this and that

Yesterday, I posted about Coffee Jelly, I forgot to mention that if you'd like to leave out the sugar or use a sweetener when making your gelatin, please do so.

On to today's post...The other day the weather was on the cooler side, so I made rafute.

I also made goya namashi (namashi is the Okinawan pronunciation for namasu).

Goya Namashi : based on recipe from "Chimugukuru" by Hui O Laulima

1 goya (bittermelon), cleaned & thinly sliced
1/2 teaspoon salt

1.5 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons vinegar
1.5 tablespoons water

Clean and slice bittermelon, massage salt onto the goya and let it sit for about 20 minutes.
Rinse then squeeze out the water.
Add to vinegar mixture, mix well.
Chill and serve.

NOTES: It was my first time making namashi and will definitely make it again because it is easy and perfect for summer.

I hope to also try more recipes from this cookbook.

After making the rafute, I had quite a lot of gravy leftover.

Instead of throwing it out, I made some ajitama (literally seasoned egg) with it.

If you eat ramen, you'll often see ajitama as a topping or garnish.

Make some hanjuku tamago.

Then put your peeled eggs into the rafute sauce.

Put the eggs & sauce into the refridgerator for at least a couple of hours.

This got a thumbs up from Satoshi.

I think you could use any shoyu based gravy.

Most recipes I've seen online use the pre-made sauce used for soba/udon.

If you try this, I hope you like it.

oh em gee

So...our building is getting a facelift.

They put up scaffolding around us, which sounded more like drilling?! (turns out that they actually were drilling so that they can secure their scaffolding to the building!)

My "babies" (well, most of them) came indoors...

It'll take 4 or 5 weeks, longer if the weather gets funky...

At least it gives me a "good excuse" to turn on the a/c during the daytime.

Pray they finish earlier...

On a happy note, I cut off the pointy tip of a goya (bittermelon) seed and soaked it in water. It germinated, so I planted it. A day or two later, I noticed that it started to sprout...crossing fingers we actually see some bittermelon this time.

How's your summer going?

goya kinpira

Goya was on sale the other day for 98 yen!

I used half of it with a fourth of a red bell pepper and some jakko to make kinpira using this recipe (minus the nuts).

It was a little bitter, but I liked it.

I'm making this again.

p.s. can you believe we still have cold weather?! oh and I received this red carnation from the lady at the yakitori kiosk for buying something....hope your mother's day was a nice one.

lanai

Thought I only had one goya this year, but found this one hidden...it was about 6 or 7 inches long.

I made this into a "champuru" with the goya, lup cheong and egg.

This one was really bitter but delicious.

The champuru went nicely with a Bass Pale Ale, an English beer, 5.1% alcohol. A little bitter aftertaste but delicious.

I was reading up on Swiss Chard and Beets and the info mentioned that you could pick the leaves as long as they were 4 to 6 inches long.

So I picked some and wilted them with some spinach that I bought.

We had this with a little dollop of mayo...yum!

The Italian parsley is doing well, I pick some whenever I want to add it to something I'm cooking, especially mushrooms and pasta...mmm!

I noticed this the other day, the mint is half dark green and half light green, I wonder why that is?!

Oh and the bergamot died...had this weird powdery mildew that I read about online...boo!

How is your garden doing?

goya

The temperature is supposed to drop to the lower 10s Celsius (50s Fahrenheit), so I picked the one and only goya that grew this year.

It got bigger than a week or two ago...from around 10 centimeters to 17 centimeters!

With part of it, I sauteed it with some lup cheong. It was delicious, the sweetness from the lup cheong helped to cut the bitterness.

And with the rest I made goya tsukudani.

I really wanted to make stuffed goya, but I didn't have any cilantro growing and the goya was a little too teeny to stuff.

I saved the seeds from this goya...hopefully next year I'll have more goya to show you.

It is Friday here, the temps have dropped quite a bit over here, though they are talking about summery weather in a couple of days, WT?! Hope you have a nice weekend.

dinners

Before it gets too cold to talk about beer, thought I'd share this one with you, as well as some dinners...Castello's Lager, an Italian beer.

Easy to drink and similar to American beers. Would I get it again? probably not it was a little to thin for my liking, but it was nice to try.

One thing we had for dinner was goya champuru made with corned beef hash and an egg.

First time making it this way but it was delicious.

Just saute the goya with the corned beef hash and then add in a scrambled egg, add some pepper and serve over rice.

Unfortunately this goya was from the market, the one on our lanai is only 2 inches long...boo!

Another thing we had was this carpaccio made with tai (sea bream).

I saw this recipe in the latest issue of "Elle a Table", I didn't follow the measurements just the method.

Take a white flesh fish like tai (sea bream) and slice thinly, place on plate.
*if you can find white fleshed fish that is already sliced for sashimi, then use that, it will save you some time.

