When we first moved into our house, I had carved out a small patch of land for the herb garden. Since the irrigation was a little messed up, the gardenette was close to a hose and small enough to be manageable daily.

Once the main garden was built last October, I had transferred all my energy, plants and herbs into raised beds and sort of neglected the temporary gardenette. Most everything had died (that patch is still without automatic irrigation) except for the weeds and the fennel plants, which had miraculously thrived with no attention and no water. I have no idea what super-strain of fennel this is, but heck, I’m grateful.

I’ve got more fennel than I can ever eat myself, so I’ve been inserting both the bulb and the fragrant fronds into salads and grilling recipes when we entertain. People say fennel is licorice-y, but it’s so much more than that. Fennel is refreshing, slightly minty with the fragrance and “mist” of anise. I think the word, “licorice flavor” is too strong of a description — I don’t taste the licorice flavor straight on my tongue, it’s more of an overall delicate aroma. Kind of like how fresh basil, mint or dill tastes in your mouth.

Fennel is perfect to pair with miso, honey and orange. It’s an herb that can stand on its own – the fresh crunch of the bulb and don’t forget the lovely fronds, which are equally fragrant with a more floral slant.

If you’re not a big fan of fennel – I’ve got substitutes for you in the recipe.

Miso Salmon with Orange and Fennel Recipe

This is another miso inspired recipe I’ve developed for my client, Miso & Easy, a ready-to-use miso paste. Use any miso paste that you wish!

Here’s what ya need:

The first step is to marinate your salmon (or any fish of your choice) with miso, honey, ginger, sake (or white wine – or omit the alcohol altogether). Marinate in refrigerator for 1 hour or even overnight is fine.

On a baking sheet, layer sliced fennel bulb and a few orange slices. Substitute onion for the fennel, omit the orange if you’d like.

Lay the marinated salmon on top.

Top with fennel fronds – or fresh herb of your choice (basil, parsley, etc) You can even top it with more orange slices if you want.

Bake until done and serve with rice.

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This is a variation of one of the most popular recipes from my cookbook (Todd & Diane posted the recipe for Garlic Butter Noodles) and SteamyKitchen.com (Garlic Scallion Noodles).

I’ve one-upped the recipe by adding in a spoonful of miso paste and throwing in fresh mushrooms, which is like upgrading from (okay, I just deleted a lame analogy of something related to stereos….too doiky, too predicable….deerrrrrr….)

Anyways, the miso paste, even just just a spoonful of it, melted into butter gives the entire dish richness (without adding meat!) I’ve created this recipe for my client, Miso & Easy, who makes ready-to-use miso paste. 

Garlic Noodles with Miso Butter

You can use any type of noodles that you want, Asian noodles or even spaghetti noodles (which is what I used). The secret ingredient is miso paste and Maggi Sauce….but soy sauce will work just as well.

Get your wok out (or a large saute pan with high sides) and add saute the garlic and green onions in butter, but for the love of Buddha, don’t burn the garlic – keep the heat in control!

Add in the mushrooms.

Just as the mushooms are softening, add in the miso (you might want to make a little space in the pan and stir the miso with the butter to melt it)

Maggi or soy sauce.

Cooked noodles and toss! toss! toss!

And toss more!

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 20 comments

The Chinese equivalent to bacon is Chinese Sausage, or “lap cheong” in Cantonese. If there’s one ingredient that will make brussels sprouts your most favorite vegetable, it’s Chinese Sausage (yes, even more so than bacon).

Chinese Sausage is the secret ingredient to my fried rice - and hey, it’s sold on Amazon.com (actually, that’s a pretty good price $12.85 for a package of 3).

I should probably compare Chinese Sausage to pancetta, as it’s more like pancetta than bacon. But it’s much sweeter and not quite as salty.

Each sausage is dotted with fat…lot of it. Is that a good thing? Well, I believe that sausage without fat is just pork. The fat is where the flavor is, but I do understand the fine line between full-flavored and too fatty. I’ll show you exactly how to deal with this and let you decide how much of that fat to keep or discard. (photos of Chinese Sausage from Amazon.com)

Brussels Sprouts Chinese Sausage

One of my favorite ways to prepare brussels sprouts is to treat it like cabbage and shred it with a chef’s knife. It is a little time consuming, cutting every itty bitty mini “cabbage ball” by hand….feel free to use a food processor with a shredding disc OR just cut each brussels sprouts in half and leave ‘em half orbs.

Dice the Chinese Sausage and throw ‘em in a cold wok or saute pan. Yes. cold pan. Turn on the heat to medium-low and let the sausage heat up gradually.

