Just dropping in to let you know that over on MediterrAsian.com we’ve published a sushi hand roll recipe, and we’ve included step-by-step photos to make the rolling process easier. Sushi hand rolls are healthy and very flavorsome, so if you’ve never made them before you’ve got to give it a try.
Here’s the link.
It’s the beginning of spring here in New Zealand, and I thought that the worst of the weather was behind us until I woke up the other morning and there was a layer of frost on our deck, which also carpeted the lawn like snow. Thankfully the weekend weather was far less gloomy, so we decided to make the most of the sunny weather and dust off the barbecue for a bit of grilling.
When I was growing up in Australia barbecues were very meat-centric. In fact our family barbecues were practically a meat lovefest! To accompany all this meat we’d typically have heavily buttered bread rolls and a basic salad. Not exactly the most balanced of meals, that’s for sure.
The sort of barbecue food Ric and I typically enjoy these days is still steak — except it’s tuna and salmon steaks instead of beef steaks, and shrimp and scallops instead of sausages. This isn’t simply a health decision though, we actually enjoy the taste and texture of these foods much more than meat.
Vegetables also play a much more prominent role compared to the barbecues of my childhood. We always save plenty of room on the grill for vegetables like bell peppers, onion, eggplant, mushrooms and zucchini. And salads aren’t an afterthought, they’re an integral part of the barbecue for us. In fact we always make up at least two salads to go a long with the grilled foods.
Our barbecues generally have a cultural theme as well. We’ll either base the grilled foods and salads on a particular Mediterranean or Asian cuisine (such as Italian, Greek, Spanish, Japanese or Chinese), or have a combination of Mediterranean and Asian grilled foods and salads.
Over the weekend we decided to have a pan-Asian theme for our barbecue. The centerpiece was delicately-spiced Thai shrimp and vegetable skewers, which we accompanied with a Chinese-style noodle salad (made with transparent bean thread noodles) and a simple Vietnamese-style coleslaw. We washed this down with ice cold Tiger beer from Singapore. So our taste buds certainly got to enjoy a trip around Asia.
Here’s the recipe for the skewers, and I’ll post the salad recipes in the near future. Also I quickly wanted to let you know that I was interviewed by Lovelyn from The Art of Balanced Living blog recently, and if you want to check it out here’s the link.
Shrimp, red bell pepper and zucchini skewers marinated in a Thai green curry sauce and grilled until tender and succulent.
IN a small bowl dissolve the curry paste with 1 tablespoon of boiling water. ADD the coconut milk, fish sauce, brown sugar, garlic, lemon juice, salt and cilantro, and mix to combine. THREAD alternating shrimp and vegetables onto the skewers, then marinate them in the mixture, covered, in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. COOK the skewers on a hot grill for 10 minutes, turning and brushing regularly with the marinade. SERVE with lemon or lime wedges for squeezing.
I have to admit, it’s been a little too warm to cook these days, and I’ve been trying to avoid using the stove—the tiny kitchen in my apartment just gets too hot sometimes. So I thought it might be time for some MediterrAsian Un-Cooking…who doesn’t like a frozen treat to beat the summer heat?
I’m used to the heat, from past years spent in Taiwan—when I was a child, my dad moved our family from the U.S. to Taipei. While my Taiwanese-born parents were excited to show their homeland to me and my brother, there were definitely times when we were less than thrilled by our new surroundings, the local cuisine, and the tropical heat (Hey, we were kids!). So what’s the universal way to cheer up a kid AND deal with the weather, no matter where you are in the world? Hand them an ice cream!
However, ice cream in Taiwan wasn’t quite the same thing as it was back in the States. Well meaning relatives would kindly offer us foods that they thought would make us feel more “at home,” but while these foods took familar Western forms, such as sandwiches or ice cream, they would often turn out to have distinctly Asian flavors, such as red bean. Of course, now you can find red bean or taro ice cream at any Asian restaurant, but to a transplanted American kid used to a scoop of chocolate chip or Rocky Road, it was a shocker to get a bean popsicle. But kids adjust, and I grew to love red bean desserts. Now, I see them as a taste of nostalgia.
So when one of my cousins mentioned making delicious homemade red bean popsicles recently, I had to chuckle and I had to get the recipe. My cousin’s family loves them and they are a breeze to make…hope you enjoy them too!
(Note: My cousin’s recipe uses canned sweet red beans, which you can easily find at most Asian markets, but you can really add any ingredient or fruit that you prefer to the mix. I decided to use some fresh mango in some of my popsicles, for a bit of tropical flavor…we used to get wonderful mangoes from the open air markets in Taiwan. Also, the original recipe uses coconut cream rather than coconut milk, but coconut milk may be easier to find and works just as well. Just experiment and have fun!)
Recipe from my cousin Leng and her family (Lisa and Ananda)…thanks!
(Makes 8 servings)
Ingredients:
Equipment:
Directions:
Drain the liquid from the canned longan. Set aside a few pieces of the longan (4 or 5, depending on fruit size and your best judgment) and combine the rest of the fruit with the coconut milk in a blender. Blend until smooth, or leave some small pieces of fruit for texture. Dice the reserved longan and divide evenly among the popsicle molds. Add a heaping teaspoon of sweet red beans or mango to each mold, then pour the coconut milk-longan mixture over each until filled to the top. Give each popsicle a quick stir to evenly distribute the ingredients. Add additional beans or mango to taste, or to even out the level of liquid in the molds. Freeze until set, and enjoy!
