Mashed Potato Blini マシュポテトのビリニ

Since my wife was on a roll coming up with roasted pepper blini, pesto blini and corn blini, she looked at the bowl of mashed potatoes in the fridge and was hit with a brilliant flash—potato blini. These were mashed potatoes she prepared when we cooked a whole chicken in the Weber grill. Usually, we place two aluminum wrapped Russet potatoes in the Weber with the chicken. She removes the skin of the potatoes. mashes them and adds butter, cream cheese with onions and chives (sold in a tub), seasoning it with salt. Then she pours in the juice accumulated while the chicken was resting. These potatoes are very nice and flavorful. We like them but we generally cannot finish them. From the leftover potatoes, my wife makes gnocchi (of which we have a backlog in the freezer). I often make “potato croquettes” (but again we have a backlog in our freezer). “Mashed potato blini” seemed like a perfect use of the left over potatoes particularly since there was no backlog in the freezer—yet. This turned out very well. The crust is crunchy but the inside is quite tender with mashed potato flavor and a hint of barbecue chicken. With this dish we found another way to use up leftover mashed potatoes.

Ingredients(X3): makes 14 blini
2 cups of mashed potatoes
6 tbs melted butter
3/4 cup sour cream
6 large eggs, beaten
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup + 2 tbs. cake flour 
1 Tbs + 1 1/2 tsp. Baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
enough additional cream or buttermilk to make it the texture of pancake batter 

Directions:
Run the mashed potatoes through a ricer to work out any lumps. Put the riced potatoes in a bowl.  Add the egg, the melted butter and sour cream, then add the flour, baking powder and salt and whisk until well blended. (You may need to add more cream so the batter is the consistency of pancake batter.)

In a cast iron platar, melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Use the melted butter to grease each of the platar cups before adding the batter. Pour the batter into the cups until they are mostly full. Cook over moderately low heat, turning once, until set, about 5 minutes per side. Repeat with the remaining butter and batter.

This is a great way to use the left over mashed potatoes. The outside is crispy and the inside has a nice smooth moist texture. The overall flavor of the potatoes really comes through. These would be really good slathered in the butter for breakfast or as a side for lunch or dinner. 

Stir-fried Eggplant and Shiitake in Oyster Sauce 茄子と椎茸のオイスターソース炒め

This is another variation of stir-fried eggplant to which this version is very similar but I skipped a few steps to make it easier and quicker. Since we got very good fresh shiitake mushrooms which were very thick, I added to this to the stir-fry. It is difficult to see which is the eggplant and which is shiitake (Picture #1) visually but when tasting it, the differences becomes clear. The addition of the shiitake makes this dish more interesting than just eggplant. Thick, fresh shiitake almost tastes like meat. Perilla and ginger add their distinct flavors.

Ingredients: (about makes 8 small servings like seen in picture #1).
2 Japanese (Asian) eggplants (picture #2), each weighed about 110-115 grams, stem ends removed and cut into a large bite size by cutting on bias as you roll 45 degrees (“ran-giri” 乱切り)
2 fresh shiitake, large and thick, stems removed and cut into a similar size large chunks
1/2 tsp ginger root, peeled, and julienned, 
5-7 perilla leaves, finely chopped
1 tbs vegetable oil (I used peanut oil) with a splash or dark sesame oil

Seasonings:
1 tbs oyster sauce
1/2 tbs soy sauce (I used x4 Japanese noodle sauce)
1/2 tsp sugar (optional)
1 tbs Shiaoxing wine (optional)
1/3 cup chicken broth, low sodium

Directions:
In a wok, add the oil on medium high flame. When the oil is shimmering add the eggplants. Starting from the skin side cook/brown for several minutes turning as needed.
Add the shiitake and cook 2-3 minutes more.
Add the ginger and stir.
Add the wine and broth (careful it may ignite).
When the liquid starts boiling, turn down the flame to medium and add the oyster sauce, soy sauce and sugar.
Reduce the liquid a bit and add the perilla.
Check the seasoning and adjust

The combination of eggplant and shiitake work every well together with nice umami reminiscent of a meat dish. The addition of the perilla adds a nice bright taste which provides a good contrast. 

Fresh Corn Blini コーンビリニ

It is a local corn harvest season and my wife bought 12 ears of fresh corn. We rarely eat corn on the cob but often remove the kernels from the cob, then “milk” the cobs by scraping them with the back of a knife to extract all the goodness of the corn. Using a Vitamix blender, we then puree the fresh corn without adding any liquid. With this batch of corn my wife made, corn sage muffins, corn pudding/cake, and corn broth from the cobs. But there was still some corn puree left. We contemplated how to use it and my wife came up with the idea of corn blini. This was based on her previous experience with roasted red pepper blini and pesto blini. Turned out to be a pretty good addition to the crowd. 