As it heats up, you’ll begin to see ‘em sweat. That’s a good thing – the fat inside each sausage is melting.

If you use a wok, it makes it easier, push the Chinese sausage up the sides of the wok and let the fat drip down. Make sure you control your heat – don’t let the sausage burn. Now at this point, you can use a paper towel and mop up all this extra fat and discard (!!!) or be like me and just use that fat to fry the brussels sprouts. Just do an extra lap in the pool.

Remove all of the cooked sausage to a plate, being careful to not scoop up any of that fat. We’ll add the cooked sausage back in the pan later.

Crank up the heat and add in the brussels sprouts. Add in 1 tablespoon of water to get the b.s. cooking. If you’ve taken the easy way out and only cut the b.s. in half, you’ll add in a bit more water, cover the pan and let the b.s. steam. But since we’ve got shreds, they cook rather quickly – no need to cover the pan.

Fish sauce is my other secret weapon in this dish – feel free to sub with soy sauce.

Once the brussels sprouts have cooked through – just taste one of them, they should still be just slightly crunchy but with no raw taste – add the Chinese Sausage right back in.

Toss toss toss!

Done. You’ll never have brussels sprouts quite like this….feel free to do this with regular cabbage as well.

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 32 comments

You know the beginning stages of falling in love? That exhilarating, “I’ll stop the world and melt with you….” feeling (that’s for my Modern English fans).

Well, back on 8/8/08, my birthday a few years ago, I fell in love all over again with my husband. The morning of my birthday, he told me, “pack your bags, we’re going on a surprise trip!”

I’m like, “YAY! How fun!” But of course super-neurotic control-freak me went a little crazy.

Where are we going? Who’s going to take care of the kids? What do I pack? Who’s going to water my garden? Get the mail? Take the kids to school? Who will feeeeeeeeed my babies? Tellmetellmetellmeeeeeeee!!!!

Scott had it all taken care of. Like clockwork, the nanny rang our doorbell, the kids were hugging me goodbye, boarding passes were printed out (but not shown to me) and the car was packed.

I just had to force myself….pry myself away….and just go with the flow. Well, it turned out that we were headed to Las Vegas with reservations at a restaurant that I’ve been dying to try, Japonais at the Mirage. One of the side dishes was a mashed potatoes – savory, nutty, creamy and buttery. The funny thing was that you couldn’t really tell straight away what flavored the mashed potatoes and I had to ask the server for the secret ingredient, which he happily gave.

Miso paste.

Absolutely divine. Umami to the max. And still to this day, it’s one of my favorite ways to have potatoes.

As I’m writing this post, I’m gettin’ those same goosebumpy feelings – for my husband (not the potaotes). Scott rocks my world.

Miso Mashed Potatoes

Crazy easy to make. Basically, make mashed potatoes the same way you’ve always been making them, but stir in miso paste.

I’ve made this recipe for my client, Miso & Easy, who makes a super-convenient prepared miso that comes in a squeeze bottle. The same company is also the maker of best-selling miso paste called Marukome. You can use either product in this recipe.

Ingredients:

Okay, time to have a little fun here. Use any type of potatoes – white, russet or reds work best. Any type of fresh herbs- chives, tarragon, parsley or green onion. Cream or milk.

The first step is to boil the potatoes and them mash them.

Add in the butter and miso.

Pour in the milk.

Throw in some fresh chives.

No gravy, salt or pepper needed. The miso paste provides all the flavor.

By the way, I’m serving the Miso Mashed Potatoes with Ham with Grilled Peaches Recipe.

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 19 comments

Just when I thought I could devote entire week to writing headnotes for my cookbook, Scott reminded me that corporate taxes were due end of the month. “End of the month!??? That’s like in a few days! Why didn’t you tell me before?”

Of course, he did. Everyday for the past 10 days he’s reminded me, but I’m the mistress of procrastination and born with true talent in only hearing what I choose to (says my mom too)….covering ears…”lalalalalala!”

So this week’s recipe development centered on all things grilled….I make it, Scott grills it, the kids clean up. Our entire family understands the “shared responsibility” rule, but what they don’t know is that my portion only takes 10 minutes. Shhhh…..we won’t tell them, will we?

Grilled Honey Miso Wings

Here are the ingredients. The recipe features either using miso paste that you can fine at most grocery stores, Asian markets, Whole Foods or other health food grocery stores…..or Miso & Easy (you can buy it online at Marukai) which is miso paste in a convenient squeeze bottle.

Miso & Easy is a client of mine – I create recipes for them – if you want more miso recipe, all of them are right here!

Whisk together the marinade ingredients:
Continue reading Grilled Honey Miso Wings...

