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Plums 2020
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Mikan time
Oranges ripening along the road near home. Not quite ready to pick yet. We can wait, because the other day we received this: A 10 kg gift of fancy mikan from Kagawa, in the citrus growing regions southwest of here. These are perfectly in season, delicious and juicy.
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Hoshigaki
I don’t like persimmon very much when it is fresh, but I love dried persimmon. Today I helped Naomi and Hitomi prepare persimmons for drying. We started by picking them from the Hatanakas’ tree. Then we sat on the kitchen floor at Monaca to trim and peel them. We tied them onto strings, dipped them…
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Spicy
Jalapeños, habaneros and jalokia (ghost) peppers, locally grown, are a highlight of our late summer farmer’s market shopping This year, we got our chilis right before the typhoon and power outage so we couldn’t freeze them. Instead I sun-dried half of them and put the other half into vinegar. After ten days, I bottled the…
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Ume chutney
With so many plums on hand, I’ve gotten creative. There’s only so much jam you can make and give away when everyone else is also making it. It’s sort of like “zucchini season” in Pennsylvania when everyone is overwhelmed with their harvest. This is an adaptation of a British chutney recipe from Saveur. I localised…
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Ume-zing spiced plum jam
All the ume trees in our yard are producing plums like mad this year. We made ume-shu and with the remainder of the first harvest I cooked up this jam. It’s really good. I’ll be making some more because we’re harvesting plums every other day now. Ume-zing spiced plum jammakes about 2 cups 1 kg…
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Chocolate Cake, 1933 style
“All About Baking”, published in 1933, is an excellent primer on baking with lots of lost wisdom about how to prepare pans, to set baking times, and to perfect mixing techniques in the days before electric mixers. Doing this with a hand mixer makes it so very easy. Creaming butter by hand is a good…
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Jaljeera, Cumin Lemonade
While teaching a school program on a hot day in India, the kids and I were served a drink I’d never tasted before. It’s a sweet, salty, and spicy lemonade called jaljeera. I’m in love; this is the best thing for a hot day, whether it’s a Tokyo heatwave or a dusty playground. There are…
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Curried Mushroom Toast
Back from India, Tod is perfecting his fusion Indian recipes. Here is this morning’s brunch – a creamy curried mushroom sauce over toast. We’ve made this before, but this time Tod’s included some of the more esoteric Indian spices. The result is a rich, full-bodied flavour. If you don’t have these spices and seasonings at…
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Back in the Kitchen
Ah, what a relief. We have arrived in Bangalore and are staying with Shreyas and Arun. We can cook again! After five weeks on the road without kitchen access or grocery explorations, this is such a treat. Food is a big part of our lives and we love to both cook and eat. Shreyas is…
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