Couscous with fresh mint ミント入りクスクスサラダ

This combination of greens and salads was our lunch on one weekend. Among the three salads, salmon salad and potato salad are our usual but couscous salad with fresh mint is new. The greens are home-grown arugula, blanched broccoli, and sugar snaps. For color, I added skinned Campari tomato. After taking the pictures, I added my honey mustard dressing on the greens.

The couscous recipe came from WP food section as a way to use mint from your yard which may be profusely growing at this time of the year. The original included frozen sweet peas but we omitted it. Since we planted mint late spring this year, this was a recipe we had to try. The lunch included cheese muffins my wife made some time ago.  (She just realized we did not post the muffin recipe).

Ingredients (2 servings, for us more like 4-6 servings)
3/4 cup dried plain couscous.
1 cup chicken broth (our usual Swanson no salt and no fat kind).
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbs butter
1/4 cup finely minced fresh mint leaves.
1/4 tbs chopped parsley.

For dressing
1/4 cup live oil
1/4 rice vinegar
black pepper

Directions:
let the chicken broth with the salt, butter come to boil and add the couscous, remove from the heat and let it steep with the lid on for 15 minutes. Use a folk to fluff the grains and let it cool.
Add the minced mint and parsley (see below).

Mix the oil and vinegar together.

Mixed it into the couscous.

This is very refreshing couscous salad. Because of the dressing, it is not too dry and there is no danger of inhaling it (which can happen when eating dry couscous). Especially with the combination of other salads and greens, this is a really nice summer lunch. Once the salads are made up, it is a cinch to put together a lunch without having to do any cooking.

Polenta with tomato sauce and meatballs ポレンタとトマトソース

This was also inspired by a recipe in "Perfect Pairings" called "Baked Polenta Casserole".  The idea is to put polenta on the bottom of the casserole and add tomato sauce and pecorino cheese and bake it. In the" Perfect Pairings" book this dish was paired with Sangiovese. My wife makes polenta loaf every-now-and-then. She usually slices it into half inch thick slices, wraps it in plastic wrap and then aluminum foil and freezes it. So we usually have slices of her frozen polenta loaf in the freezer. I also made marinara sauce and meatballs several days ago. So we have all the ingredients to make this dish plus meatballs. We also added more vegetables (to make it healthier?) and used a combination of cheeses.  We had this with Cabernet from Napa (Do not remember which one) and the wine went very well.

The bottom is composed of one slice of the polenta loaf.

First, place three slices of polenta on the bottom of a small Pyrex baking dish, add sliced meat balls with marinara sauce. Add blanched broccoli and sugar snaps.

Top with slices of double Gloucester cheese and smoked Gouda.

This turned out to be a quite good dish. Since we already had all the ingredients ready to go, it was a synch to put it together. This went well with our red wine.

Cold "shippoku" udon noodle with simmered vegetables 冷製卓袱うどん

Since we had several hot and muggy days recently in the Washington DC area, I made this cold noodle dish from ingredients I had on hand. I had cold simmered vegetables and prepared udon noodles (which were leftover for making cold fresh tomato pasta dish). I call this cold "shippoku" udon 冷製卓袱うどん. This (warm version) is a popular dish in the Southern islands of Japan (Shikoku 四国 and Kyushu 九州). I do not know the exact definition of it but I take it as a noodle (either soba or udon) dish with lots of cooked veggies and other toppings. I made this all cold for a hot summer day.

Cold cooked vegetables included daikon, carrot, skinned Campari tomato and sugar snap. Since I had Chinese-style simmered pork or "Chashu" チャーシュー (this one is made from pork butt and has much more fat than meat made from pork loin), I cut it into batons and added it to the dish.

The original simmered vegetables included daikon, carrot, shiitake mushroom, Campari tomato (simmered in Japanese broth which was lightly seasoned with light colored soy sauce and mirin. After the veggies were soft/done, I let it cool and then refrigerated it). We ate the veggies by themselves for several days so by the time I made  this dish only a few pieces of daikon, carrot and tomato were remaining. The sugar snap was just blanched and cooled. For the broth, I added more concentrated noddle sauce from the bottle to the broth in which the veggies were cooked.

