Salmon & Leek Udon + Cucumber & Red Pepper Salad

Salmon  & Leek Udon Noodle Soup

Serves 2-3 people

This is my favourite recipe in a hurry, or when it's cold out and you just need something warm, comforting and nutritious. You can pick up udon really cheap at Asian stores, sometimes less than $1 a packet so it's something you can always have in the cupboard for emergencies. Udon is easy on the stomach and fussy kids seem to enjoy it too. You can also add tofu  if you want some extra oomph. Don't order takeaways, try this instead :)

4 C dashi stock (2 sachets dashi powder + 4C water)
2 x salmon fillets (skin on or off depending on what you prefer)
1 x leek *
handful of dried chopped shiitake mushrooms
1 T miso paste
1 T sake/ ryorishu
1 T soy sauce
2 x packets of udon noodles (vacuum packed type)



Bring the dashi stock to the boil and add the shiitake mushrooms and salmon fillets (chopped in half). Turn heat down to medium and simmer for about 3-5 minutes.
Add the sake and soy sauce.
Chop the leek diagonally into rings and add to the broth, turn up the heat and add the udon. Cook for about 2 minutes until the udon are separated and cooked.
Turn off the heat and mix in the miso paste gently.

*you can substitute the leek for spring onions, just add them last.


Cucumber and Red Pepper Sweet and Sour Salad

Serves 2-3 people as a side salad
1/2 telegraph cucumber
1/2 red pepper
few leaves of lettuce
1 t sugar
1 T mirin
2 T rice or grain vinegar
pinch of salt

Cut the cucumber in half length ways and scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon and discard, chop into crescent shaped slithers.
Chop the red pepper into similar sized pieces.
Mix the sugar, mirin, vinegar and salt together and then toss through the cucumber and pepper.  Garnish with a couple of lettuce leaves and serve.

Rice: The Long and The Short of It

Many Japanese recipes are centred around the most important staple, rice. For an authentic Japanese experience it's important you have the right kind of rice, for practical reasons (you want the rice to stick together so that it's easy to pick up with chopsticks), as well as for texture, flavour, and looks.

Just like the Italians like their pasta al dente, for the Japanese the rice has to be cooked just right, or it will taint the whole dining experience. Now I'm no expert on how to get the perfect bowl of rice, but I can give you a few pointers on the basics.

1. Buy SHORT grain rice or sushi rice. I use the American grown non-GMO Sushi Rice or Australian grown SunRice Sushi Rice both available from Kosco, you can buy Japanese grown rice, but just expect to pay a bit more. You can also get genjimai which is semi-hulled rice if you want a bit more whole grain nutrition. 
2. Buy a rice cooker. Save your sanity and take the guess work out of it. You can get rice cookers, like the one pictured above, on sale for as little as $30, well worth the small outlay.
3. Wash your rice gently but thoroughly before cooking. I usually wash mine about three times in the rice cooker bowl, until the water is near enough to clear. If you don't wash away the starch you will get heavy gluggy rice.
4. Let your rice stand. If you have a basic rice cooker like the one pictured, once cooked allow the rice to stand (with lid still on) for about 5-10 minutes before you stir, put the lid on and allow to stand for a further few minutes before serving. This should stop it from being too gluggy. You want your rice to be sticking together but not too dry or too wet. If you've put in too much water and it goes gluggy, take the lid off for a few minutes, stir gently and then allow to stand for a bit longer on the warm setting.

Before I went to Japan I used to cook Uncle Ben's rice in the bags, I was later to learn that this to Japanese people is like chewing cardboard pellets! Needless to say I have never looked at rice quite the same since living in Japan.

You can do a myriad of things with your left over rice, so always cook extra for the freezer or your lunch the next day.  

Which brings me to an easy lunch box recipe, onigiri or rice balls. When your sick of sandwiches these go down a treat, and are also great for picnics and hanami (cherry blossom viewing).

Onigiri- Japanese Rice Balls

Traditionally onigiri are triangular in shape...they are not the massively over-sized hunks of rice sold at some sushi stores that you can't seem to eat all the way through with your dignity still in tact, because they never, ever, stay together!
You don't need to season the rice with vinegar (that would make it sushi). But if you like you can add a bit of salt to the water that you dip your hands in (wetting your hands first will stop the rice from sticking to them).

Panda Onigiri with Rolled Sweet Egg Omelette and Edamame

How to make the perfect onigiri:

• To make a manageable sized onigiri, place a spoonful of warm rice (you can briefly microwave leftover rice) in the palm of one hand .
• Add a teaspoon or so of your filling in the centre. This could be some chopped up leftover Teriyaki Chicken, tinned tuna mixed with (lots of) kewpie mayonnaise, or my personal favourite umeboshi (Japanese sour plums), or you can get creative and try putting other things in the middle too, the skies the limit (let me know how it turns out). You can get some amazing additive-free locally grown umeboshi from Masako Fisher at Yumesato Farm, beware of the Chinese chemically flavoured ones in stores- not so good.
• Put some more rice on top to cover the filling.
• Cup your hands together like you are holding a small creature inside that you don't want to escape...and closing your hands around the rice squish to form a triangular prism. Keep on turning and squishing so your onigiri is nice and firm and a definite triangular shape.
• You can leave your onigiri as is, or roll it in some sesame seeds or katsuobushi (bonito flakes), or cut a strip of nori to wrap around it (pack this separately if you are taking it for lunch). 

Making a good shaped onigiri takes a bit of practice, but if you find it too tricky there are some super cute rice moulds that you can purchase at Asian stores. Recently I found this cute panda rice mould and nori cutter on Trade Me. DD loves it and it's the perfect size for her little hands.

