Rapido e facile Pasta Aglio Olio con Mentaiko

She looked at me and asked, “I’m hungry, do you have any leftover mentaiko pasta?”

I had neither leftover nor any softened butter on hand, therefore with 3 remaining sacs of Mentaiko, I made pasta Aglio e Olio con Mentaiko…

Posted on 23rd Jun 2010 in Fusion, Italian, Japanese, Recipes | 6 comments

Easy Mentaiko pasta sauce (with secret ingredient)

Noodles flecked with Mentaiko roe – the plate is fairly dry because everything is stuck to the noodles

I’ve been wanting to do Mentaiko pasta ever since Joone! introduced it to me on a visit to the now-defunct Le Papillon at Red Dot Design Museum. Since I had a very small group of friends over I decided to, finally, make a Mentaiko pasta.

There were a lot of considerations I made (mainly because I have a long commute to and from work), from the type of pasta to a recipe that looks credible enough. Believe me, for this one lunch, I had 2 days of dinners with different versions of Mentaiko pasta, each made from a recipe that I selected from a multitude of bloggers and recipe sites.

While it will be a long time before I do another pasta recipe, I liked the result of my recipe: my friends loved it and asked for it.

Posted on 20th Jun 2010 in Food and Drink, Japanese, Recipes | 13 comments

Edamame Pasta

After all that great food, it’s time for some righteous cleansing with more great food. Some people would recommend a coffee enema (which says a lot about them) but I think I prefer a less controversial method.

I recently found this recipe in the New York Times by Martha Rose Shulman that looked delicious and it’s incredibly easy to do for a vegetarian meal.

Posted on 29th Apr 2010 in Italian, Japanese, Recipes | 4 comments

Ootoya Teishoku-Ya at Orchard Central

Two bloggers at ~~work~~ ~~playing~~ in action. Tripod optional.

I was tired, no, I was bone-weary and thought of going for an invigorating foot reflex-thingy but while that would sooth my body, it would still leave a hole at the core of my being. What was really needed is nourishment for the soul.

A quick SMS confirmed dinner at Duo Le before I collapsed into bed.

Fast-forward 3 hours, I was sitting at Tully’s sipping ice tea and suggesting dinner at Ootoya instead simply because I walked past the restaurant and it felt good. And the Korean BBQ didn’t feature an All-You-Can-Eat option.

Posted on 8th Feb 2010 in Food and Drink, Japanese, Meat | 4 comments

Shunjuu Izakaya Sumiyaki revisited

It’s been 4 years since my last visit to Shunjuu Izakaya when it first opened because, frankly, the restaurant manager raised a big stink over food photography in private property and I’ve more or less limited my visits to food-photography-friendly places.

Anyway, it turned out that we could leave our offices on time, so we she decided on Shunjuu.

Posted on 8th Oct 2009 in Japanese | Post a comment

Soba So Good (Cold Soba with honey-soy sauce)

I’ve just finished Michelle Maisto’s wonderful “The Gastronomy of Marriage – A memoir of food and love“. I was handed this book as part of Rachel’s efforts to get me to appreciate women authors (I find them mostly boring; always alternating between feminism and emancipation even for the horror/murder/fantasy/Sci Fi genres). I have to say Rachel scored on this one (yes, I’m not returning the book). It’s a good read mainly because it is light and peppered generously with vignettes of eating within the context of living together with minimal mention of shopping, shoes and couture. I’d recommend it to any foodie in a relationship with another foodie. It’s not about dominance, it’s about sacrifice.

There are many good recipes in there, but what I find more intriguing are her one-sentence descriptions of dinner prep. One that caught my eye was Maisto’s adaptation of Sybil Kapoor‘s Buckwheat noodles with Honey-Soy Sauce recipe. It is a simple but awesomely delicious dish that beats instant noodles in terms of taste, freshness and the sense of accomplishment.

Here’s my adaptation that’s faster with less cleaning up to do.

Posted on 24th Sep 2009 in Japanese, Recipes | 5 comments

Nigorizake

This is my favorite Sake. Nigorizake or Nigori Sake, basically, “Cloudy” Sake. Served very cold, the mouthfeel is similar to a very thick barley water (which is what it’s similar to except this is rice, not barley).

The clouds come from the remaining rice solids from the “crudely” filtered sake. The result is a full-bodied, slightly sweet drink with a long fruity finish.

To paraphrase a Sake expert, forget about the Junmai this and the ginjo that. Go ahead and ask for it because no self-respecting Japanese restaurant would be without it. This is a fun, friendly and approachable drink that serves as a great introduction to Sake and a great way to thumb your nose at Sake drinkers who take themselves too seriously.

Posted on 14th May 2009 in Drink, Food and Drink, Japanese | Post a comment