Ingredients: makes 14 blini
2 cups corn puree
6 tbs melted butter
3/4 cup cream
6 large eggs, beaten
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup corn meal or corn flour 
1 Tbs + 1 1/2 tsp. Baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt

Directions:
In a food processor, puree the corn until smooth; scrape into a medium bowl. (If you are not going to use the corn right away put it in a pan and bring to a boil to eliminate any potential bacteria from the corn).  Add the egg, the melted butter and cream, then add the flours, baking powder and salt and whisk until well blended. (You may need to add more liquid so the batter is the consistency of pancake batter.)

In a cast iron platar, melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Use the melted butter to grease each of the platar cups before adding the batter . Pour the batter into the cups until they are full using the largest ice cream scoop. Cook over moderately low heat, turning once, until set, about 5 minutes or more per side. Repeat with the remaining butter and batter.

These blini were wonderful. They had an incredible and strong corn taste that was very pleasant. The texture was lovely and moist. Tasted great slathered with butter for breakfast. 

Simmered Dried Daikon Threads 切り干し大根の煮物

I realized that I posted this same dish 14 years ago. Although the statute of limitation may have passed I am re-blogging this recipe. This is because in the intervening years additional sources of Japanese food items which previously were not available have become available and I recently got a new package of “kiriboshi daikon” 切り干し大根 (*digression alert) or “threaded and dried daikon” from “Japanese Taste”. So I decided to make this traditional dish (picture #1).

*”Kiriboshi” is an example of  Japanese language form referred to as “rendaku” 連濁 or “sequential voicing”. In sequential voicing, when two words are combined to make a compound word, the first consonant of the second word which would generally be “unvoiced” in the combination becomes “voiced” i.e. when pronounced you can feel your vocal chords vibrate. In this example, kiri 切り(is an adjective for the state of being cut ) and hoshi 干し is an adjective for dried. In the process of making a compound word meaning cut and dried “kiri+hoshi” becomes “kiri-boshi” i.e. the h in hoshi remains silent or unvoiced so it becomes b which is voiced. This is a common thing in combined words in Japanese. (This is Japanese grammar 101/102 the short course—enjoy). 

I served this as a part of starting appetizers. This is a very gentle slightly sweet (from the dried daikon. The drying process makes the daikon sweeter) taste was enhanced with “Umami” of kelp and bonito broth. In the picture below, the dish on the right is salmon kelp roll, blanched sugar snaps and skinned Campari tomato. The kelp for the salmon kelp rolls is called “Hidaka kelp” 日高昆布 from Hokkaido. It has a nice texture. I got this also from “Japanese taste”.

Ingredients:
1 package (30gram) of “kiriboshi daikon”, washed and soaked in water to hydrate for 30 minutes and drained. The excess water (the daikon) squeezed dry.

One sheet (a full size one) deep dried tofu or abura-age 油揚げ, soaked in hot water and squeezed dry, cut in half lengthwise and cut into thin strips.
One medium carrot, peeled, sliced thin on bias and then julienned.
Kelp and bonito broth, enough to cover the above ingredients, about 200ml.
2 tbs x4 concentrated Japanese noodle sauce (or 1 tbs each soy sauce and mirin).
1 tsp vegetable oil and a splash of roasted sesame oil
Green beans, blanched in salted water for 3-4 minutes, the amount arbitrary

Directions:
Add the vegetable oil with a splash of roasted sesame oil in a sauté pan on medium flame.
Add the carrot and stir for a minute, add the daikon and abura-age, stir briefly
Add the broth to cover the ingredients and simmer
Season it with the noodle sauce (or the soy sauce and mirin), simmer for 30-40 minutes until the liquid is mostly reduced
I did not cook green beans with the rest of the ingredients because they were very good green beans and I did not want to over cook them. I just boiled them for 3 minutes to cook them but keep them crunchy. Before serving, slice the green beans on bias and garnish.

This is a nice seemingly simple dish which actually has fairly complex combination of flavors and textures. The daikon is slightly chewy and the abura-age has a rough texture and almost tastes like meat. Perfect for a small appetizer. 

