autumn miso soup

Tuber veggies make good autumn miso soup.

Ingredients are as below (well, more or less use whatever veggies you have).

- chayote
- taro
- carrot
- onion
- fried thin tofu
- kombu
- miso

Cook veggies and mix in some miso to the soup. It's as simple as that.

home-made kefir

When I visited a supermarket last time, I noticed that all packages of yogurt did not indicate where they were produced. All of cheaper ones had 'dairy products', which is NOT milk. Then I thought, alright I am going to make my own yogurt out of milk I can clearly see where it was produced.

This is not exactly yogurt, but kefir. I warmem up about a litre of milk to around 45 degrees (celsius). I mixed the bacteria into the milk and left overnight between 45 - 30 degrees. When I woke up and checked, the kefir was ready.

This kefir can be used over and over with new packs of milk.

pickled daikon and turnip

Daikon and turnip are, I must say, pretty good for pickles.

Basically what you need is only salt.

Try out whatever other ingredients you like.

Turnip pickle and sauerkraut

This morning's production: Turnip pickle and sauerkraut.

Fast food, but no junk

House-garden's beans, home-made pickle, and tofu, these make up our fast, but no junk dinner.

mizuna (みずな) salad

Honestly, initially it was my wife's idea, but we have enjoyed mizuna salad for some time already.

This time, I mixed mizuna and radish. Dressing? Well, I used olive oil, salt and sudachi juice (and tabasco) today. But you can use whatever your favorite dressing.

turnip leaf pickle

Veggies and fruits we receive and cook are getting completely autumn and even showing switch to the winter. Farmers have harvested young turnips for bigger tubers at the real harvest.

We pickled the young turnip leaf, with salt, kombu and some pieces of dry red chili. A pickle usually serve my family with regular simple side dish for a week or more.

sudachi （すだち）honey juice

For a family who have sick members, squeeze sudachi (すだち) juice into a cup, pour hot water and as much honey as you like. That should be a good vitamin C source.

chard/garlic pasta

We've got some chard and wondered what to do. An idea appeared in my mind was a spaghetti dish.

Recipe for two adults:

- a bunch of chard
- half head of garlic
- spaghetti
- salt

Cook appropriate amount of spaghetti. At the same time, cut  chard into the size you want, peel and mash garlic pieces. Stir-fry mashed garlic and add chard later. Season with salt when done.

This was a pretty cool dish.

German melon ? (ドイツうり) pickles

German melon (ドイツうり) sounded strange. I surfed a bit on the web and found this cultivar is native to Sasayama. Why German? One article says that people tended to name things with some exotic foreign hints during some period. Still it sounds wired.

I found an article online and tried out pickling this. I sliced the German melon, sprinkled salt, placed them in a bowl together with a piece of こんぶ (kombu) and left it for a night.

My wife liked the pickle. I found it a bit wired because the pickle had a hint of melon. My daughter does not eat green colored-veggies as usual...

stir-fried aubergine and common beans

Stir-fried aubergine and *** is getting pretty routine at my home.

Ingredients
- a half head of garlic
- 3 aubergine
- a pack of common beans (もろっこまめ)
- miso
- honey

Chop above veggies into the size you want, stir-fry and season with a bit of honey and miso.

autumn miso soup

You don't know how to deal with veggies you've got? My general solution is "through them all into a soup". I mean they also tastes good.

Ingredients for my family were as below, but you can make miso soup with any veggies as you like. I prefer to make miso-soup with wither leaf-veggies only or tuber-crops only.

- 2/3 of a big sweet potato
- 1 rather large onion
- 1 burdock
- 2 carrots
- 5 dry mushrooms (しいたけ)
- 1/2 pack of thin deep-fried tofu
- miso

Stir-fried water spinach

I stir-fried water spinach (空心菜) together with garlic. That was pretty good.

Ingredients are

- a bunch of water spinach

- a a head half of garlic

- salt

how to cook もろへいや

もろへいや is another sticky sort of vegetale and nutritious.

I do not know any sophisticated way of cooking it. But I often simply pick a bunch and cook in boiled water for a couple of minutes, and cool down with tap water. Chop into pieces one find easy to fit in the mouth. Served with soy source or any other source you like. It's a very nutritious vegetable. Ones who have not yet tried out, I recommend you to.

A pumpkin dish

This pumpkin dish has been one of my favorite, almost routine and pretty Japanese stuff.

Ingredients are

- 1/2 pumpkin

- 2-3 carrots

- some dried kelp (こんぶ)

- couple of pieces of dry mushroom (しいたけ)

- two large spoonful of soy source

- two large spoonful of honey (or sugar)

First sork こんぶ & しいたけ in the water.

Dise the pumpkin and carrots into the size you want them to be.

Through all above and cook for around 15 min, and will be ready to be served.

In usual Japanese houses nowadays, people would use chemically synthesized fish and sea weed extract. Since I do not consume any meat or fish, I use こんぶ & しいたけ instead.

Once I spend a couple of days at 永平寺 (Eiheiji), a Zen temple. That was fun. People in strict zen temples do not consume meat or fish. Thus, they have invented a good variety of vegetarian recipes in throughout their history. Meals there were inspiring for my later life, too. For people who are interested, you can also find couple of books about the temple's recipes, like below. Vegetarians who have run out of their spring of ideas may find a rest in these books, too.

- "永平寺の精進料理 七六〇年受け継がれた健康の智慧を家庭でいただく"
- "永平寺の心と精進料理 "

simple okra | natto | rice meal

When other family members are not around, naturally (?) eating gets much simpler.

Okra is one of best companions on those occasions.

Okra needs to be cooked only for 2-3 minutes in boiled water and a pinch of salt. I would cool down  with tap water, but I think this process is not a must. Dise them. And it's all done to eat with soy source or whatever other spices you like.

Recommended for singles, too ;-) This is a simple, yet powerfully nutritious meal, I believe.

mixed stir-fried veggie (aubergine, common beans)

In the summer, somehow I have much more chances to stir-fry veggies.

Ingredients

- 3 aubergines
- a pack of common beans
- a pack of mushroom (this time I used しいたけ)
- salt / pepper / soy source to season

もろへいや うどん

Somebody told me that もろへいや originally was grown in Egypt. This sticky leaf-vegetable is supposed to be very rich in nutrition (richer than the spinach).

It cannot be simpler. Cook もろへいや for a minute, chop into around 2 cm. Place on top of cooked and cooled うどん。Sprinkle as much soy source as you want.

もろへいや is also good to eat with soy source.

Mixed stir-fried veg

I personally can get inspirations easier out of summer veggies, like beans and greens (well, often stir-frying though). I realized that a family member of mine (native to east Europe) prefers to cook tuber veggies (well mostly soups). I noticed that this is an interesting contrast.

This time, I stir-fried miscellaneous veggies I found at home, namely zucchini, mushroom, pepper and common beans. Was simple and good.

Stir-fried aubergine, pepper and zucchini in みそ

The clue is aubergine. The rest, you can use virtually any veggies you have at home. Somehow I like this combination of aubergine stir-fried in rather plenty of oil and seasoned with みそ and honey.

Ingredients are
- 3 aubergines
- 1 zucchini
- 5 rather small peppers
- みそ
- honey (or sugar)
- salt

Basically, slice aubergines (I prefer to cut aubergine as on the picture for frying. In this way, aubergines get more crispy.) and zucchini. Cut also peppers.

Start frying with aubergines and zucchini. Add peppers bit later.

When veggies are almost ready, add みそ, salt, honey (or sugar) and salt as much as you like.