Chirashizushi

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Chirashi zushi is simply sushi rice in a bowl, decorated with toppings—chirashi means “to scatter things.” Tokyo-style chirashi zushi takes advantage of the abundant fish and seafood of available because of its closeness to the sea. You can thinly slice sashimi-quality fish such as tuna, flounder, salmon, sea bream, squid, octopus, or scallops. If you order this in a restaurant, you are likely to get a lot of fish because chefs will generally use abnormally-shaped fish that aren’t right for nigiri in the chirashi. A bargain tip for sampling a lot of different kinds of fish!

In other parts of Japan, chirashi toppings can be nearly anything, pieces of vegetable are the most common, or cooked seafood including shrimp.

My daughter’s comment on this meal was that the sushi rice could have used more vinegar. On a quick research expedition for this post, I did see some mention of using more vinegar and less sugar for the seasoning of the rice than what you’d use for nigiri or maki rolls. She has good taste.

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Ms. Shimbo’s recipe includes sashimi fish, seasoned lotus root, simmered shiitake, salted cucumbers, and cooked shrimp. It’s an excellent overview of chirashi zushi that will enable you to make your own riffs on the basics.

I used tuna, mackerel, and salmon. The shrimp was hugely expensive, so I also bought nerimono (fish cake) imported from Japan but I didn’t use it when I realized how much food there was for only the three of us. I also made a small thin omelette, rather than the rolled omelette.

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…….. mackerel, salmon, tuna, cucumber fans,
lotus root, thin omelette, and sweet simmered dried shiitake …….

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Sushi Rice Topped with Assorted Sashimi Fish, Shellfish, and Omelette Edomae Chirashizushi serves 4 or 5, generously page 285
Prepare the Lotus Root 7 ounces lotus root (about 5 inches of a 2½-inch-diameter root) 1 quart cold water 2 Tablespoons komezu (rice vinegar.)¼ cup water ⅔ teaspoon salt 2 Tablespoons sugar 3 Tablespoons komezu (rice vinegar)	Peel the lotus root, and slice it thinly. Soak it in the quart of water acidified with the vinegar.Drain the lotus root. In a saucepan, bring the water, salt, and sugar to a boil. Add the lotus root, and cook, covered with a drop-lid, over medium-low heat for 10 minutes. Remove the saucepan from the heat, and let the lotus root stand in the cooking liquid until it is cool. The lotus root can be prepared to this point up to three days in advance, placed in a sterilized jar with a tight-fitting lid, and stored in the refrigerator.
Prepare the Cucumber ½ Japanese cucumber, preferably, or a salad cucumber	Cut the cucumber diagonally into 2-inch pieces, and then cut each piece in half lengthwise. Make about six evenly spaced diagonal cuts from the skin side, leaving about ¼-inch at one side uncut. Soak the cucumber in salted water for 10 minutes. Remove the cucumber from the water, wipe it with a paper towel, and press open the cut ends of each slice to make a fan shape.
Prepare the Mushrooms and Omelette 4 to 5 sweet simmered dried shiitake 1 rolled omelette	The sweet simmered shiitake can be made well ahead and frozen. I made thin omelette with 1 egg and and extra yolk instead.
Prepare the Sushi Rice rice komezu (Japanese rice vinegar) sugar salt	The recipe is here. I made 2.1 pounds of rice rather than the 2.8 Ms. Shimbo calls for. For chirashi zushi, I would suggest using more vinegar than what you’d use for maki rolls.
Prepare the Sashimi 4 to 5 large tiger shrimp (6 inches) in their shells, heads attached 3 ½ ounces sashimi-quality salmon 3 ½ ounces sashimi-quality tuna 3 ½ ounces sashimi-quality sea bream or flounder 4 to 5 large sashimi-quality scallops	Cook the shrimp, if you are using them: Insert a wooden skewer through the belly side of each shrimp, from throat to tail so it will remain straight while cooking. Peel, but leave the tail. Cut open from the belly side without cutting through the back. Gently press the shrimp open to lie flat.Slice the fish about ¼ inch thick. Refrigerate until you are ready to assemble the sushi.
Assemble the Chirashi Zushi Use deep soup bowls for serving the sushi. Heap one-quarter of the sushi rice, covering the bottom of the bowl but leaving the side exposed. Gently level the top of the rice. Place the cucumber, shiitake, and lotus root in the center, and arrange the sliced fish, shrimp, and omelette around the vegetables. To make a beautiful arrangement, place items of different colors next to each other and slightly overlalpped, so the presentation does not look flat. Garnish the bowl with wasabi and sweet pickled ginger, and serve with shoyu or tamari on the side.
Garnish and Condiments Wasabi Sweet pickled ginger Shoyu (soy sauce) or Tamari	To eat chirashi zushi, apply a little wasabi to a slice of fish, shrimp, or scallop. Pick it up, lightly dip one edge in shoyu, place the item back on the rice, and pick it up again, together with some rice. The omelette and and shiitake are best eaten without shoyu.

