Simmered whole Vermilion snapper 鯛の煮付け

The food you can make really depends on what is available at the store. We went to a local gourmet grocery store one weekend and found a small red snapper called Vermilion snapper. The fish before cleaning was just the right size; weighing about 1 lb. It also looked really fresh. Upon reflection I thought it also looked really lonely in all its freshness so I bought two. My plan was to use them in separate recipes for two dinners. This was a just the right sized fish for me to present as a whole head-on fish (or "okashira-zuki" 御頭付き). It was a much more manageable size than "sea bream" which I posted before. Since the size and appearance were somewhat similar to "Kinme dai" 金目鯛, I decided to try simmering the whole fish or "nitsuke" 煮付け.

Digression alert: I am not sure about the English name for "Kinme dai" but "Splendid Alfonsino" appears to be the corresponding English name. Although the Japanese name bears "dai", (which is the same as "tai" only changing the "T" to "D" sound when making a compound word), they are not related to "tai" 鯛 or "sea bream". Kinme dai are deep water fish with large eyes (Japanese name means “golden eye” red snapper). They are suited for “sashimi” and "nitsuke" with firmer and oiler meat than red snapper but I have never seen this fish in markets in the US.

I had the fish monger scale and gut the fish. Japanese generally keep the fins on for decorative purposes but I forgot to tell the fish monger not to remove them so as you can see in the picture they are gone. After I did a little bit of touch-up cleaning and scaling, I made cross cuts on the skin on both sides to prevent the skin from rupturing during cooking (below #1).

Simmering broth: I soaked a 5 inch square of kelp (not the eating kind but the broth making kind) in about 2 cups of water.  After 30 minutes of soaking, the kelp was soft and pliable. I placed the kelp on the bottom of the square Pyrex pan (which just accommodated the fish diagonally) to prevent from the fish skin from sticking to the bottom of the pan. It also added a "umami" flavor to the broth.  I put the kelp-soaking water (2 cups), soy sauce (4 tbs), sake (2 tbs), mirin (2 tbs) and sugar (2 tbs) in a separate pan and let it come to a gentle boil for few minutes to let the tastes amalgamate and the alcohol to evaporate.  I poured it  in the Pyrex dish with slices of fresh ginger and placed the fish and precooked daikon (see "Daikon" below) (#1 in the picture below).

I placed my favorite "pink" silicon otoshi-buta 落とし蓋 (#2) on top and put the glass lid on (#3). So, this was a cross between simmering and steaming. After 15 minutes of gentle simmering, I turned the lid slightly askew to reduce the simmering liquid. After a total of 30 minutes, the simmering liquid had reduced in half. I turned the flame up a little, and spooned the simmering liquid over the fish repeatedly for 5 minutes to further season the fish and reducing the simmering liquid (#4).

Daikon: I also cooked daikon. I peeled and cut the daikon into 1 inch-thick rounds. I halved it into half moons. As a short-cut method, I placed the daikon in a microwaveable silicon container with a little bit of water on the bottom and microwaved it for a few minutes or until it became soft (do not over zap, it will become dry). I just placed the half moon daikon in the same pot as the fish turning once during the cooking.

As you can see in the first picture, I served the whole fish with the daikon and very finely julienned fresh ginger root or "ito shouga" 糸生姜 (soaked in water with the moisture wrung out) as a garnish.

The dish looked nice (even without the fins) but in terms of the taste and texture, it was a bit of a disappointment.  The meat was soft (too soft) and lacked good flavor despite the simmering liquid and ginger. As usual. my wife was the de-boning expert serving up the meat.  At the end of the meal, my wife readily acceded to my request for the eyes (gelatinous stuff behind the eyes are what I am going for) in exchange she got the "cheek" meat (she made it clear she thought she got the better end of the deal).  But otherwise the head was kind of too small to be worthwhile. Since we got two fish, I will try another cooking method on the other.

