End of the Book - Kitsune Udon and The Swordsman Wizard Makes Some Friends

Recipe:  Basic Japanese Cooking by Jody Vassallo
Book:  Aventura by Shin Midorikawa

Kitsune Udon

(Light Udon Noodle Soup)

1 tbsp wakame
7 oz fresh dried udon noodles
4 cups dashi stock
4 x 4 inch squares of abura age 
3 scallions, sliced
16 pieces of bamboo shoots (they must be an acquired taste...)

 Soak the wakame in a bowl of warm, salted water for about 5 minutes (even if you really like it, as I do, try not too use too much as it will expand way more than you expect it to).

The recipe says to cook the noodles in boiling water for 5 minutes, but I suggest following the instructions on the noodle package.  Bring the dashi to a boil and ladle over noodles served in each bowl.  Top with abura age, scallions, wakame, and bamboo (if you have acquired that taste - I omitted them).  

All in all this was a nice, light soup.  The abura age was more palatable to Jay than it was to Jessica.  


About the book:  


A misfit goes off to school and meets other misfit friends.  They can all do magic but some of their abilities are hidden from them.  But only until they are separated from everyone on the school grounds and have to face a monster by themselves!  

I will not be reading volume 2, because I already read that story (it was called The Chamber of Secrets).
 

1st Bell: The Red-Haired Boy - Gyoza, Ankake Udon, and Witchcraft and Wizardy, Japanese-Style

"Across the skies, five continents, and seven seas, in the middle of this earth, there is a school for witchcraft and wizardry.  It is said that long ago, in ancient times, this school was created by the power of the floating rock and the flying rock, a power wielded by the two wizards who survived the last battle.  This was written in the prophetic book of preemergence and preexistence:  The school is honored by the gods for nurturing new generations of witches and wizard.  Surrounded by four elemental spirits - fire, water, wind, and earth - and under the protection of the light spirit, this academy has endured on this mother earth for many centuries..."

Gyoza

(Pork Dumplings)

10 oz ground pork or chicken

7 oz raw peeled shrimp (I just went for the pure pork)

1/2 cup shredded Chinese Cabbage

2 spring onions sliced

2 tsp ginger, grated

1 egg, lightly beaten

2 tsp soy sauce 

1 tsp mirin

1 tsp sake

30 gyoza wrappers, or as many as are needed to use up all the filling

2 tbsp vegetable oil for frying

For the Dipping Sauce

3 tbsp soy sauce

3 tbsp rice vinegar

1 1/2 tbsp sesame oil

1 1/2 tsp sugar

pinch or more of chili flakes (as spicy as you want it)

Mix all the filling ingredients from the pork through the sake.  

They should be thoroughly mixed.   

Cooking with Dog goes so far as to suggest that you should even knead the mixture in order to get a more chewy consistency.

Making sure that you are only taking one thin wrapper at a time (they stick!), fill the center of the wrapper with about a tablespoon of the pork mixture (overfilling will damage the structural integrity of your dumpling and threaten sticking to the pan, but more on that later).  As far as sealing the gyoza wrappers, you're more or less on your own.  If you aren't adept at it, as 2 of my Alabama kitchen helpers were, thank you Jay and Obe (Jay's were nicer looking...), I would avoid trying to make the fancy pleats and either take Ben's approach, which was just to wet the edges of the wrapper with water and press them together in an unpleated half-moon, or the cheater's approach, the dumpling molds.  I completely forgot that I even had them leftover from my Russian pierogi making days. 

 

Once the wrappers are all filled, you want heat the oil in a large frying pan, and add enough gyoza to cover the bottom of the pan.  

Cook until the bases are crisp and golden, then add 1/2 cup of water, cover and cook for 5 minutes, or until all the water has evaporated.  

Mix the dipping sauce ingredients together and serve immediately with the hot gyoza.  

Or, instead of serving immediately, you could waste a bunch of time prying the gyoza off the bottom of the pan where they have stuck with a vengeance.  You could also try your second batch without the oil first, thinking that might have been the problem, and then pry those off as well.  You could further, though I don't recommend it, take the uncooked dumplings home and try to cook them the next day in a heavier bottomed skillet that holds the heat more evenly, but by then they will have sat together, soaking up the moisture from the filling.  They will be sticky, impossible to separate and even more difficult to cook without losing the best part, their crisply fried outer skins. 

