Hiroko’s Kitchen | Blog

Back to the note of consuming sake warm; I like Hitohada-kan temperature(body temperature, 98 degree) in which we can taste slight sweetness of sake without masking the distinctive flavor of it. Which sake suited to Hitohada-kan? Here is my list. All sake mentioned here is available in America. Enjoy cold evening with body warming sake over delicious Japanese meals. Need recipes? Find ones in The Japanese Kitchen or The Sushi Experience!

Tengumai, Yamahai, Junmai from Ishikawa Prefecture
Suigei, Tokubetsu Junmai, Kochi Prefecture
Nanbu Bijin, Tokubetsu Junmai, Iwate Prefecture
Kikusui, Junmai, Niigata Prefecture
Tamano Hikari, Yamahai, Kyoto Prefecture
Shirakabegura, Kimoto, Hyogo Prefecture
Azumaichi, Junmai, Saga Prefecture
Kikumasamune, Junmai, Hyogo Prefecture
Hakkaisan, Honjozo, Niigata Prefecture

Are you attending IACP Annual Conference, New York, this March-April? Please come to celebrate the pre-opening dinner at Hiroko’s Kitchen. I am preparing Kaiseki dinner – Kaiseki dinner prepared in American Kitchen using American ingredients.
$110
max. 12 guests
March 29, Thursday

Kaiseki is an elaborate, formal Japanese meal in which about eight to ten dishes are served sequentially in individual small bowls and plates. I will produce fork and knife friendly Kaiseki dinner – five courses – using ingredients available and familiar in America. During the meal I will explore with you the structure, meaning and beauty of this special form of dinner. Some raw seafood included. It is a delightful and fun culinary journey held at my modern New York apartment.

Sign up! at IACP website. I found out that registration of the Conference, classes and events are coming soon.

Just as Americans have a special vocabulary related to the serving of alcoholic beverages – “neat”, “on the rocks”, “straight up”, and so on – we use specific terminology in the endlessly discussed subject of cooling and warming sake. Now it is the best time of the year to enjoy sake warmed, and you can enjoy it in six different ways.

Hinata-kan (sunshine warm, 86 degree), Hitohada-kan (body temperature, 98 degree), Nuru-kan (lukewarm, 104 degree), Jo-kan (warm, 113 degree), Atsu-kan (hot, 122 degree) and Tobikiri-kan (superhot, 131 degree).

Warming sake brings up the sweetness and distinctive flavor of sake. Sake suited to warm are not the Ginjo- or Dai-gnjo class (warming destroys the delicate aroma and flavor), but Junmai, Yama-hai Kimoto varieties. Read more about sake in The Sushi Experience.

By the way, please let me know if you know any restaurant or sake bar which offer sake with six different temperatures.

I found two long (3 1/2 foot each) gobo, burdock, left in my kitchen which I purchased toward the end of last year. I planned to make one more Osechi ryori dish, tataki gobo, but I abandoned the idea. It was too much.

One of the most popular burdock dish is kinpira gobo, whose recipe you can find it in my The Japanese Kitchen. Instead of making this homey traditional Japanese dish, I decided to make something with Western flavors. Here is burdock pasta. I have shredded the burdock with a vegetable peeler into thin and long slices. I parboiled them in the water for about 2 minutes. I cooked the drained burdock in plenty of olive oil (I infused the oil with salt pickled anchovy) with some garlic and chile pepper flakes. I served the burdock pasta with a sausage. The crunchy texture and earthy flavor of the burdock was perfect accompany for the sausage.

Burdock is rich in dietary fibers. It helps to reduce blood cholesterol and prevents constipation. Eating good food nurishes our body. Eating bad food makes us sick. We call it Ishoku Dogen.

Finally I have been plating the Osechi ryori which I started to prepare on Dec. 28th last year. Today we have about 40 family and friends coming to celebrate the beginning of New Year with auspicious (to some people, misterious) food items. I will post the reaction to Osechi ryori from our guest tomorrow. To most of them it is a new experience. Happy New Year!
\

Sea Moss

I had no idea what sea moss means when Molanzo Ollivierre from Mayreau island in Granedine mentioned it to me. When I asked what kind of seawead do locals eat in this part of the world, his answer was ” I aquaculture sea moss”. The locals seem to use it to make special healthy drinks and even jelly. I asked him to take me to his farm which is located at the shore of Mayreau island, a tiny island with mere 375 population. Molanzo is farming two different kinds of sea moss – ucquma and Grassoleon (he wrote down these words on my notebook). Here you see the photo of Molanzo and just harvested sea moss. I picked one small piece and popped it into my mouth. It was salty, crunchy and had full of umami flavor. According to Molanzo the locals do not consume it fresh, but dry them in the sun. I came back to New York City with some dried sea moss with a drink recipe from Molanzo. Molanzo suggested me to go on-line to find similar sea moss drink recipes. “There are many more.” I am not ready to try any of the drink recipes yet. Molanzo’s dream is to export his sea moss to North and South America. Anyone who is interested in his sea moss/ seaweed, here is the contact. Marilyn Ollivierre (Molanzo’s Mother: 1-784-432-2766); Molanzo: 1-784-527-5478/ mis_tic_man@hotmail.com