Red seedless grape soup 赤ぶどうのスープ

We like grapes but the quality is sometimes hit or miss. The other day my wife informed me that the recent batch of seedless red grapes I had brought home had very tough skins. When my wife “processes” fresh fruits she donates the culls (damaged or slightly bad) to the resident wildlife (mostly squirrels and birds). Soon after my wife made her pronouncement concerning the quality of the grapes I went out to the patio where she was feeding the culls to the squirrels. The patio was littered with what appeared to be grape skins. When I asked her why, she said that she had already told me the skins were tough and apparently the squirrels agreed with her. They had peeled and discarded the skins before eating the grapes!  So what do you do when you have a big batch of grapes with skins so tough not even the squirrels will eat them skin on? My wife decided to salvage the situation by making “red grape soup”. I was not looking when she made it so here she goes.

This is a very simple recipe. I put the grapes in a sauce pan with several spoonfuls of sugar (no water) and turned the heat on low. I cooked them until the juice came out and they were soft. Then I put the mixture through a sieve.

This turned out much better than either of us expected. It was surprisingly good warm and even better cold. It has some thickness to it and is more like grape puree than grape juice, jelly or jam. It had a very refreshing grape taste. For rescuing inedible grapes, this is a good solution…sorry squirrels.

Yuzu Japanese restaurant 柚子 日本料理店

I always have my radar up for any new (particularly Japanese) restaurant, that opens near us. I noticed a Washington Post article about a Japanese restaurant that opened about 1 month ago ("soft" opening) in our neck-of-the-woods. Judging from the WP article and the restaurant's website, I decided this was a place we had to try particularly since they have omakase ($80 and up). So one evening we signed up and tried it out.

The restaurant is much larger than you would expect from outside.
We were seated at the counter (Chef's table) which can accommodate 4 comfortably or 6 extremely good friends. The interior is nicely decorated with framed Japanese washcloths or "tenugui" 手ぬぐい along one wall.  (Washcloths is really an understatement because the Japanese have raised these humble household items to an art form--with nicely done colorful prints and whimsical subjects). The counter appeared to be a very impressive brand new solid slab of walnut wood.
We were greeted by a smiling Chef Yoshihisa "Yoshi" Ota (above). After a few dishes and drinks, we asked how he deiced to open this restaurant. He said, it was a long story that would take days to tell but he gave us the “cliff notes”  (truncated)  version. As a young sushi chef, he worked in Sushi Den in New York. After returning to Japan, he had an exclusive small Japanese restaurant in Ginza for 10 years. When "Kushi" Izakaya  was planning to open in DC he was contacted to be a chef there. Remembering his stint in New York, he wanted to come back to the US to serve "real" Japanese dishes to Americans and took the position as head Chef for Kushi. Fast forward a few more years and another stint at Sushi-ko in Chevy Chase, he realized his dream and opened his own restaurant Yuzu. He wanted a small restaurant where he would serve guests who appreciated and enjoyed real Japanese food. He thought about opening his restaurant in New York but there are so many Japanese restaurants in New York. Besides, he and his family had lived here for several years and developed an attachment to Bethesda. So he decided to open this restaurant here.

When faced with the selection of libations, we had to realize the hard fact that in Montgomery county, where this restaurant is located, the county controls the sale of alcohol. This makes it very challenging to stock good sake/liquors since the restaurateur has to go through the county liquor stores/board with all its rules and regulations rather than just purchasing through any wholesalers as is done in DC for example. Although Yuzu obtained the liquor license almost 1 month ago, Yoshi was disappointed that things were coming in very slowly and their sake list was rather small. We chose "Haiku" 俳句 which used to be our house sake. Slightly yeasty but still a rather agreeable sake.

Our course started with sunomono 酢の物 with “midorizu” 緑酢 (meaning “green vinegar” which is a vinegar dressing with grated Japanese cucumber) dressed thinly sliced conch and crab. Conch can be often too chewy but this was very nicely prepared. Next was flounder ヒラメ thinly sliced "Usuzukuri" 薄造り(below left). Other dishes included a simmered dish or "Nimono" 煮物 with homemade "Ganmodoki"  雁擬き with bamboo shoot and pork belly, vegetables dressed in tofu-sesame dressing or "shira-ae" 白和え (below right). All nicely done.

