Happy New Year 2023 新年おめでとう御座います2023

It is morning of the first day of 2023. The past year was marked by many events; not the least of which is the still lingering COVID-19. In any case, here is the “Kagami-mochi” 鏡餅 New Year’s decoration. It is  accompanied by various rabbit figurines because this is the year of the rabbit according to the Chinese zodiac. We usually place the new year’s decoration in the tokonoma 床間 alcove  of  our “tearoom” in the basement but this year, we decided to place it in the room where we spend most of our time to maximize our enjoyment of the collection.

As usual, the highlight of our new year is the Sushi taro osechi box 寿司太郎お節箱. We drove down to Dupont circle and picked up the Osechi box and hand-cut soba noodles “toshikoshi soba” 年越しそば (which we usually enjoy the 2nd day of the new year). For many years, we traditionally have our regular breakfast of Cafe Latte with yogurt and breads and have the New Year’s “Ozouni” お雑煮 soup for lunch. I also served a few items I made. As always, we wheeled out the real Japanese laquer ware bowls my mother gave us a long time ago.

As usual, we encased the mochi in a fried tofu pouch or “abura-age” 油揚げ (in an effort to make the eating experience a bit more manageable). It is at the bottom of the bowl so you can’t see it in the picture. I cut the carrot into a flower-shape and the daikon into a ginko leaf-shape. I also added burdock root ごぼう (the white rectangular object in the picture), shiitake mushroom, shrimp, flower-shape gluten cakes or “fu” 麩, snow pea, scallion and yuzu zest (frozen). I made the broth from dashi packs, a bit of mirin and x4 Japanese noodle sauce.

The accompanying dishes (from left to right) are all listed in “Norio’s New year dishes”. They are: chicken squares with gorgonzola cheese and dried fig, salmon kelp roll 鮭の昆布巻き, datemaki omelet 伊達巻, and salmon Russian marinade. (This year I made some modifications to the marinade by adding Dijon mustard and dill). Of course it wouldn’t be an adequate celebration of the first day of the New Year without at least a token glass of sake. This year it was our house favorite Tengumai Daiginjo 天狗舞大吟醸. The soup and these items were pretty good if I do say so myself.

Although we did not tap into the osechi box, here is a preview of what to expect when we eagerly dive in this evening. The picture below shows the first tier. Although many goodies are hidden below the items we can see, we can spot our favorites like “karasumi” 唐墨,  “mushi uni” 蒸し雲丹 and “Kazunoko” 数の子.

The second tier also has our favorites such as “Ankimo tofu”, “Ikura” and duck breast.

We are repeating ourselves but it is so wonderful that we are able to get this incredible osechi from Sushi Taro. We will be enjoying these delicacies over the next few days.

Fruitcake フルーツケーキ

My wife likes to have special baked goods for the Xmas season. After several attempts, we gave up on making panettone and now buy it. For stollen bread, she made  it a few times but now we also buy it. This year we got two different brands of panettone from Amazon and a large stollen from Williams-Sonoma.  We also used to buy fruitcake (Claxton Fruit Cake) in the past. We were not planning on including fruitcake in this year’s line-up but I came across a recipe for fruitcake on the WashingtonPost website. Supposedly this one goes well with cheese. So I mentioned it to my wife and she went into action. (Note from Wifey: We had bought various candied fruit from Harry and David. While munching on them as a snack I thought, ‘These would be perfect for a fruitcake. So when I was presented with the fruitcake recipe, it was ‘all-systems-go”.) As usual, she made some modifications due to availability nuts and dried fruit. I helped her by cutting up the dried fruit. It was remarkably good and indeed went well with cheese (and a glass of red wine). 

Ingredients (shown in the picture below)
2 cups (180 grams) walnuts halves
1 cup (140 grams) dried mission figs, chopped into ½-inch pieces
1 cup (140 grams) dried fruit medley from Harry and David cut into 1/2 inch pieces (Original recipe called for dried dates.)
1 cup (140 grams) combination candied pineapple and mangos from Harry and David cut into 1/2 inch pieces. (Original recipe called for dried cherries)
½ cup (170 grams) honey, (I used buckwheat honey which is very strong in flavor and dark in color)
½ cup (118 grams) brandy
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon grated nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground mace (may substitute with ground allspice)
1 cup (220 grams) packed light or dark brown sugar
1 cup (125 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon fine salt
1 stick (4 ounces/113 grams) unsalted butter
2 large eggs.