Despite the many mishaps, all the dumplings were eaten to rave reviews.  I think it was the extra pinch of chili flakes in the dipping sauce that made them so delicious.  I might also suggest adding a little salt to the pork mixture, for some added flavor, or possibly just increasing the soy sauce a bit.

I am at a point in my cooking where I have to decide whether I want to put the effort, and possible tears, into trying to master this dish, or whether I want to concede and put it on the list with fried chicken - cheap enough to pay somebody else to do a better job.  I will keep you posted.

Ankake Udon

(Udon Noodles with Egg Broth and Ginger)

14 oz dried udon noodles

4 eggs, beaten

2 spring onions, finely chopped

1 inch ginger, grated

For the soup

4 cups of dashi stock

1 1/2 tbsp each mirin, sake, soy sauce

1 1/2 tsp salt

2 tbsp cornstarch

Cook the udon noodles according to the package directions.  Heat the soup stock to boiling.  Blend the cornstarch with 4 tbsp of water, reduce the heat to medium, and blend the starch into the stock.  The soup will thicken after a few minutes, then reduce the heat to low.  

Mix the egg, greens, and onions together in a small bowl.  

Create a whirlpool in the stock and slowly pour in the egg mixture.  Divide the udon noodles into 4 bowls and pour the soup over the top.  Sprinkle 1/4 of the ginger into each bowl.  Serve hot.

Do not cut your finger so deeply that you start to feel faint while chopping mustard greens.  It throws off all your concentration, and you will probably forget to add the cornstarch to the soup.  Thankfully, there was no red in my greens and after a quick rest and emergency bandaging by Jay, the soup turned out to be a good restorative, regardless of its unthickened broth.  I loved it.  A nice vegetarian meal for the asking.

We also partook of some delicious hot sake:  

About the book:


Can you say Harry Potter in a Japanese hat?  I haven't read any more than that yet, but sheesh, some originality would be great.

Rurouni Reprise - Sukiyaki and the Westernization of Japanese Food

 Narrator:  "The cultural renaissance of meiji also had a great influence on cuisine, creating a variety of new dishes.  Among them, beef-pot, or gyunabe (sukiyaki) was seen as representative of European foods, and was affordable to the general public." 

Book:  Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Recipes:  The Complete Book of Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko

Tokyo Style Sukiyaki


6 eggs, at room temperature, beaten one each into individual ramekins
2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 lb marbled beef or pork, sliced thin 
6 spring onions, sliced into short lengths
12 shiitake mushrooms (any kind of mushroom will do, really)
4 Japanese cabbage leaves, roughly chopped
10 oz firm tofu, cut into bite sized cubes
14 oz dried udon noodles, cooked according to the package directions


For the wari-shita sauce (stock):

5 tbsp shoyu 
1/2 cup mirin
1 tbsp sake
1 tbsp sugar


Heat all the ingredients for the wari-shita sauce in a small sauce pan over medium heat.  

Cook until the sugar has dissolved.  In a large, deep skillet, heat the oil in the pan over medium heat.  

Add half of the wari-shita sauce and when it started bubbling, add the vegetables, tofu, and noodles, keeping all the ingredients more or less separated in the pan, reserving an open space for the beef.  Cook until the onions become tender.  Add the beef and remove it from the pan immediately after it starts to change its color.  

Serve immediately by dipping each ingredient into the beaten egg before eating.  
 

Ideally this dish is prepared at the table in an electric skillet.  Each guests serves themselves from the pan, and the meat is cooked and eaten as it's needed.  We made it on the stove top and missed the "room temperature" bit about the eggs since we were more or less mixing recipes.  Osaka style uses only sake and soy sauce for its stock, but uses udon noodles.  We followed the Tokyo style which has the Wari-shita sauce but uses shiritaki noodles which we didn't have available.  One recipe mentioned the room temp eggs, one did not. 

