soup

Postcards from Southwestern France: Gazpacho or cold soup, Cassoulet, Albi, Moissac, Conques

maki — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 15:04:28 +0200

We left Provence this week for a little trip to the Midi-Pyrénées in the southwestern part of France. We’ve been trying to save money by cooking at home most of the time since we started our nomadic existence in France (see previously; not that that’s much of a hardship, since the produce and other foodstuffs in Provence are spectacular). But this week we’ve been staying in an apartment in a 17th century townhouse right around the corner from the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum in the heart of Albi, the capital of the Tarn Department. Since there are tons of great little restaurants here, we’ve been indulging ourselves a bit.

One thing I have noticed while eating out a lot more is that many places are serving little cups of what they usually call gazpacho, as an amuse bouche or as part of the entrée (appetizer). They are basically cold soups, made with various vegetables. I’m not sure this is a regional custom, but it is very nice regardless. Here’s one we had the other day in the small medieval town of Moissac, as an amuse-bouche. It was basically a cold tomato juice, but very nice and refreshing.

Here’s another kind of gazpacho - a cold melon soup, served as an amuse bouche also. It was just pureed melon with nothing added I think.

Here’s another one, served as part of an entrée. This time it was a cold sweet pepper soup.

Here’s a more classic gazpacho, made with tomatoes and cucumber, served in a tumbler. This was a full entrée portion.

Finally, here’s my favorite - it was merely described as a gazpacho des legumes (vegetable gazpacho). It was a cold vegetable soup; I tasted sweet corn, maybe carrot, celery, and so on. I know gazpacho purists may shake their heads, but it was really refreshing and delicious. It was one part of an amuse bouche - the other part was what you see on the spoon in the back, a piece of rough paté with a tiny bit of chutney. The combination was really nice.

Once we get back ‘home’ to Provence, I think I am going to start more meals with a little cold soup of some kind. It’s really a great start to a summer meal.

Cassoulet and more food from the region

The most famous regional dish is cassoulet, the hearty dish made of white beans and loads of hearty (fat!) meaty bits, such as duck, sausage, and - fat! I’ve had cassoulet elsewhere many times before, and made it myself, but the the way they make it here is really much better in my opinion. Here’s a relatively light yet still rich version that we had at a restaurant with the adorable name of La Fourchet A Droite (The Fork (is) to the Right) in Albi. The abundance of fat just makes it unctuously creamy rather than greasy. I liked it so much, I’ve managed to have it twice so far…and am contemplating having it again for dinner tonight! (Actually cassoulet is supposed to have originated in the town of Castelnaudary, which is about an hour from Albi. I think I need to come back here when the weather is cooler and more conducive to enjoying piping hot bean-and-meat casseroles.)

This is a Pastis Gascon, a speciality of the Gers region, also in the Midi Pyrénées. It’s a pastry made of many layers of phyllo dough, and is filled with Armagnac-soaked and caramelized apple. I’m not sure I totally love it, but it is so pretty to look at.

I much preferred this pie though. It was filled with poached apricots and served with a sour cherry sauce and rich vanilla ice cream. Gorgeous! This was dessert at the meal that started with the gazpacho des legumes amuse bouche pictured above, at the Hotel Sainte Foy in Conques.

A little more Albi, plus Conques and Moissac

Albi is a fairly large town, but very mellow, and not crowded at all, even though it is the hometown of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and has a fine museum dedicated to him, not to mention a big, fortress like cathedral, beautiful riverside views, a quaint old town and more. The town is built of red brick, which is a gorgeous pink-rose color. Here it is in the early morning…

…and in the late afternoon…

Here’s the inside of the large Marché Couvert (covered market) in the center of town. It has several produce stalls, a fish stall, bakeries and pastry shops, and a lot more. It may not be quite as awesome as the larger markets in Provence, but it’s still quite good. We bought stuff from here for the meals that we ate in.

I loved this little store, called L’Artisan Pastellier. They sell clothing, accessories and other products made from the blue Pastel dye that was highly prized in Europe until indigo was imported from India. The blue is softer than indigo. They also sell art pastels, watercolor paints and other art supplies, mostly made with vegetable based dyes. Their web site.

