Gravlax グラブラックス

Some years ago, I made gravlax but somehow I have not made it for some time. I even forgot that I had made it. But this year, my wife requested I make the gravlax for New Year. She even remembered and was able to specified the recipe I had used. I have been serving this with my "Russian" marinated salmon for several days of the new year.



Although both are "chemically" cooked or cured salmon, the flavor and texture are totally different giving a nice contrast of two salmon dishes. Here I served my gravlax on a bed of thinly sliced Japanese cucumber with capers. The "Russian" marinated salmon was garnished with Ikura salmon roe and fresh dill. The gravlax has the texture of smoked salmon (without smoke) but also nice flavors of coriander seeds and tequila predominate with subtle fresh herbs (mint, dill, basil and citrus). The marinated salmon has soft "cooked" texture with lemon flavor. The onion (I used sweet onion) became marinated and goes so well with the marinated salmon.



In another serving example, I served the gravlax (arranged in a rose flower shape) on a bed of water cress (mostly leaves removing large stems) with my wife's home made creme fraiche and "ikura" salmon roe garnish. I also added salmon-kelp roll 鮭の昆布巻き and daikon namasu 大根なます with thinly sliced boiled and vinegar seasoned octopus 酢だこ.



My wife's creme fraiche took some time (4 days as opposed to usual 2 days) to form (probably due to the rather cool room temperature but it tasted great.



Although sake or Champaign will go well with these dishes, we decided either scotch or good bourbon is better. Here we served Kentucky's Maker's mark (now a part of Suntory of Japan along with Jim Bean),



The recipe for the gravlax came from Julia Child's "In Julia's Kitchen with Master chefs" and by Monique Barbeau. Although I followed her recipe, some of the measurements are clearly off and I made adjustments.

Ingredients:
Salmon: Side of fresh salmon, skin on all pin bones removed.

Note:

1. The recipe states 1 and 1/2 lb side of salmon but if that was the case, it is a very small salmon indeed. Mine weighted at least 2 and 1/2 lbs. even after I removed the very thick head and very thin belly portions. Next time I will use the mid portions of two sides of salmon with identical size and thickness. The meat of the thin tail portion got cured too much and became a bit leathery and salty (but still very edible). 
2. I prefer scaling the skin as well because while slicing the final products, the scales did come off sometimes and attach to the slices of gravlax.

Dry cure:
3/4 cups kosher salt
1 and 1/2 cups of light brown sugar
(In contrast to a very small side of salmon, the amount of the dry cure is way too much in the original recipe which specify 1 and 1/2 cups of kosher salt and 2 cups of brown sugar. I only used 1/3-1/2 of the total of 3 and 1/2 dry cure I prepared for my 2.5 lb side of salmon. I will cut the amount of the dry cure by half next time which is listed above.)

Liquid cure: ( the amount of liquid cure was perfect)
1/2 cup tequila
1/2 cup freshly squeezed lime juice
Zest of one lemon (I used my micrograter)
Zest of one orange (I used my micrograter)
2 tsp of whole coriander seeds
3 sprigs of fresh dill, with stems
3 sprigs of fresh mint, with stems
3 sprigs of fresh basil, with stems

Day one - Dry cure
I used a rectangular Pyrex baking dish (13 x 9 inches) in which my side of the salmon just fit. I lined the inside with plastic wrap with excess portions on both ends so that I could wrap the salmon completely. I layered the dry cure in 1/4 inch thick on the bottom (preserving at least 1/3 for the next day). I placed the salmon skin side up (or meat side in contact with the cure). I placed additional cure on the sides and the ends and wrapped the salmon with plastic wrap. I covered (loosely) with aluminum foil and placed it in another Pylex baking dish which was slightly smaller than the bottom baking dish. I put 3 heavy cans of vegetables (I think they were either beans or tomato but the weight is what needed here, about 5 lb) on the top. I placed this in the refrigerator for 24 hours.

Day two - liquid cure
I roughly chopped the herbs and mixed them with the tequila, lime juice, and orange and lemon zests. I placed whole coriander seeds in a small Ziploc bag and using a heavy pot, I crushed the seeds and added to the liquid cure.

