Tiramisu (ティラミス)

A friend (are you reading this blog ?) made Tiramisu before,
and I have been wanting to try since then.
I looked into online recipe, and this one was the easiest one, but turned out to be the most delicious Tiramisu I've ever had :)))

How to make:
- Separate two egg white and york, and whip egg white with sugar to make solid melange.
- In another bowl, mix egg york and Mascarpone cheese.
- Gradually add egg white melange into the Mascarpone mixture. While mixing, try not to break melange consistency. You can do folding motion in order not to break melange.
- Mix water, powder coffee, ram or some sort of liqueur, and vanilla essence.
- Dip finger biscuit into the coffee mixture. Don't soak it ! It'll break. Place it in to a final container.
- After the finger biscuit layer, put Mascarpone mixture. On top of the final layer of Mascarpone, sprinkle cacao powder, and keep it in fridge.
- I enjoyed it for 4 days, and it become taster better as time went by ! Enjoy !

Portabella Mushroom Sandwitch and Sardin Sandwitch

What can go wrong with 
- Roasted Portabella Mushroom + roasted onion + sliced tomato + melted cheese
and
- Spicy sardin + chopped onion + mayo + lemon zest + caper
They made a wonderful weekend breakfast !

Chole Curry, Okura Curry, and Puri

I finally succeeded in making Puri ( fried bread) today !
The point was using warm water in stead of cold water.

Crab Quiche

Crab Quiche without any pie crust !
i believe the dish has different name when it does not have crust, but don't remember now.
Green peas go well with crab meat.

Korean Bean Sprout (もやしのナムル)

I started keeping this dish all the time, and put it on noodle as topping or eat it as itself.
The key is to use Korean red chili which is sweet rather than spicy.

How to make:

1: mix Korean red chili, salt, sesame oil and sesame seeds in a container.
2: boil bean sprout, and put it into the mixture while it's hot.

Sweet & Spicy Chicken Wing

Looks a bit scary, but these are really yummy !
Just deep fry chicken wings without putting anything, then dip them into sweet & spicy sauce which is sold in Chinese super market for a dollar or two.

Red Snapper Roast （キンメダイのソテー）

Roast red snapper like I roast chicken in a toaster oven !

Edamame and Goat Cheese Salad （枝豆とゴートチーズのサラダ）

I still remember the shock I got when I first time tasted beans salad at a cafe in Japan.
There is this fashionable cafe called "Afternoon Tea" opened up while I was in high-school,
and it was quite a event to go there to have lunch with saved up allowance.
"Afternoon tea" also has shops which are selling their bread, dinner wares, and home/bath apparel.
It's still quite popular in Japan.
Anyways, let's go back to the talk about bean salad.
Their lunch plate comes with bread salad bowl which is something like  garlic bread cubes, lettuce, rosemary  and Parmesan cheese tossed together.  Bread salad was also new to Japan at that time.
Bean salad  came as a side dish in a tiny bowl which looks very colorful with different kind of beans.
I think there are more kinds of canned beans, and it's easy to make bean salad with multiple kind of beans.
I use Japanese bean, Edamame, this time with red pepper and goat feta cheese.
It's very refreshing !

Easy Roast Chicken using a Toaster （トースターでローストチキン）

I started baking some meat and vegetable in a oven toaster.
After baking them for 30 to 40 min, everything from main to side is ready for dinner.
Chicken leg quarter spiced with fresh herbs and a clove of garlic is my favorite roast.
I accompany the chicken with potato or mushroom.
Depending on the size, put vegetable from middle of cooking or take them out so that they don't get so dry or burnt.
While baking chicken, juice or fat melting from meat, and I pour that on the meat from time to time so that meat doesn't get dry. Oh, herbs and spices can be contained under the skin. In this way, flavor will penetrate inside of meat while it's being cooked.

Golden Fish Sweet

This is souvenir from Japan. The golden fish is made of bean paste, and water is sugar jelly.
It's amazing how much effort you can put to cooking !