We also made side trips to the medieval towns of Conques (that’s a photo of Conques up at the top) and Moissac. One reason why I brought my mother here is because she’s been rather obsessed by the pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostella, and Conques and Moissac were key stops. Both are beautiful places, though Conques is quite touristy. Moissac is a bit more relaxed I think. The Gothic cloister there is breathtaking.

If you’d like to see photos, they are all on my Flickr.

All in all, we really enjoyed our week here, even though the heat was stifling for much of it. (It felt a lot more humid than Provence, though that may just have been an anomaly.) I don’t think I would choose to live here full time over Provence, but I think I’ll try to come back here again in the cooler months - for, you guessed it, more cassoulet.

Sweet Potato, Coconut and Shrimp Miso Soup

maki — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:31:25 +0100

This rich fusion-esque soup is something I just came up with while fiddling around with the idea of a bisque-like soup without any cream or milk in it. After a few experiments, I’m happy with this version. I am not lactose-intolerent, but several members of my family are, especially my stepfather. Besides, even those of us with the sturdiest stomachs may have problems when there is tons of butter and cream involved.

This soup also happens to be quite frugal, since I use the shells and heads of peeled fresh shrimp that I stock up in the freezer to make the base stock. You don’t even have to add any actual shrimp, though they can provide a nice texture contrast.

The key to this soup is to balance the sweetness that comes from the sweet potato and coconut milk with the spiciness of the cayenne or chili pepper, plus the sourness of lemon juice.

Recipe: Sweet Potato, Coconut and Shrimp Miso Soup

For the shrimp stock:

About 2 cups of shrimp shells and heads
1 small onion
1 celery stalk
Olive oil
1 bay leaf

Chop up the onion and celery, and sauté in the olive oil until limp. Add the shrimp shells and 5 cups of water. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to a simmer. Simmer for about 20 minutes, skimming off the scum that rises to the surface. Strain through a sieve or a colander lined with a cheesecloth or gauze. You will have about 4 1/2 cups of soup stock. It will be more orange if you have more heads.

For the soup:

1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 large sweet potato (I used the white kind, but the orange kind will work too), peeled and chopped up roughly
1/2 large fennel bulb or 1 small fennel bulb, chopped up roughly (If you can’t get bulb fennel, use a couple of stalks of celery finely chopped)
1-2 Tbs. Olive oil
The shrimp stock
1 cup coconut milk (use low-fat if you must, but full-fat will be richer)
2 Tbs. white miso
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt and pepper
Chopped fresh coriander or parsley
Hot red chili powder or cayenne pepper
A few shrimp (optional)

Equipment:

A heavy bottomed pan, or a slow cooker
A stick blender (mine is a 12+ year old Bamix that still works flawlessly)

In a large heavy bottomed pan (an enameled cast iron one such as Le Creuset is ideal) heat up the olive oil and add the onion. Sauté until limp, then add the other vegetables. Sauté until the vegetables are just turning a bit brown around the edges. (If using a slow cooker, do this part in a big sauté pan or frying pan or wok.)

Add the shrimp stock and bring to a boil. Lower the heat, and simmer gently until the vegetables are totally softened, about 30-40 minutes depending on how small you cut your vegetables.

With a stick blender, puree the soup until it’s smooth. A few small chunks in there are fine. You can also puree it in batches in a blender.

Return to the pot and add the coconut milk. Dissolve the miso in a little of the soup, and add to the pot. Add the lemon juice and pepper. Taste and add salt if you think it needs it (probably around a teaspoon may be needed). You can add more lemon juice at this point too.

Optionally add a few small fresh peeled shrimp just before serving, and simmer just until the shrimp are cooked, a couple of minutes.

Serve topped with a sprinkle of hot chili pepper or cayenne pepper (or chopped fresh red chili peppers), and chopped coriander or parsley. Optionally drizzle a bit of basil scented olive oil or even butter on top. The only accompaniment you need is some good bread or plain rice.

Notes

If you want this to have an even thicker texture, add about 2 Tbs. of potato starch or cornstarch dissolved in a little water; simmer until the soup thickens. Add more of the starch-water mixture to your liking.

