shiso-kimchi shrimp cocktail sauce

My husband recently met Taro Arai, owner and chief dreaming officer of Mikuni restaurants, at a conference and came home with a signed copy of his book for moi! Abundance: Finding the American Dream in a Japanese Kitchen is full of inspiring and encouraging stories of Taro's family's emigration to America and their struggles in the first years of the restaurant, plus their faith in God that kept them going.

Not only is it a joyful account of one family's miraculous story, but the food photos make me drool! And one item near the beginning of the book stuck with me: Shiso, a common herb used in Japanese cooking, is anti-inflammatory and antibacterial.

I decided to use more of it as soon as possible, and I found some fresh shiso at a local Asian market (I asked, and they do grow the shiso here locally in Florida).

I found a recipe online for cabbage/shiso/apple coleslaw (to come in a later post) that was really fragrant and fresh tasting, and then I also decided to go crazy and make up my own shiso recipe the other evening when I had fresh shrimp to boil.

You'll need:

• fresh shrimp for boiling (I used 1.5 pounds for 4 people, and we had leftovers)
• ice, for cooling the shrimp down after boiling and decanting
• 2 lemons, one sliced in wedges and the other juiced (I used about 1.5-2 tablespoons of the juice)
• 1/4 cup finely minced kimchi
• 3 large red shiso (akajiso) leaves, minced finely
• 2 green onions, green and white parts sliced thinly (save a few of the green bit for garnish)
• 1/2 c. mayo

Do this:

Boil your shrimp till they make a "C" shape and are pink, decant, rinse, and pile on the ice to chill those puppies down.

In a small bowl, mix the mayo, finely minced kimchi, lemon juice, chopped green onions, and finely minced shiso leaves. Taste and see if you need a bit of salt and pepper.

That's it! Peel and devein your shrimp and then dip to your heart's content. I found that kimchi and shiso go really well together, and the bit of lemon juice for extra tartness plus the mayo for creaminess just tied it all together. (I'm a kimchi nut anyway and I'm always looking for new ways to use it.)

Don't be a wimpy-shrimpy about this--dig in!

honeyed black-vinegar salmon

No photo. In the middle of packing and cleaning. Moving from Seattle to Orlando tomorrow.

But I had to share: I made the easiest and most delicious baked salmon the other evening.

You'll need:

• salmon
• Chinese black vinegar
• honey
• rice bran oil

Do this:

Plop the fish in a glass baking dish. Drizzle over the oil, vinegar, and honey, then bake a few minutes till flaky.

That's it. Dig in and hear your Beans rave. Not to mention your own happy tummy.

chinese mustard powder: my secret weapon

Do you have an international market nearby? If so, get thyself there this instant and buy yourself some of this heavenly blast-your-nose spicy mustard powder. (Hubby declares it's similar to British-style mustard.)

I use it in so many instances:

• salmon burgers
• chorizo meatballs
• mashed potatoes or mashed cauliflower
• and my own homemade BBQ sauce for pulled pork with lettuce wraps: ketchup, this amazing mustard powder, apple cider vinegar, onion powder, minced pickled heirloom Beaver Dam peppers, garlic powder

I can imagine it'd also be great in salad dressing...excuse me while I go do some more mustard dreaming...

wasabi-lime dressing

miso burgers, roasted kabocha, and avocado salad with wasabi-lime dressing

Let me tell you a little story...

Once upon a time, there was a lovely princess with lustrous brown wavy hair, wondrous dark chocolate-colored eyes, and a palate that was die-hard crazy about wasabi.

She and her prince lived in Japan for eight years, where this obsession was cultivated to within an inch of its life.

And then a big move...across the deep salty waters...to the West. A shop called Chocolati in the serfdom of Greenwood, Seattle, created an amazing, uber-wow truffle called Ichi. It had wasabi and ginger enrobed in a royal garment of dark chocolate, crowned with wee sesame seeds. The princess once again indulged in her pale-green infatuation.

Fortunately a local international shop sold wasabi paste in a tubular device, which the princess ordered her butler to purchase and her live-in cook to use in an astringent, perky salad dressing. It was dubbed Wasabi-Lime Dressing, and a British serf named Nigella apparently conjured it.

The live-in Seattle cook made a pronouncement and declared that this is what you need:

• 3 T. fresh lime juice
• 1/4 c. peanut oil (this cook used rice-bran oil instead)
• 1 T. wasabi paste
• 1/2 t. kosher salt or 1/4 t. table salt 

Then she said you must do this:

Shake in a jar or stir briskly with a whiskly.

It was best served on a salad with creamy avocados, and a side of miso burgers and roasted kabocha.

