Japanese Food Recipes Tarako Japanese Spaghetti

Japanese Food Recipes

 

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Not to long ago I did a blog post and videos on some sushi recipes that are some of my favorite to make and eat. I love Japanese food recipes and I make these sushi types all the time for friends and family because they love it as much as I do. As I have said before my first choice in culinary gastronomy has always been Asian food! I don't care from where it comes from I just love Asian and Oriental food. I find it to be the most versatile and in most cases the most nutritious as well. Japanese food recipes are some of my all time favorites.

One of the things I love most about Japanese food recipes is that they have taken bits and pieces of other Asian/Oriental cuisines and added them to their own to make them there own. I think this happens in all Asian/Oriental cultures. As an example I made a Vietnamese Spring Roll video and blog post and if you look around spring rolls are made all over the Asian/Oriental world. There are some differences in sauces and ingredients that will go into these delicious rolls but, for the most part they are all similar in one way or another. It is the same with Japanese food recipes as they are so versatile and delicious.

Asian dishes are very versatile and that is why I love them so much! I recently made a blog post and videos of some sushi Japanese food recipes that I like to make because they are easy and delicious. I make these sushi recipes and others for friends and family all the time because they love them as much as I do. I made one sushi recipe called California Roll Uramaki, which is one of my total fave Japanese food recipes as far as sushi is concerned.

California Roll Uramaki is a sushi roll in which the rice is on the outside of the nori sheet and then the rice is covered in Tobiko. Tobiko is the roe or eggs of the flying fish. It is much prized by Asians and used often in many Japanese food recipes. Anyway, after I made that video and posted it to Youtube and I got some nice responses and one of the comments was from a guy named Jay who has a cooking channel called The Aimless Cook.

As far as my experience with Japanese food recipes Jay's comments were complimentary to me and I appreciated them greatly. Then I got a private message from Jay talking about fish roe or fish eggs. I used Tobiko fish eggs to cover my uramaki, but I made a slip on my video and called it masago instead. That was a blooper! Anyway Jay sent me this private message explaining the differences between some of the more common fish roe that are used in Japanese food recipes. He taught me the difference between Masago, Mentaiko, Tarako and Bottarga. This was stuff I didn't know and I appreciated the information as I will use it in future Japanese food recipes I make.

Then Jay sent me a link to a video he did on a recipe called Tarako Japanese Spaghetti. As far as Japanese food recipes are concerned Tarako is considered to be a favorite amongst the Japanese. I watched the video and I made a variation of the dish at home and I like it so much that I asked Jay if he would mind of I made the Tarako for my blog and video channel. He said yes and so I am presenting it to you here.


As stated Tarako is a Japanese favorite and in my opinion it is a dish that is a fusion of West meets East or East meets West depending on your point of view. Tarako is the roe/egg of the Pollock fish. You buy Tarako in an Asian market and they are frozen in the egg sacks from the fish and you cut the sack open to use the eggs. In Japan they use Tarako is a couple of different ways. Some eat it plain for breakfast. In Japanese food recipes Tarako is also used as a filling or Onigiri or Omusubi which are rice balls stuffed Tarako and of course Tarako is used in this spaghetti dish.

Tarako is the Japanese version of a dish called Bottarga which comes from Sardinia, an island off the coast of Italy. It is called "Bottarga Di Muggine." It is a pasta dish that uses the roe of the mullet fish. The roe is sliced or ground and dried and then sprinkled on pasta dishes.

Tarako can be topped with either slivered nori sheets or Furikake which is something you can buy in most Asian markets and is made of slivered nori, sesame seeds, sugar, salt and bonito flakes. In most cases it will have MSG and I don't like MSG so I made my own for this recipe. I hope you enjoy this recipe and the details are listed below.

Tarako Spaghetti ingredients:

1 pack regular Italian spaghetti
1 stick of unsalted butter.
1/2 cup or more of heavy cream.
4 Tarako Pollock fish egg sacks cut open and eggs removed to plate or bowl.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Instructions:

Melt butter in nonstick pan. Don't let butter get burned or turn brown.
Add Tarako fish roe/eggs to the butter and cook them.
Pollock eggs will cook fast and change color quickly. When all the eggs have changed color uniformly add the heavy cream.
Add salt and pepper to taste. Black pepper or white pepper will do.
Reduce the sauce to desired thickness. If sauce is to thin it won't stick to pasta so reduce to reasonable thickness.
Add about 1 Tsp of Kewpie Mayo(Japanese Mayo) if you have it and stir it in.
If you don't have Kewpie you can use the regular mayo or look below for a quick way to convert regular mayo into as close as possible to Kewpie.

