Dinner! 2002

[CathyL]

Not necessary to douse them with oil, then?  I might try this tonight.

Oh, I though the oil was understood. No need to douse, however - a judicious drizzle should do it.

[Priscilla]

And that I'll need an axe to dispatch it.

Sounds like Liza might be able to help a person out in this regard.

Liza Liza took an axe and gave CathyL's Hubbard forty whacks? And when she saw what she had done gave my kabocha forty-one?

Toby, the pear half in the Hubbard is truly inspired. Reminscent of Paul Prudhomme's Turducken, you know what I mean?

[torakris]

Priscilla, if by 'little' you mean the bitsy thumb-sized ones, I agree they're not worth tinkering with, as is the case with most midgetized vegetables.  But the bigger than a baseball/smaller than a basketball squashes (there's doubtless a sport with the right-sized ball but I don't know what) can be lovely.

Every fall here in Japan I can find these little squashes about the size of a baseball and they are yellow with orange striping. I don't think they really have a name here as the Japanese don't actually eat them, rather decorate with them. I find them absolutely delicious! I cut them in half, place them cut side down on a buttered baking tray and roast until tender. They become wonderfully carmelized and need nothing more than a sprinkling of salt and pepper.

Kabocha is pretty much the only squash offered here and I roast it the same way only longer.

Occasionally I have seen spaghetti squash, only they call it somen kabocha. somen being the thin Japanese noodles.

[Priscilla]

CathyL, yes I did mean the supertiny ones...baseball-size on up is fair game, I agree. Regulation-softball size, bowling-ball size, etc. Nerf-ball size.

Your dispatching with an axe image is right outta one of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books...remember Ma Ingalls hacking up a Hubbard, (Liza-like, we now know), in I forget which volume.

The nice really old and spry guy at the farmer's market with the sharply pressed plaid shirt showing a modest triangle of superclean white t-shirt tucked into superclean and pressed vintage Levis has lovely giant squashes...I just might be unable to resist getting one to hack. All peaceable-like, of course.

[Wilfrid]

Okay, if I can get my hand around 'em, I nix 'em. Got it.

[Nick]

I love delicata and butternut; acorn tends to be rather bland on its own.  All together, sliced maybe 1/2" thick and high-heat roasted, they caramelize nicely and become much more interesting.  No need to peel, for most of the smaller varieties.  The rind adds texture and color.  

Delicata is a great little squash! I cut in half lengthwise, get the seeds out, and place it on a rack in a pan (cavity side down) with a little water in the bottom of the pan to steam it. The amount of water is critical. Hopefully when a fork pierces the skin and meat easily, the water is gone. Then take and turn the squash over and add whatever filling you want that doesn't need cooking (maybe just a little butter and maple syrup?) and let it go til the meat dries on the outside just a bit.

Buttercup is good the same way - or sliced about 1/2" thick at the outside, a little water in the pan that will steam then evaporate off, and then let it brown and crisp up a little on the outside with the inside not dried out.

[winodj]

I'm making Stirfry tonight. Beef, onion, garlic, nothing special.

But I wonder, why is vegetable oil preferable to olive oil in this case? What makes vegetable oil or peanut oil preferable?

[Jinmyo]

Olive oil has no history with the kinds of ingredients and techniques involved in stir-frying. So if authenticty is important to you, don't use it.

In fact, with Latin and South Western dishes I always use corn oil.

For stir-frying you want high high high heat. Olive oil will begin to break down long before you get to where you need to go.

[Nick]

Miso soup and something else not sure what.

Miso soup -

Saute some onions and shitake mushrooms in a little evoo.

Add water that you've soaked (re-hydrated) the dried shitakes and Kombu in.

When it comes to a light boil, add Kombu (kelp).

Reduce the heat and cook until the shitakes are at the right stage.

Put some miso (I use and recommend South River) in a bowl and pour some broth from the soup into the bowl and mix the miso in.

Return this to the pot which has been taken off the heat and stir in. Let sit a few minutes and serve.

