Rasen gyoza (spiral dumplings)

Today’s market basket for the veggies.

They are not burnt, just perfectly grilled.

A perfect mix of pasta and filling, poached and pan-fried… Like a gyoza. Bigger. More of the yummy stuff !

Fleischnacka, the other French snails

Fleischnacka, meat snails. Pasta rolls. That’s a fun Alsacian family dish.

Ideally, you want to make them with leftovers (meat, stock and veggies) from pot-au-feu. It’s possible to start with ground meat.

Served in the broth.

Or without, with a salad.

Midnight passage…

Read why Toshikiri-soba is the Japanese New-Year kiss…

Kake-soba

Tenkasu (tempura crumbs), negi leeks, chili pepper.

Into the tsuyu broth…

Passing midnight.

And that’s it !

Mochi, mochi, mochi…

Mochis !

Kamo namba, so convenient !

This is insanely good. Maybe the best specialty of Osaka.
It’s kamo namba, or kamo namban. It can be served with soba buckwheat noodles or udon white wheat noodles. It can be made as nabe hot pot cooked on the table.

They disagree on the origin of name “namban” means South, and is often used to name dishes from South of Japan. Namba is a town inside Osaka, in the Minami (=South) side. So South of Osaka is more likely. Also, they would cultivate negi leeks in Namba. Well, not recently. And probably they had those ducks (kamo) running around.

Why is that convenient ? I don’t know, but they say here “it’s convenient like duck and negi leeks”. It’s good to have both in one place, you can do that dish.

This type of negi leek is Kujo negi (Kyoto’s 9th avenue negi leek). Surely there too they were cultivating leeks. Not sure they still do behind the big buildings now, not even sure they don’t… I’ll tell you why another day.

The particularity is the greens are very sweet and can be eaten raw without tearing apart your mouth.

The whites need being seared without fat, just a few minutes.

Kamo is duck. This not classic duck… well, it is organic, it looked good and it is “chick”, they say.

Sear it without fat, like the negi whites. Duck is good rare. Even if you disagree, roast it a little less than you want as it keeps cooking in the broth.

Boil the udon. Make 6 cups of dashi (with dry fish and kombu), flavor it with soy sauce (about 3 tbs of dark type) and mirin (2 to 4 tbs), bring to a boil. Add salt if you need. Combine the udon, the meat and negi, pour the broth.

How to make quick dashi

Add a little shichimi togarashi (7 spice mix). And enjoy. The chick is delicious, the veggie tender, this is wonderful.

Cal 529.2 F12.8g C65.6g P34.3g

SOBA ike-men (noodle arrangement)

Soba : Japanese buckwheat noodles made of pure buckwheat, buckwheat and wheat, or wheat and tea for matcha soba. Do not confuse with *chuka soba* and *yaki soba* which are ramen (Chinese style noodles).

More about noodle types :
Guided tour of my soba closet