Red Cabbage & Sweet Corn Salad （赤キャベツとコーンのサラダ）

Since red cabbage is harder than regular cabbage, you can boil a bit as well.
I put a lot of salt to chopped red cabbage to dehydrate it.
Squeeze water from cabbage as much as possible, and add boiled sweet corn.
It's easy to dehusk corn with bread knife.
I added a bit of mayonnaise, lemon, and salt to finish it as lightly flavored coleslaw.

 

Today's dinner plate looked like this :

Tomato Mozzarella Spagetti

This is the laziest dish I make. TJ's tomato sauce & fresh mozzarella cheese.
Don't heat up mozzarella cheese. It should be warmed up in the sauce which produces the best milky and chewy texture.
My sister gave me this long microwavable container which I boil pasta in microwave.
You can get it in Japanese dollar shop like Daiso, but basically any large enough container which can accommodate pasta is fine.

Salmon with Mushroom （鮭のソテーきのこソースと）

Salmon and mushrooms are Autumn taste. They go well together !

Salmon with Mushroom Sauce

Fish dish is amazingly easy and quick. Unfortunately, it's difficult to get good & reasonable seafood in US. In my neighborhood,  Asian markets such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, or Vietnamese markets carry good seafood. Especially, Japanese ones are quite cleanly cut and packed.
  I simply boil salmon with water and sake (or white wine), and put sauteed mushroom and fresh basil on top. It's simple and nice !
As a rule of thumb, salmon goes well with potato.

Egg Benedict (エッグベネディクト）

Egg Benedict again ! I recently found two things about this dish.
1- Need to put generous amount of vinegar into water to poach egg. Otherwise, egg does spread out all over in the water.
2- Mixture of TJ's Champagne vinaigrette and Japanese mayonnaise results in wonderful hollandais sauce.

Bloody Orange and Fennel Salad （赤オレンジとのサラダ）

I think I posted orange and fennel salad before. I made it with bloody orange this time.
Bloody orange has deeper flavor than normal orange, and most of all, it looks bloody read !

Yellow and Orange Turnip Salad (黄色と橙カブのサラダ）

These turnips are really great. I had turnip salad in two different restaurants around San Francisco, and I really love the taste of both of them. I was initially thinking, it must be the salad dressing which makes the dish so tasty, but then the distinctive flavor seems to be from turnip itself when I remember the taste.
so, I decided to give me a try to cook it by myself to know the actual taste of turnips.
I found some of good grocery stores actually are selling them, but they don't look so attractive. That's why I've never got it before.
I went home, and microwaved them till it got soft, and left them till they cooled down.
I pealed and diced them, and mix with lemon juice, mayonnaise, and salt/pepper.
It tasted sooo good just as it is ! and most of all, it looks cute when I put both yellow and orange ones. Happy Cooking- :)

I

Penne Bolognese (ペンネボロネーゼ）

My mom was stunned with this dish I improvised, and I decided to put it in my blog.
Photo did not turn out to be great, but the taste was authentic !
I've picked up a relatively expensive handmade style dried penne packet, and  I did not ruin it with regular pasta sauce, and I decided to make my own. (but it's easy as always)
  First, saute minced garlic and chopped onion, and put ground chicken to further saute the mixture. Then, add tomato paste, chopped dried tomato, and many kind of spices like cinnamon, paprika, nutmeg and you name it ! In the end, you put boiled penne to the sauce.

Easy Seafood Pilaf (簡単シーフードピラフ）

I love flavor of saffron. It's gorgeous and sweet.
Some people think it's hard to use because of  the strong flavor, and probably because  it's pricey.
I like to put it in milky sweets like yogurt, ice cream, or even hot milk, and dazzle a bit of cardamon seed.
For savory dish, seafood ,especially scallop, is definitely a good match to saffron.
This time, I simply put rice, saffron, butter, and frozen seafood mix in rice cooker, and finished it up with freshly grounded pepper and salt. Very easy and nice !
 