This was all leftover control but it was nice cold refreshing dish, perfect for our lunch over the weekend.

Nattou and avocado salad 納豆とアボカドのサラダ

I had several ripe avocados in the refrigerator. Whenever we have extra avocados, I usually make guacamole. This time, I remembered a Japanese recipe I saw that used nattou 納豆 and avocado. Since I had frozen nattou which was getting old, I decided to make this dish. As usual, I took the liberty of changing the recipe using my common sense. Since nattou is involved, I served with cold sake (our house sake "Mu" daiginjou 八重垣『無』大吟醸) as a first dish .

As a garnish, I used a chiffonade of basil and dried nori strips. The only reason I used basil instead of perilla was that some cuttings of basil which my wife had harvested were sitting in a glass of water on the counter in front of me. I served more nori strips on the side so we could add more as we ate the salad and mixed the ingredients together.

The avocado and tomato were dressed with Mayer lemon juice (I happened to have one. We love the flavors of Meyer lemon), olive oil and Kosher salt.

Ingredients (for 2 small servings):
1 small package of nattou, previously frozen, thawed, prepared by adding the sauce and mustard that comes in the package with the nattou. Using my nattou mixing contraption, I mixed well (a few hundred times). This will reduce the smell making it to palatable for my wife.

Half ripe avocado, stone and skin removed and cut into bite-size cubes
2 Campari tomatos, skinned (by blanching) and cut into bite-size cubes

Kosher salt, olive oil (we used our favorite spicy Spanish olive oil), and lemon juice from one half of a Meyer lemon (it has the taste between orange and lemon juice).
Several leaves of basil, cut into fine chiffonade
1 package of seasoned nori sheets, cut into thin strips

Directions:
Add the lemon juice to the avocado and tomato and coat well, season it with salt and drizzle olive oil.
Top it with half of the prepared nattou
Garnished it with chiffonade of basil leaves and nori strips

Before eating mix everything together and add more nori strips.

Although nattou was a bit sticky, at least, there was no strong smell (which is good for my wife). This is a really interesting combination and the addition of olive oil and Meyer lemon juice was a key to this dish.

Pizza two kinds ピザ２種類

Although I posted my pizza recipes before, since I am running out of new dishes I decide to post these two pizzas I made recently which were really enjoyable with a glass of red wine. The dough was hand stretched (not rolled) then transferred to a wooden pizza peel coated with cornmeal (for easy sliding off the paddle). Then bushed with garlic infused olive oil (crushed garlic plus oil).  The first one is Pizza Margherita. Instead of plain Mozzarella cheese I used smoked Mozzarella for this (more details of the recipe have been posted before).

As before I put slices of Mozzarella on the dough and then placed my marinara sauce on the slices of cheese. (the sauce was made from garlic, onion, skinned Campari tomato and several spices).  I put the sauce on the cheese instead of vice versa to prevent the moisture from the sauce making the dough/crust soggy, I put half of the torn basil on top before baking and added more after the pizza came out of the oven. I brushed the crust with the garlic infused oil on the outer edge and added grated Parmigiano Reggiano on the top.

The second pizza included ingredients my wife's suggested. The cheeses were Mozzarella (leftover from making the Margherita pizza), Double Gloucester and smoked Gouda, all finely diced and mixed.  I topped everything with oil cured black olives (stones removed) and pimento stuffed green olive (these olives were ear-marked for the Martinis I have on occasion...oh well).

I garnished the pizza with torn fresh basil and grated Parmesan.