We were also completely uncertain how to use the eggs as it wasn't entirely clear that you were in fact dipping your hot food into raw egg.  To avoid the past recipe typos and mistakes, we consulted the internet experts, and my new favorite cooking show, Cooking with Dog who does a masterful job explaining how to make this dish.  I will be working closely with this web site for all things Japanese that they cover.  Mostly because the dog is hilarious.  Francis the cooking dog says, "I'm not sure if you are supposed to eat raw eggs in your country, but here is how you are supposed to eat sukiyaki."  I cannot think of a less "Western" recipe, but it's actually quite delicious.  The whole benefit of having a hotpot at your table is that the ingredients are piping hot when you dip them into the egg, relieving any doubts you might have about its rawness.  As the soup gets cooler, it's not quite as tasty. 

About the book: 

I had to make this recipe because the main character, Kaoru, discovers some hidden money and shouts out, "and now we're gonna splurge at the beef-pot house for lunch!"  The narrator gives the aside mentioned above that reveals that not only did Japan open her doors to western weapons, a sort of western democratic philosophy, and western military practices, but they also wanted to integrate western foods.  Wikipedia tells us, "in the 1860s when Japan was opened to foreigners, new cooking styles were also introduced. Cows, milk, meat, and egg became widely used, and sukiyaki was the most popular way to serve them. The first sukiyaki restaurant, Isekuma, opened in Yokohama in 1862."  The beef pot houses were extremely popular, almost a status-enhancer to be seen in one, hence the main character's rabid desire to make all her new friends go there.

This anecdote serves my theory that there's a great deal of history to be learned from comic books that is just as valuable as the entertainment they provide.  

"End" of the Book - Abura-Age Inari, Kakiage, and Cliffhangers Leave Ya Hangin'

"Your soul is straight and honest... but right now you've gone badly askew."

Book:  Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Recipes:  The Complete Book of Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko

Su Meshi (sort of)

(Sushi Rice)

An indeterminate amount of cooked sticky rice
8 tsp sugar
2 tsp sea salt
3 tbsp rice vingar


Mix all the ingredients together and hope that you end up with something that's not too vinegary. 

I think we used about 2 cups of cooked rice.  I'm not really sure, because kitchen helper Jessica was in charge of it while I ran out for groceries.  As I'm looking back at the instructions, I can totally see why this recipe was a disaster.  The actual recipe for the abura age refers you (indirectly) to the recipe for su-meshi, which refers you to the recipe for "Japanese" rice, which is wholly confusing.  It says to use 15% more water than rice, but immediately after says that for one cup of rice you would use 1 cup of water.  *shrug*  I think Jessica navigated that beautifully, ignored the 1:1 misprint and figured the math for the 15%, because the rice cooked perfectly.  Once you have this indeterminate amount of rice, you are supposed to add the other ingredients, but since it never says how much rice to use, (it gives you a tip for how much rice will make a certain amount of sushi rolls, but doesn't actually say that's how much rice the recipe calls for...) I think we didn't use enough, because our rice was way too vinegary.

This is actually the third time that I've run into measurement issues with this same cookbook and I'm only glad I bought it at The Strand and didn't have to pay full price.

 Abura Age Inari

(Fried Thin Tofu Stuffed with Sushi Rice)

1 package of abura-age (ready to use)
Enough dashi stock to cover the abura age in the pan (maybe one cup)
2 tbsp sake
4 1/2 tbsp shoyu
A generous quantity of su-meshi made with 8 tsp sugar


Rinse the abura age and drain well.  Lay them in a pan and pour in enough dashi stock to cover them.  

Bring to a boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes.  Add the sugar in 3 batches during this time, shaking the pan to dissolve it (do not stir).  Simmer for a further 15 minutes after all the sugar has been added.  Add the sake and shake the pan again, then add the shoyu in three batches.  Simmer until almost all the liquid has evaporated.  Transfer to a wide sieve and leave to drain.  

Shape the rice into a rough rectangle just smaller than the abura-age half and stuff inside.  The cookbook says to "press the edges together to seal the bag" but no amount of pressing was going to keep those together.  Jessica sort of delicately rolled her edges, I just sort of flopped mine together and flipped the whole over to hide its shame.  

Here is my disclaimer.  Given all the measurement nonsense that surrounded this, it wasn't too bad. At least I didn't think so.  Jessica was gracious enough not to spit her first bite out, but could not be coaxed into eating even another nibble. She referred to them as "the beasts."  I actually ate a whole one, and at a 2 more for lunch the next day.  I suggested bringing some to Yan, but Jessica dissuaded me on the grounds that I like Yan, and want to keep her as a friend.

