Japanese Recipes for Healthy Living

Archive for November, 2009

Have you seen this kind of fruit bouquet?

I was always curious about it, and wanted to buy one. But when I checked the price online, I was surprised. It’s not cheap. So I decided to make one by myself at home. The picture above and below is my work!

It’s pretty easy to make it.

There is a whole iceberg lettuce in the container. I used a cookie cutter and a hammer to cut pineapple. It was so much fun making this thing.

This garlic chive pancake is originally Korean dish, but it’s very popular in Japan. It’s very easy to cook and contains a lot of vegetables. This recipe is my version, and it might be different from the Korean one, but it’s very tasty.

Korean Pancake, Chidimi

<Ingredients>

8 oz garlic chive, cut into 2 inches
1 carrot, julienned
2 tbsp pickled cut ginger (see below)
8 medium shrimps, peeled and cut into 3 or 4 pieces
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 cup water
2 eggs
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp fish powder (option, see below)
vegetable oil

(For the dipping sauce— mix up all the ingredients below)
3 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp rice vinegar
1/2 tbsp honey
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp chili garlic sauce

Chili Garlic Sauce

<How to cook>

1. Mix flour, water, salt and fish powder in a big bowl.
2. Put garlic chive, carrot, pickled ginger and shrimp in the bowl, and mix them up.
3. Heat vegetable oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Ladle 1 cup batter into skillet to make an 5-inch pancake. Cook about 3-4 minutes , then turn over and cook until other side is golden, 3-4 minutes more.
4. Serve warm with dipping sauce.

ASIAN INGREDIENTS

garlic chive, nira

Garlic Chive——I’ve never seen this vegetable in American grocery stores. You can find it in Korean stores, Japanese stores and Chinese stores. According to about.com, “Garlic chives pack a major nutritional punch for a mere 30 calories per 100 grams. Low in fat and high in dietary fiber and protein, they contain high amounts of Vitamin C and carotene, and are a good source of calcium. They also contain Vitamin B1 and B2. In Chinese medicine, garlic chives are considered to be a yin or warming food.”

pickled ginger

Pickled ginger——– You can find this at Asian grocery stores and some  American grocery stores. There is also pink ginger that usually is served at sushi restaurants. For this recipe, red one is suitable.

kezuriko

Fish powder (kezuriko)———– This can be found only at Japanese grocery stores as long as I know. It is powder form of dried, fermented and smoked skipjack tuna(bonito). This powder doesn’t have any chemical, which means no MSG.

chick pea, cucumber, corn and red bell pepper salad / lentil salad

I know… this is not Japanese cuisine, but the color was beautiful (and it was delicious), so I just wanted to take a picture. I used Japanese cucumber for this chick pea salad. I think Japanese and Persian cucumbers are very similar, and they are much smaller than the regular cucumber (the big one). The taste is a little different too. I prefer using Japanese or Persian cucumber for any salad. The combination of cucumber, corn, chick pea, red bell pepper and cilantro was so good. I mixed 1 tbsp of Dijon Mustard, 2 tbsp of white balsamic vinegar and 4 tbsp of extra virgin olive for the dressing.  I mixed up all the ingredients, with salt and pepper.

The lentil salad’s recipe was from the book “Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook“. I am not a vegan or vegetarian, but I just love their recipes. It’s so easy to cook and a lot of healthy recipes. You can see the lentil salad’s recipe here online. Since I am not a vegan, I used chicken stock instead of vegetable stock.

With some sourdough bread, hmmm, yummy.