fresh green beans, boiled for few minutes  in salted  water
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 tbs olive oil
1 tbs butter
1 cup whey (since we had it after my wife made cheese curd) (or chicken broth)
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Puree the green beans in the Vita-mix or other high-power blender adding a small mount of liquid and puree until smooth
Sauté the onion in the oil and butter on medium flame until cooked but not browned
Add the green bean puree and the whey and cook for 20-30 minutes.
Using an immersion blender, blend until smooth and no onion bits remain.
Season with salt and pepper

I served this hot initially but for the left overs, I diluted it with milk and served cold which was also quite nice. This is a great way to salvage green beans that otherwise because they are too fibrous would have been thrown out.