The oven I use; (Miele) has an "intensive" mode which is set at 480F with intense heat from the bottom. I preheated the oven for 30 minutes with a pizza stone on the lower rack. I then slid the pizza onto the stone. It took less than 5 minutes for the pizza to cook. We ate one slice each from each of the two pizzas and then (we couldn't resist) shared one more slice. Luckily, our gluttony still left us with enough slices for leftovers. We wrapped the remaining pizza into 2 slice packets wrapped in plastic wrap and kept them in the refrigerator.  The slices heat up very nicely in the toaster oven (we use "toast" mode with the pizza slices on the aluminum foil). This is a great snack with a glass of red wine to look forward to after we come home from work.

Cold chicken stew with fresh tomato sauce 冷製チキンシチュー

This started out as a leftover control and turned out to be a very nice cold chicken vegetable stew perfect for hot summer. Whenever we barbecue a chicken in the Weber grill, we often use up the breast meat (for sandwiches) but often the dark meat gets left behind. In addition to the left over chicken dark meat, I found a small portion of daikon and 1/4 head of cabbage in the refrigerator.  So, I made chicken and vegetable stew. I had previously made fresh cold tomato sauce  for cold pasta with prosciutto and some of the sauce and Campari tomatoes were left over. So, I combined both dishes and served the combination cold with a garnish of basil chiffonade and a drizzle of our favorite spicy Spanish olive oil.

The addition of the tomato sauce really made this dish. It was perfect for hot summer as a starter.

Ingredients:

For Chicken vegetable stew
Cooked dark chicken meat, 2 legs, skin removed and meat torn into bite sized pieces
1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
1/4 head cabbage, core removed and cut into bit sized chunks
4 medium Russet potatoes, skinned and cut into bite size
2 inch long Daikon, skinned and sliced in to 1/2 inch thick and then quartered
2 medium carrots, skinned sliced and cut into small cubes
2 tbs olive oil
4 cups no salt chicken broth (Swanson)
Salt and black pepper for seasoning

For cold fresh tomato sauce
2 tbs olive oil
1-2 tbs concentrated Japanese noodle sauce (adjust amount depending on your taste)
6 skinned Campari tomato, quatered
1/2 clove garlic, through a garlic press

Directions:
For chicken vegetable stew
1. Heat the olive oil in deep pan, sauté the onion, and cabbage until wilted. Add the remaining vegetables, cooked chicken meat, and chicken stock. Simmer for 20 minutes or until all the vegetables are cooked.
2. Season it with salt and pepper.
3. Let it cool to room temperature and then refrigerate (of course you could eat this as hot stew).

For tomato sauce
1. In a mixing container (for an immersion blender), add the olive oil, garlic, noodle sauce, and 3 quatered tomatoes.
2. Blend using a immersion blender until everything is emulsified.
3. Add the remaining tomato pieces to the sauce.
4. Refrigerate at least 1 hour.

Assembly:
1. Put the cold stew in a glass bowl and add the fresh tomato sauce (the amount are arbitrary).
2. Lightly mix and taste, if needed add more salt or pepper.
3. Garnish with chiffonade of fresh basil or green perila leaves.
4. Drizzle with your favorite olive oil.

Although this was mostly left-over control, this is a very refreshing cold stew. This is perfect for hot muggy days of summer in Washington.

Spinach Spaetzle ホウレン草スペーツル

After a great success of making spaetzle using our newly acquired spaetzle maker, my wife made this spinach spaetzle. (What's the old adage, "the right  tool for the job"). She made this basically because we had a bit of spinach left over from another dish. This was light supper and I served spinach spaetzle with meat balls in tomato sauce and green beans.

With the spaetzle maker, the size of the spaetzle is just right and it is much easier to make. By-the-way, it may look like there are peas on the plate in the picture above but it is actually the spaetzle as shown in the close-up below. I heated it up by sautéing in a bit of olive oil.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup thawed, drained frozen spinach (we used fresh spinach cooked without any addition of water).
1 cup low-fat (1%) milk
1 egg
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1/8 teaspoon grated nutmeg
2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, for cooking spaetzle

Directions:
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil.