Chilled wintermelon and shrimp soup

maki — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:12:31 +0200

These days, the house generally looks like a warzone because of the packing, and I am not in the mood for involved cooking. So I’m making very simple bentos, and mostly one-dish/one-pot type of things for dinner. A great one-pot meal is soup of course, but it is also summer, when we aren’t always in the mood for a steaming hot bowlful.

The answer is chilled soup that can be made ahead and just taken out at dinnertime. This one is really easy to make too, which is a big plus. Winter melon has a inherently cooling quality according to old (Chinese) medicine, so this is really nice to have on a warm evening.

A bit about wintermelon

The name wintermelon (in Japanese tougan 冬瓜) is a little misleading, because it may seem that it’s a melon that is only in season in winter. It actually ripens in hot weather in temperate zones (it can be grown year round in hotter areas), but the hard, waxy outer skin allows it to be kept in a cool place for a long time, so that it can be eaten in the winter months. I think it’s most suitable for eating in the warm months, because it’s watery and very subtle in flavor, with a crisp texture that is retained even after cooking (though cooking it for a very long time will make it soft).

Winter melon has a pale green, shiny smooth skin, and is quite big. (Be sure it’s smooth skinned - the dark green crinkly ones you may see sold nearby are bitter melon (also called goya, in Japanese nigauri にが瓜) and are treated quite differently.) You see them anywhere from around 10-15 cm / 4-6 inches in diameter on up. If you buy a whole one, you can keep it in a cool cellar until you decide to use it. You can also buy cut portions, which may be a more convenient for a small family or if you don’t want to commit to one huge fruit.

When you cut into it, it looks like this.

The inner part with the seeds is fluffy and inedible (like the innards of a pumpkin, to which it is related), so you need to scoop it out. The skin is really quite tough, so be careful when peeling it.

In Japanese cooking, winter melon is usually cut into bite size squares and parboiled for about 10 minutes in plain water, before being stewed, used in soups, stir-fried, and so on.

Recipe: Chilled wintermelon and shrimp soup

2 cups of parboiled wintermelon cubes
5 cups dashi stock, vegan dashi stock or chicken stock (yes you can use water and granules or a stock cube - I do myself when I’m in a hurry)
1 Tbs. soy sauce
1 Tbs. mirin or sherry
1 Tbs. kurosu (black vinegar) or balsamic vinegar
1 tsp. fresh ginger juice (grate some fresh ginger and squeeze out the juice)
200 g / about 7 oz. fresh shrimp, shelled and deveined
Salt
Green garnish (here I have used edamame and green onion tops from the garden)

If you haven’t already, peel, de-seed and cut up the wintermelon into cubes about 1 inch / 2 cm big. Put them in a pot of water, bring up to a boil and cook for about 10 minutes. Drain.

Put the wintermelon in a pot with the dashi, soy sauce and mirin. Bring up to a boil, then simmer slowly for about 15 minutes.

In the meantime, peel and devein the shrimp, and cup up into chunks (or use small shrimp). Add the shrimp to the soup. Simmer a couple of minutes, and add the ginger juice and vinegar. Taste and add salt if necessary.

Take the pot off the heat, and transfer the contents to a bowl or other refrigerator-appropriate container. Let cool down to room temperature cover tightly with plastic film or a lid and chill until ice cold. (You can put it in the freezer for about 30 minutes before serving to make sure it’s really cold.)

Serve garnished with some edamame, green onions, etc. on top.

The soup keeps in the refrigerator for a couple of days. To make it a complete one-bowl meal, add some cooked and well rinsed somen or soba noodles, a bit more soy sauce, and a lot of green onions on top.

Vegan version

Use a vegetable stock or vegan dashi stock, and blanched (boiling water poured over and drained) tofu cubes instead of the shrimp. You may need to add a bit more soy sauce to compensate for the blandness of the tofu.

Other variations

Try cut up chicken breast instead of the shrimp
Add some cut up tomatoes and a bit more vinegar
Scoop out the wintermelon and shrimp, thicken about 1 cup of the soup with 1-2 Tbs. cornstarch, and pour over as a sauce. This is called ankake.
Gelify the soup with gelatin or agar-agar for an interesting savory jelly

Vegetarian / Vegan dashi (Japanese stock)

maki — Thu, 17 May 2007 13:11:11 +0200

As I’ve stated many times here over the years, the basis of most Japanese savory foods is a good dashi, or stock. Dashi is not just used for soups, it’s used for stewing, in sauces, batters, and many, many other things.

