Tofu lasagna and farm fruits

Not the Italian lasagne. 豆腐ラザニア tofu rasaniya It’s a Japanese comfort dish. Not an homonym, it’s really inspired by the pasta dish but without the pasta. You are left with very soft tofu in Italian style sauces. Warm and tender. It’s usually served with rice.

Fruits like those you pick in the backyard. I went to the countryside. I have some from a farm, others from farmer’s market. They are the fruits you can see in local woods right now, kaki persimmons, mikan oranges, yuzu citrus. You can see two types of kaki, some rounds and some ogive ones. The latter may be shibui (tart) and the farm lady said we should guess… A bit of branch is left and if they are tart, we can do that.

That’s a quickly thrown casual meal. I had tomato sauce, silky tofu and these blanched veggies : bell peppers and ninniku no me (garlic stalks).

For the cheezy sauce as usual sake kasu, miso and this time the oil was sesame oil. I have added grated ukon (turmeric).

Alternate and bake. I topped with toasted bread crumbs.

Genmai, brown rice. I was given good farm rice too.

Serve very hot. Mmmm…

Pot au feu or pot luck ? Seafood veggie red stew.

A long time ago, a very cheerful lady asked if I liked French pot au feu and I said that was not my favorite dish. She was very disappointed as she had just discovered the dish in a “traditional French restaurant” here in Osaka, and she said : “Really I love everything spicy with tomato sauce, chick peas, seafood and hot dog sausages…”. It seems, she ate an original variation for sure that drifts far away from what most call pot au feu in France.
Well, I’ve made it today without the knackies. I don’t know if that has a name. Maybe the Spanish “cocido de pulpo con patatas”, but I don’t see it with sausages. Well, they are not here.
I have the pulpo (octopus) :

Hokkaido octopus.

Into a broth (onion with cloves, chick peas, bouquet garni, mushrooms).

Boiled.

Added potatoes. Later tomato sauce and a little red wine. a little hot chili.

Kyoto red kabu turnip.

I first added pieces of the root, then stalks, then at the end leaves.

Put it in a pottery.

Cover and announce “pot au feu” or whatever name…

Baked hana mame beans, buckwheat berry flan

Beans and grains, simply. Baked beans with huge beans and a twist, spicy buckwheat flans with balsamico icing.

I had a leftover of cooked buckwheat groats, so I’ve added minced onion, garlic and feet of shiitake mushrooms, pasted parsley, turmeric, a little massala spice mix, water and potato starch. I’ve steamed the mix in a muffin tray till that became solid. On top, it’s (bought) balsamic reduction sauce. I know it’s cheating, but as I have this product, I use it.

Hana mame. The name literally means ‘flower bean’, but in English that’s runner bean. The Japanese ones are really huge. These are 紫花豆 murasaki hanamame (purple flower beans) and there exist some white ones too.
This photo was taken after soaking.

Other posts about murasaki haname beans.

After soaking the beans overnight, I boiled them of course. Then in a pottery, I’ve put beans, simple passata tomato sauce, and a mix of bean cooking broth + miso + sakekasu (sake lees)+ olive oil. And baked.
Beside, I steamed and cut a mizu nasu aubergine, to serve with these beans.

The sauce gets creamy thanks to the sakekasu.

Island shred : green papaya, goya bitter squash, shikwasa lime juice and peel and pinch of salt. Mix and let 30 minutes.

Another delicious and filling plant-based meal…

So let’s mix in the aubergines…

Asari shellfish and tagliatelle

A colorful pasta, veggie, seafood one-dish meal.

Tagliatelle made with durum semolina plus a little matcha green tea powder.

Asari shellfish.

Cooked with garlic, chili, white wine, tomato paste…

…konnyaku, capers, favas (broad beans)

… stalks on mitsuba. The leaves decorate the serving plate.

Gnocchi x gnocchi

Gnocchi di patata ? Gnocchi di polenta ?

That’s the Daring Cook’s challenge of this month : potato gnocchi.

Todd, who is The Daring Kitchen’s AWESOME webmaster and an amazing cook, is our September Daring Cooks’ host! Todd challenged us to make light and fluffy potato Gnocchi and encouraged us to flavor the lil pillows of goodness and go wild with a sauce to top them with!

As I had already made some and I wanted a fresher Summer version, I tried to combine polenta gnocchi and potato gnocchi recipes :

It’s gluten free. I didn’t add flour. I cooked the polenta, and made mashed potato. I mixed about 60% potato, 40% polenta. Flavored with salt, nutmeg, black pepper, a little olive oil. Let cool a few hours.

Prepared a sauce (tomato, garlic, olive oil) and stir-fried peppers and onions with garlic and rosemary.

Formed gnocchi with the chilled dough, coated them in sauce.
They can’t be boiled or they would fall apart (yep, I tried). It’s not a problem, they can reheated in the sauce.