German Style Baby Shitake and Baby potatoes (新シイタケと新じゃがのジャーマンポテト風）

Hi ! Looong time no see !
I haven't been writing this blog for a while.
After the massive earthquake and Tsunami attack in Japan, my mom had been staying with me here in US, and I was really away from updating any sort of things like catching up with friends, planning summer vacation, and updating the blog ! However, I was still keeping records of some dishes I cooked for Mom.
I made German Potato style Baby potato sauteed with baby Shimeji mushroom. German potato is fairly common dish in Japan, and I am not sure if the dish is called as German potato in worldwide.
It's basically sauteed potato with onion and garlic, and put some vinegar in finishing. I like to put soy sauce and balsamic vinegar. This combination really works.

 

Bread Salad with Leak and Potato (ホロねぎとジャガイモの入ったパンサラダ）

I've been busy for sometime, and it's been for a while to cook !
As a rehabilitation session, I made a salad with leak.
So far, I have not been able to connect "Leak" with "Poireau" onion in France.
I liked boiled Poireau with creamy vinegrette when I was in France, but since we don't have leaks in Japan, I haven't had it for a while even in French restaurants in Japan.. We have white long onion which looks thin leak, but its taste is very strong like regular yellow onion.
I woke up with hunger this morning, and started browsing my fridge. While I was browsing left overs, I suddenly notice that I can use Leak in stead of Poireau ! However, in the end, they are exactly same thing.. It's just funny that I haven't noticed for such a long time.. 
Anyways, here it is. 
I microwaved sweet Yucon Gold potato, boiled leaks, and toasted diced Ciabatta bread with olive oil and garlic.  Then, I tossed them with cream dressing. It was delicious !

 

Clam and Green Pasta （蛤と菜の花のパスタ）

I was planning to make Clam Chowder, but canned clam I've got was too big for it. Then I decided to put into pasta.

Edible Chili Oil Noodle （食べるラー油麺）

This is another dish which uses the Edible Chili Oil

Boiled Pork and Vegitable with Edible Chili Oil (食べるラー油でいただくしゃぶしゃぶ）

The Edible Chili Oil is very handy. You can boil whatever you like, and put the oil on top of it.
It's just yummy !

Edible Chili Oil （食べるラー油）

This is very popular now in Japan. It looks very spicy, but actually it's not. It is just very tasty and can go well with anything like bread, rice, or noodle.

What you need:
- Garlic
- Green Onion
- Rice Topping  (Furikake)
- Korean Chili Flake
- Regular Oil
- Sesame Oil
- Soy Sauce
- Sugar

How to make:
- Slowly deep fry Korean chili flake, chopped garlic, green onion, and rice topping with oil and sesame oil.
- Leave the above till it gets cool down.
- Add soy sauce and sugar.

Chicken Soboro -Tricolour Rice (鶏そぼろの三色ご飯）

This is one of the popular lunch box menu in Japan. Soboro is Teriyaki Flavored ground chicken, and it goes well with rice. Usually, it comes with sweetened scramble egg and some sort of green vegetable.
I like to eat it with Japanese sour plum, Umeboshi.

Salmon Cream Pasta (サーモンクリームパスタ）

I really wanted to have this pasta today ! When I just started getting some allowance, going out to eat with my friends was new exciting experience. One of the restaurants which were popular in my high school days was Japanese style spaghetti shop where you eat pasta with chopsticks. They have this salmon pasta with a whole potato and butter in it. I loved it !

Spiced Fish and Doubly Tomato Salad （スパイシーフィッシュとダブルトマトサラダ）

I put dried tomato into dressing and marinate tomato with it, so here we make "Doubly Tomato Salad" !

Koya Tofu and Eggplant (高野豆腐と茄子の煮びたし）

I microwave eggplant and remove all the skin, and soak it into Dashi (Japanese soup stock).