As spring in New England turns into summer, we’ve been going through a bit of a heat wave, and I’ve definitely been on a cold food kick—there is nothing better than a chilled dish waiting for you in the fridge, ready to be enjoyed as soon as you get home from work. When I’ve pondered what foods to prepare for these warm days, my mind has inevitably turned to lighter fare like salads, pasta and cold noodles.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been excited to see fresh “fiddleheads” (the tightly curled ferns that resemble the scrolled top end of a violin) appearing in the produce bins at my local supermarkets. I’ve come to think of fiddleheads as a quintessential New England ingredient—they are often associated with Maine and Vermont or our Canadian neighbors further north. However, fiddleheads are also a common ingredient in Asian cuisine. For example, they are frequently found in the Korean dish bibimbap.
With their asparagus-like flavor and firm but delicate texture, I decided that fiddleheads would be the perfect seasonal addition to some Asian-inspired soba noodles—the perfect cool dish to complement the warm weather.
(Note: Fiddleheads are in season for just a few precious weeks in the spring, so enjoy them while you can! You can also blanch fiddleheads for a few minutes in boiling water, and store them in your freezer for future use. If you can’t find fiddleheads for this recipe, substitute bite-sized pieces of fresh asparagus.)
Serves 4-6
Ingredients:
Dressing:
Combine the following:
Directions:
Cook soba noodles according to package directions, then rinse in cold water and set aside.
Clean the fiddleheads by rinsing thoroughly in cold water. Repeat several times, rubbing gently to remove the brown leaf like covering from the surface. Trim tough/brown ends if necessary.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil, then add fiddleheads to blanch for 3-5 minutes. Remove fiddleheads from pot and plunge into a bowl of ice water for 1-2 minutes, then drain.
Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a large pan. Add minced garlic and sauté for a minute, then add the fiddleheads, sliced mushrooms and tofu, sautéing for another 2-3 minutes (Fiddleheads should be firm but tender). Remove from heat.
Toss cold soba noodles with the lemon-sesame-soy mixture and gently stir in the fiddleheads, mushrooms and tofu. Garnish with shredded carrot if desired. Serve and enjoy—this dish can be served immediately, but is also great as a cold dish the next day.
Whenever we cook rice we usually cook up double the amount we need, and freeze the rest. We use this rice in a few different ways. Usually it’s to make some sort of fried rice dish, because cooked and cooled rice really is the only type of rice to use if you want to make a decent fried rice. (It retains its texture and doesn’t go mushy like freshly cooked rice.) Cooked and cooled rice is also ideal for making hearty rice salads like this Asian-style rice salad.
We actually invented this rice salad just a couple of days ago. We both felt like a quick and satisfying lunch with Asian flavors, and we happened to have some leftover rice just sitting in the fridge. We couldn’t be bothered cooking, so we scoured our fridge and pantry for suitable ingredients to make an Asian-inspired rice salad.
One thing we didn’t have to worry about was seasonings (we’re always stocked up with Asian seasonings). But we hadn’t done a grocery shop for a few days, so we weren’t sure if we’d have a good range of fresh ingredients on hand.
Luckily we did have some ideal produce for Asian cooking: celery, red pepper, carrot, scallions, and a big knob of ginger root. All we needed was some sort of protein to balance out the flavors and improve the nutritional content. We chose one of our pantry staples — canned tuna — to fill that gap (cold shrimp, cold shredded chicken, or cashew nuts would have also worked well).
It only took us about five minutes to prepare the ingredients, which simply involved dicing the red pepper and celery, slicing the scallions and grating the carrot and ginger. Then we mixed those ingredients with the rice and tuna, and added a combination of seasonings we know work really well together — soy sauce, oyster sauce and toasted sesame oil.
The finished salad tasted surprisingly good, and really satisfied our craving for Asian flavors. Hopefully you’ll enjoy it too!
Asian-style Rice Salad
Serves 2 as a main, 4 as a side dish
2 1/2 tablespoons Chinese soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons oyster sauce
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1 teaspoon finely grated fresh ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
3 cups cooked cold long-grain rice (leftover rice is ideal)
1 carrot — grated
1/2 stick celery — finely chopped
1/2 red pepper — deseeded and diced
1 scallion — finely sliced on the diagonal
6 oz (180g) canned tuna in oil — drained and flaked
MIX together the soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, ginger and pepper in a small bowl. MIX together the rice, carrot, celery, red pepper, scallion and tuna in another bowl. TOSS the dressing with the rice mixture until well combined.
Well, spring has definitely been coming “in like a lion” this year— there are still a few raw and rainy days ahead as we wait for the nicer weather to arrive. And on days like these, there is nothing better than a bowl of soup.
I especially love a refreshing lime flavored soup to clear the head and warm the body during this transitional period. This tangy, Southeast Asian inspired lime soup makes a great light meal, is quick to prepare, and reminds us of warmer days ahead. Enjoy!
Zesty Lime and Salmon Soup
Serves 4-6
Ingredients:
Directions:
In a large stockpot or saucepan, heat the oil and add in the garlic, mushrooms, onion, and pepper. Sauté for about 5 minutes. Add the chicken stock, lime juice, and fish pieces. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for about 5-7 minutes until fish is cooked through (Skim foam from the surface of the soup as it appears). Stir in the cilantro and season to taste with sea salt. Ladle into bowls and serve with lime wedges on the side.
(Note: You can also substitute chicken or a different fish of your choice, or add a handful of rice noodles to each bowl before serving if you prefer a more filling soup.)
