Corn, Roasted Ped Pepper, Edamame and Jalapeño Pepper Salad 玉蜀黍、ロースト赤パプリカ、枝豆とべーコンサラダ

Although it is not quite local corn season, fresh corn is available and on our last trip to Whole Foods my wife celebrated the season by stocking up on corn. She used it for various dishes and this is one of them. In addition, we got a bag of 6 red peppers. (Turns out it was much cheaper to buy the bag of peppers than to buy several peppers individually). My wife looked up corn salad recipes which used roasted red pepper on the internet. This dish is an amalgamation of the various ingredients used in those recipes with our own ideas mixed in. It has a nice color combination and tasted great.

Ingredients:
1 roasted red pepper, skin, ribs and seeds removed and cut into small squares
2 ears of fresh corn on cob, microwaved wrapped in wet paper towel for 2 minutes or more until cooked
1 sweet (Vidalia) onion, finely chopped
2 strips of bacon, cooked to crisp and crumbled
1 large jalapeño pepper, seeded, deveined and finely chopped
1 cup of boiled edamame, shelled (or lima beans)

For dressing:
1 tbs Dijon mustard
1 tbs honey
2 tbs rice vinegar (or any vinegar)
8 tbs or more fruity olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

For roasted red pepper
I roasted them at 450F in the toaster oven on convection mode for 20 minutes turning a few times so that all the surface was cooked/charred. I then put them in Ziploc bags to steam for 30 minutes. Once cooled down, remove the stem end, skin, ribs, seeds and peel. (The skin will come off easily).

Combine all the ingredients, add the dressing and stir well.

This is a great salad. The corn adds and lovely sweetness and crunch. Although I initially protested when my wife suggested using bacon, it adds a salty, smokiness and crunch which is really a great addition and a “must-have” for this salad. In addition to adding to the color the roasted red peppers adds a slightly spicy bite. The edamame yields yet another crunch dimension. The dressing adds a bright tart note. We will be making this one again.

Mini Apple Spiced Muffins アップルシナモンミニマフィン

We occasionally get a free cook booklets from Giant grocery store when we receive a grocery delivery. One of these include small “bites” type recipes. Since my wife is a devotee of “small bites” dishes, she decided to make one of these recipes. This is a kind of apple-cinnamon mini-muffin. This is very nice as a part of breakfast with nice classic apple-cinnamon flavors.

Ingredients: (makes about 24 to 30 mini-muffins)
1 apple, cored, skinned and cut into small pieces
1 cup bran cereal (we used Kellogg Special k,  since that was only cereal we had)
3/4 cup AP flour
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tps baking soda
3 tbs unsalted butter, melted
1 large egg
1 cup Greek yogurt (we used home-made and strained kind)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1tsp vanilla extract

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350F
Place the cereal in food processor and grind it to a fine texture. In a bowl, combine the cereal, flour, baking soda, and sugar.
In a separate bowl, mix the egg, butter, yogurt, cinnamon and vanilla.
Mix the wet and dry ingredients (do not over mix)
Fold in the apple
Add the batter in a greased mini muffin pan and bake 13-15 minutes.

For a freebee cookbook recipe, this is really good. My wife further expanded her repertoires. This is just the right size if you want a little added-something with your usual breakfast repertoire.

“Atsu-age” Fried-tofu with Mapo Eggplant 厚揚げの麻婆茄子かけ

“Atsu-age” 厚揚げ or “Nama-age” 生揚げ is fried tofu with a surface like “Abura-age” but the inside remains as soft tofu. We used be able to get good quality atsu-age from our japanese grocery store. I have posted quite a few dishes I made with this but the best dish, as far as we are concerned, and particularly if the quality of the atsu-age is good is simply grilled (in the toaster oven) served with soy sauce and chopped scallion. But, for some reason, the ones we have gotten recently are not really good.  This was the case with the one I got the other day. I decided to make something different using this not-really-good atsu-age. Since I had leftover mapo eggplant, I decided to use it as a topping for the atsu-age.

Because of the spicy mapo eggplant sauce, the atsu-age was more palatable but still not great.