The regular way to make dashi was one of my first entries on Just Hungry. It uses kombu seaweed and dried bonito flakes (katsuobushi). Some people use niboshi, small dried fish, in addition to or instead of bonito flakes.

Katsuobushi and niboshi are both fish-based, so not vegetarian. So how do you make a good vegetarian, even vegan, dashi?

Mizu dashi (water dashi) with kombu

My preference is for a simple kombu based stock, which can be made quite easily by soaking a piece of good quality kombu in water in a closed container overnight in the fridge, as shown in the photo. (See this post for more about kombu.) I put about a 30cm / 12 inch long piece of kombu in about 2 litres (8 cups) of filtered water. This is more kombu than for the regular kombu and katsuobushi stock, since the kombu has to produce all the umami on its own. If you don’t have time to soak it overnight, you can soak it for a minimum of half an hour at room temperature.

To use, bring the dashi up to a simmer (not a full boil), then take out the kombu. This produces a light colored, subtly flavored dashi. The soaked kombu can be cooked further until soft, and used in stewed dishes and the like.

Dashi using shiitake mushrooms and kombu

If the kombu dashi is too subtle for you, you can try tossing in a couple of good quality dried (never fresh) shiitake mushrooms in the water. This needs to be soaked for at least a couple of hours, or until the shiitake are quite soft. This will produce a light brown colored dashi with an assertive shiitake flavor, which is especially suitable for dishes that will include the shiitake. The soaked shiitake can be used in your dish.

Saving the soaking liquid from shiitake mushrooms

Finally, if you are using shiitake mushrooms for a dish and reconstituting them anyway, save the soaking liquid to use as dashi in the future. I keep the cut off hard stems in it to extract a bit more flavor. It will keep for a few days in the fridge, or can be frozen. (I freeze it in small ziplock bags, laid flat.)

Soybean cooking liquid

If you cook whole dried soybeans, the cooking liquid is full of umami and makes an interesting rich vegan stock. Use on its own or in combination with one of the other stocks.

Corn cream soup with intentional lumps

maki — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 15:03:33 +0200

What’s the soup of your childhood? The one that your mother made for you when you had a cold, needed cheering up, or just as a treat? For me, there’s no question: it’s corn cream soup.

Corn cream soup (and yes, it’s called like that, not ‘cream of corn soup’ or ‘creamed corn soup’) belongs to the yohshoku category of Japanese home cooking. It’s an old fashioned, milk based potage, with creamed corn in it. It smells milky, and tastes sweet and savory. It’s loved by Japanese kids.

Now, while my mother was a pretty good cook generally, she did have trouble getting some things right. Her curry for instance was always rather watery. And her corn cream soup, instead of being silky smooth, always had little lumps of undissolved roux. I loved those little lumps though - they tasted like tiny dumplings. Later on when I started to make my own corn cream soup I followed recipes, so my corn cream came out smooth and lumpless. That was fine, but I missed the lumps from my childhood memories. So, I incorporated them back.

Everyone uses canned corn to make a corn cream soup. You can be fancy and use fresh, but that lifts this humble soup into the realm of gourmet special-occasion big deal cooking, which is not what my memories are about at all. I have adjusted the usual way of making this soup by using whole corn rather than creamed, since whole corn cans have more actual corn in them and I suspect less added sugar, and I like the mixture of crushed/creamed and whole corn niblets. Besides, creamed corn cans are unheard of here in Switzerland.

Corn cream soup with intentional lumps

1 can of whole corn kernels
4 cups (about 1 l) milk, whole or 2%
1 medium onion
1 Tbs. butter
1 medium potato
1 bay leaf
1 stock cube
salt and pepper

Optional lumps:

2 Tbs. butter
4 Tbs. white flour

Equipment: immersion (stick) blender, regular stand blender or food processor

Slice the onion thinly. Cut the potato into small chunks.