Directions:

Toast the walnut then roughly chop and place in a small bowl. In a medium bowl, toss together the figs, dates and dried fruit until combined. Whisk together the honey, brandy, lemon juice and lemon zest until combined, and set aside. In a small bowl, whisk together the cinnamon, nutmeg and mace. In a medium bowl, thoroughly whisk together the sugar, flour, baking powder and salt to combine then set aside.

Melt the butter in a sauce pan. Heat slowly to let the water in the butter boil off without exploding and then cook until the solids turn brown, about 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and stir in the spices (this will help bloom the flavor of the spices and suffuse them into the fruitcake). Carefully, add the honey mixture — the contents of the pot may bubble up — and stir to combine. Add the dried figs and stir to coat. Turn off the heat and let the mixture cool.

Once the mixture has cooled, stir in the eggs, one at a time, and mix thoroughly to incorporate. Stir in the dry ingredients until no trace of flour remains, then fold in the remaining dried fruit and walnuts. Grease a 9-by-5-inch loaf pan then line it with a piece of parchment paper long enough to have a generous overhang on each of the long sides. (Word of advice; be sure the parchment paper covers the entire bottom of the loaf pan because the cake really sticks to any exposed surface.) Grease the parchment as well. Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan and smooth out the top with an offset spatula or spoon, if needed. (Next picture below) Bake for 1 hour 35 minutes in a 300 degree oven or until the fruitcake has just begun to pull away from the edges of the pan. Transfer the fruitcake to a wire rack and let cool in the pan for about 20 minutes. Use the parchment sling to lift the fruitcake from the pan, and let cool completely before serving. (Second picture below.)

This is a really surprisingly great fruit cake. Probably the best we ever tasted. (Yes I know the baseline for fruit cake is very low, but this one stands up to any baseline for pastry.) It is very moist. The brandy, browned butter and honey really work well together to create a very complex pleasing taste. The dried fruit is slightly firm and adds another taste dimension. It also goes extremely well with a slice of cheddar cheese. The gentle sweetness of the fruit cake juxtaposed to the rich saltiness is the cheese is very nice. Next time we’ll make the fruitcake in several smaller loaf pans. The smaller pieces are just the right size for a fruitcake cheese appetizer and that combination goes very well with red wine. 

Nattou ball 納豆つくね

This recipe also came from a YouTube episode by the original Japanese Iron chef Rokusaburo Michiba 道場六三郎. He made two dishes from nattou 納豆, the infamous sticky and smelly Japanese dish of fermented soybeans, which often appears as part of breakfast. Nattou is most commonly eaten over rice for breakfast. Another less common but popular way is in miso soup for a dish which is called “Nattou-jiru” 納豆汁. Even among the Japanese, some (especially from “Kansai” 関西 west part of Japan) do not eat it and some love it. (I belong to the latter category). 

For many years my wife referred to nattou as the one Japanese food she just could not eat—the smell, the sliminess, the fermented taste.  (Every culture seems to have a dish like this; an acquired taste developed in childhood. Think ripe French cheese or Australian vegemite. And for me, believe it or not, cooked oatmeal).  Then my mother learned that the natto-nastiness could be alleviated by stirring it. She recommended several hundred turns would do the trick. The stirring apparently enters air into the natou that helps remove the smell and stringy sliminess. All of a sudden natto was on my wife’s menu. 

I have made quite a few dishes with nattou, many of which are focused on reducing the stickiness and the smell. In any case, Michiba made a miso soup but, instead of mixing nattou into the soup, he made nattou into balls which he called “nattou-tsukume*”  and then put it into miso soup. I made it as a small appetizer one evening.  I put a small amount of miso soup (made it a bit stronger) as a sauce and topped it with Japanese mustard (see picture below)

* “Tsukune”, “Tsukuneru” which means “knead” or “mix”, and is usually made from ground chicken and a most common item in “Yakitori” 焼き鳥.

