Yearly Archives: 2010

Mango & Tomato Menu

Olga of Mango & Tomato is is hosting a recipe contest for her 2 year blog-iversary that requires the use of mangoes and tomatoes in a dish. We were only required to make one item, but I couldn’t calm my imagination and decided on three different dishes.

Mango Bloody Mary
spicy tomato puree with mango juice, absolut peppar, mint and mango garnish

Spicy & Sweet Fish Fajitas
grilled red chile tortilla topped with tomato and mango fried rice, grilled mahi mahi, and mango & black bean salsa

Tomato Petit Fours with Mango Glaze
tomato cakes with a touch of cocoa powder drizzled with a sweet mango glaze and kinako-cinnamon

Most of these things were basically just assembled versions of the descriptions. The most successful were the fajitas and the petit fours. I took this opportunity to try a bloody mary for the first time (and use up some absolut peppar) and I did not like it. 2 parts tomato mixture, 1 part mango juice, 1 part absolut, and the drink was still too tomato-y! Some people like drinking tomato juice but I cannot stand it.

The fajitas were juicy, crispy, and acidic. The rice used some tomato soup, diced tomato, and diced mango. I crisped up the bottom before combining all the ingredients, which was a great textural contrast. I’m sure everyone has their own fried rice and salsa recipes, so I’ll leave that up to you. Mango salsa is one of my favorite things to eat, but I thought it was a predictable use of the ingredients so I tried to make a dessert. I was thinking about making a granita or sorbet duo using the mango and tomato, or even a tomato macaron with mango filling, but my laziness got the best of me and I chose to do a cake. I’ve heard of a tomato-soup cake before, so I adapted a recipe for donuts to be used for cake and subbed the milk for tomato soup. The result was spicy, savory, and paired well with sweet, sticky glaze I drizzled over the mini-cakes. The glaze came together easily and is an adaptation of a glaze I make when whipping up traditional petit fours.

Tomato Petit Fours with Mango Glaze

  • 1¼ cups cake flour, sifted
  • ½ cup granulated sugar
  • 1¼ tsp. baking powder
  • 1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg and/or cinnamon
  • dash salt
  • ½ cup tomato soup
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • 1½ tbsp. butter, melted
  • ½ c. powdered sugar
  • 3-6 tbsp. mango juice
  • 1-2 drops vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 425°F. Sift together flour, sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt. Add egg and butter, stir until combined. Measure out soup, whisk in baking powder until frothy. Fold into mixture. Cook 2tbsp portions of batter, either in squares or circles (you can do this in liners or pans, whatever you have laying around. I used a brownie bites pan). Bake around 8 minutes or until the tops spring back when touched. Let cool for 4–5 minutes.

While the cakes are cooling, combine the mango juice and sugar. Add a little at a time until you get the consistency you want, it should be thin enough to be drizzled or poured. When you’ve reached the desired consistency, add a dash of vanilla and stir.

Assemble the cakes, drizzle glaze, and sprinkle with cocoa powder and/or kinako-cinnamon mixture. Top with diced mango and tomato and mint leaf.

p.s. look at the snazzy header I designed for mango & tomato! Olga was nice enough to come to my apartment and teach a friend and me a knife skills class in April, so we worked on a mini-face lift for her site~

Savory Challah Bread Pudding

After seeing a recipe for mini bread pudding using leftover challah bread on Mango & Tomato, I decided to try my hand at it. I chose to go the savory route since I wanted to be able to eat these as snacks or pack in my lunches. I also didn’t have any of the sweet ingredients on hand, and took this opportunity to make a nokorimono (leftover) dish!

I mixed all the ingredients together and let them mingle in the fridge overnight before popping them in the oven the following day. I chose to bake them in muffin liners so they’d release from the pan effortlessly and would be easy to transport.

makes ~10 mini bread puddings

  • leftover challah bread
  • diced tomato
  • parmesan cheese
  • chopped savory marcona almonds (made by my friend, Stephanie)
  • flax seeds
  • ground black sesame seeds
  • milk
  • eggs
  • soy sauce
  • turkey

Cut or pull the challah bread apart into manageable pieces. The ingredient amounts will depend on the amount of bread you have. Mix eggs, milk, sesame seeds, and soy sauce into a bowl and combine. Add tomato, cheese, almonds, flax seeds, and torn turkey into another bowl. Toss with hands to combine. Pour liquid mixture over bread mixture, combine with hands. Line muffin pan with liners, fill cups 75-90% full, sprinkle with more cheese on top. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes, or until the “puddings” are done to your likeness. You can bake a little longer if you don’t like having spongey bottoms to the puddings.

I brought these over to my house for memorial day weekend and got my sister to try one~ They taste pretty good and can be considered one of those “freezer stash” items to keep for rainy days, or nice picnic lunches. The small, individual size lends itself to sharing, but you could definitely cook this mixture in a pan and serve it up family-style!

I was lacking herbs in the kitchen and think some dill, parsley, or even some spinach would work well in this dish.