Heat the butter in a thick-bottomed pan. Add the onions and sauté until the onion is translucent. Add the milk and all the other ingredients, reserving about 2 tablespoons of the corn kernels for later. Heat up slowly over medium-low heat, and simmer until the potato is totally tender. Take the bay leaf out.

In the meantime, make the lumps. (This is basically a badly made roux.) Melt the butter in a small non-stick pan over medium heat. Add the flour. Blend and stir until you have a rather lumpy mix. Set aside.

Blend the soup with an immersion blender, or in a regular blender or food processor, until smooth. Add a little water if if it’s too thick. Add the reserved corn kernels.

Add the lumpy roux and stir briefly, but not too well - you don’t want it to disperse evenly in the hot liquid, you want it to remain in little lumps.

Season with salt and pepper (taste first since the stock cube is salty). Take off the heat (if you let it keep cooking it will curdle).

Makes 6 servings.

You can make it prettier by sprinkling some chopped parsley on top, but I like the minimalist butter-yellow look.

Fairly low-fat creamy red pepper, tomato and garlic soup with not low-fat grilled cheese, bacon and mushroom sandwich

maki — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 08:22:51 +0100

The theme of the elimination challenge in the most recent Top Chef was to create an adult version of childhood comfort food. The winning combo, created by Betty, was a variation of the classic pairing of cream of tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich. Instead of just tomatoes, she added roasted red peppers to the soup, and instead of just cheese, she put grilled portobello mushrooms in the sandwich.

It looked like just the thing for lunch, but when I checked out the recipe as demonstrated by Lee Anne, I wasn't too happy with the 2 cups of heavy cream in the soup. Not that I have anything against cream, I just thought it wasn't necessary in this case. So I fiddled around a bit and came up with a much lower fat, but still satisfyingly creamy, version. The creamy texture comes from the pureed peppers and the roasted garlic. The only added butterfat in this version comes from the spoonful of sour cream or crême fraîche that each person adds at the last minute, so the cook can shift any responsibility for the added calories to the eater. The soup is almost as good without the cream, so it can be served to a mixed group (vegetarians and omnivores, dieters and non-dieters, lactose-intolerent folks and Swiss people, etc.)

I've also reduced the number of vegetables used. I think the basil and celery used in the original recipe would bring in minestrone-like overtones, and the cream of tomato soup flavor I was aiming for was much simpler, a combination of sweet with a little sour.

The sandwich is not very low-fat. No real grilled cheese sandwich is. Mine is quite similar to Betty's version, except that I used Gruyère cheese, and added crispy bacon. I also used regular mushrooms instead of Portobellos, since that's what I had on hand and they are way cheaper. I also used plain whole wheat sliced bread, not sourdough (I think sourdough gets rather overused in Caifornia).

Fairly low-fat creamy red pepper, tomato and garlic soup

4 large red or orange sweet peppers, or a combination (I used 2 red and 2 orange)
1 large can (800g / 28 oz) of crushed tomatoes
5 large garlic cloves, unpeeled
1 medium onion
2-3 Tbs. olive oil
1 bay leaves
1 Tbs. dried thyme
1 vegetable stock cube
water
salt and pepper
1 Tbs. honey (optional)
2 Tbs. lemon juice
Sour cream or crême fraîche

Equipment needed: stick blender (immersion blender) or blender or food processor

Preheat the oven to 200°C / 400°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Wrap the unpeeled garlic cloves in aluminum foil.

Cut the peppers in half and de-core, de-stem and de-seed. Put them cut side down on the baking sheet. Bake for about 30 minutes in the oven until the skins are blackened and blistering. Bake the wrapped garlic cloves with the peppers (just put the package on the edge of the baking sheet)

Take out the baking sheet. Push the peppers towards the center of the sheet, and wrap the peppers completely in the parchment paper. Leave until cool enough to handle. Peel off the skins. (Wrapping them in the paper steams them, which makes the skins come off a little easier.)

In the meantime, chop up the onion and sauté in a heavy bottomed non-reactive pot with the olive oil until transparent and soft. Add the can of tomatoes, stock cube, peeled peppers, bay leaves and thyme. Take the garlic out of the foil pouch and squeeze out the softened insides into the pot.

Bring the pot to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer until the peppers are completely tender, about 15-20 minutes. Take out the bay leaves.