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 22 comments

The once empty garage-turned-playroom-turned-moving boxes storage-area-turned-photography studio is now finally looking lived in, played in, worked in. In other words, it’s a mess and I love it. The wire shelving that holds my props is now about to collapse from the weight of an etsy and Fishs Eddy binge.

Wooden boards are strewn across the bottom shelves, delicate stoneware bowls of all different sizes and shapes are stacked so high that it almost looks comical.

One itty bitty puff of air to one single 3″ bowl and it will leeeeeeeeean to the left and come crashing down onto the next tower of bowls.

These gorgeous Caribbean-blue glass bowls were sold in a package of 6, and thank goodness, because that itty bitty puff of air really did happen, as well as the teetering tower of bowls and now I only have 2 of these lovely bowls left, which happen to be perfect for serving mussels. Spicy, steaming, mussels in a miso broth.

Spicy Steamed Mussels in Miso Broth

This recipe will take you 20 minutes tops, even if you move slow as a sloth. This recipe is created for my client, Miso & Easy.

The ingredients:

The first step is to cook the onions for a couple of minutes. I add the garlic after the onions have been cooking to prevent the garlic from burning.  Yes, I’m cooking in a wok because it’s big, wide and has a nice see-through lid.

Pour in your broth, add the miso. Toss in those tomatoes!

Leafy vegetables and mussels go in, cover and let it cook. Just a few minutes is all it takes.

That glass lid? Awesome. Let’s me check the progress of the mussels without opening the lid. And psssst….it’s a Steamy Kitchen Wok! Yes! I designed my own wok and it’s currently in production – eeeeks! I’m excited, can’t wait to show you once they come in and we can start selling them in the store.

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 19 comments

This recipe was originally slated for my cookbook, but I seem to have too many recipes already slated for the Vegetable chapter, so I’m puttin’ it here and sharing with you on the blog.

Learning a good stir fry technique for home cooking is important – it will save you from throwing out the odds and ends of vegetables in the refrigerator, and give you countless recipe ideas to whip up at the last minute.

A stir fry usually only takes 10 minutes to cook and can be as flexible as you want. Here’s my technique for home cooks.

How to Stir Fry Green Bean and Shiitake Mushrooms

You can use either a saute pan (a fry pan with high straight sides + lid) or a wok. The first step is to cook the green beans because they will have a difficult time cooking in the stir fry without overcooking the rest of the ingredients. Other vegetables that require pre-cooking include: broccoli, cauliflower and any thick, hard vegetable.

I like to steam them instead of boiling/blanching them because it takes less time to bring a small amount of water to boil for steaming.

Fill the wok with about 1 cup of water and bring to a boil. Add in the green beans and cover.

Once the green beans are cooked to crisp-tender (just taste one, if it doesn’t taste raw anymore, it should be fine), remove the beans and drain. Wipe the wok clean with a towel and return to the stove.

You need to make sure that the wok has no water – not even a drop – as you’ll be adding in cooking oil. Hot wok + water + oil = splatter and burns.

When the wok is hot again, swirl in the cooking oil and add in the mushrooms and onions. Stir fry for a couple of minutes. Then add in the garlic, ginger and green beans.

Why do we not add in the ginger and garlic in an earlier step with onions? Because they’ll burn. Burnt ginger and garlic is bitter. So we add it AFTER the mushrooms and the onions have cooked.

The next step is to add in the oyster sauce and water and stir fry until the sauce is just beginning to bubble. That’s it!

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 29 comments

A couple of weeks ago, we had a massive Temaki sushi party with friends. If you’ve never been to one, I highly suggest making friends with the fine folks at I Love Blue Sea  or head over to Casson Trenor’s site, Sustainable Sushi and host a sushi party of your own.

Since I’m a type of person who always over-cooks for dinner parties (oh, not overcook as in sawdust meat, but over-cooks as in I prepare enough food to feed triple the amount of guests I’m expecting), there was plenty of seafood leftover for the weekend to make Seafood Miso Noodle Soup.

Like nearly all of my recipes, this meal is fast ‘n flexible, especially when you use rice noodles, which take a quick soak and 30 second boil. Dried rice noodles are soaked in cool or warm water for a few minutes to soften and rehydrate a bit. Then a swirl in your boiling broth and it’s done.

Japanese miso flavors the broth – you can use regular miso paste (any kind, though I recommend Shiro Miso, which is white miso, the most mild of all) or check out my client, Miso & Easy, which is prepared miso paste already mixed with dashi and conveniently packaged in a squeeze bottle. Just add water.