Topping:
Take a pinch (or more) of shiofuki kombu (dried seasoned seaweed) and chop finely with a pinch (or more) of shibazuke (pickles colored with red shiso leaves)
Add some olive oil, mix well (this will make a "sauce")

Decorate:
Sprinkle some chopped green onion and some toasted white sesame seeds.

Eat right away.

NOTES: this was easy, delicious and would be nice to serve at a party. Definitely making this again.

What have you been eating?

58

Remember how I mentioned that the Japanese like to use numbers to make up words?

Well, the other day was 5.8 which is go-ya...bittermelon day!

When I saw the huge pile of goya at the market, I didn't put the two together.

Even the price had a 5 & 8 in it...158 yen (about US$1.58)

In fact, the half can of SPAM was more expensive about double the price of the goya!

This goya was huge! but the insides were really ripe. The coating around the seeds were red.

I used part for goya champuru and the other part for stuffed bittermelon...rain is in the forecast for the next couple of days, I think Summer is here!

on the lanai

The other week I picked this bell pepper, it was still really small but it looked like it may have been diseased (I could be wrong), so I threw it out.

Then the other day, I picked this one, it was a bit bigger but it also had a spot.

I kept it and chopped it up to put into our breakfast burritos that morning.

Then the weather got really cold one day and Satoshi said, "you should pick the goya, I don't think they will get any bigger".

So I did, they were about 4 or 5 inches long.

The bigger of the 3 surprised us because we had been keeping our eye on the two smaller ones and hadn't noticed the bigger one until it was really huge.

A couple of weeks ago, my friend Kazumi had let me taste her goya tsukudani.

So, thinking this would be a new way to prepare goya I asked her for her recipe.

I'll note it at the end of this post, but this was good, not as sweet as her version but just enough to help overcome some bitterness from the goya.

This was our dinner on Sunday: goya tsukudani, miso soup with daikon, carrot and sweet potato, genmai (brown rice), egg & lettuce, and yuzu pickles.

The yuzu pickles are delicious, I love the crunch and the bright flavor from the citron.

Finally, Rowena had asked me in one of her comments, as to how I use the chirimen jakko (dried small anchovies).

The most simple way we eat them is to mix some with grated daikon and top with some shoyu or ponzu (citrus soy sauce).

I also place the mixture on tamagoyaki (rolled omlette).

You can also find chirimen jakko in tsukudani, like the one we had from Shinonome.

Chirimen jakko was also part of the recipe that Kazumi gave to me for the goya tsukudani.

Here is the recipe if you'd like to try this.

Goya Tsukudani adapted from Kazumi : yields about 1/4 cup
150 grams goya, cleaned and sliced into half cm slices.
37.5 mililiters shoyu (2.5 tablespoons)
25 mililiters vinegar (1.6 tablespoons)
50 grams sugar
1.5 teaspoons roasted sesame seeds
1 gram hana-katsuo (bonito shavings)
5 grams chirimen jakko (dried small anchovies)

After cleaning the "cotton" and slicing the bittermelon, put into boiling water to blanch.
Put liquid condiments into a pot and heat on medium.
Add goya, stirring once in awhile.
Just before all the liquid evaporates, add the sesame seeds, katsuo & jakko.

NOTES: She didn't have measurements for the sesame seeds, katsuo or jakko, so the measurements are what I used.

I weighed the goya after I cleaned it.

Since the jakko is dried, I added it while I still had quite a bit of liquid.

All in all, it took about 30 minutes for all the liquid to evaporate.

The bittermelon still keeps its bitter bite but is made a little softer with the addition of sugar.

I think this would be nice in musubi.

Whew, this post was long, but I wanted to wrap everything into one post so that I could share with you the happenings from our lanai.

from the lanai

From the lanai, I picked a little of the cilantro, a little green onion and two of the goya (bitter melon).

Can you believe that on the 3rd floor we have worms?

How in the heck can they come up that high?

Anyway, the worm(s) were in the smaller of the two goya, and on the bell pepper and on the chili pepper plant, I'll tell you about the bell pepper and chili pepper plant another day.

So, about a week ago, I spotted one worm(on the smaller of the two goya), it hadn't made a hole but was just gnawing at it, brave dude to gnaw at the goya like that.

I took it off, then left the goya to get bigger.

Yesterday, I noticed that the bigger of the two goya was a light tinge of yellow, meaning it was getting overripe.

So, I picked the two and noticed this hole...

...with this long bugger in it.

Eep! and the thing about it was I thought it was dead but it was still alive.

In the morning, I thought it would've died in the garbage bucket but no, it had climbed out and was trapped in my tea strainer on the counter...sigh.

So now, he will definitely be going out with the garbage...sorry, dude.

Getting back to the goya, green onion and cilantro.

Whenever I buy goya, my cooking repertoire consists of one thing, goya champuru.

This time around, I decided to try making stuffed bitter melon and used Nate's recipe as inspiration. UPDATE: the author passed away and the blog is no longer public.