If you have a stick blender (immersion blender), blend the mixture thoroughly until smooth. Or, put in a blender or food processor in batches and blend. Optionally, strain through a sieve or strainer (I don't bother with this).

Return to the pot, bring back up to heat, and if it's too thick add a little water until it's the desired consistency. Add the lemon juice and stir very well. Taste and if you think it needs to be a bit sweeter, add the honey. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve with a bowl of the sour cream or crême fraîche on the table, and have the diners put as much of it as they want on their soup.

Grilled cheese, bacon and mushroom sandwich

The key is to pre-cook the bacon until its crispy. Don't put uncooked or flabby bacon inside a sandwich.

To make 2 sandwiches:

4 slices whole wheat bread
Cheese of your choice (I used Gruyèyere)
4 slices bacon
1 cup or so sliced fresh mushrooms
Butter

Cook the bacon with your preferred method. (I cook them between layers of paper towels in the microwave for uses like this.) Slice your cheese of choice thinly.

Sauté the mushrooms in a little butter until they are brown and a bit crispy on the outside. Season with salt and pepper.

Assemble the sandwiches by putting two bacon slices each on the bread, topped with cheese and the mushrooms. Melt some more butter on a flat grill or a frying pan, and grill the sandwiches on both sides until the cheese is melting and the bread is crispy-brown.

Serve immediately.

Miso soup wrapup, and choosing and caring for lacquered soup bowls

maki — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 15:35:35 +0200

The top black bowl is resin; the bottom two are real lacquered bowls.

Food Destinations took up all of my weekend time, and the past two days, blogging wise, but I wanted to wrap up the week of miso soup, and also talk about the black-and-red lacquerware - and lacquerware-like - bowls that the soup is traditionally served in.

Miso soup redux

There are of course many, many more variations of miso soup; the basic thing to remember are the following:

For any ingredients that need to be cooked, make sure to cook them first - either separately (e.g. grilling or parboiling) or in the dashi stock, before adding the miso.
Never let miso soup come to a rolling boil after you add the miso. You will lose much of the aroma and flavor. (Unless of course, you don't actually like miso and are only having the soup for health reasons...)
Add instantly cooked or delicate items at the last minute.
Remember that regular miso is quite salty. If you are having miso soup with rice, the Japanese way, then your soup can be a bit heavier on the miso. If you are having miso soup on its own, go easier on the miso.

I'll have more miso soup recipes in the future I'm sure, but I hope that the 5 recipes got you thinking about your own variations.

Lacquered (and "lacquered") bowls for miso soup

Miso soup bowls are traditionally made of turned or carved wood, that is lacquered with natural lacquer and decorated.

However, most of the bowls you see at restaurants outside of Japan are made of resin or plastic. You can easily tell a plastic/resin bowl, since it is of a uniform thickness all around, and also gets hot outside very quickly. They are also a little flexible. (If you get a bowl of miso or clear soup at a restaurant with a lid on, and the lid refuses to come off, gently squeeze the sides of the bowl and twist-pull the lid.)

The bottom of areal lacquered bowl will be a bit thicker than the sides, and feel substantial in your hand. The bowl will also be expensive. At Jlist.com for example, they sell the plastic-resin type of bowls for under $3, but the real lacquered wooden bowls are $14 (pretty reasonable prices even if you figure in the cost of shipping from Japan).

If you just want the look of the bowls, the plastic-resin bowls are quite nice enough. Some of them almost look like the real thing, with convincing wood grain and such. I have four real lacquered bowls, and 12 black plastic ones with lids. Besides using them for soup, they also make different serving bowls for other things like salads or appetizers - the black or red interior surface makes a dramatic color statement. I've served pale-colored ice cream and sorbet in mine quite often. They are also easy to care for, and usually can go into the top rack of a dishwasher (though I prefer to hand wash mine). Always check the maker's recommendations though. The cheaper, flimsy ones may not stand up well in the heat of a dishwasher.

Real lacquer bowls need some tender loving care to prevent the lacquer from chipping or flaking off the wood base. This is a problem in overheated, very dry houses and apartments. Japan is quite a humid country, and lacquer bowls love humidity and hate dry conditions. If you live in a desert climate, you may want to consider sticking to the plastic-resin bowls unless you can provide extra humidity in the room where your bowls are stored.