Although the order is not exact, another dish of deep fried "Kasago" カサゴ or scorpion fish in a broth with mushrooms (below) was also very nice.

At this point, we were really enjoying the dinner and I stopped taking pictures (I am not as dedicated as other food bloggers). We had a small sweet vinegar picked vegetables as a "hashi yasume" 箸休め meaning "to rest the chop sticks". This was very refreshing; not too vinegary and not too sweet.

After this, we went into a "sushi" course. All were good especially the fatty salmon "aburi" 炙り. Anago アナゴ was also memorable with a nice sweet and tangy sauce. Marinated "tuna" or “zuke” and regular "tuna" were served one after the other for comparison. Sea scallop was fresh. It tasted sweet and buttery. Shime-saba しめ鯖 was also excellent. Ama-ebi (done half-and-half with wasabi and yuzu koshou) was also good. I may have missed few more items. Chef Yoshi served us rolls of tuna (or salmon, I am not sure) and Japanese pickled daikon “takuwan” 沢庵 as "shime" 〆 or "ending" item for the sushi course with a very nice and hot miso soup with red snapper (meat and jaw bone in it) in  a good briny broth.

In terms of special seasonings, Chef used a real fresh “wasabi daikon” rhizome from Japan grated on the traditional shark-skin grater adding a nice fresh wasabi taste to the dishes. As for the name sake, a large fresh yellow yuzu, again from Japan, and yuzu-koshou 柚子胡椒 were used effectively in sushi and other dishes.

As a desert, "mizu youkan" 水羊羹 with, we think, a maple syrup-based sauce, which is a nice American twist for this traditional summer-time Japanese sweet. At this point, we were quite full.

This post was not meant as a review of the restaurant but rather our first impression of Yuzu. The restaurant is still in a "preview" or "soft" opening phase. Yoshi told us that he would like to do the "Grand" opening soon. As a result, the restaurant and staff were still "ironing out some of the kinks." For example, the front door kept locking and wait staff continually had to rush to let in customers who were vainly pulling on the door to get in (not good for business if the customers are locked out). Early in the evening when the restaurant was rather empty, everything went OK but as the tables started filling up, we could see that things got a bit frantic especially for the chef who prepared sushi and sashimi orders for the tables as well as taking care of us at the counter. His attention was drawn in so many different directions .

The omakase course was quite good. The sashimi was fresh and the chef did many different treatments to extract the best out of them but nothing was unexpected or spectacular.  We understand the chef had to balance the quality and cost. We were a bit concerned that the restaurant seemed too large for the present contingent of wait staff and, particularly, for one chef, no matter how talented, to pay attention to all the details. We sincerely hope this restaurant will succeed. We look forward to seeing a few sous chefs, and an expanded sake list on our next visit. We will be back.

Pea soup with fresh tarragon グリーンピース スープ タラゴン風味

Although fresh produce is generally better than frozen, we have one exception to this rule and that is green peas (English peas). In general frozen peas are harvested when the sugar content is at its peak then quickly processed and frozen. We tried many "fresh" green peas in pods including those from roadside stands but they tend to be starchy because the sugar quickly reverts back to starch after the peas are harvested. Among the frozen green peas, my wife insists on using Hanover brand "petite peas".  In this case, I have to agree. Since French tarragon was nicely growing in our spring herb garden, I was tasked to find "Hanover" frozen "petit peas", which, I am happy to report was completed successfully. (No they did not pay us for this endorsement...maybe they should.) My wife made this pea soup with tarragon a dish that represents spring at its finest.
 