I first cut the atsu-age into cubes and heated it up in the toaster oven on high toast mode.

This ws not bad and made a nice appetizer but I hope at some point we can get better quality atsu-age.

Mapo Eggplant 麻婆茄子

When I stopped by our Japanese grocery store, they had some genuine Japanese eggplants and I got two. I asked my wife what I should make, she requested “Mapo eggplant” 麻婆茄子. In the past I used to make this dish but I do not think I posted the recipe. I made it exactly like Mapotofu 麻婆豆腐 but instead of tofu, I used eggplant. Since I had some chicken thighs, I removed the meat from one of the thighs and hand chopped it into small pieces to use as a protein for this dish. The final dish was mildly spicy with the nice soft texture of eggplant. The chicken really added nice taste and texture. This is great as it is or over rice.

Ingredients:
2 small Japanese egg plants
One chicken thigh, skin and bone removed and chopped in small pieces or ground chicken
2-3 tbs peanut oil and 1 tsp dark sesame oil
1 tbs ginger root, skinned and finely chopped
1 tbs garlic, chopped
1 small shallot, finely chopped
3 stalks of spring onion
1 tsp Doubanjian 豆板醤
1 tsp Tenmenjian 甜麺醤
1/4 cup chicken broth
1/2 tsp potato starch+2tbs sake or water to make potato starch slurries

Directions：
Remove the stem end, peel skin in stripes (to reduce the bitterness the skin may have) and slice into 1/4 inch thick pieces.
Heat up a wok and add 2 tbs peanut oil and 1/2 tsp sesame oil. When the oil is almost smoking, add the eggplant and stir fly until the oil is absorbed and the eggplant slightly browned (see below).
Remove the eggplant from the wok and set aside.

Add 1tbs peanut oil and 1/2 tsp sesame oil in the wok. When the oil is hot, add the shallot, ginger and garlic and stir for few minutes. Add the doubanjian and stir until fragrant for 1 more minute. Add the chicken and stir until cooked (2-3 minutes). Add the eggplant, tenmenjian, chicken broth and mix and cook for a few minutes. Add the spring onion and the potato starch slurry and cook on high flame until the sauce thickens. If desired finish with sesame oil and powdered sansho pepper.

You just can’t beat the taste and texture of Japanese eggplant. This dish was homey and comforting. The eggplant had a soft texture and the chicken added a firm contrast. It is hard to get the right level of spiciness. It can either be too hot or too bland. This version was perfect.

Cold Marinated Eggplant 冷製レンジなすのポン酢漬け

We recently got Japanese (or Asian) eggplant from Weee. Although  I posted quite a few dishes using eggplant, we have not had eggplant for a long time. We really love “grilled eggplant” or Yakinasu 焼きなす, it requires a charcoal fire to make it correctly, however. I decided to take a short cut and cook the eggplant in the microwave oven. I then marinated the cooked eggplant (see below) overnight in the refrigerator.

Just before serving, I topped it with “katusobushi” 鰹節 bonito flakes. This is very easy to make and tasted pretty good. This is loosely based on a recipe I read on line sometime ago but I could not find the original recipe so I made the dish from memory.

Ingredients:
One Japanese eggplant (picture below).
3 tbs ponzu shouyu ポン酢醤油
1/2 tbs or more to taste, x4 concentrated Japanese noodle sauce
1/4 tsp dark sesame oil
2 stalks of scallion, finely chopped

Directions:
First make the marinade mixing the ponzu, noodle sauce, sesame oil and scallion.
Cut off the stem end of the egg plant and peel the skin
Since it was too long to fit into the silicon microwave container, I cut it into two pieces and microwaved it 2-2.5 minutes until cooked and soft (in the picture below, I made the indentation when I pressed it to see if it was done).
I cut the cooked eggplant in to long strips and then cut crosswise into bite sized pieces
I placed the hot eggplant into the marinade
I sealed the container and refrigerated it for a few hours or overnight (I like overnight marination)

Just before serving, top the eggplant with bonito flakes.

This is a very easy to make and tastes pretty good. Its a perfect small appetizer dish to go with sake.