Last Year's Ume-shu

We tasted last year's ume-shu (plum liqueur) for the first time on Saturday. It was made in May 2009. It's our homemade with about 2.5 pounds of plums, 2.5 liters of shochu, and 1.5 pounds of rock sugar. The jar was stored in the dark cool place for the entire time.

the bottom layers of the plums are now shriveled after 1+ year. The color was developed into light amber. The taste was already quite nice with the mild tartness, fresh plum, and very smooth texture. Mmm...so lovely. Each of us had just a glass on the rocks. We will get it back to the storage and want to age it further for more deep flavor.

Donabe braised beef in tomato and white kidney bean sauce

My sister, Tomoko, really enjoyed the beef stew I made at her home back in Japan, and she requested for the recipe.

So, I made it again, this time with the beef brisket (instead of beef shank). I made the dish with the soup & stew donabe, "Miso-shiru Nabe". This donabe makes the wonderful braising.

Donabe Braised Beef in tomato and white kidney bean sauce

Ingredients

2 tablespoon olive oil

1.5 pounds beef brisket, cut into large cubes, season with salt and pepper

2 tablespoon butter

1 medium-size onion, minced

1/2 medium-size carrot, cut into small dice

3-4 cloves garlic, minced

1 branch rosemary, minced

3 sage leaves, minced

1 cup red wine

1 can (16 oz) diced Italian tomatoes

1.5 cup chicken or beef stock

2 bay leaves

1 can (16 oz) white kidney beans, rinsed

salt and pepper

Procedure

1. In a large saute pan, heat the olive oil and brown both sides of the beef. Set aside.

2. In the soup & stew donabe, "Miso-shiru Nabe", heat the butter and saute the onion, carrot, and garlic over medium heat until the onion is very soft.

3. Add the rosemary and sage. Continue to saute for another minute.

4. Add the browned beef and red wine. Simmer until the wine is reduced by half.

5. Add the tomatoes, stock, and bay leaves. Bring to boil, and reduce to simmer. Skim as necessary.

6. Line the surface with a piece of parchment paper. Cover with the lid, and transfer the donabe to the 325F oven.

7. Braise in the oven for 3.5 to 4 hours. Check 1-2 times meanwhile, and add more stock if necessary.

8. Bring the donabe back to the stove. Remove the parchment paper.

9. Add the white kidney beans. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper.

By braising the meat in the donabe in the oven, the meat turns fork-tender and really flavorful. I hope Tomoko will enjoy cooking this dish with her donabe!

You can also view the recipe on toiro's website. Hope you will enjoy.

Happy donabe life.

Donabe purple rice

There are countless variation of mixed grain rice.

By adding a little amount of black rice to white rice, you can make the beautiful purple rice.

Because the rice is cooked with this wonderful double-lid donabe rice cooker, "Kamado-san", the texture of this mixed grain rice turns out really nice.

There is no special preparation necessary. When you soak the white rice in water in the donabe (2 rice-cup of white rice and 400 ml of water), you add 3 tablespoons of black rice and 3 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon of water. Soak for 30 minutes, and cook normally.

The result is not only beautiful, but the flavor is intensified with a slight nuttiness from the black rice. (*In the picture, I did 1 rice-cup of each white and brown rice with the black rice, so it was even healthier!)

I'm sorry that Kamado-san is currently out-of-order, but it should be back in stock by the end of next week. If you would like to be notified when it's available, please sign-up to receive our newsletter from toiro's website.

Happy donabe life.

Donabe roasted kurobuta pork

Back to donabe cooking.

We got the bone-in kurobuta pork loin, also from McCall's Meat & Fish. They cut the individual slices from the big chunk for us. This time, I brined the meat overnight before cooking. My brine solution consists of 1.5 liters water, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 1/3 cup Kosher salt, 2 bay leaves, and 1 teaspoon black peppercorns. The brining can season the meat evenly and make the meat really moist and flavorful. After removing the meat from the brine solution, I just patted them dry, and they were ready to cook.

I used my super-versatile tagine-style donabe, "Fukkura-san" to cook the pork. I seared the meat with the olive oil until golden (about 4-5 minutes each side), before transferring them to another plate. Wipe the skillet, and heat some butter. Saute the asparagus with some garlic lightly, then I brought the meat back on top of the asparagus. Cover with the lid and the meat was cooked for another 4-5 minutes with the lid on over medium+ heat. Turn off the heat, and let the meat rest with the cover on for another 5 minutes.

The meat was so juicy and flavorful that I didn't even need any sauce for the dish. The tagine-style donabe, with its even heat distribution and FIR (Far-Infrared Radiation), sealed all the flavors in the meat and cooked it so tender. But it was also good with the pan juice or the simple squeezed lemon and Dijon mustard. I served the pork with multi-grain rice, cooked with the double-lid donabe rice cooker, "Kamado-san".

I love the simple delicious meal like this.

This year's first barbecue with Santa Maria BBQ Grill

The first night since I returned to LA from Japan was a very American-style dinner.

Jason cleaned up our Santa Maria BBQ Grill, and we did our first barbecue of this year. We picked up some beautiful beef skirt steak from McCall's Meat and Fish, so I marinated the meat for about 5 hours. Here's my marinade recipe.

