Now a quote from my The Japanese Kitchen (page 122-124): “There are several similar stories about how natto came into being – it involves an interesting coincidence. Farmers or warriors as far back as 10th century threw away leftover, still warm, cooked soybeans on top of discarded rice straw. Later they found that the beans had fermented in the straw and were transformed into a food with a distinctive flavor and texture. Natto bacteria reside in rice straw had performed the miracle of creating a new food, rather than spoiled waste. In 1905 a Japanese researcher succeeded in isolating the natto bacteria from other varieties in rice straw. By 1919 cultured natto bactyeria were introduced to the natto industry, and natto production became more stable and prosperous.” When I was small, natto was sold in rice straw wrappers which reminded me of the story of natto’s invention. A fragrance of rice straw is unfortunately found in today’s packaged natto.

Today there is a natto making kit sold in Japan. The kit comes with a bag of soybeans (small bean variety), natto bacteria, thermometer, containers to ferment natto and thermo-box. I searched if I can purchase natto bacteria in America so that I can try it here. The answer is yes! During my search I was surprized to learn that there are health pills sold on-line, which contains natto bacteria. I am not a believer of these pills, so this summer I will make my own natto using natto bacteria and increase beneficial bacteria in my gut. I will post the recipe, then.

Luis and Amy tried natto during Culinary Trip To Japan with Hiroko Shimbo. Amy, who lives in Chicago, became a natto lover.

Nukamiso is a fermented pickling base, which is made of rice bran, salt and water. I have just read an article titled “Some of My Best Friends are Bacteria” by Michael Pollan, and confirmed that my tradition of making Nukamiso-zuke (pickled vegetables in Nukamiso base) and eating them encourage the growth of “good bacteria” in my gut, and keep me health. Nukamiso indeed contains large numbers of probiotic bacteria.

The tradition of Nukamiso-zuke comes from my mother. She kept her pickling pot 365 days in her kitchen counter, even sweltering, humid summer time, so that we could enjoy pickled seasonal vegetables all the year through. After moving to NY City I started my Nukamiso pot but I enjoy it during warm and hot months. From now on I will follow my mother’s path and make Numamiso-zuke all the time.

The photo shows my Nukamiso-zuke with my hand; radishes before pickling; radishes completely buried under Nukamiso; pickled radishes ready to eat (after rinsing them).

Our last week dinner guest Chris M knows Norman Greig, the owner of the farm. Norman told Chris an interesting farm history – how local farms could survive in the past. Before the introduction and expansion of large supermarkets in the country local farms were the prime source of produce and fruit for local people. Families sent their kids to the farms to harvest and bring produce and vegetables back to home. Today it is ironic that people living in the country drive to large supermarkets and shop produce and fruits which are not local and seasonal, but also came from far away, sometimes foreign countries.

To survive in this new environment Farmers like Greig has been running a program “Pick Your Own”. This encourages both city people and local people to come to his farm and harvest produce and fruits. Since we do the job, the price of the harvested items is half of the greenmarket price. I am very grateful that I can take an advantage of this wonderful program. At Greig Farm next week peas and snap peas are available. Summer raspberries will be ready in July. My favorite blueberries and blackberries are coming in August. So, let’s do the harvest at Greig Farm or other farm which offers the same program. It is nothing better for our health than eating ripe and ready-to-eat produce and fruits out of soil.

I kept the harvested strawberries in a refrigerator overnight and through next morning. By lunch time on Sunday they were releasing delicious, strong aroma and screaming at to me to eat them. Then, an image of California raised packaged, non-perishable strawberries, which are stacked up at supermarket shelf, came to my mind. It is wired, but this wired strawberries (far from natural food product) has become normal food item in today’s food scene.

Here I made the strawberry jam after my dinner on Sunday. This morning my rye toast got a thick smudge of this strawberry jam. Yummy, yummy and yummy.

Azuki bean is an indispensable ingredient to make varieties of wagashi, Japanese sweets. We cook the beans, add sugar and make it into smooth paste (koshi-an) or chunky form (tsubushi-an). The prepared azuki bean has unique characteristics: flavor is sweet and is noticeably beany; color is dark purple, which reminds people of bitter chocolate. By the way, this is not a good thing, though, because it leads to a disappointment; texture is not creamy or smooth, but comes with slight graininess. It is bean.

In the past years I have introduced sweet azuki bean paste, both in Japan and here in America, to my friends and strangers in the form of gyuhi, nerikiri or manju (steamed bun stuffed with azuki paste) sweets. The result is that over seventy percent of them (they are non-Japanese and non-Asian people) showed negative reaction to it. Texture was not right. People expected smooth mouth-feel texture from the desert which they tasted. The flavor was second issue.