I served two other small dishes; from left to right simmered “Kabocha” squash, miso simmered mackerel and nattou tsukune.

Ingredients (4 tsukune balls):

2 small individual packages of nattou (if frozen, thawed) with packets of sauce and mustard
1 stalk of chopped scallion
1 tbs katakuriko potato starch
2 cups of Japanese dashi broth
1-2 tbs miso
Japanese hot mustard (from tube) slightly diluted with water for topping

Directions:
Prepare the natou by adding the sauce, mustard and the scallion. Mix well (stir over 100 time if you have the time), add the potato starch and mix.
Using two spoons, moistened, I made four quenelles (or moisten your hands and make small balls) and drop them in the simmering broth.
Cook it for several minutes (see below).
You could dissolve the miso and serve this as “miso soup”. I wasn’t ready to serve the dish so I separated the nattou balls and the broth and placed them in a sealed containers and in the refrigerator.
Before serving, I warmed up the nattou balls in the preserved broth. I took out a small amount of broth and dissolved the miso to taste.
I served the miso broth in a small dish, with the nattou ball and topped with the mustard

This is a very interesting dish. The hot Japanese mustard made this dish. Although the nattou balls tasted like nattou to me, the texture and smell is quite acceptable (especially for my wife’s palate). “Mikey liked it!”

Mini-honey corn muffin ミニハチミツコーンマフィン

This is another one of my wife’s baking projects. This time it’s mini honey corn muffins. They have a pleasant sweetness and corn flavor. The texture is coarse and they are a bit on the dry side. So, my wife concocted honey butter (shown on the muffin on the left below). This picture shows the butter before the muffin is toasted. We made the picture this way so the congealed honey butter is visible. The small muffins are quite nice as a breakfast with other assorted baked goods.

As usual, I will ask my wife for the recipe.

Ingredients:
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (1/2 cup AP flour and 1/2 cup whole wheat flour can be used as a substitute.
1 cup yellow corn meal (corn flour might be another substitute).
3 Tbs. Sugar
2 tsp. Baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk (or buttermilk)
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup honey
1 cup fresh corn (optional, I didn’t use it)

Directions:
Mix the dry ingredients (flours through salt) in a bowl. In another bowl mix the wet ingredients (eggs through honey). Add the wet ingredients to the dry and fold in the corn kernels if using them. Put into mini muffin tins lined with paper muffin cups. Bake in a 350 F oven for 18 to 23 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the center of the muffins comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 5 to 10 minutes (picture below).

These make a nice little bite. The corn and honey flavor really comes through. Not sure what the whole wheat pastry flour brings to the show. The texture is a bit coarse and dry. This situation is rectified with the application of honey butter melted on a warmed muffin. 

Basil panna cotta バジルパンナコッタ

This is one of my wife’s panna cotta projects. Actually this is the second try making this basil panna cotta to use the basil forest growing on our kitchen window sill. The first time she made it, she followed a recipe she found on the internet. There was way too much gelatin. The panna cotta came out solid and rubbery—like a rubber ball.  It would have bounced if dropped. We declared it a failure. So this is her second try. This time she used the tried and trusted ratio of 2 cups of liquid to 1 tsp of gelatin and it was a resounding success. It has a subtle but distinctive basil flavor and the texture was just right and melted in your mouth.

.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup cream
1/4 cup fresh basil crushed (or more to taste)
1/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup milk
1 tsp gelatin

Directions:
Put the cream, basil and sugar in a sauce pan. Bring to a boil then remove from the heat, cover, and let steep for 30 minutes. Pour through a fine mesh sieve to remove the solids. Press the solids to release as much flavor and liquid as possible. Bloom the gelatin over 1/2 cup of the milk. Put the bloomed gelatin in the top of a double boiler. Heat until it fully melts. Stir in the still warm basil/cream. Then the rest of the milk. Distribute it into the containers that are going to be used to chill the mixture. We used mini milk jars. Refrigerate until set.