The house I live in now is not that overheated, but it can get rather dry in the winter. So I keep my real lacquered bowls wrapped in soft cloth in a closed cabinet, and run a humidifier. (Some people like to put cups of water in the cabinet.) Don't ever put real lacquer ware in the dishwasher - hand wash only! If you have hard water, wipe the bowls after washing or they will get an unslightly white scale on them, which is very visible against the dark colors. Keep it out of sunlight also, since it dislikes ultraviolet rays. This applies to lacquered boxes too, though in my experience bowls seem to be more susceptible to flaking and chipping, perhaps because of their shape.

Why bother with real lacquer bowls at all? you might wonder. On a practical level they do hold in heat a lot better than the plastic-resin type. However, the reason for me to bother with the maintenance issues is they just feel wonderful - warm, substantial, and alive, in a way that plastic or resin can never emulate.

A week of miso soup, day 5: Ground shrimp, ginger and miso

maki — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 00:17:10 +0200

This is a miso soup made of fresh shrimp ground to a paste, mixed with flavoring ingredients, then whisked into hot dashi stock until just cooked. It's called ebi no nagashi jiru (ebi is shrimp). It's a quite traditional soup that used to be laborious to make, before the advent of the food processor. It's not one that is served that often in homes, perhaps because it used to be a bother to make, or perhaps because miso soup is rarely the star of a meal. It's really delicious in any case, and shows yet another way of making a miso based soup.

Nagashi jiru is traditionally made with fresh bonito (katsuo), but bonito is probably not that easy to get a hold of, so I have made it with shrimp here. It can also be made with fresh tuna or a white fish like red snapper.

Fresh ginger and sake are used a lot in Japanese cooking with fish or meat. These ingredients, plus onion, help to lessen any gamyness (kusami). This technique is also used in Chinese cooking. Here ginger juice and sake are used to make the shrimp taste brighter.

The soup has a coral color from the shrimp, and an intriguing texture.

Ground shrimp and ginger miso soup (ebi no nagashi jiru)

4 cups of dashi stock
200g / about 7 oz. fresh peeled shrimp
1 Tbs. miso, red miso preferred, but you can use white or blended
1 Tbs. fresh ginger juice (grate some fresh ginger, and squeeze out the juice)
1 Tbs. sake or dry sherry
1 Tbs. soy sauce
pinch of salt
a little finely chopped green onion

Equipment needed: a food processor

Make the dashi stock following the directions on day 1.

Chop the shrimp up roughly and put in the bowl of the food processor. Process until finely chopped. Add the miso, ginger juice and sake, and about 4 to 5 tablespoons of the dashi stock until it is a very smooth paste.

Add the shrimp paste to the rest of the dashi stock, and simmer very gently while stirring until it turns a pinkish-coral color. Add the soy sauce, and if necessary a little salt (taste!)

Serve with a sprinkle of green onion.

Variation: add some cubed tofu.

A week of miso soup, day 4: Hokkaido-style corn, chicken and cabbage soup with miso

maki — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 19:38:21 +0200

Today's miso soup may not look like miso soup, but it does have miso in it. It shows how to use miso as a background flavoring, instead of the predominant one. Since it has milk and a little butter in it, I've called it Hokkaido style after the northenmost main island in the archipelago that makes up Japan.

Hokkaido is quite different from the rest of the country, since it has large stretches of flat, farmable land (unlike the rest of Japan which is very mountainous) that is ideal for farming. The climate is that of Northern Europe or Canada, and much of it is used for dairy production and crops such as wheat and corn. Sapporo is the largest city in Hokkaido, so whenever you see Sapporo on Japanese food (such as Sapporo ramen), it usually means it has some milk, cream or butter in it.

This soup also shows a way of clearing the refrigerator. I had half a cabbage and some spring onions in the fridge, plus a frozen half of a chicken breast, and I always have canned corn around. So it all came together for this soup. It makes a great one-bowl kind of meal, with some rustic bread. You can put in leftover rice or potatoes in the soup too. The miso adds an intriguing sort of meaty flavor to the milky soup. I've given vegetarian alternatives in the recipe.

