Miso Marinated Salmon with Green Salad

02/06/201302/06/2013 Moya7 Comments

Browsing through The Perfect 10 Cookbook’s (a supplement of Woman This Month magazine) recipes from around the world, “Japanese” and “Miso” caught my attention and immediately I found myself craving that pleasant savoury flavour, called Umami… our 5th sense of taste. Japanese is such a feel good food, even hearing and saying the words tempura, sukiyaki, miso, sashimi, sushi… makes me hungry!

Buying Miso can be a little confusing as the paste varies in colour, texture, flavour, sweetness and saltiness! Miso is a naturally fermented paste and is a basic flavouring used in Japanese cooking; produced by cooking soybean, rice or barley, injecting with a mold, mixing with water and salt, miso is then aged in kegs… some up to three years! When I think about miso as a condiment it opens up many culinary possibilities when adding miso to sauces, soups, broths, dips, marinades and dressings, all of which can be used with vegetables, meat, chicken, duck and fish.

From as far back as I can remember I have always loved the taste of Salmon. This oily fish is so versatile and works with many flavours. I used a dark soybean miso (Hatcho) with the Salmon, but it is quite acceptable to use a lighter sweeter miso. As miso pastes vary, tasting miso straight from its packet is a good way of gauging its flavour and saltiness before using with recipes. Use a smooth miso paste for marinating. Miso confused… then hop over to The Just Hungry blog which has some great information on miso.

Once the fish has marinated for 24 hours, the rest is quick and easy. For a more substantial meal, serve this dish with steamed Japanese rice or udon noodles. With the healthy omega and the satisfying umami, this dish is sure to please.

Miso Marinated Fish with Green Salad

This recipe is adapted from the Perfect Ten Cookbook, a supplement of Woman this Month magazine, recipe by James Claire.

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons of Japanese cooking sake
100ml mirin
100g of hatcho miso paste (or your own preference)
2 teaspoons honey
4 salmon fillets (or other firm white fish) (each weighing 150g to 175g)

for the salad and dressing

1 head of lolla rossa lettuce, torn into bits sized pieces
3 medium cucumber, seeds scraped out, thinly sliced
3 spring onions, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
2 tablespoons mirin
1 tablespoons sesame oil
sea salt, to taste
toasted sesame seeds, for garnish

How to make: For the marinade, pour the sake and mirin into a small saucepan, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for about 30 seconds. Remove for the heat and gradually whisk in the miso paste until you have a smooth mixture. Mix in the honey. Leave the marinade to cool. Slather the miso marinade all over the fish fillets. Cover the fish and leave to marinate in the fridge for 24 hours.

Heat a ridged grill pan to medium-high heat. Brush the ridges of the grill pan with vegetable oil before placing the fish on to cook, otherwise the fish will stick. Place the fish top side down and leave the fish undisturbed for about 3 minutes or until you make the grill marks. Turn the fish over, reduce the heat to medium and cook for a further 5 minutes or until you have cooked to the desired doneness.

In a small dish whisk the white wine vinegar, mirin and sesame oil together, season with salt. Toss the dressing with the salad and scatter over the sesame seeds just before serving. Serves 4.

Note: The fish is best marinated for 24 hours but you could marinate the fish overnight if you were short on time. You can use a normal fry-pan instead of the ridged grill pan or cook the fish under a grill if preferred.

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Flowers for the Table

25/05/201325/05/2013 Moya12 Comments

Placing fresh flowers on a table, already set with linens, candles, flatware and glasses, visually brings a beautiful table setting to life; creating a certain mood which complements the dining experience from beginning to end. I’m not talking about elaborate floral masterpieces (leaving those to the experts), just simple floral displays arranged with what ever available flowers or herbs you might have in the garden or buying them instead.

A flower’s appeal is in its contradictions – so delicate in form yet strong in fragrance, so small in size yet big in beauty, so short in life yet long on effect.- Adabella Radici

Take for example Bougainvillea, a shrub that grows abundantly in Bahrain, I love its vibrant colorful papery flowers. Placed in small glass bottles or vases, Bougainvillea adds a wonderful splash of colour to a table setting and one that I am particularly fond of.

Adding Rosemary to a delicious Home-made Salted Caramel Focaccia is one way of enjoying this versatile culinary herb, but sometimes I use the green needle-like woody sprigs for simple floral displays, along with the perfumed frangipani and jasmine flowers. So simple, but visually very pretty. The more successful gardeners among us will have more flowers to choose from! Glass bottles or small vases with a single flower or small bouquet repeated down the center of a table can look quite stunning.

I am not in favour of vision blocking floral displays when seated at a table, they might look pretty impressive, but try having a conversation through one of them! Large floral displays are best suited to a buffet table setting. Here are a few other ideas for simple floral displays by a Pottery Barns floral stylist which I thought were very doable. So, whether it’s folding the napkins a certain way or placing pretty gift boxes at each place setting, whatever way you choose to set your table… don’t forget some flowers!

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Sweet Sixteens

20/05/201326/05/2013 Moya8 Comments

It has been some months since I participated in a sweet blog hop and when I saw the theme “Sweets without Heat” over at Nic’s Dining with a Stud, I knew straight away which recipe to enter! The Sweet Sixteens recipe is from the calendar “Home Cooking” that a friend and I had worked on some years ago, back then I had no clue about photography so the styling and preparation of the food for the photo shoot was left to me. The photo above has some sweet memories, apart from being deliciously sweet, this was one of my first attempts at food styling for the camera! I also remember for this particular shoot, a short break was taken and on our return… a certain male in the house had eaten most of our “hero” food. Now knowing better I often get asked, “is this food for your photography or can we eat it?”

Sweet Sixteens is an old recipe for my childhood when living in Ireland and called Fifteens, as the recipe used 15 biscuits, 15 marshmallows and 15 cherries, I have always preferred calling them Sweet Sixteens! These yummy little morsels are not as sweet as you might think, even though the recipe uses sweetened condensed milk. With no heat involved these sweet treats are quick to make, however, the mixture needs a few hours in the fridge to set before slicing. Children will love helping you with this recipe and will take great delight in squashing the bag of coconut around, turning the coconut pink!

Sweet Sixteens

Ingredients:

50g/2oz desiccated coconut
2 or 3 drops of red food colour (optional)
16 digestive biscuits, crushed finely
16 red glacé cherries, quartered
16 large white marshmallows, halved
200ml or ¾ cup sweetened condensed milk

How to make: Mix together in a medium bowl the biscuits, cherries, marshmallows and sweetened condensed milk. If the biscuit mixture looks a little dry add another tablespoon of sweetened condensed milk, the mixture should not be very sticky.

Lay two sheets of greaseproof paper onto a work surface. Divide the contents of the bowl into two, tip mixture onto the greaseproof paper. With hands roll and form the mixture into a log.

Divide the coconut, sprinkle over log and greaseproof paper, roll each log until coated with coconut. Roll the log up firmly in the greaseproof paper, refrigerate for a couple of hours or overnight to set. Slice the logs into desired thickness. Store in an airtight container until needed. Makes 20 slices (approximately).

How to colour coconut pink: Place the coconut into a medium plastic bag, add a few drops of red food colour. Holding the bag closed, gently massage the food colour into the coconut until you have the desired pink colour.

Variations: Use green glacé cherries or a mix of both. Use a mix of pink and white marshmallows.

To see all the other delicious entires for “Sweets Without Heat” head over to the hosts blog Nic’s Dining with a Stud, which is part of the Sweet Adventures Blog Hop held monthly.