Last step is a choice: You can now take the sauce and blend it in a processor or blender until the Tarako eggs have liquified or leave the sauce as is and and plate the dish and pour sauce over the spaghetti or add spaghetti to the skillet with the sauce and then plate and eat.

This recipe will serve 4 if you want only two servings then cut amounts in half!

Furikake Topping:

1 or 2 sheets of nori cut into thin strips or slivered as chiffonade.
1/8 to 1/4 cup toasted white sesame seeds.
1/2 Tsp sugar.
1/2 Tbsp salt.
1/2 Tsp white or black pepper.
Optional: You can use red pepper flakes for some heat if you don't have white or black pepper.
Mix it all up together and use it as topping on your Tarako Spaghetti.

Kewpie Mayo Homemade:

1 1/2 Tsp regular mayo.
1/2 Tsp salt.
1/2 Tsp sugar.
1 Tsp Rice Vinegar.
Mix together and add to the Tarako cream sauce in your pan.

Eat and Enjoy!

Sushi Recipes 5 Sushi Recipes That Are Fun To Make And Good To Eat!

Since I was a kid my mother would tell me that in another life I must have been Japanese or been born in another Asian culture. I would always look at her and wonder why she would say that? So I would ask "Why do you think that?" and she would answer "because of all the Asian food you eat!" Well, I can't help it I guess! I started cooking at such a young age and I cooked whatever I could get my hands on.

Then one day this friend of mine came to the door in the morning to go to school and we went to the local grocery store because he said that he wanted to get something inside first. Well, what my friend got was flavored nori sheets. He stole a load of those thin flavored nori sheets and out the door of  the grocery store we went!

I know now that he stole the nori sheets, but at that time I didn't know what they were. He gave me some and told me to eat it so I did! I was all of 15yrs old and it tasted great! I was hooked! So for months I hate to admit it but, we went on this little crime spree of hijacking nori sheets from the store in the mornings! We never got caught! I was public enemy #1. I am glad that we never got caught because I  would never want to admit to anyone on the inside that I'd been locked up for steeling nori sheets cause then they would all make me the laughing stock of the joint!

As time went on I learned how to make Asian foods of all kinds and it is my first preference in gastronomy. It seems like no matter what it is that I am making it ends up being made with an Asian flair of some kind whether it is a spice or herb or vegetable.  I find all Asian styles of food to be literally endless in variety and so pungent, so fragrant and there is very little waste! There are things that I will eat that nobody I know will eat! I remember when I took my girlfriend to an Asian market here in Vegas where I live and I was showing her around and telling her about some of the things that I buy and eat. I was having fun watching her turn green as I showed her things like fish roe for my sushi or fish heads for making my soup. She did turn a lovely color of green though! Hehehehe!........:) I'm a bad boy!

Anyway sushi recipes are one of my favorite foods because they are so easy to make and contrary to popular belief can be made out of anything and it is not very expensive to make and it is really good for you. One of my favorite sushi recipes to make is a very simple sushi called maki sushi or sushi maki and it's called cucumber maki sushi. There is no raw fish in this sushi it is all vegetable and a fantastic way to get your veggies. The cucumbers used in cucumber maki are seeded so your maki won' get all soggy. Here is the video on how to roll up a cucumber maki.


You see it is very easy to make and it really is delicious! So the next time you are sitting around wondering what you can do with your left over salad fixings, then consider making a cucumber maki! You can add other veggies to it as well that is the truly lovely thing about making sushi recipes is that you can make them your own!

My next favorite sushi to make is the classic California Roll sushi. This is another very tasty and very inexpensive sushi roll to make. There is fish in it in the form of surimi. It is classically made with crab but, have you seen the price of crab lately? Ouch! Surimi is an excellent compromise and you get your protein fix with it. Here is how to make a California Roll sushi with the seaweed on the outside!