I have used a vegetable stock cube that has salt in it instead of dashi for this, so go a little easy on the miso. Taste and adjust!

The Official Testers liked this so much that they ate 5 big bowls of it between the two of them for lunch.

Hokkaido style corn, chicken, milk and miso soup

Note that this makes 6 cups of liquid + the ingredients, so there is more miso than for the previous recipes.

4 cups of water
1 vegetable stock cube
2 cups milk or soy milk
1 cup white cabbage, finely shredded
The white part of 1 green onion, finely sliced
1 cup of fresh, canned or frozen corn
1 Tbs. butter or sesame oil
6 oz. / about 200g chicken breast or leftover cold chicken, cut into pieces (vegetarians use firm tofu, TVP or quorn)
1/2 cup of white miso (or more or less to taste)
chopped parsley for garnish
A sprinkle of white or black pepper

Heat up the water in a pot and dissolve the vegetable stock cube. Slice up the vegetables in the meantime.

Sauté the cabbage and onion in a frying pan with the butter or oil until it's just turning limp. Put in the soup stock and simmer until just tender.

Briefly sauté the corn in the frying pan (you don't need more butter, but you can add more if you like). Add to the soup. Add the milk, and bring up to a simmer. Add the cut up chicken - if you add raw it will cook almost immediately

Add the miso to the soup following the directions for day 1. Taste and add more miso if needed. Garnish with the fresh parsley and the pepper, and serve.

Note: if you go for the vegetarian option and use sesame oil and tofu (the preferred replacement for the chicken), it will be much tastier if you briefly sauté the well drained tofu in the sesame oil before adding to the soup.

A week of miso soup, day 3: Grilled eggplant (aubergine) and mushroom

maki — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 21:23:29 +0200

One of my least favorite restaurant miso soup variations is when they just throw a few raw mushrooms slices into the bowl before serving. Raw button mushrooms have no flavor at all, and a rather unpleasant spongy texture. Grilling them beforehand, on the other hand, reduces their moisture content, concentrates the flavor so you can actually taste it, and adds that nice grilled-roasted flavor. Eggplants (aubergines) are also a lot tastier after grilling.

In Japanese cooking, grilling is usually performed without the addition of oil as a lubricant, so the pure flavor of the ingredient is preserved. I've grilled slices of eggplant and mushroom on a preheated cast iron grill pan (which is much better for grilling on a ceramic-top or electric range than a traditional Japanese mesh grill) until brown on the outside before putting them into the dashi stock to finish cooking. As always, the miso is added at the end.

I've used the small, slim Asian style eggplant for this, not the big fat Mediterranean kind. If that is the only kind you can find, slice it rather thinly before grilling, and cut into quarters before adding to the soup. I used regular white mushrooms but you can use any mushrooms that you like.

I also added a little chopped up ginger shoot as a garnish. You can find green ginger shoots at a Thai or general Asian grocery store - or you may find that your ginger root has sprouted a shoot on its own. Finely julienned ginger root can be used instead if you dont' have any shoots.

The Official Taste Tester gives this one the best marks of the miso soups so far this week, pronouncing it "earthy and tasty".

Grilled eggplant and mushroom miso soup

4 cups of dashi stock
1 slim Chinese or Japanese style eggplant
4 to 5 medium sized mushrooms, or 2 large ones
1 or 2 ginger shoots
1/4 to 1/3 cup white miso

Prepare the dashi stock following the instructions for Day 1. Keep warm.

Preheat your grill pan until it's very hot.

Slice the eggplant into round slices. Slice the mushrooms to about the same thickness as the eggplant.

Line the grill pan with the mushrooms. (There's no need to oil the pan, the mushrooms will not stick.) Grill on both sides until they are marked with grill lines and have shrunken a bit. Toss them into the dashi soup stock and simmer.

Grill the eggplant slices in the same way, and put into the dashi soup. Continue simmering until the eggplant is tender, about 10 minutes. (You add the mushrooms first because they take longer than the eggplant to cook.

Chop the green part o the ginger shoots very finely.

Add the miso to the soup. Serve immediately, garnished with the chopped ginger shoots.