Summer in Europe - with More Fusion Cooking
19 August 2008
I am now back in Japan, after having spent two very nice weeks in Germany and Austria. And I have to say, as much as I like Tokyo, summer is just much more pleasant in Europe than over here! While in Europe it is so enjoyable to go outside into the warm sunshine, here in Tokyo you really just want to flee the humid heat and retreat to any air conditioned building. Not to mention the crowds of enormous cicadas, which start their ear-piercing noise at 4 am every day in the trees right outside our bedroom windows (rather than chirping, their noises sound like rattling screams – as you see I am not very romantic about these animals...).
But summer will go by, and Tokyo is of course still a really cool place to be! I am absolutely looking forward to the months to come, very excited about all our planned trips and hopefully many more culinary discoveries. Yet I really enjoyed my little summer break, spending time with my parents and seeing many friends. My trip gave me some new ideas for cooking, too, mixing typical Japanese flavours with European ingredients which have not yet gained ground in Japan. Experimenting with not-so-obvious combinations really is a lot of fun!
I had the chance to prepare a Japanese (well, rather "personal-fusion" Japanese) dinner for my friends I stayed with in Munich, featuring the following dish. The key of this recipe, of course, are the delicious little puy lentils…
Japanese-Flavoured Lentils with Wasabi Cream
| serves 4 |
for the lentils salad |
| 120g puy lentils (the tiny green ones) |
| 180ml dashi (Japanese fish stock) |
| soy sauce to taste |
| 2 carrots |
| 1 clove of garlic |
| 2 shiso leaves |
| 50ml Japanese rice vinegar |
| a dash of dark sesame oil (to taste) |
for the wasabi cream |
| 150ml whipping cream |
| approx. 3 teaspoons of wasabi paste (to taste) |
| 2 tablespoons of ground almonds |
| some spring onions to garnish |
Prepare the dashi; it tastes best if you cook the broth yourself, but you can of course also use instant powder. (If you cannot get ingredients for dashi, use other fish stock.)
[more on how to prepare dashi]
Heat a drop of dark sesame oil in a pot and add the lentils. Stir until the oil has spread well, then pour in the dashi and season the broth to taste with some soy sauce. Cover with a lid and simmer gently for about 30 minutes. Check from time to time if there is enough liquid left and add some more dashi and/or soy sauce if necessary.
Meanwhile peel the carrots and cut them into little cubes of a few millimeters each (about the size of the lentils). Heat a little bit of oil in a frying pan and briefly fry the mashed garlic. Before it gets really brown, add the carrots, season with a pinch of salt and sauté for just a few minutes – the carrots should still have some bite inside.
Once both the lentils and the carrots are done, mix them together in a salad bowl and let them cool down a bit. When just about lukewarm, season to taste with rice vinegar and some dark sesame oil. I think the lentils salad tastes best if you let it rest in the fridge for a while (or even over night) before eating, so it can well absorb the aroma the condiments.
For the wasabi foam, whip the cream until between creamy and stiff and stir in the wasabi cream as well as the ground almonds. Add the wasabi cautiously and bit by bit so the cream does not get too spicy for your taste!
Finally cut the fresh shiso leaves into small bits and add them into the lentils salad. To serve, fill the lentils into glasses or bowls, spread the wasabi cream on top and garnish with some finely sliced spring onions.
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