After washing the goya, I sliced it into 1 inch (or so) slices. With a butter knife, I scraped out the "cotton" as best as I could.

Then, I filled each piece with this filling:

97 grams of minced pork
chopped green onion
6 water chestnuts, minced
1/2 tablespoon shoyu
1/2 tablespoon oyster sauce
1/2 teaspoon black bean sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 egg

Mix well.

Since my goya were quite small, I had extra filling, Nate said in his post that he steamed the rest of his filling in foil cups, so that is what I did also.

I put them in foil cups that I have for bento.

I don't have a steamer big enough to accommodate all of these pieces, so I put them into my non-stick frying pan.

I put the heat on low, added a little water to the pan after it heated up and covered the pan for 30 minutes.

After steaming it for 30 minutes, I turned off the heat and let it sit in the pan, covered for another 10 minutes.

Then served it with rice and topped it with the fresh cilantro.

NOTES: As an after thought, if ever I need to steam in my frying pan again, I will put whatever needs to be steamed on foil, so that the water won't come in direct contact with it.

This was delicious and I'm glad I tried a different way to prepare goya.

Thanks Nate for the cilantro seeds and delicious recipe.

goya champuru

The weather is still warm during the daytime. Humidity for the most part is non-existent. But we do have some rainy days which brings cooler temps.

At night, it is quite cool too, but not quite cool enough to take out our heavy futon (comforter).

Still some people insist on dressing like it is the middle of winter, which makes me instantly perspire whenever I see them.

Anyway, here's a dish we had a couple of nights ago...goya champuru.

I wish I could tell you that the goya (bittermelon) in the photo was from our lanai.

But sadly, we had lots of flowers and nothing bigger than the tip of my finger.

This is the 2nd year I've tried planting goya, not sure what I am doing wrong.

Got this nice sized goya at a farm stand for only 100 yen (about US$1).

It had been awhile since I'd made goya champuru for Satoshi but I think it turned out quite well.

I've posted about how to make champuru here.

goya

Do you remember I planted some goya (bittermelon), then accidently killed them when I was killing some aphids?

Well, I replanted them before going to Hawaii. I also made a make-shift trellis by tying some knots along several strings then hanging it from my laundry poles.

While I was gone, I asked Satoshi to lead the goya to climb up the rope...and came home to this.

As I was looking at the plant I noticed 3 teeny goya...hope they get bigger.

Gonna google to see how to take care of them (or if you know what I should do, write it in the comments)...so excited!

hawaii cooks

Yesterday for dinner we had goya champuru. I've written up about this in the past. My mom got these teeny tiny goya (bittermelon) from a friend. They are supposedly wild...all I know it was a P.I.T.A (pain in the a**) to clean.

We added some portuguese sausage, tofu, onion and egg. Since my mom is watching her salt intake we didn't season it at all.

It was still quite flavorful from the sausage, but these goya slices sure packed a bitter punch!

What did you eat for dinner yesterday?

odds & ends

It is the end of the month, so let's clear out some photos.

There was an assorted fish (maguro, ika, salmon), shrimp salad maki for lunch one day...mmm.

We've been eating carrot and cucumber sticks with a teaspoon of olive tapenade with our dinners.

My generous blog friend, Abigail of Mamatouille sent me some Jasmine tea and Espresso flavored Kit Kats, along with some Cadbury milk chocolate and a cup of 60% Ghiradelli chips...thank you again!

The Jasmine tea flavored Kit Kat was my favorite, the tea flavor really shines through. The Espresso flavored was good also but a little on the bitter side. The Cadbury Dairy Milk was creamy.

I received these Japanese sweets, which I think are called kangori from my friend Kazumi when we went to Nose.

Kan is the chinese character for cold but also because they use kanten (agar-agar), gori is ice. These aren't cold treats but they resemble pieces of ice. Biting into them, they have slight crunch to them but the inside is gelatinous.

For another lunch, I had some inarizushi stuffed with okowa (mochi rice). These were delicious because they have assorted savory flavored mochi rice.

I made some walnut covered chicken for a dinner. I actually had made this before when I was in Hawaii, but used mac nuts then. These came out just as delicious.

I tried Ellie Krieger's Ranch dressing, it was easy and delicious. We've also been eating carrot and cucumber sticks with this dressing too.

This photo of the dog and his owner was taken in January (I think), I totally had forgotten about this photo. The owner can barely walk and uses this cart to steady herself while the dog just sits calmly as it rolls along.

My goya (bittermelon) before I "killed" it. There were aphids on my bell pepper plants and I got crazy...sprayed everything with a soapy solution and the goya plant (and bell pepper plant) dried...I am hoping for a revival.

Lastly, a bento I bought from Daiei for lunch...they had kodaimai (short wild rice), salmon, some assorted tempura and some nishime..only 498 yen (about US$4.98).

Yet another delicious month....goochisoosama!