One of my foodie friends was watching this video and she sent me a message that she liked my video and wishes that she could make California Roll more often. I asked her why? She replied that it was really very hard to get quality avocados in Japan to make these California roll sushi recipes!

Now California Roll sushi is made two ways. The first way above is with the seaweed on the outside and the next way is called California Roll Uramaki. This is a California Roll sushi with the rice on the outside. This California Roll is the harder of the two sushi recipes to make! Now in this video I am using a sushi mat to make this roll and in the old days they did not have plastic wrap to put around the to make it easier to clean. I did not use plastic wrap with my mat not because I wanted to show you how this was done in the bad old sushi days but, because I didn't have any plastic wrap in the house and it was to late for me to go running out for some. Here is how to make a California Roll Uramaki.


The addition of the Tobiko, flying fish eggs is really delicious on this Uramaki recipe! The next sushi I like to make is Temaki. The Temaki sushi roll is a total "hand rolled" sushi and it takes the form of a cone. Temaki is made when someone has a gathering and they lay out a spread of all kinds of ingredients from raw fish and other seafoods to vegetables and eggs and anything else they want to put out. Then the nori sheets will either be full sized, half sized or quarter sized depending on the size of the Temaki sushi to be rolled. The host decides how to lay out the nori sheets. When I do this I make them in half size and quarter size sheets and I lay out all kinds of stuff. Sushi grade Salmon, Sashimi Tuna and Smoked Salmon, veggies, egg, chilies and more! I mix it up a bit and mix ingredients from different Asian cultures. I will have Thai basil and Thai bird chilies. Different mushrooms and fungi. Here is how to make a basic Temaki sushi roll.

Now I also have one of my favorite sushi recipes as a bonus on this blog post for a foodie compadre of mine and has a Youtube channel called SeansFood. My mate Sean lives in England and the answer is yes to anyone reading this post that yes they have sushi in England! Anyway! I am going to make show you how to make English sushi! I know what some of you are thinking! What's that? Well, in England there is a classic breakfast that has been eaten for years and years and years and that breakfast is called kippers and eggs! For those of you who may not know kippers is smoked herring and is just delicious and it is eaten with eggs for breakfast by many people in England! Eggs! In Japan they make a sushi called Tamago and it is made with eggs, sugar and shoyu soy sauce. I don't use the sugar I don't like sweet in my eggs with I am going to make it with kippers! So I have combined the two ingredients to make English breakfast sushi in respect of Sean and SeansFood! So here we go! On with the show! English breakfast sushi:

So there you have it! 5 of my favorite sushi recipes that are easy to make and tasty to eat and I love to make them in the summer because I don't need to heat up my home with the stove or oven! My next blog post will be a fast one on how to make Sumeshi!(sushi rice the traditional way)

Cayenne Pepper - About The Cayenne Chili Pepper

Cayenne Pepper

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The Cayenne pepper that most of us use on a daily basis comes in a ground up form of either coarse or fine ground dried pods of the Cayenne chili pepper. The Cayenne pepper is quite pungent and quite fiery and hot. The Pepper itself adds fire and flair to the dishes it is used on. Cayenne pepper is used in culinary endeavors all over the world today! The Cayenne Pepper is also known as the bird pepper or bird chili(Thailand)The Guinea spice and cow horn pepper. In common everyday language when they are crushed up we just call it red pepper. Naturally, as with most herbs and spices the Cayenne pepper has been used for culinary as well as medicinal purposes. It originally comes from India where the hottest chili pepper in the world the Nala Jolokia or Ghost Pepper comes from. In Latin it is referred to as Capsicum Annum and it is a member of the nightshade family. Interestingly enough the Cayenne is a distant relative of bell peppers and jalapeno peppers.

The Cayenne pepper is called a fruit and it is these fruits that dried and ground or pulped and baked into cakes that thenget sifted in order to make the powdered spice so common in today's kitchens. The Cayenne is famous in the cuisine of many cultures such as Sichuan cuisine of China and the fiery foods of Thailand and Vietnam. According the the official Nicholas Culpepper guide of Scoville heat units the Cayenne is generally rated at between 30,000 to 90,000. The Cayenne pepper has been used as a nutritional supplement for years in the United States and other countries.