Nuts Curry, Cauliflower Curry, Spinach & Cheese Curry (インドカレー色々）

I made three kinds of curry,  Nuts Curry, Cauliflower Curry, Spinach & Cheese Curry.
Among these three curries, I was especially excited about making Nuts Curry.
I had this one kind of Indian curries I really like in an Indian restaurant nearby, but I have never had it in somebody's place. So I did not know what it is. I could only guess it may have some ground nuts.
I decided to give me a try, and it worked ! I only used ground nuts and regular Indian spices such as mustard seeds, cumin, etc, yet it yields such complicated flavor.

 

Nuts Curry

 

Spinach & Cheese Curry (Palak Paneer)

Cauliflower and Tamarind Curry

Lentil Curry (Darl)

Angel Cake (シフォンケーキ）

This is my favorite cake ! It's called "Angel Cake" in the States, but we call it "Chiffon Cake".
"Chiffon" is a French word which means soft clothes.
This cake is as soft as sponge and heavenly good :)

What you need:

- Angel cake food pan  ( A pan which has hole in the center)
- 3/4 cup of cake flour
- 1 and 1/4 cup of powder sugar or confiscate sugar
- 3 egg yolk
- 4 egg white
- 1/2 cup of oil
- 1/2 of water

How to make:
- 1:  Shake flour into a strainer and keep it in a bowl
- 2:  Separate eggs into yolk and white.
- 3: Make egg mixture.
-- Put egg yolk and 1/3 of sugar into a bowl and beat it till the mixture gets whitish.
-- Add oil and water, and mix.
-- Add flour through a strainer into the egg mixture.
-- Adjust the texture of this egg mixture by adding milk so that it is as dilute as yogurt.
- 4: In a big bowl, put egg white and the rest of sugar. Beat till it forms quite solid melange.
- 5: Put 1/3 of melange into the egg mixture, and mix completely. Then, add the rest of melange, and mix roughly for several times. You still see some chunks of melange.
-6: Put the cake mixture into a angel cake pan. Slightly bring the pan and drop it so that air inside will escape. Repeat this process for three times. Stir the mixture with a skew or chop stick for few times.
- 7: Bake it for 50 min in 325degF oven, and then for 10~15min in 300degF till nothing will stick to a skewer when you poke it into the cake.
- 8: Keep the cake upside down till it gets cool down. (If you don't do this, cake will shrink)

Soup Spagetti (スープスパゲッティ）

My Mom made this when I was small.
As the name of the dish tells you, it's soupy pasta.
It , I believe, is a fusion dish, and not Italian at all, but if you know anything like this in Italian cooking, please let me know.
I first saute bacon and garlic, then add green pepper, tomato, seafood.  I used chicken soup stock to make soup, and added some soy sauce in the end.
After boiling pasta till 80 % in a separate pot, I added it to this soup to finish it up. This way pasta will soak the soup.

Soup Pot Pie (スープのパイ包み焼き）

I cover mushroom soup with pie crust. I tried it with cream tomato soup before, and it goes better with rich pie crust than mushroom soup.

Roasted Ram (ラムロースト）

This is another toaster dish. Just get a rack of lamb, and put it with various kinds of vegetables into oven !

Homemade Udon (手打ちうどん）

My friend suggested me to try to make Udon from scratch, and I finally tried it.
The process itself is quite a fun, and it tastes different from what I can buy from super market.
It should be fun to make it in a party !

Dip it into Dashi !

Savory Egg Pudding -Chawan Mushi （茶碗蒸し）

I had a lot of ingredients from Japanese New Year dishes, and put everything into this savory egg pudding. This is one of my favorite dish, and I can eat it endlessly :)

This is how it looks from outside

Japanese New Year Dish (御節）

Happy New Year of 2011 !
New year is the most important holiday in Japan, and we have special dishes for the first three days of January called Osechi (御節）. We have boxes of small dishes, and rice cake soup（Ozoni, お雑煮）.
Since it is quite pricey to get everything in California, I prepared simple version of it.

Ozoni has chicken, carrot, snow pea, bamboo shoot, and kamaboko (fish cake)

 

Osechi has fish cake, sweet omelet, and Koya Tofu.