When I removed the vegetable can weights and unwrapped the salmon, the dry cure was all melted and a quite good amount of liquid had exuded from the fish. The salmon was noticeably dark and firm.  I removed the salmon and set aside. I discarded the liquid and plastic wraps, washed and dried the baking pans. I lined the bottom pan with plastic wrap exactly as I did for the dry cure process. I poured in the liquid cure and spread the  herbs and spices evenly on the bottom. I sprinkled the dry cure on the liquid bed (no exact amount specified, so I just lightly sprinkled) and placed the salmon back with fresh side down. I also placed the dry cure on the cut end and on the sides. I wrapped the salmon using the excess ends of plastic wrap, loosely covered with a sheet of aluminum foil, placed it in the upper baking dish and the weight (3 cans) and placed back to the refrigerator for another 24 hours.

If the curing is completed, the salmon fresh should be uniformly firm and dark red (That was the case for me at the end of 24 hours liquid cure). But if not, the original recipe recommends to place it back in the liquid cure for 1-2 more days. The original recipe indicates that the gravlax will last for 10 days stored in the liquid cure.

I forgot to take pictures during these curing processes.

Slicing:
I happened to have a long flexible knife (Global) for slicing smoked salmon and gravlax. I sliced it very thinly turning the knife blade horizontally to release it from the skin. I sliced the thin tail portion of the meat obliquely but as the meat became thick, I slanted my knife only slightly.



The thin tail meat got a bit over cured in the dry cure process and got slightly too firm and salty. Next time I will use two portions of salmon of equal size and thickness rather than one side with a thin tail portion. Since we had consumed all the tail portion at this point, I poured the liquid cure into a gallon Ziploc bag, put in the gravlax, removed the air as much as possible before sealing. This made it much easier to store in the refrigerator.



After the salmon feast, we switched to cold sake and enjoyed more small dishes from the box. From right to left are; herring roe on kelp, steamed sea urchin, kumquat simmered in syrup, sweet fish with its roe simmered for 10 hours, chestnut "shibukawa-ni", and sake braised prawn.

Sushi Taro's New Year's eve soba noodle 寿司太郎の年越しそば

As before, Sushi Taro osechi also included “Toshikoshi soba” (New year’s eve soba). As before, we could not eat soba on the new year’s eve. So this was, new year soba for lunch. This year, I made warm soba in broth or “Kake-soba” かけ蕎麦. Since it also included kelp and rather thick shavings of dried bonito (Katsuobushi 鰹節), I used them to make a broth and seasoned it with soy sauce and mirin. I added shrimp, red and white fish cake sliced and blanched snow peas in addition to chopped scallion. I served it with Japanese red pepper flakes or “Ichimi tougarashi” 一味唐辛子.

I also served some items from the box as well as ones I made. A piece of fish (the second from the right) is from the box, grilled Japanese snapper with sansho miso paste 真鯛の木の芽焼き which I heated up in the toaster oven which made it much better than when it was cold. This time, new year’s omelet roll or “date maki” 伊達巻き was from the box, although I also made my own. The rest are from what I made for the new year.

Even though this was lunch this type of food, calls for sake and it is very difficult to resist. We succumbed but restrained ourselves to only one small sake glass full.

Simmered chicken wings and daikon大根手羽煮物

We like chicken wings. Short of grilling them over hot charcoal Yakitori style, our most common way of cooking wings is to coat them with a flour and curry powder mixture and bake them at a  high temperature (450F in convection mode). They come out almost as if they had been deep fried. I bought the wings last weekend and placed them in a Ziploc bag with sake. I did not have a chance to cook them during the week so I wasn’t sure they would still be good when I turned my attention to them the next weekend. Because they were soaked in sake, they survived. Instead of our usual way of cooking them, I decided to make something different and came up with this dish, especially since I had some good daikon which also needed some attention. This is a rather common method of cooking and the "collagen" from the wings makes the simmered dish very unctuous. The daikon absorbed all the goodness of the wings.



Ingredients:
Chicken wings,  6, drummets and wings separated (wing tips removed and discarded or use it to make broth) (#1)
Daikon, Skin peeled and cut into 1 inch thick (#1).

I first added vegetable oil (2 tbs) in a frying pan, browned the chicken wings (turning once few minutes each). Once the wings were browned, I moved the wings to make room for the daikon and browned it next (few minutes for each sides until the edges browned). I added some chicken broth (my usual Swanson) to just cover the wings and daikon (about 300ml, #2).