Let’s post a little more about texture on my future blog.

To make shiratamako flour glutenous rice is rinsed, soaked, ground and dried. The flour comes in fairly large granules. Here is the another trial of my gyuhi sweet – colored differently and stuffed with sweetened azuki bean paste which has slight flavor difference.

According to Nick, who loves Japanese food and culture, seriously thinks to become a chef who cooks good Japanese dishes. Nick describes his project as in “Each menu is themed to a certain location and I chose Japan. I have personally found that many students before me had a tendency to want to include as many iconic dishes in their menu as possible more than they want to create the most balanced meal possible.” Nick is trying to create a balanced, no-mixed up or messed up Japanese meal.

With this project ahead Nick contacted by e-mail and asked me if I can offer him advice and assistance during the creation of his menu. My answer was Yes.

He proved me that he is very serious. He has already, almost read through my first book, The Japanese Kitchen. I have advised him to get my latest cookbook, Hiroko’s American Kitchen. This book will let Nick learn how to prepare dishes with Japanese key ingredients and Japanese cooking techniques along with locally available and seasonal produces and proteins in New Hampshire.

Nick recently wrote me that ” I have acquired Hiroko’s American Kitchen and have almost finished reading it.” Excellent! Nick also wrote me that he agrees with my point which I made in the introduction – about the extension of Japanese cuisine in America using American ingredients. Nick will send me his menu idea soon. I will keep you posted.

I made my favorite Corn and Ginger Rice with Shoyu and Butter (recipe is available in the Hiroko’s American Kitchen, and at www.theingredientfinder.com.) with smoked shoyu. Cooking tips: Smoked shoyu tasted slightly less saltier than the regular shoyu, so I added 1 1/2 tablespoons of it to the finished rice. The result of the rice was faintly smoky and excellent. I cannot wait to try katsuo (skipjack tuna) and maguro (tuna) sashimi with this smoked shoyu. Robust flavor of these two fish should pair nicely with smoked shoyu. I will also try making smoked quail egg – cooked quail egg marinated in smoked shoyu – should be interesting.

At the Fair Chef Nakamura was serving mazemen. Mazemen literally means “noodles tossed with little flavored broth”. Ramen noodles does not come with generous amount of delicious hot steaming broth. This style of dish was invented around 1950′s and served to the cooks as staff meals at ramen restaurants. The use of little flavored broth is the way not to waste time consuming, expensive broth for staff meals. Here you can see the dish which I savored – noodles topped with ramen egg, mushroom and chicken. Chef Nakamura prepares chicken in the same manner as we do for pork belly. “Chicken is more popular than pork belly here in America”, chef says. The mazemen was fantastic.

Here is the noodles which they were cooking. George explained to me that the noodles are super elastic. After I squeezed some in my hand and let it go, noodles sprung back like an animal. According to George, the dough is rolled four times to build strong gluten. Sun Noodles carry six different types of ramen noodles – Temomi Noodle, Tonkotsu Noodle, Tokyo Wavy Noodle, Tokyo Straight Noodle, Hirauchi Noodle and Sapporo Noodle. If you love ramen, visit http://sunnoodle.com/ramenlab.

I would also like mention a new ramen restaurant in Brooklyn. It is Ganso (25 Bond Street, Brooklyn). They serve my favorite Tokyo style Shoyu broth ramen. I do not like heavy, sticky fatty tonkotsu broth. Ganso’s gyoza is also excellent. Oh…now I am hungry for ramen and gyoza.

Then, one day when I was at the greenmarket standing in front of just harvested asparagus, I thought of making the vegetable version of Gomadofu – without nut butter. After several trials I produced a satisfactory recipe. Today I use carrot, green peas, fava beans, parsnip, tomato and other seasonal vegetables to make seasonal vegetable Gomadofu. Here is what you need to make Asparagus kuzudofu.

1 cup kelp stock
1 cup milk
7 ounce asparagus
40g kuzu
Salt totaste

Cook the asparagus in salt added boiling water until just tender. Drain the asparagus and process it with milk in the juicer-mixer until pureed. Mix the kuzu and kelp stock in a bowl and strain through a fine sieve. Transfer the kuzu-stock mixture and asparagus-milk to a medium pot and cook over moderately high heat until the kuzu starts to get thicken. Turn the heat to very low and cook, stirring, for 30 minutes. Transfer the asparagus mixture to a mold and refrigerate overnight. Next day remove the asparagus kuzu from the mold and cut it into bite sized pieces – about 2 1/2 inch square. Serve with the sauce.