Green peas: My wife used two bags (16 oz each) of frozen Hanover brand “petite” green peas. She simply put the frozen peas in a colander and ran warm tap water over them for few minutes until they were thawed. (These peas are so tender, boiling them would be a travesty.)
Onion: Finely chopped, one large
Chicken broth: low-sodium non-fat Swanson chicken broth, 48oz
French tarragon: Leaves removed and finely chopped, about 1-2 tbs

In a pan, she added olive oil and sautéed the onion until soft and semitransparent (for 5 minutes). She added the thawed green peas and added chicken broth and simmered for 10-15 minutes. Using an emersion blender (a.k.a. Motor boat), she blended the soup. We could have put this through a sieve but to make it smoother, but this time, we went for a more “rustic” soup and did not removed the “solids”.
She mixed in the French tarragon and seasoned it with a bit more salt.

This is a good soup warm or cold. We added a bit of cream and garnished it with a sprig of tarragon. The nice yellow green color was indeed the color of spring and early summer. The soup is sweet from the natural sweetness of the green peas. The tarragon adds a subtle bright note. Next day, we ate the soup cold which was also good. Depending on your preference, you could adjust the thickness by adding milk or cream.

"Saag Tofu" Indian-style tofu 豆腐のインド風ほうれん草ソース

We are not at all familiar with Indian cuisine but my wife likes the "spicy" but not "hot" taste of some Indian-inspired dishes. She started making this Indian-style spinach sauce/curry which must be similar to "saag". This time instead of "Saag paneer" which also contains Indian farm cheese, we made "Saag Tofu". We figured tofu would stand in for the cheese curd.

The amount of tofu is rather arbitrary. Here I used a half block of tofu. I cut the tofu into small cubes and parboiled it before putting it into an oven proof pan. We added "saag", mixed to cover the tofu. We baked it in a 400F oven (toaster oven, convection) for 15 minutes with a lid on the pan. We garnish this with coarsely chopped {roasted and cooled) cashew nuts.

The textured of cheese curd and tofu is obviously different but the tofu and cheese are essentially taste neutral. The crunch of cashew nuts and rather soft tofu makes a nice contrast. The sauce itself has the tastes of lots of spices but is only mildly hot (from Jalopeno pepper). We found this saag to be very versatile and can be used in many untraditional ways. This can be eaten with Indian flat bread (naan etc) but we enjoyed it by itself.

Crispy baked chickpeas カリカリひよこ豆

I saw this recipe on-line and thought this would make a nice snack and also thought this was the kind of thing my wife likes to make. So I suggested it to her one weekend. You could make all kind of variations depending on the spices you use.

Ingredients:
Chick peas: 14oz can, drained and rinsed, Olive oil
Spices: Many variations are possible. This time we used red (Cayenne) pepper powder and salt.

First, I drained and rinsed the can of chickpeas in a colander. On a cookie sheet, I placed a sheet of paper towel and spread the chickpeas in a single layer. I then placed another sheet of paper towel on top and rubbed gently to remove the thin transparent skin from the chick peas.  This is the tedious part: while the towel removed the majority of paper-like outer skins, I found I had to remove the remainder individually by hand. I took away the paper towel, added olive oil and coated the chickpeas by rolling them in the oil by hand. I seasoned them with salt, red pepper and baked them in a 400 degree F oven for 30 minutes.

The result was very satisfying. It is somewhat like Wasabi green peas but better. They are light, and crispy. The slow heat of the red pepper catches up with you but in a very pleasant way. This is a nice drinking snack.

Salmon salad on Belgian endive 鮭のサラダのチコリボート

This is another dish used for leftover control. One evening we had salmon. I made this salmon salad the next day from the leftovers. Since I happened to have Belgian endive, I placed the salmon salad on several leaves to make it a small appetizer we could pick up with our fingers.

Salmon: This was leftover from salmon cooked in a frying pan and then finished in the oven. I probably had 3-4 oz. I coarsely crumbled it by hand.

Other vegetables: I had leftover steamed green beans. I cut them into I inch portions (10-12 green beans). I also had a quarter of a ripe avocado. I diced it.

I dressed the above in a mixture of mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, and lemon juice.
I served it on the boat of Belgian endive leaves and “floated” the boat on a “sea” of baby arugula as a start dish for the evening.