Furikake rice seasoning

If you just can't stand eating plain rice...or you want to get your kids to eat more, you can buy rice seasonings (furikake) in all sorts of flavours, the one pictured is nori and egg (noritama). You can also buy seasonings for onigiri that you just stir through. 

Would love to hear about your creations or if you found this helpful :)

What's Left in The Fridge?

I do my big shop fortnightly mid-week so am now scraping the bottom of the barrel to find things to cook for dinner! Thanks to the St Albans Vege Coop though I still had some pumpkin left, so was able to make some Kabocha no Nidsuke: Simmered Pumpkin, with Tori no Teriyaki: Chicken Teriyaki, served with rice and miso soup.

(Feeds 2-3 people with enough miso soup for seconds):

Kabocha no Nidsuke: Simmered Pumpkin

1/2 a small pumpkin/ squash (approx 600g)
3/4 t or 1 sachet of instant dashi stock
2 T soy sauce
1 T sugar
1 T mirin 

Chop the pumpkin into wedges and use your vege peeler to peel a thin slice from the edges and corners (mentori), this makes it look nice and helps stop the pumpkin falling apart when you simmer it. Leave the skin on- you can eat the skin of some varieties.
Arrange the pieces in a saucepan and put in enough water just to cover, add the soy sauce sugar and mirin.
Bring to the boil and then turn to low and simmer until tender.
Garnish with sesame seeds or bonito flakes (katsuobushi).

Tori no Teriyaki: Chicken Teriyaki

2 chicken thigh fillets
4 T Japanese soy sauce
1 clove garlic crushed
1/2 t freshly grated ginger
1 T mirin
1 T sake or ryorishu (Japanese cooking wine)

Cut the chicken into bite size pieces or strips, mix together all other ingredients and add to chicken. Leave to marinate for a few hours or overnight.
reserving the liquid, cook in a frying pan or wok on high heat. Turn heat down to low once cooked through and add the remaining liquid and stir through.

You can leave out the ginger if you don't have it, it's still yummy! And you can use other parts of chicken or chicken legs/ pieces too.

Garnish with sesame seeds and steamed veges, shredded cabbage or salad, and serve with rice and miso soup.

Miso Shiru: Miso Soup

4 C water
2-3 T miso paste (I used shiro miso)
1 sachet instant dashi stock
1 T wakame

Bring the water to the boil and then turn to low, add a sachet of instant dashi.
Using a sieve and spoon, or ladle and spoon, stir and dissolve the miso paste in the hot water (put more or less in depending on what you like). Do not let the soup boil as it will alter the flavour of the miso.
Add the dried wakame and turn off the gas.
Other things you can add are: spinach, tofu, spring onion, daikon radish, aburage, cabbage, clams or any combination of these.

The Essential Ingredients

From right to left: Ryorishu, Mirin, Shoyu, Dashi

Before you get started with cooking Japanese at home, a trip to buy the above ingredients is a must. The above form the basis of many Japanese dishes and one of each will go a long way. Don't worry too much about brands, they are all pretty similar.

I do most of my regular shop at Kosco Asian Supermarket, the Homebase Shirley store in Christchurch seems to have the best selection of Japanese food and they have a Japanese staff member too.

So what are the essentials?

Ryorishu=  Japanese Cooking Wine. You could also use sake instead. As this has alcohol some Asian food markets might not sell it if they don't have a liquor licence.

Mirin= Sweet Cooking Rice Wine. This is heavily sweetened sake.Adds the sweet flavour in dishes such as teriyaki. You can add sugar to sake or ryorishu as a substitute.

Shoyu= Japanese Soy Sauce. It is really important that you use a Japanese soy sauce as there is quite a difference in flavour to Chinese soy sauce. Tamari is a richer heavier type of soy sauce, for my recipes I usually use just regular shoyu. You can also get salt reduced varieties if you are concerned about salt content.

Dashi= Soup Stock. This is the backbone of many Japanese dishes and gives a distinctive flavour. It is used in many dishes and when making miso soup.  You can make your own dashi stock by boiling kombu kelp, bonito flakes, and dried sardines- but really who can be bothered! There are a few different brands of dashi, I like the one pictured above because it doesn't contain MSG and it comes in little sachets (it is less salty than MSG-containing varieties though, so you may need to add more to get a fuller flavour).

Other things that are good to have on hand:

Miso = Fermented Soybean Paste for making miso soup. You can get just straight miso or with dashi already added (dashi iri miso). I would advise asking a shop assistant for help when first buying. You can also get instant varieties which are quick and easy. I tend to use shiro miso which has a mild flavour, aka miso has a much more intense flavour and is darker in colour.

Wakame seaweed, is used in soups and salads, you buy it in dried form and soak to use. You can buy Korean or Japanese wakame, the flavour is the same.

Kewpie Mayonnaise, a must have item in our house- be careful it's addictive!

Shiitake mushrooms, you can buy these dried or frozen- I have rarely found fresh ones in Christchurch and when I have they cost a fortune! They have a really distinctive flavour and add oomph to your dish. You need to soak the dried ones before using, the soaking water makes a nice stock for soups. If you're pushed for time you can also get dried sliced shiitake that require less time to soak. I have recently seen these sold in Countdown stores in the produce section.

Sesame Oil (goma abura), this adds flavour and aroma to dishes. Make sure you have a good quality oil as the flavour is worlds apart from cheaper brands. Trust me it's worth spending a couple of extra dollars.

I don't want to overload you with too much info so I will continue to introduce ingredients with my recipes. If there is something you are curious about please feel free to ask and I will try to feature it in a future blogpost.

Happy cooking!