Kazunoko (herring roe): Kazunoko is a reconstituted dried herring roe. I love the popping crunching noise which echoes in my mouth while eating them. Kazunoko is an expensive delicacy and is an indispensable part of Osechi ryori. Without it Osechi ryori is not complete. Tiny eggs of herring roe symbolizes family prosperity, and its golden yellow color represents gold. Herring roe is sold dried or salt cured. For this year’s special New Year’s party I have acquire the very special dried variety at the end of last year. It takes 3 to 4 days to reconstitute it properly. After the roe is reconstituted, I carefully remove thin films which covers tiny eggs, and pickle them in the mixture of mirin (sweet cooking wine) and shoyu (soy sauce) sauce. Every year when my mother was preparing the herring roe, she told us not to use a knife to cut each roe into bite sized pieces, but break it with fingers. The knife smashes tiny eggs and allows fish juice (quite strong) spills out of them. We serve herring roe garnished with little fish flakes.

Nishiki tamago is a dish in which boiled egg is separately strained through a fine sieve, mixed with sugar and little salt, packed in a mold and lightly steamed. Bright yellow color of egg yolk in the dish symbolizes gold, and egg white, silver. My mother always asked me to help her to make the dish, because pressing through especially firmer egg white (20 of them at one time) through a fine sieve was quite a job. Pleasure and pain always come together. Here is the recipe;

8 x 8-inch mold
15 eggs, hard boiled
8 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt

Peel the eggs. Cut each egg into half and remove the yolk part and transfer it into a bowl. Set a fine sieve over a large bowl. Press the egg white through it into the bowl with a shamoji spatula. Clearn and dry the sieve and put it over another large bowl. Press the egg yolk through the sieve into the bowl with the shamoji spatula. Add 6 tablespoons of the sugar and 1/3 teaspoon of the salt to the egg yolk bowl and gently fold in with the spatula. Add the remaining sugar and the salt to the egg white bowl and gently fold in. Transfer the egg white to the mold and lightly pack. Level the surface of the egg white with a flat spatula. Cover evenly the egg white with the egg yolk. Gently level the surface with a flat spatula. Transfer the mold to a steamer which is producing high steam, and cook the egg for 5 minutes over medium heat. Cool the egg and cut it into bite sized pieces.

Tazukuri is a candied whole baby sardines. To prepare this dish you need gomame (dried baby sardines), which can be found only Japanese food stores. The reason why baby sardines are the part of celebration is that in the past sardines were important fertilizer for rice paddies, so they symbolized good harvest, therefore prosperous year. Cannot find Japanese dried baby sardine? Come up with alternative – which food item represents prosperity in your culture?

Here is the recipe which I inherited from my Mom.

7 ounces gomame
3 tablespoons water
3 tablespoons sake
3 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons shoyu (soy sauce)
Chile flakes

Carefully remove the intestine part of each baby sardine. It is quite a task. You need to work on hundred of tiny fish. If you do not remove them, the fish taste bitter. Do this task with your fingers. Do not break the fish. Put a thick bottomed skillet over medium heat. When it is hot add the sardines. Turn the heat to small and cook the sardines until fragrant and crispy to touch. Be careful not to burn the fish. Transfer the fish to a large platter and cool. In a saucepan add the water, sake and sugar and put it over medium heat. On simmering add the soy sauce and cook until the volume of the sauce becomes half of the original. Add the sardines and sprinkle of chile flakes to the saucepan and with forks toss the fish with the sauce. The sauce slightly coagulates as it cools, so do the tossing process quickly. Here you are the Tazukuri.

Next year will be my 14th year of living in America. “Kooin Ya no Gotoshi” This is the Japanese version of “Time Flies”. In the past thirteen years I did not celebrate the New years in the way in which I was raised and cherished – visiting a local temple before midnight of December 31st and listening to a temple bell tolling one hundred eight times; savoring a special New Year’s Feast, Osechi ryori, and ozoni (rice cake soup) with family members in the morning of New Year; visiting a local shrine and welcoming the year of the god and play for family’s health, happiness, peace and prosperous for the New Year. Today I very much miss the way how we celebrate New year in Japan. There is no temple and shrine near me in New York City, so I decided to prepare the proper Osechi ryori and enjoy it with family and friends at the New Year 2012 open house.

Osechi ryori are specially prepared New Year’s food items (served and consumed cold) which are packed in stack-upable jubako obento boxes, which are only used for New Year’s occasion. Every prepared food item goes into these boxes has its own reason to be there. As I prepare some of these items I will post the recipes, so you can join me the preparations. Let me start with Tazukuri – next post.