The rice had too much vinegar and not enough sweetness, the abura age called for 3 1/2 cups of broth but said to just cover it, which I didn't understand until after I'd realized that it was going to take 5 hours to simmer off all that liquid and I should have ignored the instructions, so I poured it out, probably pouring out all the sugar and sweetness that would have stayed in the abura-age in the process.  It was frustrating, but unlike Jessica, I'm not afraid to try it again, but I will know next time to make it ahead of when you want to eat it.  Look for this to be revisited soon.  My plan is use internet research to double check recipe amounts on this book every time for now on.  Onward to the good bits of the dinner.

Kakiage

(Tempura Shrimp and Corn Fritters)

For the filling:


1 lb uncooked baby shrimp,  peeled and de-veined (or chopped up jumbo shrimp, if that's all Pathmark can offer you)
1 can corn
4 spring onions, chopped
Half a package of button mushrooms, chopped


For the tempura batter:


1 1/4 cups ice cold water
2 eggs, beaten
1 1/4 cups flour
1/4 tsp baking powder


For the dipping sauce:


1 2/3 cups of dashi stock
1/2 cup shoyu
1/2 cup mirin
1 tbsp chives, chopped


Oil for frying


In a saucepan, combine all the liquid ingredients for the dipping sauce and bring to a boil.  Turn off the heat and sprinkle with chives. 


Mix all the filling ingredients together and set aside.  

Mix all the batter ingredients together and stir with chopsticks (it should be lumpy).  Add the batter to the filling and stir to coat.  Heat the oil over high heat, add small spoonfulls of the shrimp mixture cover, and cook until browned and crispy.  Drain on paper towels while you cook the next batch.  Serve hot with the warm dipping sauce.  

These came out much better than the beasts.  When the corn started to fry it scared us a bit with it's popping and spitting sounds, but it the end result was perfect.  We didn't make the dipping sauce, thinking we didn't need it, but I was desperate for some extra saltiness, so I just threw some soy sauce and mirin together (it was too strong, but with just a little taste of it, it was enough).  We also made the miso soup correctly, with real dashi stock and mushrooms.

B

About the book:

Cliffhanger!  And! My student does not have Volume 2, which means if I want to find out how it ends, I will have to go and buy it for him.  

Basically, in true serial writer fashion, the best bit was saved for right before the end of the volume.  Our friend Himura meets another fighter, a man who is paid to fight others.  But, he says, "I refuse to fight anyone weak.  My recent fights have been boring and I'm getting tired of it."  So, when some of the thugs from Act 1 show up again wanting revenge on Battosai, they tempt Sanosuke with the challenge of fighting a real master samurai.  Of course, Himura doesn't want to fight because Sanosuke's Chi is only clouded, not truly evil.  

Honor and weapons make an appearance in this one as well, as the thug brothers have brought a gun to finish off Battosai after he's been weakened by Sanosuke.  This is a dishonorable thing to do, and Sanosuke himself takes the gun and breaks.  He will fight with a more traditional weapon, the Zanbato.   "Zanbato:  a giant sword invented before the Sengoku or 'warring states. period, designed to take down a rider and his horse in one swing.  It is the heaviest katana ever made.  Because of its weight, it is said that no one has even been able to wield it to its full capacity"  (this is real, not Manga fiction!).

And thus ends the issue.  Rats.  Not to fear though, there's an anime series which I've ordered from Netflix and should arrive soon.  And my faithful student has delivered up yet another Manga for me to use as my book for future postings (look for a new one sometime tomorrow).  

Act Four - Kasshin-Ryu Reborn: Buta-Niku Shoga Yaki, Miso Soup, and the Honor of the Samurai

"My father and I taught those two.  Even if these two are out of the dojo, their misuse of the blade is my responsibility.  I thought I was trying hard to teach Katsujen-Ken.  Swordsmanship to benefit people.  

I guess it was just an illusion."