Marinade for Skirt Steak

4 cloves garlic

1/2 cup Italian parsley

2 teaspoons herb de Provence

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup olive oil

In a food processor, blend together all the ingredients. Marinade about 1.5 pounds of beef skirt steak for 4 hours or more.

Once the grill was ready, over medium-high heat, I grilled the marinated meat for about 5 minutes on one side, and additional 3 minutes after turning over the meat (with the lid on).

The meat was nicely medium-rare, and tasted so juicy and tender. I served the meat with my whimsical chimichurri (parsley, chives, and mitsuba), sauteed rainbow chard, and donabe rice.

I love BBQ.

Back in Japan (June 2010)...More wine, more food

Some more food and wine shots...since my sister has a 9-year-old son, we did a lot of dinners at home. My family enjoyed the dishes I made.

Salad, quick braised swardfish and zucchini, pork sukiyaki, hand-cut beef with roasted asparagus, etc.

I tend to eat more beef when I'm back home, because I love the taste of Japanese beef much better than American beef. As an homage to Elio Locanda Italiana, I made southern Italian-style beef stew with the beef shank ("gyu-sune"). Everybody loved it.

And, more French wines...

2007 Rapet Pere & Fils, Pernand-Vergelesses "Les Combottes"...This Pernand is quite hard to find, as all of their (small) production is allocated to small number of distributors worldwide.

2002 Domaine Bernard Delagrange, Bourgogne "Fief de la Grange"

1998 Domaine Bernand Delagrange, Bourgogne "Fief de la Grange"...I was excited about these two "regional" AOC wines from two different vintages. They are quite outstanding, as both were aged in the domaine's cellar for the whole time before they were shipped straight to the importer in Japan just recently. So the condition of each wine was perfect and they were just ready to drink.

Tarlant, Champagne, Brut Rose (Oeuilly, Epernay)...Beautiful rose. 85% Chardonnay + 15% Pinot Noir. My mom's favorite of the week.

Sieur d'Arques, Aimery, Cremant de Limoux, Brut Rose...from Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc, and Pinot Noir.

2006 Gilbert et Christine Feletting, Chambolle-Musigny...Boutique domaine. Aged for 12-18 months in French oak (20-30% new).

2005 Jane et Sylvain, Gevrey-Chambertin...Another tiny domaine. Average 40-year-old vines. The grapes are from 6 different parcels (total 1.9 ha.)

Back in Japan (June 2010)...Dinner at Elio Locanda Italiana

Tokyo is a wonderful city where you can enjoy authentic international cuisines. Among them, Tokyo Italian and French are top notch. I was already missing Tokyo Italian so much, so we went to Elio Locanda Italiana in Kojimachi district of Tokyo for dinner. At Elio, they serve traditional Southern Italian cuisine mainly from Chef/Owner Elio's home, Calabria. The restaurant has the very lively and casual ambience.

I was so happy to see my girlfriends...we've been friends for 20 years! There were 5 of us tonight, and we had a great time together.

Antipasto misto was already quite unbelievable! Our server sliced the buffalo mozzarella roll in front of our table and it was served with the olive oil. I especially loved the regional eggplant ball, which is made from minced (sun-dried) eggplant and some other vegetables.

For the pasta course, we picked white asparagus risotto, lobster chitarra, and minced duck leg fusilli.

The secondi...Kinme-dai snapper grill, and charcoal grilled kurobuta pork.

Spumante and Calabria's local wine, 2007 Casa Vinicola Ribrandi, Ciro Rosso Classico. It's made from Gaglioppo grape, which is one of the oldest Italian variety, originally brought from Greece. The wine had the nice rustic character with the juicy palate.

There was no way to skip the dessert. Our waiter told us we can choose as many kinds as we want. So, I chose 4 kinds for myself! I had the fromaggio torta, fig torta, chocolate torta, and tiramisu (it's been a while since I had the really nice tiramisu). Fantastic.

I enjoyed every bite of the night. Bravo.

Back in Japan (June 2010)...Some more lunch shots

Rice dishes are great.

I went back to Nyan Nyan in Kita-Urawa for another super-rustic lunch. I had Mabo-don (mabo dofu with rice). So simple and rustic.

In Ginza, I had Zuke Honmaguro Don (soy-marinated blue fin tuna over rice) at Tarafuku Manma. I loved the toppings of the grated yama-imo (mountain yam) with raw quail egg.

Back in Japan (June 2010)...Kyoto at home

We came back to Urawa from Kyoto in the late afternoon. Mom and I had such a wonderful 3-day vacation in the old capital city!

We brought back some local dishes from Kyoto and had them for dinner. We had "kumiage yuba" (fresh rich tofu skin), "dashimaki tamago" (omelet roll), Kyoto shumai, "sansho chirimen" (baby fish with mountain peppers), and also taberu la-yu (chunky la-yu) from Kyoto Hotel Okura! The la-yu was indeed quite chunky, but it was surprisingly mild-flavored and not too hot. It was very nice with the shumai, as well as with the freshly made simple white donabe rice.

Burgundy red can go very nicely with Kyoto dishes. We opened 2004 S. C. Guillard, Gevrey-Chambertin, Vieilles Vignes, "Aux Corvees".