I put on the lid and simmered it for 30 minutes. I then added soy sauce (2tbs), mirin (1tbs) and sake (1tbs) and sugar (2 tsp) and put the lid back on and simmered for another 30 minutes (#3). I then removed the lid and turned up the flame and let it reduce by half shaking occasionally (10-15 minutes). I tasted it and added a bit more soy sauce. I served one wing and drumett and two wedges of daikon  as a drinking snack (#4).

My wife asked if we needed a fork and knife. I said "chopsticks would do. The meat will just come off the bone like butter." I was right. The daikon is very soft and absorbed all the flavor and was easy to cut with chopsticks. Removing the bones from the wings was equally as easy with chopsticks (need moderate - not "jedai"-chopstick skills). My wife was impressed with this dish. We quickly switched to sake.

P.S After refrigerating, I removed all congealed fat from the surface. The broth was totally congealed because of the collagen from the wings. It heats up well by microwaving.

Pa Dutch Lebanon Bologna sandwich ペンシルヴァニアダッチ、レバノンボロニアサンド

I mentioned several times that, although my wife is not Pennsylvania Dutch, she grew up in Pennsylvania Dutch country predominated primarily by Mennonites. Her childhood food memories have a large PA Dutch food component.

This time, as she was browsing through the many catalogs we receive, especially around Christmas she found "Pennsylvania Dutch Sweet Lebanon Bologna" in the Vermont Country Store catalog. She said she had not tasted this since her childhood and promptly ordered it. In her excitement she decided to share her find with her siblings who also live far away from PA Dutch country. So she ordered some for them too. When it arrived, she told me I just had to try this traditional (so I was told) sandwich featuring the bologna on pumpernickel bread.



Since we do not have traditional "Bread and Butter" pickles, she used my Japanese-style cucumber pickles.



Here is how my wife made her beloved sandwich from her childhood. First, she has to use Pa-Dutch style Lebanon (which is named after a county called Lebanon, PA, not the country located in the middle east) Bologna (#1). She is particularly fond of  a "sweet" variety shown here. Second, the bread has to be Pumpernickel bread. She lightly toasted it and let it cool down before assembling (#2) with sharp cheddar cheese slices and pickled cucumber. Since we did not have "Bread and Butter" cucumber pickles, she substituted with my Japanese-style pickled cucumber (#2)



The bread slices were generously smeared with mayo and "two" slices (I said one and half will cover the bread but was told that you do not do one and half) of the Lebanon Bologna were placed (#3). Slices of cheddar cheese and pickled cucumber went next (#4). This was capped by another slice of the Pumpernickel (with mayo smeared as well) and cut in half and served (First two pictures).

This was a rather nice sandwich. I have to admit it has a pleasant unique taste which I have never had before. My wife was in heaven. Beer anyone?

P.S. We have a funny follow-up. My wife somehow imagined that she would receive a "log" of Bologna especially as it was rather pricey but she received two 8oz packages (which was exactly as listed in the catalog). The next time I went to the local grocery store I was curious to see if  they just might carry the Lebanon bologna my wife just bought or something similar. I looked and immediately I found the very same packages of Lebanon Bologna by Seltzer's and it was orders of magnitude cheaper even excluding the shipping cost than what my wife had paid. We are sure this has been available all along but we never looked for it. My wife was a bit chagrined particularly when she took into account the additional expenses she incurred by sending it to her sibs. We had a good laugh nonetheless. She is actually glad to discover that she can have 10 packages from the local grocery store for the cost of one mail order any time she wants.

Sushi Taro Osechi box 寿司太郎のお節重箱

Again this year, we got Sushi Taro's New Year's Osechi box 御節重箱. Many of the items are expected classic osechi items and are just great. A few items, however, change every year.  I am providing you with a description of a few items we really love. The picture below shows the first tier. This year, there were more chestnuts "Shibukawani" 栗の渋皮煮 than last year's box (supposedly one of the customers asked for it which suited us just fine).



The steamed sea urchin 蒸し雲丹 is wonderful. Short of having raw fresh sea urchin this is a close second.



Herring roe on kelp or "komochi konbu" 子持ち昆布 was presented on a skewer with a green vegetable which was very nice but I cannot figure out what kind of vegetable that was. Small seasoned whole shrimp 小海老艶煮 were nestled between the duck and kumquats simmered in syrup (this is new this year and we really liked it but a word of caution when chewing, you need to pay attention to the orientation of the shrimp to avoid mouth puncture). Hiding in the left lower corner is (miso) marinated egg yolk with walnuts 黄身くるみ or 黄身の味噌漬けくるみ入り which we look forward to every year; great sake snack. Quite a few more items are hiding behind these and we will uncover them as we dig down.