Book:  Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Recipes:  The Complete Book of Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko

Buta-Niku Shoga Yaki

(Pan-Fried Pork with Ginger Sauce)

1 lb pork loin
1 small onion, thinly sliced lengthwise
1/4 cup beansprouts, if you can find them
2 oz snow peas (or green beans because you can't find snow peas either)
1 tbsp vegetable oil


For the marinade:


1 tbsp shoyu
1 tbsp mirin
1 tbsp sake
1 1/2 in piece of ginger, peeled and grated


Wrap the pork in plastic wrap and freeze for 2 hours.  With a sharp knife cut into 1/8 in slices.  Or you can skip this step because you want to eat before midnight, try to slice it using the butterfly method, get frustrated and give up, and watch as your boyfriend does it beautifully each time (Thank you, Jay!).  Slice the thin meat into 1 1/2 wide strips.  


Mix all the marinade ingredients and add the pork for 15 minutes.  

Heat the oil in a pan over medium high heat and add the onions.  Saute for 3 minutes.  Add half the pork to the onions and saute until the color of the meat just turns (I hate overcooked pork) remove the meat and keep warm while you saute the second half. Add the second half of the meat, and all the onions to the plate and keep warm.


Pour the reserved marinade into the pan and cook until the sauce is reduced by one third.  add the beansprouts and snow peas and cook until tender, then return the pork and onions and cook for another 2 minutes.  Serve the slices of meat alternating with the snow peas, leaned up against a pile of beansprouts on each plate.  

Basically, this recipe just barely escaped being a disaster.  The flavors were superb, even without the beansprouts and the green bean substitution.  The problem was the timing on the meat.  The recipe says to cook it for three full minutes.  I cooked it even less than that, but when I added it back into the marinade, it was a bit overcooked.  Also, I didn't think about the fact that green beans take a lot longer to cook than pea pods, so I just threw them in the pan.  We ended up having to remove the meat and keep it warm, and continue cooking the beans, but by that time, all the sauce had cooked off and was scorching on the bottom.  Our beans, slightly too crisp, were just barely saved from tasting burnt.  Next time, if snow peas are scarce, I would steam the beans a bit first, then toss them in with the meat at the very last second.

Miso Soup


A small portion of dried wakame (seaweed)
One pack of silken tofu, cut into cubes
1 2/3 cup of dashi stock (dried bonito tuna stock, or dashi bullion)
3 tbsp white miso
2 scallions, chopped

Soak the wakame in a bowl of cold, salted water for 15 minutes (thank you Yan for the tip on salting! it really does keep the wakame from turning slimy) .  

Cut the tofu into bite sized strips.


Bring the broth to a boil.  Remove from heat and mix a portion of the broth with the miso in a bowl.  Return the miso mixture the pan.  Keep the heat on low, but do not allow the broth to boil.  Add the tofu and scallions, and wakame, and serve.  

I could not find tofu at either of the grocery stores I usually shop in.  The first time I made this recipe, I couldn't find Dashi No-Moto either (Dashi Bullion).  I substituted half the amount of vegetable bullion, which, as predicted, was a tad too salty.  I also took the recipe at its word when it said that I should use 5 grams of dried Wakame, half the package, and ended up with enough Wakame to feed miso soup to an army of hungry, rebellious samurai for a week.  Nonetheless, the soup was good.

When I made it the second time, I had the actual Dashi stock and was a bit surprised to learn its origin. It's a soup base that's made from boiling dried, shaved flakes of bonito tuna (note to all my strict veg friends, this might be up there with the revelation that Worcestershire sauce has anchovies in it!).  The second time around, I also had an appropriate cluster of wakame, and chopped button mushrooms to take the place of the tofu, and that soup was even better.

About the book:  Apparently, the samurai have sunken so low as to be deemed drunks, bullies, and braggarts.  At least the former students of Kaoru's school for swordsmen have.  And naturally, those they chose to bully are a gang of "derelicts" who are worse than the Yakuza.  When Kaoru says that she will accept the shame of her former students, the thugs are not shy of fighting a woman.  Of course, they don't have to because Himura Kenshin arrives in time to blast them out the dojo!

One thing I do like about this book is that it has a lot of interesting historical notes; for instance, did you know that Japan had wooden cannons that fired clay cannon balls?  According to the book, they could do as much damage as a steel cannon.  Of course, this does nothing to help the thugs, because Himura is one tough rurouni.