Garlic Scapes and Orzo

Last Saturday we went to the farmers’ market. I was thinking about buying some shiso, but the fellow had plants that were smaller than mine. The cool wet spring was not ideal for shiso seed germination and he’d had to plant a second time. My plants are volunteers, mostly green, and a few red.
Mr. Tess was looking for the guy selling shiitake, but either we were too late or the season is over. But there was a man with a small chest freezer selling bison and beef. J had purchased some ground bison from him last year and it was very good. I was hoping for liver or tongue: sold out of the former, and doesn’t usually bring the latter because not many want it. He’ll bring it if we call ahead. I want to try Ms. Shimbo’s mother’s recipe. We bought a pound of ground bison.

I spotted some baskets with curly bright green spikes—very pretty. The girl said they were “garlic spikes.” How could we resist! When we got home, the internet told me they are garlic scapes. When you plant garlic bulbs, they put out bright green leaves like scallions and chives. They also sprout a flower stem that curls into gorgeous tendrils. In pre-computer times, my father planted some garlic, but when he went to harvest it, the head was very small and all he got was this “top garlic.” Looked like miniature garlic! I planted some in my own (flower) garden and they grew the the curly tendrils which straightened as they matured and bloomed. They self sowed for a few years and then disappeared. Apparently, if you want garlic, you must remove the flower stems so the energy made by the leaves goes to nourish the bulb. I think that the scapes used to be discarded by garlic farmers until they discovered there is a market for the mildly garlic flavored stems.
We also bought a couple of baskets of tender new potatoes. Some were as small as golf balls, but many were about the size of tennis balls: it’s not the size but the age of the potato that makes it new. The skin is thin and fragile and they are creamy and soft. The small potatoes sold in supermarkets are rarely really new potatoes.

First we thought of a potato soup with the garlic scapes, but it seemed a waste to use these delicate potatoes in a soup. I thought about pasta, and found many recipes for making pesto with them. J wanted a creamy sauce; this was a surprise—when did he start liking creamy pasta sauce? Maybe it’s just my Alfredo sauce…
I settled on a couple of similar recipes for “absorption” pasta. The amounts of each ingredient varied wildly between them:

Recipe A	My Recipe	Recipe B
Serves 4	Serves 3 to 4	Serves 4 as a side dish, or 2 as a main course
1 pound orzo	12 oz. orzo	8 oz pasta
8 ounces chicken stock	1 cup chicken stock + water	2 cups chicken stock
3 Tablespoons heavy cream	1 cup heavy cream	1 cup heavy cream
1 onion, diced	(no onion: just forgot)	1 onion, diced
Salt and pepper	Pepper	Salt and pepper
3 garlic scapes	6 – 7 garlic scapes	6 garlic scapes
1 portabello mushroom plus 3 shiitake mushrooms	8 oz mushrooms	4 oz assorted mushrooms
3 ounces baby arugula	frozen spinach	3 oz baby Swiss chard
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus shavings	some Parmesan, finely grated	1 oz Parmeggiano-Reggiano, shredded
6 Tablespoons olive oil plus 2 of butter and 3 Tablespoons of “Truffle Butter”	2 Tablespoons olive oil, 2 Tablespoons butter	2 – 3 Tablespoons olive oil, 2 Tablespoons butter, 1 Tablespoon truffle oil