In a blender, combine spinach, milk, egg, oil and nutmeg (#1 and #2); blend until spinach is puréed. Whisk flour and salt together in a large measuring cup (using a measuring cup makes it easier to pour the batter into the hopper of the spaetzle maker). Stir in spinach mixture. (#3).  In several batches pour the batter into the hopper of the spaetzle maker.  Slide the hopper back and forth over the base plate with holes (#4 & #5). Cook until noodles float and firm up, about 1 minute. Lift spaetzle out with a strainer and transfer to a colander to drain and drizzle on some olive oil to keep them from sticking together. (#6)  Repeat with remaining dough.

When ready to serve, melt butter in a large skillet over high heat. Add spaetzle and cook, tossing frequently, until spaetzle just begins to brown.

Although we really did not taste the spinach, it adds a nice green color. This is a welcome change from our usual forms of pasta. Despite a good amount of nutmeg, it is not at all overwhelming. The texture was firm enough to hold together but still very tender.

Pork-Ricotta meatballs リコッタチーズ入りミートボール

I often make pork or chicken meatballs. I usually add eggs and panko to make them light and tender. Instead of frying, I usually bake them. I came across this recipe in the Wall street Journal. The original recipe was for lamb meatballs. Since I had my usual hand-chopped ground pork from the trimmings of pork tenderloin, I made meatballs with pork and my usual seasoning but added Ricotta cheese instead of bread crumbs. I served the meatballs with tomato sauce I made from fresh and skinned Campari tomato. I added blanched broccoli as a side.

My wife added some sweet potato Gnocchi she made some time ago and froze. She just cooked them simply in butter. This made it a complete dinner but I took the picture before the gnocchi was added so it does not appear.

Ingredients:
For meatballs:
1 lb ground pork (I used  hand chopped trimmings of pork tenderloins.)
1/3 lb whole milk Ricotta cheese
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 jalapeño pepper, seeded, de-veined and finely chopped
3 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stem removed and finely chopped
2 eggs
1 tsp smoked paprika
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For tomato sauce:
1/4 cup olive oil
6 skinned fresh Campari tomatos, quartered  (I usually have this prepared over the weekend but when we do not finish them during the week, I use them to make tomato sauce)
3 cloves of garlic, finely minced
1/2 medium onion, finely minced
1/2 tsp each of dried oregano and basil
2 bay leaves
Pinch of red pepper flakes
Kosher salt
(Optional) 1/4 tsp baking soda (Although made form fresh Campari tomatos and the sauce is not too acidic I still add baking soda to further reduce acidity) and 1/4 tsp of sugar.

Directions:
For meatballs:
Sautee the onion, jalapeño and shiitake mushroom in olive oil until the onion is transparent. Season with salt and pepper. Let it cool to room temperature.
Mix all other ingredients into the onion mixture (I was going to adjust the consistency if it was too soft by adding bread crumbs or flour but it was just right and I did not add them).
Using a medium size ice-cream scoop, make meatballs and place it in a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil coated with olive oil.

The green is from jalapeño pepper.

I cooked it in a preheated 350F oven toaster in convection mode for 30 minutes. The bottom became flat but that does not bother me.

For tomato sauce:
Put the olive oil in a deep sautée pan on low heat and add the red pepper and garlic.
When the garlic is fragrant, add the onion and sautée for several minutes on medium flame until soft and transparent, add the campari tomatos with its juice, add the oregano, basil and bay leaves, mix and simmer until the sauce is reduced to the consistency you like (30-40 minutes).
Taste and add salt and sugar (optional).  I also added the baking soda. It causes the sauce to start foaming.  Keep stirring and let it simmer further until all the bubbles subside.

Adding Ricotta and Parmesan cheese made the meatballs very tender and flavorful. This is definitely more high fat meatball but certainly good. I may make this with ground lamb and more closely following the original recipe some day. By adding my wife's gnocchi, this was a well balanced and satisfying dinner that goes so well with red wine.