Edit: Can also add carrots, celery at the saute stage. Also can add fish such as hake, cod, etc. at the same time as kelp.

[Jinmyo]

Miso soup and something else not sure what.

Miso soup -

Saute some onions and shitake mushrooms in a little evoo.

Add water that you've soaked (re-hydrated) the dried shitakes and Kombu in.

When it comes to a light boil, add Kombu (kelp).

Reduce the heat and cook until the shitakes are at the right stage.

Put some miso (I use and recommend South River) in a bowl and pour some broth from the soup into the bowl and mix the miso in.

Return this to the pot which has been taken off the heat and stir in. Let sit a few minutes and serve.

Edit: Can also add carrots, celery at the saute stage. Also can add fish such as hake, cod, etc. at the same time as kelp.

Nick, that's a very unusual way to make miso shiru with the oil and sauteeing the mushrooms. Onions, carrots, celery as well. Might I ask where you learned this?

Was this aka (red) miso or shiro (white) miso?

[Nick]

Nick, that's a very unusual way to make miso shiru with the oil and sauteeing the mushrooms. Onions, carrots, celery as well. Might I ask where you learned this?

Was this aka (red) miso or shiro (white) miso?

Jin, what's shiru? Soup?

Until you brought it up I didn't think I was doing anything unusual. It's just been kind of an evolution over some years. At first I made the soup like most people I'd known did. Bring some water to a boil and put the stuff in. But then I got into making onion soup and learned the best way was to saute the onions until they got slightly burned. I think you call it caremelized (sp). At any rate, they'd be brown spots of the onion on the pan which added great flavor to the soup. From this I started sauteing (though not caremelizing) the onion before starting the miso soup. Then started adding other things in the sauteing phase.

Adding the fish with the seaweed also came later. When they're in season, the small Maine shrimp are great in this. Also, at the first part when the boil comes you can add some small noodles, then the fish/weed.

I mostly use barley miso. For something lighter and sweeter, corn miso.

I first started learning this stuff when Michio Kushi came to Boston in the sixties and started a little store he called Erewhon.

Edit: "they'd be" is a way of saying "the'd be" which is, for all of you from other parts of the country, a shortening of "there would be."

[torakris]

As with Jinmyo, I was also surprised by your method of miso shiru (miso soup). I have never sauteed things to be used in miso soup and with EVOO? Interesting. I might give it a try. Far from traditional but hey, if it tastes good.

What is corn miso?

I have never heard of it.

[torakris]

Today was avery busy day and so I prepared a very simple dinner.

Fusilli with raw tomato and ricotta sauce (excellent by the way!)

salad of baby greens with a simple homemade garlic vinagrette

various ice creams for dessert.

[J Acord]

Last night,

peppered steak, butternut squash and maple syrup mash, and some red onion marmalade (because I really fancied making it).

[Jinmyo]

Antipasto of cold cotecchino with lentil "butter" (pureed lentil with rosemary and olives) wrapped in red leaf lettuce; roasted tomato puree on large basil leaves.

Roasted red pepper bisque with a dollop of creme fraiche and a mussel atop.

Manicotti stuffed with ricotta, spinach, pine nuts, breaded and deep-fried, eaten by hand with a lemon dipping sauce.

Roast pork loin with roasted red onion and much garlic with turnip mashers.

[Wilfrid]

Okay, Liza and Cathy, very funny. Those cute little squash are absolutely inedible, aren't they.

First off, you can't cut them open. Cleavers, kitchen knives, axes, whatever. You have to take your life in your hands, and then they shatter and spray all over the room.

Next, the interiors consist entirely of seeds. Seeds in such numbers, Kurt Godel wouldn't be able to keep count.

When you finally gather some seedless scraps and roast them in the oven, the skin remains absolutely hard as marble - totally rock solid. And you end up with about two and a half grams of edible flesh from about a pound of squash.

I think you both owe me dinner.

Nice green salad last night, then.

[CathyL]

Okay, Liza and Cathy, very funny.  Those cute little squash are absolutely inedible, aren't they.