Heat the cream over medium low heat, to reduce by half.
Heat the chicken stock.
Heat 1 Tablespoon olive oil in a skillet, and sear the mushrooms. Add some ground pepper near the end of cooking. Remove to a bowl.
Wash the scapes and cut off the flower heads. Cut the stems into fork-sized lengths. Stir-fry them in the skillet, until lightly charred. Remove to a plate.
Brown the butter in the same skillet, scrapping up the fond. Remove from heat and add to the reducing cream.
Add 1 Tablespoon olive oil to the skillet, and over medium heat, and if you remember the onion, sauté until translucent. Add the pasta (orzo) and a grind or two of pepper. Stir to coat each grain with oil. Add 1 cup of hot chicken stock and give the pasta a good stir. Cover tightly. Allow the pasta to simmer until al denté. Check every 5 minutes or so to make sure the bottom of the pan still has liquid otherwise the pasta would stick and burn. Add hot stock as necessary. Total cooking time will be about 20 minutes.
Add the cream to the pasta and stir to mix well. Add half the onions and the garlic scapes (reserve a few for garnish) and mix well. Add arugula or Swiss chard now. I just served the cooked frozen spinach on the side. Serve on individual pasta plates. Top with the reserved half of the mushrooms and garnish with a few scapes. Serve with grated Parmesan.

Chuka Soba that tastes like more…

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This recipe is a favorite of mine. I’ve posted it before, with a much more charming introduction than now, so if you are fond of stories, go have a look. But I want to call attention to the recipe again for the pleasure of my readers, and this format may be more reader friendly. I’ve been a bit off-kilter for the past few weeks, not sleeping well, and not having much of an appetite. That has made cooking a low priority in my life, but this is very easy and delicious comfort food, even if you have not had much experience with Japanese food. You can change the shrimp and scallops for lobster or crab, or mussels, clams, salmon, or whatever seafood you fancy. Of course you can substitute any green vegetables you like as well. For me, it is the simple sauce that makes this dish so happy and satisfying.

Oh, noodles. So lovely…

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Pan-Fried Crisp Chuka Soba with vegetables and seafood Age-chuka Soba Itame-yasai to Shi-fu-do serves 4 page 344
Cook the Noodles: 13 ounces dried chuka soba noodles 2 teaspoons sesame oil	Bring a large pot of water to a vigorous boil. Add noodles and cook them al dente, about 3 to 5 minutes. Test for doneness by removing and biting a noodle. Drain and toss with sesame oil in a large bowl. Set them aside while you prepare the vegetables and sauce.
The Toppings: 4 ounces snow peas 2 cups soybean or mung-bean sprouts 1 small head of broccoli, separated into flowerets 2 ounces bamboo shoots, cut into 1″ x 1 1/2″ strips (I used water chestnuts) 16 medium shrimp (or 8 shrimp, and 8 scallops), butterflied or not	Combine the peas, bean sprouts, and bamboo shoots. In a medium pot of boiling water, blanch the broccoli for 30 seconds, then add the bowl of other vegetables. Blanch for another 10 seconds. Drain, cool, and set aside. Fry the shrimp and scallops separately. Reserve. Or poach the seafood in 1 cup of chicken stock. Remove and reserve. Use the chicken stock for making the sauce.
The Sauce: 1 cup chicken stock 2 Tablespoons sake 1/2 teaspoon sugar 1 Tablespoon shoyu 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon salt, to taste 1 Tablespoon potato starch, mixed with 1 1/2 TBS water Ground white pepper	Combine the chicken stock, sake, sugar, and shoyu.
Fry the noodles: 3/4 to 1 cup vegetable oil, for frying	Heat a skillet and add about 3 Tablespoons of oil. When the oil is hot, add one-quarter of the noodles, and press them with a spatula to make a flat disk about 7 inches in diameter. Cook over medium-low heat, turning it once, until both sides are golden and crisp. Remove the noodles and drain on paper towels. Repeat to make 4 noodle cakes. Add more oil as needed to prevent sticking. Reserve all four cakes. Keep warm if possible.
The Stir-Frying: Heat a wok, and add a little vegetable oil. Add the shrimp and scallops, and give them a few good stirs. Add the vegetables, and stir-fry for a minute or two. Add the sauce, and bring the mixture to a boil. Reduce heat to low and add the potato starch slurry. Cook until the sauce is thickened. Taste and add salt if needed. Add a generous amount of ground pepper.
Serving: Put the crisp noodle cakes into four bowls. Divide the sauce and vegetables among the dishes. Serve.

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Focus is important.
Really, it’s what you look at,
and less than what you see.