The rest of the ingredients are really up to you – assorted seafood, any vegetable and any fresh mushrooms that you like. I’ve used Japanese mushrooms (Brown Beech Mushroom), but regular sliced white mushrooms will work just as well.

Ingredients for Seafood Miso Noodle Soup

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 19 comments

A couple of years ago, Todd, Diane and I flew to NYC to work on a small video project with the French Culinary Institute. We met up at the hotel on the first day and after a 14.63 second hello, we jumped into a cab and headed to Momofuku Saäm Bar. If you know us, food is on our minds – ALL THE TIME. We’d rather stay in a clean hotel in the crappy part of town to save money — so that we could spend it on food…..which we did.

Our hotel….err….motel was nice, tidy but sooo small. If I wanted to stretch out my arms, I’d have to open the door to so. And I’d probably even hit the elevator button in the same motion.

But enough about the hotel, back to the food.

At Momofuku Milk Bar, we saw little jars of Kimchi Butter for sale (see DL’s mention and photo of the jar), and I was so tempted to buy a gallon to bring home with me, but I don’t think TSA would appreciate a vat of butter in my carry on.

Kimchi butter is spicy, savory, a touch of sour and is awwwwwesome on steak, burgers, vegetables or eggs. Psssstttt…..great hangover breakfast: scrambled eggs cooked with kimchi butter and a side of bacon.

Here’s my version that includes chopped kimchi, a spoonful of miso (for savory) and some good butter. Other things you can add to make your own – a few shakes of fish sauce, finely minced garlic, finely grated fresh ginger and Korean chili powder to make it more spicy.

Add everything to your food processor and whiz, whirl until everything has come together nicely. Or, if you like, just chop everything by hand and mix in a bowl.

You can put this in a jar and refrigerate, but I like to make Kimchi Butter logs that I can refrigerate or freeze. When I need some, I just cut off a piece of the log and return the rest to the freezer.

Kimchi Butter Logs

I use a sushi mat to make rolling a lot easier, but you really don’t need to if you don’t have one.

Lay the sushi mat on the counter with the slats going horizontal. Lay a large piece of plastic wrap on top.

Spoon the Kimchi Butter onto the plastic wrap.

Wrap the bottom edge of the plastic wrap up and over and shape loosely into a log shape. Try to keep a 1.5″ edge of plastic wrap  on both sides.

Grab the bottom of the sushi mat and roll on top of the log.

Now use two hands – right hand is pulling back on the mat to tighen the log. The other hand is holding the edge of the mat out. Notice that the edge of the mat (in my left hand) stays on top – do not let that edge tuck under the Kimchi Butter. Keep tugging and tightening until the Kimchi Butter is a nice, solid, evenly sized log. (this is also the way to make sushi rolls too)

Ta-da! Twist the ends and refrigerate or freeze.

Or you could just skip all this fancy rolling and place the Kimchi Butter in a jar or plastic tub to refrigerate.

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 29 comments

As my many house guests can attest to, I am not a breakfast eater (unless I’m hung over, then a 1/2 pound of bacon will be devoured quickly). When Diane and Todd were over, the first thing my boys did right after waking up in the morning was run over to the cottage to wake them up and drag them to the house to make their famous breakfast.

They made homemade pancakes, waffles, french toast and cinnamon sugar knots. Oh, and we went through 10 pounds of bacon too (I’m not joking). You should see my boys’ faces when they woke up on Sunday and realized Uncle Todd and Auntie Diane were gone….(sigh) back to cold cereal and boring eggs.

But the ONE thing I will eat in the morning is 10-minute miso soup. Okay, sometimes I like Ochazuke for breakfast too (but that’s for another post). My body craves savory Japanese flavors in the morning and miso soup, fortified with egg, mushrooms, tofu and whatever leafy greens I have will hit the spot.

I’m developing recipes for Miso & Easy, which is a prepared miso paste that’s all ready to go – add hot water and you’ve got instant miso soup. It’s a brand new product.

If you’re using regular miso paste, same recipe, just use vegetable broth or dashi broth in place of water.

What is dashi?

Dashi is Japanese soup base that’s made from bonito fish. Instead of using chicken, vegetable or beef broth (in soups and in cooking dishes), Japanese recipes will call for dashi broth instead. You can make it from scratch, with a piece of kombu (dried seaweed) and dried bonito flakes; or use instant dashi powder (which is what I use)

But if you don’t have dashi, just use vegetable broth instead.

As for the other ingredients, it’s simple. And flexible. Whatever fresh mushrooms you have (below I have Japanese mushrooms), whatever leafy greens you want (spinach, bok choy, napa cabbage) and whatever firmness of tofu you want.

©Steamy Kitchen Recipes, 2012. | Permalink | 33 comments