eating "local"

Last Monday, after my dentist appointment, I went into Hanshin department store to pick up something for lunch.

I also needed some celery so I went to their produce area. Now, I don't usually shop for produce at the department stores because they tend to be on the pricey side.

Surprisingly, they were having a sale and everything was rather reasonable and an even bigger bonus was that the items on sale were grown in Japan.

I found a bunch of celery for 298 yen (about US$2.98). Usually when I buy celery, they have 1 stalk packaged and it is usually 158 yen (about US$1.58)...so I was excited to pick up 3 stalks for the 298 yen.

The zucchini was of good size too and were 2 for 298 yen (about US$2.98). Usually when I buy zucchini, they are scrawny and cost 298 yen for 1.

Lastly, the asparagus were unbelievably cheap also...189 yen (about US$1.89) for 11 stalks. Usually they only have 3 woody local stalks for ranging between 158 yen and 198 yen (about US$1.58-$1.98).

When I went to pay for them, the cashier said to me, "how shall I cut it?", pointing to the celery. I told, "just cut it in half." She immediately pulled out a produce knife and cut it in half, this actually surprised me.

The good/bad thing about shopping at the department store was that they wrapped everything in this brown paper, though I guess it was better than a plastic bag.

I've already used some of the celery and one of the zucchini for 3 bean salad and vegetable soup.

And I've used the asparagus with some eringi and shimeji mushrooms for a stir-fry with a little butter and tarragon. We've also eaten the leftovers for breakfast with a sunny-side up egg on top and toast.

I also tried Ellie Krieger's "Grilled Zucchini Roll-ups with Herbs and Cheese". This was delicious, only problem I had was getting the zucchini slices thin.

Though we aren't truly eating local, we are eating more items from Japan. Have you been eating local and/or more items from your country?

easy dinner

I have a cookbook that gives variations of their recipes. Last year, I tried their recipe for Celery dressed with kim chee which was paired with a yakiniku bowl topped with oroshi daikon (grated daikon).

The other day, I made the same salad but with a miso flavored yakiniku bowl.

Serves 2 : from Orange Page "Natsu ni Oishi kondate"

200g sirloin, thinly sliced
150g kabocha (pumpkin) : about 1/8 of a kabocha
1 teaspoon butter
1/2 tablespoon sesame oil
400g rice

Sauce:
1 teaspoon sesame seed
1/2 tablespoon grated garlic
1/2 tablespoon grated ginger
1/2 tablespoon miso (preferably akamiso (red miso))
1/2 tablespoon mirin (sweet rice wine)
1/2 tablespoon sake (rice wine)
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon tobanjan (chili paste)
1/4 teaspoon oyster sauce

Cut kabocha to about 5mm thin slices.
Cut meat into bite sized pieces.
Put ingredients for sauce into a bowl and mix well.

Heat pan and put in butter, "fry" kabocha until a toothpick goes through smoothly.
Take kabocha out and put in sesame oil.

Cook meat in oil, when it turns color, add the sauce.
After all the meat is coated well with the sauce, put rice into bowls, add meat and kabocha.

Serve with kim chee celery salad.

Enjoy.

p.s. there is another miso recipe that I love during the summer because it uses fresh corn.

easy dinner

It has been really humid the past couple of days. Yesterday afternoon it poured with thunder and this morning we awoke to cloudy skies and more humidity, not very inspiring cooking weather.

For dinner, I decided to make something easy.... Donburi (dish in a deep bowl). I found a relatively easy recipe in a cookbook I have been using a lot lately, "Orange Page's Natsu ni oishii kondate"

Oroshinose-yakinikudon (grilled marinated meat bowl with grated daikon on top) Serves 2
2 bowls of cooked rice (about 400g)
200g thinly slice beef sirloin
3 cm daikon (long white radish)
3 leaves of shiso (perilla)
shiroi irigoma (white sesame seeds)

1/2 tablespoon sesame seed oil
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 tablespoon sake (rice wine)
ichimitogarashi (ground red chili pepper) to taste

Sauce:
1/2 tablespoon shoyu (soy sauce)
1/2 tablespoon mirin (sweet rice wine)
1/2 tablespoon oyster sauce

Prep: Cut meat into bite sized pieces. Peel daikon and grate. Wash grated daikon and drain well. Mince shiso.

Method: In a frying pan, put the sesame oil and heat on high. Place beef flatly and sprinkle salt and pepper on both sides. Cook in pan until beef changes color then add sake and ingredients for the sauce. Let the sauce coat the beef well and take out of the pan.

Plating: In a donburi bowl (deep bowl), put the cooked rice and place the cooked beef on top. Add the grated daikon and shiso on top of the beef. Sprinkle some sesame seeds and some ground chili pepper.

NOTES: This dish was delicious. The sauce didn't overpower the beef and went well with the cool grated daikon.

Another thing that I did was "toss together" a little salad. This recipe was also from the same book on the same page as the recipe above.

Celery no kim chee ae (Celery dressed with kim chee) Serves 2
1 stalk of celery
80g kim chee
1 teaspoon mirin (sweet rice wine)
1/2 teaspoon of sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon of shoyu (soy sauce)

Prep: Take the leaves off the stalk and break the leaves with your hands into easy to eat pieces. Slice the stalk of celery to 2mm (thinly). Slice the kim chee to 2-3 cm pieces.

Method: In a bowl add the mirin, sesame oil and shoyu, mix. Add in celery and kim chee.

NOTES: The leaves of the celery were quite bitter, but I liked the crunch of the celery stalk and kim chee.

Enjoy!