At the least, we owe you a Greenmarket tour with a squash-selecting tutorial.

Forgive me for suggesting such a thing, but...could you possibly have purchased the cute little ornamental squash? Those are absolutely inedible.

I started giggling at the Kurt Godel reference, then tried but failed to resist LOLing at the mental image of you shattering and spraying absolutely inedible ornamental squash scraps and seeds all over the room, Beloved and the munchkin. I'm a bad, bad eGulleteer.

[Wilfrid]

Priscilla, if by 'little' you mean the bitsy thumb-sized ones, I agree they're not worth tinkering with, as is the case with most midgetized vegetables.  But the bigger than a baseball/smaller than a basketball squashes (there's doubtless a sport with the right-sized ball but I don't know what) can be lovely.

Oh, so some of the bigger-than-a-baseball ones are "ornamental"? I had worked that out by the time I was standing, quivering and bleeding, among the ruins. Beloved and Munchkin were out, fortunately, but I was able to show them the patch of missing skin on my left hand when they got home.

All very comical. Humph.

[SobaAddict70]

nothing extraordinary....I mean, this IS e-gullet after all...

Monday: with some duck from a local Cantonese take-out joint -- shredded the duck meat, and stir-fried with some Napa cabbage, carrots, onions, and Chinese black mushrooms, mushroom soy, red bean paste, scallions, ginger and garlic. Steamed rice. Szechuan pickled turnips. Ginger tea with honey. Tangelos.

Tuesday: Broiled salmon, coconut and red bean rice, sauteed spinach w/caramelized onions. Evian.

[Wilfrid]

Hard as marble. I could only break them with a cleaver. Hence the shatter and spray effect.

They were cute though. I will use them as a centerpiece next time.

[Spoonful]

Hamburger on baguette with Dijon, sautéed mushrooms and onions, with blue cheese a side of homemade FF and mayo and a roasted red and yellow pepper salad topped with more blue. Hubby had his with Ementhal and his salad was topped with Feta.

That's Johnathon's fault

[Priscilla]

Don't any of you crazy and latently murderous cooks roast a whole squash in the oven until tender, and THEN cut it--smoothly quietly and all peaceable-like, easily, even, into manageable pieces, gently discarding what we'll euphemistically call the "guts," and then doing what you will with the resultant cooked flesh? Rather than getting the mawl from the woodpile, burnishing it with four-ought steel wool, cleaning it to food-safe standards, and then hacking away like madpeople? Kee-ripes.

Just don't forget to pierce the shell several times lest you experience something very much like a sonic boom in yer oven.

[Nick]

As with Jinmyo, I was also surprised by your method of miso shiru (miso soup).  I have never sauteed things to be used in miso soup and with EVOO? Interesting. I might give it a try. Far from traditional but hey, if it tastes good.

What is corn miso?

I have never heard of it.

To my mind miso soup is made better by the sauteing (been cooking with miso for 20-25 years.) Also when the soup is in the bowl, the evoo glistens on the surface in a miriad of little bubbles. Don't use too much oil though, and if you're cooking this for theraputic reasons, leave out the oil.

Years ago South River made corn miso, but I just checked on the net and they don't seem to make it anymore. But, they make many others. Their's is the best miso I know of that's currently on the market - at least on the east coast.

Here's their website:

South River Miso

[Jinmyo]

Nick, we don't need to agree on this.

That's a well put together Web site. Their products are interesting but none of them are traditional Japanese. As I am primarily interesting in kaiseki formal cuisine, I can't imagine using any in cooking for others. But a cup of the azuki/brown rice miso would make a nice hot drink on a cold winter morning.

[Nick]

Nick, we don't need to agree on this.

Their products are interesting but none of them are traditional Japanese. As I am primarily interesting in kaiseki formal cuisine, I can't imagine using any in cooking for others.

Check out their teachers in their beginning. Can be found at their website. Also their philosophy.

What the hell is kaiseki formal cuisine?

I used to use Japanese miso. I still have some 20-25 year old Erewhon that's never seen a refrigerator. Saving it. It's special.