Apple pie アップルパイ

My wife found a gadget to make "pockets" in one of the catalogs as well as an accompanying cookbook and bought them. She immediately went into action to make apple pie.
She made it two ways. First she used store bought puff pastry (frozen) shown directly below.



She even put a small decoration on the top.



The crust puffed up nicely slightly squeezing the apple stuffing.

Secondly she used refrigerated pre-made pie crust. The recipe suggests either type of pie crust. The one made with pre-made pie crust is shown below.



She rolled out the pie crust rather thinly and cut out the rounds using the back of the gadget which is a cutter. She then sealed in the stuffing using an egg wash.



The below are the cut surfaces, this time, the crust and stuffing is in a good ratio or maybe the crust could have been a bit thicker.



These are very nice small individual apple pies. I asked my wife to provide the recipe below.


I used the same filling for both types of pie. The only difference was the crust.

3 apples peeled, cored and chopped in a food processor
2 tbs of sugar
1 tbs. flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 cup walnuts, toasted, brown skins rubbed off, and chopped.
Raisins (I didn’t use them but they would be good)

Mix the sugar, flour and cinnamon together.  Sprinkle over the apples mixture and blend in. (the flour soaks up any juices from the apples and makes a lovely “sauce”). Add the walnuts. Stir. Using a small ice cream scoop add the apple mixture to the crust, fold over and seal with the egg wash. Cook according to the instructions for the pie crust. I used 400 degree oven for about 15-20 minutes until the crust was golden brown.

These were great. The apples were flavorful and the walnuts added interesting texture to the filling. Both types of crust were buttery and flaky.  I froze the ones made with pie crust and they heat up well in the toaster oven. (The ones made with puff pastry didn’t last long enough to be frozen). Chopping up the apples meant that the filling was fully cooked in the short time it takes for the crusts to turn golden. These would make a very elegant dessert for guests.

Mac and Cheese version 2 マック アンド チーズ 第二弾

This is a variation on "Mac and Cheese". I saw this recipe in the NY times and mentioned it to my wife which was a mistake. Being a devotee of mac and cheese, she immediately wanted me to make it. The amount of cheese included in this recipe is a bit intimidating (a lot) but un-cooked macaroni goes in with the sauce and then the whole thing is baked, which makes it much easier to cook than my variation of mac and cheese.

The picture below shows what it looks like when it came out of the oven (this is a 7 inch diameter rather deep baking dish).



It is very cheesy but not as creamy as we expected. We may have over cooked it a bit, or maybe it needed some more milk.



This is very good but my original Mac and Cheese may be better (and probably less deadly). But adjusting the cooking time and amount of milk, this may really work. The recipe below is just replicated from the original recipe in the NY times. This is just for our record, please refer to the original for details and accuracy.

Ingredients:
Butter 2 tbs
Cottage cheese 1 cup
Milk 2 cups (or maybe more to achieve the desired texture)
Dry mustard 1 tsp
Cayenne pepper a pinch
Nutmeg, freshly grated a pinch
Salt 1/2 tsp
Black pepper, freshly ground 1/4 tsp
Sharp Cheddar Cheese 1lb (set aside 1/4 cup for the topping).
Elbow pasta, dry, 1/2 lb

Preheat the oven to 375F. Using half of the butter, butter the baking dish (the original recipe called for a 9 inch diameter, ours was a bit smaller and deeper but we had to put the overflow into another smaller ramekin).

Puree the cottage cheese, mustard, cayenne, nutmeg, salt, black pepper and milk in a blender. Mix the pureed milk-cheese mixture to the grated cheddar cheese and then mix in uncooked dry elbow pasta.

Cover the baking dish tightly with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes.

Uncover, stir, top it with the reaming cheese, dot with the 1tbs of butter (at this point, the mixture is still very liquid) and bake another 15 minutes. Let it stand for 15 minutes before serving.

This is very easy to prepare and really cheesy but was not as creamy as we expected. Also the leftovers solidified into an almost solid block of cheesy pasta that we had to slice with a knife. We also had to add a lot of milk to reheat the block we sliced to have it separate into its component parts. Not bad for a quick mac and cheese fix.

Carpaccio of octopus タコのカルパチオ

Having bought a 2 lb whole boiled and frozen octopus (which is a small octopus) from Fish-For-Sushi in preparation for the New Year,  I had to make some effort to finish it before it went bad. We had dinner guests a few days before new year. Although they were not known to enjoy an octopus, I decided to take a chance and serve Carpaccio of octopus.




When I made salmon gravlax,  I bought navel oranges which turned out to be very sweet and juicy—the best oranges we have had for some time. So I decided to use the orange fruit as well as a bit of it's juice.

Ingredients (for 4 servings):
Sweet onion: one medium, thinly sliced in rings using a Japanese Mandoline (Benriner)
Boiled octopus legs: 2 thinly sliced on bias.
Navel orange: one large, fruit separated from membrane and cut into small chunks
Watercress: remove thick stalks

Olive oil: Good fruity extra-virgin olive oil
Balsamic vinegar: Aged sweet syrupy one
Salt and pepper (I used smoked sea salt).