「和」Zensai Parfait (前菜パフェ)

May’s Washoku Warriors challenge was to come up with a an original Wa (harmony) parfait based on the Zensai Parfait in Andoh’s book (p. 301) with 2 or more of the following: chunky bean jam, citrusy miso, brown sugar syrup, nutty miso (sweetened with ½ tsp sugar), and/or kinako mixed with cinnamon.

I chose to assemble:

– koshi an (store bought)
– brown sugar syrup
– nutty miso
– kinako/cinnamon
– cornflakes
– mochi
– 小桜 (sakura branch) candy

I could not find kinako anywhere near where I live, so I bought roasted soybeans (sold as “soynuts”) at Whole Foods and chopped them up in the food processor.

The brown sugar syrup was very easy to make, but I had no patience to wait for it to cool, so it was left out of the parfait.

I made the nutty miso using walnuts, but found it too salty to put in an ice cream parfait. Later, I found out it was because I forgot to add the sugar to make it a “dessert” sauce!

I also chose to use koshi-an I already had on-hand instead of making coarsely ground red bean jam as suggested in the original challenge.

I made these parfaits while a friend was over and set out all the toppings in individual containers so we could make the parfaits お好み-style (okonomi, “as you like”). She had: cinnamon buns ice cream + cornflakes + red bean paste + mochi + kinako/cinnamon mixture. I shared mine with my boyfriend (pictured above) and had: cinnamon buns ice cream + cornflakes + coffee ice cream + mochi + kinako/cinnamon + “sakura branch” candies.

While it was a bit time consuming to assemble or make the ingredients, the recipes all make large quantities so you can make parfaits instantly after the initial work ^_^. All of the ingredients keep for at least a few weeks. This is also a great alternative for those that don’t like Western-style sweets and prefer a more balanced sweet/savory dessert.

Citrus-and-Soy-Glazed Swordfish (梶木鮪の幽庵焼き)

April’s Washoku Warriors challenge was Spring. We were given the option of making kajiki maguro no yuuan yaki (梶木鮪の幽庵焼き), spinach steeped in broth — hourensou no ohitashi (菠薐草のお浸し), and/or temple style chowder — unpen-jiru (雲辺汁). I wanted to try the soup, but decided on the easier fish and spinach combination.

There was an interesting story in the book about the fish — the chef chooses the different chinese characters to display on the menu, reflecting his interpretation of the dish. I chose to display the characters that are used in the wikipedia entry for this dish, but there are two other popular uses.

The fish was surprisingly very tasty, and very easy to cook. I was a little wary of this recipe since I don’t like tougher white fish like swordfish and mahi mahi (which I substituted for the swordfish in this recipe because it was less expensive). The quick marinade and high-heat cooking method made the flesh tender and it flaked apart like the fish my dad made when we were growing up. There is also very healthy because I used less than a teaspoon of oil to sear the fish in.

I really wish we had yuzu around where I live, but alas, we don’t. I also didn’t have grapefruit juice to mix with lime and lemon to mimic the flavor of yuzu, but this dish was fine with just lemon and lime. The flavors were simple and bright, but next time I’ll double the citrus amount or cut the soy sauce in half. The end result’s shoyu flavor was a bit too strong for my taste.

The fish was served with ohitashi, rice, and roasted asparagus.

The ohitashi was the least successful part of this dish–probably due to the shortcuts I took in the marinade. I didn’t have soy sauce concentrate on hand for the ohitashi, but wanted to make this dish very quickly so I estimated the ratio of salt to sugar and added some water and instant dashi granules. The result was a little too ocean-y and far too salty. I used the leftover glaze and zest from the fish and mixed it in with the spinach and it became more palatable. Unfortunately, I don’t think the ohitashi is for me, but it may just be my dislike for leafy greens. The bright green color after blanching was very attractive though.

One great positive about this meal is that I was able to make a bento out of the leftovers!

April 21st – Yuuan yaki swordfish; roasted asparagus; spinach ohitashi; kumquats; rice.
Pictured on a Wall-E notebook!

Carte postale de la République Centrafricaine

Bento Concept has started another world tour!
Stop #1 is the Central African Republic. Next stop is Russia (3/29), followed by Greece (4/26).

I had never really heard anything about the Central African Republic before this challenge. I did a lot of research and learned about the various types of cuisines, crops, and animals that they have. A lot of the types of food were either time consuming or contained ingredients hard to find or out of season here. I made some shrimp with peanuts, rice, an elephant out of rice mixed with ground sesame seeds, roasted sweet potatoes, and some egg. The green dividers are carrot leaves (thus making it my submission for hapabento’s b.o.m.b. challenge). The top tier is rice with various colors of egg sheet on it to represent the flag of the Central African Republic.

This is also a brand new bento box and hat pick that I got from Just Bento’s Menu for Hope raffle package. Thanks so much Maki for picking up bento goodies for me in Japan!

Continue reading →