The princess lived happily ever after, her Bean-Offspring and Bean-Prince at her side, and a goblet of the Dressing in the cellar to use whenever her little heart desired.

christmas lunch menu

1. boneless turkey breast draped with bacon and herbs
2. pumpkin mashed potatoes
3. roasted parsnips
4. roasted brussels sprouts with lemon
5. carrot-raisin-pineapple salad
6. homemade cranberry-apple-ginger sauce with a hint of orange
7. choice of sparkly apple-pomegranate, apple-grape, or apple-cranberry juice
8. chocolate-coconut cookies (gluten free)
9. Christmas pudding with brandy butter

Then...a nap? With kiddiewinks in the house? No way that's happening!

rosemary red cabbage, apples, and onions

We have little eggies with ham almost every breakfast and I'm always on the lookout for fun and savory sides to go with. My garlicky/vinegary favorite is kimchi (nobody's complained about my breath yet!), but I alternate with slices of avocado and/or tomato, or with just zigzags of ketchup on top.

Practical Paleo is my main inspiration for meals lately and this little sweet-and-sour number came from its luscious pages. (Even the kiddiewinks, especially the elder one, sit around and read it to find recipes for me to make. It's that yummy.)

This would be lovely accompanying your holiday meal as well.

You'll need:

• 1 large onion, thinly sliced (I chop mine in half and then cut it into half-moons)
• 1 T. coconut oil
• 1/2 head red cabbage, thinly sliced
• 2-4 T. apple cider vinegar (I use 3)
• chopped fresh rosemary to taste
• salt to taste
• 1 green apple, cut into matchsticks (I leave the peel on when I buy organic)

Do this:

In a large pot on the stove, saute the onion in the oil till soft, then add your reddy-purpley cabbage and cook it till it begins to soften as well.

Add the vinegar, rosemary, and salt and allow it all to soften together and the flavors to meld beautifully and fragrantly.

Add the apples and cook them until tender.

I'm a vinegar kid so this hits the spot every time, and the addition of rosemary is unique to me. I've made a variation of this for years, but with the rosemary it really makes me happy. And my eggs get goose bumps.

christmas puddings 2012

 fruit soaking in brandy, ready to be pudding-ed

Flashback to 2010 when my mother-in-law was here from the UK and helped me make her mother's Christmas puddings...

Flash forward to my 2012 helper (above!)...

And my husband helped stir because once you put in the breadcrumbs, suet, eggs, sugar, candied citrus peel, currants, golden raisins, raisins, spices, and brandy, it is stiff stuff!

Well, the puddings are made and brewing in the basement till Christmas and we already have two sets of plans for those puppies.

And now I'm being summoned for a game of pirate chutes and ladders, so me pretties, I must depart.

mint lamburgers

I could've eaten ten of these juicy little gems, and when they got heavily involved with a Greek salad, it was enough to put my taste buds over the burger moon. Even the kiddiewinks were asking me if we had more lamburgers today. Sadly, we did not, but there will most definitely be a next time for this meal.

The recipe hails from The Food Lovers Kitchen and I'll be thanking them for quite some time.

You'll need:

• 1 lb. ground lamb
• 2 T. mint leaves, minced (fortunately I have mint in our back garden so it's really fresh)
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• salt and pepper (I didn't measure these)

(They also called for a minced shallot, but I didn't have that on hand. Would be nice, methinks.)

Do this:

Grab yourself a big mixing bowl and chuck all the ingredients right in. Use one hand to dig in and mix and the other hand to spin the bowl round and round, like a child trying to make himself dizzy on purpose. Pat into burgers and cook them in a cast iron skillet with some olive oil and you'll have the juiciest, tastiest minty-garlicky mouthfuls you could ever imagine.

For the salad, I just tossed together lettuce, chopped tomatoes, peeled and coarsely chopped cucumbers, and roughly chopped black olives. I used an Everyday Food Greek salad recipe for the dressing, which is basically equal parts olive oil and fresh lemon juice, with salt and pepper thrown in.

A tad obnoxiously, I must end with a quote from Wool Gathering: A Sheep Family Reunion that my son reminded me of this evening: "Good-baaaaaa." Good-baaaaaaa, little lamburgers. You made our tummies happy.

sweet-and-salty banana snackie

My new favorite munchies: organic banana slices, salted almond butter, and organic and fair trade roasted cacao nibs from Theo (down the road from us).

Sweet, salty, and crunchy with a slight coffee-smoky flavor from the nibs. Bring it on. I shared today, but oh, so reluctantly.

let them eat broccoli!

The beanie-kids surprised the socks off me the other day by trying and devouring broccoli!

I just use a really simple method: Roast in olive oil in the oven, then top with balsamic vinegar and kosher salt.

Just to test that it wasn't a fluke, I bought more and served it the same way tonight--and it worked again.

