lovesoup cooks

Where Have You Bean?

This is what I have been asking my friend, Spring. To further coax the warm weather and new vegetables to replace all those winter ones that have gone limp, I've had this wooden placard painted with haru (Spring) sitting on my kitchen table for weeks. Haru has finally decided to sit at my table with an offering of sora-mame-- Fava beans.  My (becoming) good friend Matsuyama san (the vegetable chariot from an earlier post) has been flashing takenoko (fresh bamboo shoots) and in the last week I've made green peas with takenoko and rice on more than two occasions.

These fava beans could have been used to make homemade, time-consuming, not from a box, falafel, but I used them in a lentil salad--inspired by my Aussie friend, Grace.  The lentil salad also proved the perfect home for a strange Japanese wild plant-- Yuki uri, which is translated as something on the lines of, "It may still snow". And it did snow while this 'wild vegetable' had taken up residence in my refrigerator. Right in the middle of Cherry Blossom season. The yuki uri is something of a 'hosta' plant?!!

 

A Lentil Salad With Some Spring

Ingredients:

A cup (or so) of lentils

Two cloves of finely chopped garlic (I loathe chopping garlic so I use a press)

Handful of parsley, sea salt, sesame oil

Lemon or other citrus

A bit of green onion (for color and flavor contrast)

Yuki uri (optional)

Fava beans (optional)

Method:

Bowl your lentils with a very liberal amount of sea salt, it should take about 10-15 minutes. While the lentils are boiling, let your fresh fava beans have a two to three minute bath in the hot water. Prepare a cold water rinse for the fava to jump into after their bath. The fava beans bathe in a tough outer coat, you'll need to remove their outerwear to get to the beany goodness. You can prick them with a sharp knife, but I use my nail and then just pop them out.

Finely chop your garlic, parsley and other additions. This lentil salad is very forgiving and a good 'host' to a lot of different pantry dwellers. Raisins, chopped nuts, grated carrots or even chopped celery would be welcome.

Drain and lightly rinse your lentils, add garlic, the other orphan additions and a drizzle or two of sesame oil (olive oil for a less complicated flavor or both), and your citrus (to taste).  Mix and blend, mix and blend. Don't forget to taste.

There is a certain kind of magic when you combine citrus, oil, garlic and salt. It's the backdrop for any nice salad-y thing. The flavors get even better overnight.

I've served this lentil creation as a macrobiotic side or on lettuce. I think I'll try it as a topping for tofu next.

Enjoy!

Pâté à la Japonaise

No, these aren't sakura, but plum blossoms, called ume. And they're the secret ingredient that gives my chicken liver pâté a hint of Japan. 

In February, I was asked to make a tête-à-tête anniversary dinner for a friend who loves French pâté. Having her second anniversary in February, when Tokyo is frozen, the ume blossoms are the first hint that we will eventually be able to give up the layers of wool socks and spring will eventually come. Busy purveyors of seasonal goodness (and a lot of free time) will just be opening their jugs of homemade plum brandy and umeshu, that they set-up in May of the previous year. So, with a couple years worth of said brandy in my cupboard and a desire to start making my own pâté-- I give you Pâté à la Japonaise!

A bit of warning: There are bloody livers in the following illustrative photos, not for the faint of heart (or liver).

Ingredients:

1 clove

2 allspice berries

3 coriander seeds

12 peppercorns

 

Milk

A couple pinches of salt

2 shots of Ume-shu

1 medium onion, finely chopped

½ cup butter (about 115g)

1/3 cup cream (about 75mil)

Chicken or pork livers (about 450g)

Method:

Clean all spongy and strange things from the liver. Cut liver to be a similar size and thickness. Put liver in a bowl and cover with milk (soak while you chop the onion and prepare the spices).

Grind all spices together until fine. A coffee grinder works well (or mortar and pestle).

 
Melt ½ of the butter in a skillet. When butter is melted, add chopped onion and cook until soft, about 5 minutes (don’t brown the onions). Turn up the heat to high, when the pan is very hot—add the livers to the pan. Sprinkle with salt and cook the livers on one side until they begin to brown (about 1 minute). Flip and cook the other side, throwing in a shot or two of ume-shu. 

IMPORTANT: Don’t overcook the livers:-) They should be pink on the inside. Better to undercook than overcook. Turn the fire off and you should have a buttery liquid with liver and onion.  

Put everything into a food processor or blender with remaining butter, cream and spices. Purée until smooth; taste and adjust seasoning.

And now for the tiresome part: To get that velvety-like feeling of French style pâté, you must ‘sieve’ the pâté. Pour (or rather, plop) your mixture into a fine mesh strainer. With a plastic spoon (spatula) press the pate through the mesh. This can take a long time, but the texture is worth it. Alternatively, if you like a more hearty ‘country style’ pâté, you can skip this process.

 Allow long suffering felines the leftover cream....

It may not look like much now, but after 30 minutes of time/liver sieving you'll have enough Pâté à la Japonaise for a terrine or two. Chill for several hours or overnight, tightly-wrapped with plastic wrap to keep your pale pink from going brown.

Sadly, I don't have a picture of the final product. But, I'll let you in on a little secret: If you don't achieve much of a pale pink (blink and the livers have gone brown) just add a tiny bit of red food coloring. Okay, I said it. I'm guilty.  Pâté à la Japonaise is a little sweeter than your average savory pâté, but it seems to be popular with children. Good way to get them to eat their liver?