Act Three - Tokyo Samurai: Glazed Salmon Soba Noodle Soup and The Fall of the Samurai

"You call yourself a samurai, but what did your dad ever have? Three acres and two servants! Then the moron tried to fight the revolution and got killed! Your mother had to sell her body in a brothel and died of syphilis! Which do you take after? The fool or the whore?"

Book:  Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Recipe:  Basic Japanese Cooking by Jody Vassallo


Glazed Salmon Soba Noodle Soup


1 tbsp sunflower oil
4 salmon fillets with the skin still on
1/4 cup soy sauce
3 tbsp mirin
1/2 tbsp sugar
7 oz dried soba noodles
8 cups of soy ramen broth
1 3/4 oz enoki mushrooms
2 hard boiled eggs, peeled and halved
1 3/4 oz bok choy, separated into leaves

Heat the oil in a frying pan and cook the salmon over medium heat for 5-7 minutes, or until golden brown on both sides.  Remove from the pan and keep warm.  Add the soy sauce, mirin, sake, and sugar and stir over low heat until the sugar dissolves.  Bring to a boil and cook over high heat until the sauce reduces by about half.  Add the salmon back to the pan and cook until the fish is glazed and reaches the desired level of doneness.

Cook the noodles in a pan of boiling water until they are just tender (I followed the timing on the box).  Rinse in cold water to keep the noodles from sticking.  Drain them well and divide into 4 bowls. 

Bring the ramen broth to a boil in another sauce pan.  Ladle over the noodles and top with the salmon, mushrooms, and bok choy.

Here are some snags I've run into cooking Japanese in Harlem:  I couldn't find enoki mushrooms, so I used baby portabella mushrooms.  I couldn't find bok choy, so I used kale.  I have no idea what soy ramen broth is, so I just used some vegetable bouillon.  Because of all the changes, I boiled the vegetables in the water for a few minutes to soften them more.

In the end, it looked and tasted great, despite my substitutions.  

About the book:

Apparently the Meiji era of Japan saw the last of the great Samurai rebellions before the modernization of the Japanese army. In Tokyo, there was a ban on wearing swords to prevent the surviving samurai from fomenting more dissent.  Our Rurouni Kenshin was a hitokiri, one of the "manslayers" who were thought to be unkillable.

He fought on the side of the government to bring about a modern world.  Currently, our friend Himura has discovered that the government he fought to put into place is corrupt, brutal, and immoral.  He has become a rurouni, a traveling swordsman, who only carries a training sword.  He will no longer fight for the government; only for those who cannot defend themselves.  In Act Three of the book, those who cannot defend themselves includes one young thief who is touched by Himura's faith in his honor.  The boy decides he will no longer be a thief and he becomes the first student in Kaoru's father's Dojo.

There are a few things about the artwork of this Manga that I'm not sure I like.  One, whenever the characters do something silly, their eyes turn into spirals as though they are comical, but in the very next scene, they will be engaged in a serious fight.  The second thing that bugs me is the way the fight scenes become so iconic as to be mostly incomprehensible.  I guess it's meant to convey speed, but a whole page of panels will go by and all you see are flying lines and an occasional sword grip.  At the end, there are fingers and ears on the ground and if it weren't for the Hollywood assumption that the "hero always wins," I'm not sure I'd even know who was winning until the end.  It almost makes it pointless to read those scenes.

But it is a good, old-fashioned hero story.  A bit predictable, a bit tender and sweet, a bit nauseating. 

Special thanks, once again, to Ben Killen for his food photography.

Act Two - Rurouni in the City: Obimaki Enoki, Tsukune, Onigiri and Why I Am Reading from Right to Left

"After just arriving in town, how can a murder be my fault?"

Book:  Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Recipes:  The Complete Book of Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko

Obimaki Enoki

(Bacon Rolled Enoki Mushrooms)

1 lb fresh enoki mushrooms
6 strips of thick cut bacon 
4 lemon wedges 
Ground white pepper


Cut the root part of the enoki mushrooms from the end.  Divide the mushrooms into 12 bunches.  Cut the bacon in half lengthwise.  Wrap the bacon around the middle of each mushroom and secure with a toothpick (or not, I didn't have any handy and found that my rolls stayed together just fine).  