What a major improvement over the previous attempt. The sweet, creamy, basil taste was a bit of a pleasant surprise. The texture was perfect. It was firm but very smooth and melted in the mouth. Overall this was a rather sophisticated desert just the right size to finish a dinner.

Clam Chowder 子ハマグリのチャウダー

 Recently while talking to my wife’s sister, she mentioned that she had made clam chowder using frozen baby clams. In the past, we used canned baby clams to make clam sauce for pasta as well as chowder. We always avoided using canned chopped clams which were very chewy and rubbery. Since we could not get our preferred brand of canned whole baby clams, we have not made either pasta sauce or chowder for a long time. We checked our regular grocery store (home delivery) and found that they carry frozen baby clams from Pana Pesca. We have had frozen squid and octopus from them before. We decided to try the clams. Around the same time, I came across YouTube video of New England clam chowder by Kenji Lopez-Alt. So it appeared that all the stars and the moon were aligned for me to make clam chowder. I made a chowder based on Kenji’s and my old recipes. I used a strip of bacon and used the bacon bits and chopped parsley as garnish.

The baby clams are pretty good and the best among the PanaPesca frozen seafood we tried.

Ingredients:
10.6oz (300gram) frozen baby clams, thawed and juice preserved
One medium onion, finely chopped
3 stalks of celery, finely chopped
1/4 cup of AP flour
2 bay leaves
5-6 baby red potatoes, peeled and cut into small dice
1 medium carrot, peeled and cut into small dice
1-2 strips of bacon (or salt pork)
2, 8oz bottles of clam juice
2 cups or less whole milk (amount adjusted based on the thickness of the chowder you like)
3 tbs olive oil + 1 tbs butter
Salt and pepper to taste
Fino sherry (optional)

Directions:
In a soup pot, add the bacon and cook until crispy and set it aside leaving bacon fat in the pot.
Add the butter and oil and sauté the celery and onion until cooked but not browned (4-5 minutes on medium to low flame. I also seasoned this with salt and pepper)
Add the flour and cook for a few minutes (do not brown), add the clam juice and about1 cup of milk and stir on medium flame until thickened add more milk to adjust the thickness to your taste.
Add the bay leaves, the clams and simmer for 7-8 minutes.
Meanwhile cook the potato and carrot in a separate pot in salted water (I would have cooked the potato and carrot in the same pot in which chowder was cooking but I took the suggestion from Kenji to cook them separately so that the potatoes would not dissolve).
Drain the potato and carrot and add to the chowder.
Season with salt and pepper (you could use white pepper but I used black pepper)

For garnish, I crumbled the bacon strips and finely chopped the parsley
I also added a small amount of Fino sherry to the bottom of the soup bowl.

We were quite pleased with the quality of the clams. We had this as a lunch with several slices of rustic apricot cranberry bread which went very well.

Black bean pumpkin gyoza 黒豆かぼちゃ餃子

My wife wanted a seasonal quesadilla which is composed of pumpkin puree, black beans, cheese, and roasted pork. After enjoying the quesadilla as a lunch, a good amount of the filling remained.  My wife suggested we use it to make gyoza. It sounded a bit like an odd combination for gyoza but I have seen a recipe for gyoza stuffed with potato salad so I complied. I added more finely chopped BBQed pork . Since we ended up with quite a good number of gyoza, we realized we couldn’t possibly eat them all before they went bad so we decided to freeze some. Then the next question was how? In the past I made up some gyoza and without any additional preparation froze them. The shells became brittle and shattered apart. So we decided some degree of preparation was required to keep that from happening again. So I boiled them first and froze a number of them that way. Then we realized that we would have to fry them before serving. So we got the (brilliant) idea that if we boiled, fried and then froze them, all we would have to do is toaster-oven them (the verb form of noun toaster oven) without thawing and then serve. In any case, the pre-boiled gyoza were fried in a small amount of peanut and sesame oil to produce nice brown crispy shells, frozen than toasted in the toaster-oven as shown below. (Easy-peasy). 

You can see, on the cut surface, small cubes of pork, black beans and pumpkin puree. It is not typical gyoza flavors but it worked. 

We have two frozen batches; one boiled but not fried and the other boiled and fried. Any bets on which batch gets eaten first?