Chicken Tender Fry with Salted Plum Sauce and Perilla ささ身の梅大葉揚げ

We were trying to use up frozen items hidden deep in the freezer. At one time, we bought chicken from a special poultry on-line store. We were not particularly impressed with the quality of the chicken we got. One of items was chicken the tenders. We decided they had matured long enough in the freezer so it was time to use them up. This is a variation on the chicken tender yakitori with perilla and salted plum sauce and is  based on a recipe posted on line. This time I shallow fried (picture #2) instead of cooking in the toaster oven.

Because it was fried with a batter coating, it has a crispy outside and soft inside with flavors of perilla and umeboshi 梅干 salted plum (picture #1). This combination works well. This heated up nicely in the toaster oven as well.

Ingredients:
10 chicken tenders, tendons removed and bi-valved (not cut through, just make a pocket)
10 perilla leaves

For Umeboshi  梅干しsauce or “Bainiki 梅肉 sauce
3 umeboshi salted plumes, meat cut off and finely chopped
1tsp mirin
1 tsp sake
1 tsp soy sauce
1 small pack of “kezuri-bushi” 削り節 bonito flakes 

For Batter
Equal amount of ”katakuri-ko” potato starch

Peanut oil for frying

Directions:
Umeboshi sauce
Add the chopped umeboshi fresh into a Japanese “suribachi” mortar, add the mirin, sake and soy sauce. Mix and grind using a pestle until smooth. Add the bonito flakes and mix to incorporate.

Smear the umeboshi sauce inside the bi-valved chicken tenders, close the tender and put the batter on one side of the perilla and encase the cut side, coat it with the batter and fry in the 180F oil, 1-2 minutes per side turning once (picture #2). Drain, cut in half and serve.

The umebishi sauce and perilla flavors are a very nice combination and frying makes it better. So there is no argument this is a good small dish to have.

Pesto Blini Prosciutto Cheese Sandwich

This is a sandwich my wife came up with for lunch. We made “pesto blini” some time ago and found out when we toast the blini, because of the olive oil in the pesto, essentially it fries in the toaster oven and makes a nice crispy crust. My wife decided this would make a nice sandwich. She would have used honey ham but we did not have it and, instead, used prosciutto (which we did have). She also added a slice of cheddar cheese before toasting. Melting cheese,  prosciutto and crisp pesto flavored blini are indeed a good combination. I served it with a side of cantalope.

Ingredients:
2 pesto blinis, spilt in half horizontally
Mayo and Dijon mustard
Slices of sharp cheddar or other meting cheese
Prosciutto or honey ham

Direction.
Place slices of the cheddar on one slice of the blini and toast both slices until the cheese melts
Smear the mayo and mustard on the other slices (picture #2)

Add the prosciutto (picture #3)

The prosciutto was a bit on the salty side and this sandwich may be better with honey ham or some other meat but it was still pretty good with nice pesto/basil flavor and crispy blini.

Vegetables in Cold Broth 冷製のトマトの煮浸し

Cold vegetables soaked in broth is the perfect dish for summer. I have posted cold simmered tomato and sugar snap soaked in salt broth before. I made a tomato dish similar to the one I made before but it differed because I did not simmer the tomato (Picture #1). I skinned the Campari tomato (by briefly blanching) and then soaking (but not cooking) it in the hot broth. I let it cool to room temperature and then refrigerated it. I blanched the Sugar snap then soaked it in the broth. I topped it with very briefly blanched “mitsuba ミツバ”. This preparation allows you to taste a fresher tomato flavor. The broth is also slightly sweet containing mirin and soy sauce in addition to kelp-bonito broth.

A few days later, I added simmered daikon and shiitake mushroom (picture #2, right). I also served salmon kelp roll 鮭の昆布巻き and seasoned egg or “ajitama 味玉” (left). The green is arugula sprouts which were growing in the window pot but needed to be thinned. I dressed with truffle oil.

Directions:

Vegetables I used are simmered daikon and fresh shiitake mushrooms, skinned Campari tomatoes and blanched sugar snaps. The daikon was first simmered in water with added one pinch of raw rice for 30 minutes. The seasoning broth is my usual kelp and bonito broth (I made it stronger with two dashi packs with 500ml of water) which was seasoned with mirin and soy sauce (not too strong to bring out the natural flavor of the vegetable). I did not cook the vegetable further, just placed in hot seasoned both and let it cool down and then refrigerated.

This is a very light refreshing dish to serve on a hot summer evening. The veggies have a very fresh flavor but a slightly cooked texture that make them a bit easier to eat. This is the essence of summer.