In a small serving dish, I freshly cracked some smoked sea salt. Then, I drizzled on lines of olive oil. I repeated the process this time with balsamic vinegar which I drizzled in lines perpendicular to the ones I made with the olive oil to form an olive oil, balsamic vinegar grid on the plate. I then scattered thinly sliced onion. I placed the slices of the octopus to cover the entire center portion of the plate. I added the orange chunks, more slices of onion, and then the watercress. I drizzled lines of olive oil and balsamic vinegar on the top, and sprinkled on the juice of the orange, salt and pepper.

This was a great hit. Our guests had never had octopus before. They guessed that the octopus was a “protein” but did not know what it was. We had this with champagne.

Grilled cheese Mochi rice cake 焼きチーズ餅

As a Japanese, I have to have mochi rice cakes 餅 on the new year. But, as is the case with many modern families in Japan, we only eat a small portion of the mochi we buy for the holiday. It is a “must have” for the Ozouni お雑煮 New Year's soup and we used it several times in oden おでん but we have mochi leftover even though we bought a smallest package (containing 10-15 mochi squares wrapped individually).

As a result, many Japanese on-line cooking sites have recipes for left over mochi. This recipe for grilled cheese mochi looked really interesting and I decided to make it for lunch. The great idea of this recipe is that, on one side, the cheese is melted and browned and on the other side, slightly melted, thus, you can enjoy two different cheeses.



To make this, I started cooking the mochi in a frying pan with a small amount of olive oil on low flame turning several times (for about 5 minutes) until the mochi soften and puff up slightly. I put the cheese slices on top (I used applewood smoked mozzarella cheese). When the cheese softened, I flipped the mochi over and placed another slice of cheese on the other side (now on the top). I let it cook until the bottom layer of the cheese melted, spread out a little and started browning. At the very end, I added a tiny amount of soy sauce. I placed the grilled cheese mochi on a small sheet of nori dried seaweed (above picture). When we made this the second time and I served it on a much larger nori sheet.



Since we had the leftover from new year's dishes, I also served some.



From left, daikon namasu garnished with ikura salmon roe, thinly sliced boiled octopus, kimpira burdock root, simmered Kabocha pumpkin, kelp salmon roll and New Year's omelet roll.

The combination of browned and soft cheeses, starch, soy sauce and nori cannot go wrong. This is a wonderful recipe and we will be consuming more mochi than ever this year. .

“Fearsome” sanuki-udon noodle 恐るべきさぬきうどん

Some people are truly dedicated to noodles (soba, udon and ramen). "Sanuki 讃岐" is an area in kagawa prefecture 香川県 on shikoku island 四国.  It is famous for its udon noodle which is called "Sanuki Udon 讃岐うどん".  There are many udon restaurants in this region of Sanuki and touring around these places appears to be popular among the dedicated. We like udon (but we are far from being udon connoisseurs) and often substitute it in western dishes for spaghetti.  We usually buy dried udon noodles (many of them are labeled "sanuki" udon). One day, when I was looking at dried udon noodles at the Japanese grocery store, I saw a package of semi dry udon noodle called "Fearsome" sanumi udon 恐るべきさぬきうどん. I was a bit curious as to what this was all about and got a package.　

I made this warm udon in broth or Kakeudon かけうどん  with a slice of barbecued pork, abura-age deep fried tofu and shimeji mushroom.



I also served my simmered "Kabocha" pumpkin.



The picture below shows a package of  "Fearsome" sanuki udon 恐るべきさぬきうどん.

The noodles are semi-dried and much longer (folded in half) and slightly thicker than the usual dried varieties. It takes a bit longer to cook as well. I cooked it as per the package instructions, washed it in cold running water and placed it in a broth on simmer. The noodle has a bit more bite or firmness in the center than regular noodles. It is good but we are not sure if it is worthwhile to specifically buy this kind.

I used the noodles another time to make "Nabeyaki" udon 鍋焼きうどん. Since I had mochi 餅 left over from New Year, I also added mochi in a fried tofu pouch as well as simmered vegetables (daikon 大根, carrott, kon-nyaku コンニャク、all pre-cooked in a seasoned broth). I also added an egg and scallions.



Just before serving, I removed the tooth pick and cut the mochi in the pouch.



In this dish, I cooked the noodles with the other precooked items and the egg for 5 minutes. The noodles stayed rather firm in the center. These semi-dried udon noodles are good but since we are not dedicated connoisseurs of udon, the differences between this and the usual kind is not great enough to seek out this particular kind.

Digression alert: I later learned that "Osorubeki sanuki udon" 恐るべきさぬきうどん is the name of a column that appeared in a local magazine in Kagawa. The entire series of columns were published as multiple books by Kazutoshi Tao (田尾和俊). These book are a detailed guide of large and small udon noodle places in Kagawa which was said to have popularized udon tourism and restaurant tours. This particular noodle producer must be one of these udon places and must have somehow gotten the right to use this name.