Chicken and fresh tomato stew 鶏と新鮮トマトシチュー

This started as a leftover control dish but turned out to be very good.  This started because we had a whole roasted Cornish game hen leftover (cooked in the Weber grill with wood smoke). We had cooked two birds but between the two of us, half a bird was more than enough. So, one was leftover. When I roasted them this time I stuffed a mixture of goat cheese and chopped fresh rosemary between the skin and breast meat. I also stuffed the cavity with garlic, celery, onion, and a sprig of rosemary. So, it was rather good roasted chicken to begin with.  I also had half a small head of cabbage which was getting old. So I decide to make a stew using these two items.

Although I made regular stew with chicken broth first, I added fresh tomato puree with concentrated Japanese noodle sauce, pressed garlic and olive oil (the sauce for cold noodle/spaghetti with prosciutto) and warmed it up briefly. I garnished with EV olive oil and chiffonade of basil.

Ingredients:
Cornish game hen, one, smoke roasted in Weber (any fresh chicken parts will do as well). Back bone removed, separated into parts and the breast cut in quarters.
Cabbage, 1/2 head, core removed and cut into large chunks
Onion, one large, cut into large chunks
Celery, several stalks, cut into 2 inch and 1/2 inch buttons (or chopped)
Carrot, 3-4 medium, peeled and cut into large chunks
Olive oil, 2 tbs
Chicken broth, several cups or enough to cover the ingredients. (I used Swanson no fat 1/3 less salt version).
Black pepper to taste (in our case, the chicken surface was well seasoned and I did not add nay salt or pepper).

For fresh tomato sauce (Puree all using an immersion blender)
Skinned and quartered Campari tomato, 3-4
Garlic, 2-3 cloves, pressed through a garlic press
Concentrated Japanese noodle sauce, 2-3tbs
Light olive oil, 2-3 tbs

Directions:
In a large pot, heat the olive oil and sautéed onion, celery, cabbage until the cabbage is wilted.
Add the chicken parts and the carrot, cover it with the chicken broth.
Simmer it for 1 hour or so.(I let it cooled down at this point).

Put the serving amount (for two dinner servings in our case) in a sauce pan. Add an even distribution of the chicken and vegetables for the two servings with some broth and heat it up.
Add the fresh tomato sauce and warm up but do not boil.
Check the taste and if needed season with Kosher salt
Garnish with the basil and a good olive oil (second time I used lemon-infused oil with a good result).

This is a really surprisingly good stew. The fresh tomato sauce really made the difference. It added an additional dimension of depth that did not exist in the stew without the sauce. The lemon-infused olive oil also did a good job. This is very fresh tasting stew. With a piece of bread, this is a complete meal.

Calamari salad カラマリサラダ

I like squid and octopus. So, when I see squid at the grocery store, I tend to buy it without thinking about what I will make from it. The kind of squid we can get here is small, pre-cleaned, and previously frozen. In the past, I have posted so many ways I cook squid. This time, I bought 1 lb. I made half my usual way sautéed squid with celery and cucumber イカと胡瓜、セロリの炒めのもの. The next day, I asked my wife how she would like to have the remaining boiled squid. I offered two selections: one was Japanese style with cucumber and wakame seaweed dressed in karashi-miso sauce イカとワカメの酢味噌和え, the other was  some kind of salad in Western-style (details not specified since I had no idea what I would do at the time I made the offer). She, of course, opted for the salad. 

So, I just whipped this up without any recipe using what I had available on hand.

I had just bought oil-cured black olives so I threw them in as well.

Ingredients (for two servings):
1/2 lb squid, cleaned, The tubes cut into 1/2 inch wide rings and the tentacles cut into two.
1 American mini-cucumber, quartered and seeds removed, and cut into small cubes
6 Oil-cured black olives, stone removed
Fresh basil, cut into chiffonade
Baby arugula, skinned Campari tomato
Lemon juice from one lemon
Olive oil, 1-2 tbs
Salt and pepper

Directions:
Boil squid 30 seconds in boiling water with salt and sake added, drain, let cool, then refrigerate until serving (up to one day)
In a bowl, add the squid, cucumber, basil, lemon juice and olive oil and mix. Season with pepper and salt
I served the calamari on a bed of baby arugula leaves (stems removed). I topped the salad with black olives and added a side of sliced Campari tomato. I then sprinkled the salad with our favorite Spanish olive oil.