It only took six years.

salmon with blackcurrant-ginger sauce

Still using the blackcurrants we picked the other day, but sadly, we're running low after a week and I'm hankering to go pick more. I doubt we'll drive an hour away again to do that, but it's a nice thought, anyway. We had such a lovely day and it's a sweet memory for me.

I got some Alaskan wild-caught salmon from our local butcher the other day and as my mind is always working overtime in the food department, I threw together a sweet-spicy blackcurrant puree to bless the fish (and our tummies).

You'll need:

• about 1 cup fresh blackcurrants
• a splash of real maple syrup
• about 1.5 tablespoons freshly grated ginger
• pinch of cayenne pepper
• dash each of salt and pepper
• water
• drizzle of balsamic vinegar

Do this:

To a blender, add the fruit, syrup, ginger, spices, and enough water to make a puree. Blend on the "sauce" setting, if you have one, till smooth.

Add the puree to a small saucepan and warm on low, adding in a drizzle of balsamic vinegar at the end.

On a scale of 1 to 10? 9.824!

chicken bolognese resting on portabella beds

We've cut out wheat and way back on other carbs, so the wee cogs in my noggin are always turning, conjuring up ways to serve sauces and such.

Sunday I put some chicken bolognese in the slow cooker, and after our boat ride on Lake Union, we came back and all I had to do was roast some portabello mushrooms for a few minutes, et voila!

So here's the sauce (very loosely based on a recipe from Extending the Table: A World Community Cookbook):

• chicken thighs
• onions, garlic, zucchini
• basil puree
• Italian seasoning (rosemary, savory, basil, and marjoram)
• tomato paste
• salt
• sugar (just a wee bit to take away the acidity)
• pepper
• bay leaf
• water

Just saute the onions, garlic, and zucchini in olive oil in a frying pan on the stove, add the chicken, just to brown it a little, then throw all that plus the rest of the ingredients into the slow cooker for the day.

Then when you're ready, roast your mushies in a casserole dish with olive oil and more Italian seasoning on 400 F for 15 minutes or so.

Serve the sauce on the thick, juicy mushrooms with just a tiny sprinkling of parmesan (this is pretty much the extent of our dairy consumption these days, but it's just enough to add a bit of je ne sais quoi).

blackcurrant-kale green smoothie

Blackcurrants and blueberries from our picking haul last weekend...

• blackcurrants
• blueberries
• carrots
• kale
• key lime juice
• fresh mint
• 2 bananas
• 2 navel oranges

It all adds up to yum.

mamatouille's restaurant

The kids call our kitchen "Mamatouille's Restaurant" and have the above sign posted outside the door into the kitchen.

And we have our aprons close by, just in case we need to grab them in a jiffy...

gifting my taste buds

If you want to see a few nutters dressed up for a tofu factory tour, click here. I won't claim to have ties to these folks.

Island Spring tofu, made organically on Vashon Island (just a short ferry ride from Seattle), is the best tofu we've ever had, and after living for over eight years in East Asia, that's saying a lot.

I contacted them a year or so ago to tell them how much we love their products, and asked if they give factory tours. They do, but we waited until now to visit because I wanted to make sure the beans would be big enough to appreciate it.

We loved all their samples, including a stupendous jar of their homemade kim chi they gave to me. As you can see from the photo below of the almost-empty jar, I'm enjoying it of a morning with my eggs and Korean-style dried seaweed.

Burp, one of my favorite foodie blogs (they hail from Milwaukee), recently had some giveaways and I happened to win some lover-ly bottles of pickles and ketchup from The Scrumptious Pantry. It's the kind of food I'd drool over online but never purchase because of budget constraints--what a nice gift!

The package came with cranberry catsup, earthy-spiced heirloom tomato catsup, pickled heirloom red beets, and a Wisconsin specialty, pickled heirloom Beaver Dam peppers. (On a side note, I also won an insulated lunch bag with a cow on it from the Wisconsin Dairy Board, via Burp. Ironic, because we really don't do dairy anymore, but it's a useful bag anyway.)

Trying out the cranberry catsup on my eggs (the boys claim it's too spicy). I think hubby and I decided it would be better on meat than eggs (maybe pulled pork?).

A salad with roasted potatoes and walnuts, with a dressing of finely minced Beaver Dam pickles, olive oil, white wine vinegar, basil paste, and roasted garlic paste. Yum.

My light supper tonight: mixed greens, grape tomatoes, those gorgeous pickled heirloom beets, ham, green onions, and walnuts. Dressing: olive oil, red wine vinegar, parsley, finely minced Beaver Dam pickles, basil paste, and roasted garlic paste. I plowed through this in a jif and loved every pickle-y bite.