The Cayenne pepper grows relatively quickly and is grown in many place on Earth today. The average cultivation time is 100 days for the fruit to mature. The Cayenne pepper grows best in warm, moist climates with soil that is nutrient rich. For the most part Chili peppers are perennials in sub tropic environments but can be grown as annuals in more temperate climates. Historically Cayenne pepper has been grown for many thousands of years in the West Indies and of course both Central and South America. Supposedly the Cayenne fruit was a eaten daily by the Mayans and Aztecs for culinary and health benefits.

Cayenne pepper is LOADED with vitamins like vitamin A, B6, some E but it is packed with vitamin C. It is said that nutritionally Cayenne pepper is great for blood circulation and in lowering cholesterol. It is has been reported that Cayenne is good for "thermogenics" creating heat in the body to aid in wait loss. It is also said to boost metabolism. Supposedly Cayenne pepper can stop heart attacks and remove plaque from the arteries. It also has supposedly been reported that Cayenne pepper can heal ulcers and prostate issues and in general boost one's overall health. Cayenne has also supposedly been reported to equalize blood pressure and even heal the gall bladder and supposedly has anti-fungal properties. (Check with your health care professional to verify these claims as I am not a doctor and offer no medical advice!)

As with other dried herbs and spices Cayenne should be kept in a cool and dark place that should not get any hotter than75 degrees. Do not refrigerate the dried herb. If you have fresh Cayenne peppers they can be stored in the refrigerator for up to seven to ten days.




Photo Courtesy Of JKD Atlanta

Spring Roll Recipe - Vietnamese Spring Rolls, One Of My Favorite Spring Roll Recipes

Spring Roll Recipe

 

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It's hot now in Nevada where I live and it's been well over one hundred degrees for at least a week now. So I didn't feel like cooking something hot for dinner and make my air conditioner work overtime when I am trying to keep my house cool. I decided to start making some nice cooling summer dishes that are easy to make and good to eat. This week I'm starting with Vietnamese fresh spring rolls or Goi Cuon spring roll recipe. Goi Cuon in Vietnamese means "salad roll" and I can't think of a better way to eat veggies than wrapped in rice paper or Banh Trang! These types of spring roll recipes are made with just about anything you can think of either using traditional ingredients or anything you have left over in the fridge will work to. Vietnamese spring rolls are traditionally served at room temperature and are NOT deep fried. The deep frying is an affectation of modern cooking trying to make a spring roll recipe into a fried egg roll dish.

There are many names for Goi Cuon such as "fresh roll," "salad roll," "vegetable roll," "fresh spring roll," and of course "summer roll," In many places you will find these yummy rolls on the menu being called soft roll or just vegetable rolls. It is amazing to me how much there is in common with the varied spring roll recipes out there. The Vietnamese spring roll recipe has many ingredients in common with the Thai spring roll recipe and in many cases the ingredients are interchangeable!

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Now there are Vietnamese egg rolls recipes but they are different than that of the traditional Vietnamese spring roll recipe. The fresh roll variety of spring rolls have become really popular in places Canada, Cambodia, and Laos! Any Vietnamese spring roll recipe is incomplete without a dipping sauce and the most popular dipping sauce is called Nuoc Cham. The Goi Cuon can also be served with peanut sauce or other dipping sauce varieties, but the Nuoc Cham is the most popular!

Vietnamese spring rolls can be served with closed ends like an egg roll or open on each side or sliced like Japanese sushi rolls. These are just such a versatile recipe there is just about nothing you can't make into a spring roll recipe. As I stated earlier Vietnamese spring rolls are healthy, nutritious and tasty! One of the best attributes to spring rolls made with things like chicken, shrimp or just plain vegetarian is that if you are on a diet and trying to lose weight then consider eating a spring roll recipe like the one in the video above. So lets get to the recipe.


 

Nuoc Cham The Dipping Sauce:

1/4 cup sugar.
1/2 cup warm water.
1/4 cup Vietnamese fish sauce.
1/4 cup white vinegar(traditional) or rice vinegar.
3-5 cloves minced garlic .
2-3 +/- Thai bird chilies.

1. In a glass bowl dissolve the sugar in the warm water.
2. Add fish sauce when sugar is dissolved and stir.
3. Add vinegar and stir.
4. Add garlic and chilies and stir.
5. Add a couple of Tbsp. of lime juice optional.
Makes about 1 1/2 cups of dipping sauce. Serve sauce at room temperature or chill for later.