Since it was a rather hot and humid day, for a change, we enjoyed chilled (a bit unusual) white Rioja called Fernandez Gomez Seleccion Familia White Rioja 2015. It is a blend of Viura 70%, Grenache White 20%, Malvasia 10% and was aged in barrels for 6 months with its lees. We never had white Rioja before. This is rather a pleasant white with some peaches and apricots and a hint of vanilla. We could also sense slight oak and crisp acidity. This went perfectly with this calamari salad.

Cabbage rolls with "gomoku" tofu 五目豆腐の春キャベツ包み

This is another vegan recipe from the Buddhist monk who appears regularly on a Japanese newspaper site.  Since I do not subscribe to this newspaper, I cannot get all parts of the recipe but I could watch a short video accompanying the recipe. It gave enough information for me to make, at least, a similar dish. This is a variation of Japanese cabbage rolls or rolled cabbage ロールキャベツ. This is, however, totally vegan. This is a Japanese-Western fusion and uses a interestingly different type of tomato sauce.

To carry on the Japanese-Western fusion 和洋折衷 theme, I garnished with fresh basil leaf and chiffonade.

Inside the roll is tofu and a combination of vegetables. Using a combination of many food items is sometimes called "Gomoku" 五目. "Gomoku" literally means "five items" but, in Japanese culinary parlance, it just means many items. I took the liberty of coming up with my own vegetable combination for this dish.

Ingredients (4 rolls):
1. Spring cabbage leaves, four, separated and boiled for 10 minutes until pliable. Shave off the thickest part of the veins and set aside.
2. Vegetables for stuffing: I chose white and brown "shimeji" しめじ mushrooms (white and brown beech mushrooms), separated and the bottom cut off, thin rectangles of carrots, thin squares of daikon (I happened to have simply simmered daikon in kelp broth) and julienne of hydrated and cooked kelp (again this was a byproduct of making simmered daikon). The amount was arbitrary (#1 picture below).
3. Firm (momen-goshi 木綿漉し) tofu 1/4, parboiled
4. Soy sauce (2 tbs), Kelp broth (1/4 cup), sake (2 tbs), vegetable oil and dark sesame oil for sautéing.
5. Tomato juice (I used V8 juice for more interesting flavors), 5.5oz
6. Campari tomato, skinned, and cut into quoters, 5. 7. Potato starch, 1 tsp

Directions.
1. In a small sauce pan, I added a small amount of vegetable oil and a splash of sesame oil and sautéed the vegetables. I added a small amount of kelp broth, soy sauce and mirin and braised (#2) until the liquid was almost evaporated.
2. Meanwhile, I parboiled the firm tofu for 2-3 minutes. When both the vegetables and the tofu cooled down enough to handle, I added the tofu to the vegetables crushing it into chunks by hand (#3). 3. I divided the filling into 4 portions and placed each portion in one of the four base cabbage leaves (#4) and rolled (#5).
4. In a pan in which the cabbage rolls could snugly fit, I added 5-6 oz of kelp broth and V8 juice (1 can or 5.5oz) and seasoned with soy sauce and sake (regular V8 or tomato juice contain a good amount of salt, so I adjusted the soy sauce by tasting.) (#6).
5. I put the cabbage rolls into the sauce, put on the lid and cooked on simmer for 15-20 minutes (#7).
6. I took out the rolls and kept them warm. Meanwhile, I added the cut-up tomato to the sauce and cooked on medium flame for  5-10 minutes reducing the sauce slightly (#8).
7. I added a potato starch slurry (with sake or water) and thickened the sauce. 8. I tasted  it and added a pinch of sugar (optional).

Since this is vegan, it does not have an impact of meat containing cabbage rolls but the tomato sauce was very gentle and not too acidic (may be the benefit of using fresh and skinned Campari tomatoes). This is a very good and healthy way to enjoy spring cabbage.