This is the bottom tier. Good sized prawns braised in sake 海老酒煎 are under the "flower" renkon 花輪蓮根 lotus root.  Tender simmered octopus タコの柔らか煮 is just below on the right. In the bottom section on the right is burdock root stuffed with mustard からし牛蒡 which we love. But the best items for us are quietly hiding in the dark recess of the upper right corner (close up coming).



Here are the close ups of mustard stuffed burdock root and New Year's sweet omelet roll  伊達巻.



Many of the "must-eat-for-New Year" vegetables were present and well prepared.



Here is the close up of the right upper corner; karasumi 唐墨 and monkfish liver terrine 鮟肝とうふ. We can consume a large amount of sake with these two items alone.



We are like kids in a candy store. For the first few days of the new year, we will be living on these items in the box and other items I prepared. This is the best part of the new year's celebration.

Happy New Year 2015 新年おめでとう ２０１５

Happy New Year 2015. Fourteen hours behind Japan, we welcomed the year 2015 the traditional way here in the U.S. by watching the drop of the ball in Times Square. (This happened well past my bedtime and I had nodded off. My wife, however, was much more alert and woke me with a New Year’s kiss). Does this delegate me to official “senior” status? We all grew older in 2014 as we witnessed those in the generation before us blaze the trail we will inevitably tread ourselves one day. But despite some surgery and other issues it was nonetheless a good year and for that we are thankful. The very first day of 2015 is cold but very sunny for a change in the Washington DC area. As usual, I displayed a “Plastic” Kagami-mochi 鏡餅 decoration containing packaged round mochi inside in our tokonoma 床の間.

2015 is a year of “ram” or “sheep” 羊. So, we took out our “ram” and “sheep” zodiac figures.

Since we are having a cold but sunny day, instead of staying in our “tea room” to imbibe and indulge like we have done most years, we decided to stay under the sun in our sunroom (we prefer to call it conservatory) for our new year’s ozouni お雑煮 soup. We postponed hitting our Sushi Taro supplied “osech” box 寿司太郎のお節重箱 until evening when sun has set. So, I served only items I made with our new year’s soup.

Again, the soup is the same as before. This year, I cut the carrot into plum flower shape, the daikon into pine and bamboo leaf-shape to make “Shou-chiku-bai” 松竹梅 or “pine-bamboo-plum blossom”, an ultimate combination of good luck and fortune in Japan.

As usual, I encased the rice cake “mochi” 餅 in a deep fried tofu pouch 油揚げ tied with gourd peel or Kampyou 干瓢  to accommodate my wife’s request.  I think it is a great way to eat mochi in oden or soup.

On the left, behind the perrila leaf 青紫蘇 is daikon namasu 大根なます garnished with salmon “ikura” イクラ roe. In front is thinly sliced boiled and vinegared octopus ( I got a whole 2 lb boiled and frozen octopus from Fish-For-Sushi). On the right, in the back are kelp-salmon rolls 鮭の昆布巻き, In the middle is simmered “Kabocha” カボチャの煮付 and in the front is “Datemaki” 伊達巻 or sweet egg roll which came out a bit pale this year.

We postpone our indulgence until evening to enjoy a bright day and sunshine.

Three Otoushi appetizers お通し３種類

These are three appetizers or "Otoshi" お通し I served one evening. It is always nice to start a meal with multiple small appetizer dishes but sometimes coming up with them can be a lot of work. Of course I could make things up ahead of time but somehow things don’t seem to work out that way.



The left most is shira-ae 白和え of green asparagus tips and "Fuyu" persimmon 富有柿.



The middle is "mozuki onsen tamago" もずく温泉卵 that is "mozuku" sea weed in sweet vinegar (store bought frozen) and "Onsen" egg on the top garnished with chopped scallion.



I also served deep fried tofu pouch, grilled. I tried to make it cheese filled or "Kitsune" Raclette but I did not have Raclette cheese and used a combination of cheddar and gruyere cheese which melted and ran out during the cooking process. So this became faintly cheese flavored grilled abura-age.

None of these dishes are new but it is really enjoyable to sip sake and taste these different flavors.