Vietnamese Spring Roll Goi Cuon:
Vietnamese Rice Paper (Banh Trang)
Chicken, shrimp, pork, beef.
Shredded Romaine lettuce.
Black wood ear fungus.
Bean sprouts.
Basil leaves.
Slivered scallion whites.
Scallion greens.
Finely slivered Thai bird chilies.
These were the ingredients I used there are other optional ingredients that are really excellent with this spring roll recipe like cilantro, mint leaves, rice noodle(vermicelli), mung bean noodle(vermicelli), chopped garlic, shredded napa cabbage, peeled and slivered cucumber, chopped peanuts, sambal sauce.

It is a bit long to write out the directions on how to make the spring roll recipe without any visuals like pictures. See the video above to learn how to fold the rice paper over the ingredients to make the spring roll.

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Salad Recipes Six Tips For Preparing Your Salad

Salad Recipes

 

Now I know that many if not most of you reading this post have been making salad recipes for years and years. I get it! I know that for most of us preparing a salad recipe for lunch or dinner is task that for the most part is done by rote. There are those of us though that have never been into cooking or making our own meals and we have gotten by on the seats of our pants. This blog post is more a quick tutorial on the correct or in my humble opinion the best way to prepare a salad for our consumption. When you are planning on preparing a salad there are some things to keep in mind when making your choices for the greens you will use to create the salad that you are seeing in your minds eye.

The most important of the tips for preparing your best salad recipe is of course to find and use the freshest, youngest salad greens that you can find. Why? Because the younger salad greens are more tender and possess the most delicate flavors over older salad greens. "Older" salad greens are what is known as "overgrown greens" in the culinary world and they are generally are more fibrous and can even be a bit rubbery in texture.

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Now, on this tip there is quite some debate amongst people I know and I have gone back and forth with this one. Here it is: Some people say to slice your salad greens and some people say to tear your salad greens. In my humble opinion either technique will work just fine. The difference is all in the presentation of the salad recipe you want to make. If you slice your salad greens or cut them with a steel knife then you can expect them to brown because of the contact a metal molecule to the salad greens. I am sure you have seen this happen with regular head lettuce. Now, on the other hand some people feel it is better to slice the greens because tearing the greens means that you have to hold those greens in a tight grip in order to tear them. Well this might be true but, the fact of the matter is that baby salad greens are so small that they don't need to be torn and for the most part do not need to be sliced in many cases. If you want to slice salad greens safely without the greens "browning" then use a knife like a Kyocera Ceramic Knife or a Plastic Salad Knife. Both of these knives will not "brown" your salad greens.

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The next tip to address is the cleaning of your salad greens. I know what you are thinking. "I have been washing my salad greens under running water for years!" I did it that way to! I don't anymore! It is much better to take your salad greens and soak them in some ice cold water in a big bowl for a few minutes and this will bring back some of the crispness that may have been lost in shipping unless you are lucky enough to have purchased your greens from a local farmers market. The soaking will also return a certain amount of moisture that was lost in the shipping process as well! When I am soaking the greens I will also gently move the greens around a bit so that any dirt down toward the bottom of the greens will fall away and go to the bottom of the bowl.

Another tip I can share with you is that in my bad old days I used to take the greens out of the water and place them on a clean towel or clean paper towels and pat them dry. That was the way I was taught when I was a kid. That was the way lots of us were taught when we were taught! Then all of a sudden enter the Salad Spinner! The Salad Spinner is one of the greatest inventions for the professional kitchen and gourmet home kitchen alike! The Salad Spinner uses centrifugal force to gently remove the excess water from your salad greens and make sure that they are perfectly dried and ready for use. There are times where you may dry your salad greens using the old towel method and if the leaves are not dried just right there is a chance that your salad dressing of choice may not "stick" to excessively wet greens!

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Last but not least when you are done using the Salad Spinner and you need to store your salad greens for a short amount of time I use a bowl or some kind of container and I line that container with some dry paper towels and I put my greens in the container and then I put some dry paper towels over the top of the greens in the container. I do not use an airtight lid on the container and I do not use plastic wrap of any kind on the top of the container because salad greens need to breathe. Well there you have it my six tips on how to prepare salad greens for making your best salad recipes every time!