Squid in beer sauce tapa イカのビールソース煮タパ

We like squid. The only type of squid available in our regular grocery store is relatively small, cleaned and previously frozen. We can occasionally get a frozen, larger whole squid (probably "Surume-ika" スルメイカ) at the Japanese grocery store. In any case, here again, I got a pound of squid from our grocery store. I asked my wife how I should cook it and she reminded me of a tapa dish I used to make frequently but have not made in a long time. So, I consulted my tapas cookbook  and made this squid in beer sauce.

The recipe calls for small squid (less than 4 inches long). Many of the squid I had just bought were that size but some were larger so I cut them into two or three pieces. I served the dish at (room temperature) garnished with a wedge of Meyer lemon and chopped parsley as a small starter dish.

This went well with the Tempranillo we were enjoying (Ribera del Duero 2010 Matanegra Vendimia Seleccionada, WA 92 points).

Ingredients:
1 lb small squid tubes and tentacles, cleaned. If much larger than 4 inches long cut into several pieces.
1  medium sweet onion, finely chopped
3 cloves of garlic, crushed and peeled
1 bay leaf
1 medium tomato, skinned, seeded and chopped (I used 5 skinned Campari tomatoes)
4 tbs olive oil
Salt, pepper and sugar (1/4 tbs)
1/2 cup beer (I used rather hoppy Samuel Adams Brown ale)

Directions:
1. I put 2  tbs of olive oil in a sauce pan on a low flame and added the garlic stirring until fragrant and starting to turn color and added the onion and let it gently cook for 10 minutes with a lid on (#1 below).
2. After the onion was cooked, I added the tomato, bay leaf, sugar, salt and ground black pepper (#2) and kept cooking for another 5 minutes uncovered.
3. In a shallow casserole (I used my antique Pyrex ware), I added 2 tbs of olive oil and heated on a medium flame and sautéd the squid (#3) for 2-3 minutes and added the beer (#4), covered, lowered heat, and simmered for 10 minutes.
4. I added the onion-tomato sauce (#5), covered and cooked another 25 minutes (#6).
5. I removed the squid to a plate and set aside. On a medium flame, I reduced the sauce in half or until thickened (#7).
6. I returned the squid to the pan and cooked 10 more minutes (#8).

The squid was very tender and the sauce was great. My wife reminded me that we used to use this as a pasta sauce.

Cold tofu with fresh tomato sauce 冷奴の新鮮トマトソースかけ

We really like cold angel hair pasta with tomato sauce. We made this dish multiple times this summer. Since the tomato sauce is so refreshing and good, I used it for our cold tofu.

To give a bit of a different taste, I garnished it with real wasabi and aonori. I also added a bit more mentsuyu めんつゆ or concentrated noodle sauce.

The cold tofu I used was from "Otoko-mae tofu". This is called "San-ren-chan" 三連チャン  (mahjong terminology) with three square tofu containers strung together as one package. When it is unmolded, you can sort of see the Kanji character "Otoko" 男 on the surface.

I just poured on the tomato sauce (skinned Campari tomato with olive oil and  3x concentrated Japanese "Mentsuyu" sauce, please see the previous post for recipe)

This was really good. I think this will work with either basil or perilla as well. Nice cold refreshing dish for summer.

Cold pasta with smoked salmon and tomato トマトと燻製サーモンの冷製パスタ

This is a variation of cold pasta with tomato. We really liked this dish and tried to make it again on one hot and humid weekend.  We already had cooked thin Udon noodles and we had Campari tomato but we did not have prosciutto. My wife suggested we substitute smoked salmon.  

Just to change the appearance, I garnished the top with a chiffonade of basil and strips of smoked salmon and freshly cracked black pepper.

I also added a bit of the Spanish olive oil we really like,

The sauce was prepared as I posted before. Instead of pasta, we used thin Japanese Udon noodle (this was "sanuki" udon 讃岐うどん). This combination worked well. The saltiness of prosciutto is probably a better combination but this variation is no slouch.