Set the oven to broil and cook the mushrooms, turning on all sides,  for about 10-13 minutes or until the bacon begins to crisp and the mushrooms begin to char a bit.  When they are cooked, cut each mushroom bunch in half, slicing through the center of the bacon.  Arrange the mushroom tops so that they are standing up and lay the other half on its side.  

Tsukune
(Grilled Chicken Balls on Skewers)


For the meatballs:


1 lb ground chicken
2 eggs
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp flour
2 tsp cornstarch
6 tbsp breadcrumbs
1 inch piece of fresh ginger, grated 


For the Tare (sauce):

4 tbsp sake (rice wine)
5 tbsp shoyu (soy sauce)
1 tbsp mirin (cooking rice wine)
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tbsp cornstarch blended with 1 tsp water
8 Bamboo skewers soaked in water for a few hours


Mix the ground chicken with the eggs, salt, flour, cornstarch, and bread crumbs.  Wet your hands (this actually kind of helps and was a trick I'd never known before) and shape the meat into golf ball sized balls. Bring a pan of water to a boil and add the ginger.  Add the chicken balls and boil for about 7 minutes, or until the color of the meat changes and the balls begin to float.  Scoop them out and drain them on a paper towel. 

In a small pan, mix all the ingredients for the sauce, except the cornstarch and water.  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the sauce has reduced slightly.  Add the cornstarch mixture and stir until the sauce has thickened to about the consistency of barbecue sauce.  Pour the sauce over the meat balls.  

Thread the meatballs onto the skewers and broil until they start to brown.  Brush with any leftover sauce and turn them until they are browned on all sides. 

Onigiri
(Rice Balls)


2 1/4 cups Japanese short grain rice (sticky rice)
2 1/2 cups water
2 sheets of Nori (dried seaweed) cut into thin strips
Black sesame seeds (or brown, if that's all your Spanish Harlem grocery store carries...)


Rinse the rice in a sieve until the water runs clear.  Drain and put into a heavy bottomed pan and pour in the water.  Let the rice soak in the water for 30 minutes.  Cover with a tight lid and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat and simmer for 12 minutes.  When you hear a crackling noise, remove from the heat and leave to stand another 15 minutes.  


Cool the rice completely (about 30 minutes).  Shape the rice balls using the inside of a small bowl, a rice mold, or by hand (you will really want to keep wetting your fingers, it's not for nothing they call it sticky rice!).  When the onigiri are all shaped, you may wrap them with the strips of nori, or dip them in the sesame seeds, or do both, as you please.  We even had a few exotic shapes like bears and dinosaurs with sesame seed eyes, as designed by my wonderful kitchen helper, Ally.  

There are a number of suggested fillings for these, none of which we tried this first time around but which will be featured in later posts (flaked cooked salmon, umeboshi [salty plum], chopped olives, etc.)

Not filling the rice balls made them a little plain.  Not bad, just a little boring by themselves.  The mushrooms were scarfed down in a matter of minutes.  They were simple, elegant, and delicious, as were the chicken skewers.  I especially liked the trace taste of ginger from the boiling process.  We served this alongside some delicious Peanut Noodles cooked up by the Fabulous Reva.   Alabama football night has never been so exotic!

Special thanks to Ben for his food photography!


About the book:

You read it from right to left!  It's so confusing.  The letters go left to right as usual, but when there are two text boxes in the same panel, you read the right one first.  It's taking an absurdly long time to get through it.  The book is a Manga, a Japanese comic, that was loaned to me by a former student of mine.  He's a senior now, and was unable to get into my comic book class due to schedule conflicts.

A few years ago, he showed me a Manga that was about 100 pages of people being hacked and ripped apart; body parts flying everywhere.  This fall, I accidentally bought a Manga that turned out to be all about women killing babies and men killing women.  I was ready to give on Manga completely, but decided to challenge my students to show me some that wasn't completely grotesque.  This young man rose to the challenge admirably.

Rurouni Kenshin is a Samurai tale about a warrior who does not want to be a warrior.  He helps the weak and helpless, he befriends the poor, and he aids a young girl in the quest to save her father's school for swordsmen.  That's as far as I've gotten, but I have a few more recipes to blog this weekend, and I've promised my student that I'd return the book on Monday (I've had it for almost a month!).