Ketchup Recipe and Pretty Red Things

I made homemade ketchup today.  We didn't have any, so I made it.

I still can't believe I'm the kind of person who makes their own ketchup.  I feel like Bear Grylls.  Or Rambo.  If there was a nuclear accident at the old Heinz place and all the ketchup in America was contaminated...  I could make some.

But seriously... how many people do YOU know who know how to make ketchup?  For most people, it's hard just to wiggle the butter knife around that skinny glass bottle to get the ketchup out.

Forget that.  I'm ten light-years ahead you.  I made ketchup.  Hell, while I'm at it, I could probably make the ketchup bottle too.

I need to stop.  I need to take a few steps back.  This is how hipsters in Brooklyn end up with their own old-fashioned letterpress factories run out of lofts.  If I don't stop now, I'll end up with my own small home pickling business.  Oh, wait.  Too late.  Did I mention I'll be selling homemade tofu cheese and amazake starting next week?

- 2 carrots

- 1 onion

- 2 to 3 tsp. ume plum vinegar

- 1 tbsp. maple syrup

Place two separate pots of water on the stove to boil.  While the water is heating, chop carrots and onions into fingernail-sized pieces.  They can be messy since they're headed for the blender.

Boil carrots and onions separately for 15-20 minutes, until onions are translucent and carrots are soft.  Save some of your boiling water, approximately 1/4 to 1/3 cup.

In a large bowl, add carrots, onion, 1/4 to 1/3 cup boiling water, ume vinegar, and maple syrup.  Blend well with either a hand-mixer or a food processor until smooth.  

If you're feeding this to kids, I'd add 1/2 a steamed beet for red color.  I love this ketchup because unlike conventional ketchup, it has no sugar, no artificial colors or flavors, and is a great way to sneak in veggies.

pretty things ::  essie nail color $8 //  brian atwood carla watersnake triangle clutch $1385  // 

//  kate spade twirl karolina shoes $350 //

Slow and Steady Nishime

It's midnight.
The only light in the kitchen is the fridge.
I've got a chocolate pie slice. 
And a microwave.  
The whole world is asleep.  
I'm in fuzzy jammies.

Are you with me?

Okay, we're going to do a complete 180.  It's 4:30 on a Wednesday afternoon, my fridge is packed with random crap ranging from dijon mustard to old white rice, I'm starving, and I think my blood sugar is about to render me insensate.  Let's slow-cook a crock pot of whole root vegetables for an hour.

What is nishime?

In the macrobiotic definition, it's a slow-cooking root vegetable dish that has grounding and gentle balancing energy.  It's great for people with excessive yin conditions going on.  I like it because it curbs my sugar and salt cravings.

It's not chocolate pie.  I'm not in fuzzy jammies.  But I also pay approximately $0 in medication, down from a previous $200 per-month, so I think I'll go cry about it into my very expensive sweater.

What vegetables can I put in nishime?


- daikon
- carrot
- turnip
- rutabaga
- parsnip
- celeriac
- celery

And just to be wild and crazy, today I accented my nishime with...  fiddlehead fern!

nishime with sweet + sour sauce

 Select your veggies.  Today I'm making my small dish of nishime (2 servings) with turnip, parsnip, daikon, carrots, and celery.

Roll cut your cylindrical veggies (in my case, parsnip, daikon, and carrots).  To do this, cut at a diagonal, slicing each previous diagonal in half to get chunky, uneven slices.  I'm posting a video on how to do this later this week.

This is my bowl of roll-cut daikon.  Each piece is about 2"x 2"x2"

As you roll-cut your veggies, the most important thing is NOT shape.  It's size.  If your pieces are uneven, they'll cook unevenly.  Try to get them all the same size.

My finished veggies.  I like to finish all my cutting first and place my ingredients in separate bowls so I know what I have.

Layer veggies in a soup pot.  I placed these in circles so you can see what went on bottom (outer rings) to the top (middle of the pot).  Daikon and parsnip on bottom, followed by carrots, turnips, and my lightest veggie, celery, on top.

Add about 1/2 to 1 inch of filtered water, bring to a boil, cover, lower heat, and simmer for 40 minutes to an hour, until vegetables are bright but soft enough to eat without chomping.

It was my friend's first time eating nishime, so I made a sauce out of 1 tsp. kuzu, 1 tbsp. ume vinegar, and 1 tsp. brown rice syrup, mixed with a little cold water and poured over the finished veggies.  

Enjoy with a grain, a quick veggie, and a smile!

Condiments, Dips, and Pestos

It's summer time, and the snacking's easy.  Coming soon are the chic little garden parties, the cocktail fundraisers, and the horse races I wish I was invited to.

Whether you're sick of lifeless filets of fish or tired of bland bowls of rice, condiments can be a saving grace.  Here's a trinity of fun and easy dips for your snacking pleasure!

As a side note, I'm in Beacon Hill right now, one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in America.  I'm down the street from a house that's retailing $32 million.  The healthiest food in the local grocery store is Doritos.  That's America for you.

condiment

nori condiment

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5-6 sheets nori seaweed
1/4 to 1/2 c. water
dash tamari
optional minced scallions, minced garlic, dulse sprinkles
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Rip nori sheets to small pieces, and stir with water in a small saucepan.  Slowly bring to boil, stirring gently until sheets dissolve.  Add dash of tamari and/or optional ingredients, reduce to simmer, and simmer for 2-3 more minutes.

dip

natto-scallion spread

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1/2 cup natto, available where most macro food is sold
2 tbsp. minced scallions
1 tsp. dijon mustard
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Natto is pretty radical stuff.  This is a way to make this incredibly healing food more palatable.  I'm investing in a box next week and playing around with 3-4 different natto combinations, so stay tuned.  I'm thinking of doing a sweet/savory ginger and miso natto combo, but I don't want to post that here untried.  Natto with dijon mustard is one of the most bizarre combos I've ever tried, but it's freaking delicious.

pesto

cilantro-walnut pesto

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2 c whole raw walnuts
1 bunch fresh cilantro
4 garlic cloves, rough-chopped
1/2 to 1 c. olive oil
1/2 fresh-squeezed lemon
sea salt to taste
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Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Roast your walnuts until golden brown and releasing oil, about 5-7 minutes.  Remove from oven and allow to cool.


Rough-chop cilantro and garlic into pieces your blender can manage.  Crush cool walnuts with your hands.  Add cilantro, garlic, and walnuts to blender in alternating layers, pulsing to combine as you go. The trick to this is liquid, liquid, liquid.  If your ingredients aren't mixing evenly, you need to add more oil and lemon juice.  Continue to add ingredients and pulse until it takes on that distinctive pesto-like texture.


Once your ingredients are added and it's been salted to your taste, the key is to add enough oil that the cilantro is never exposed to air.  Once it hits the air, the green starts to oxidize and turn a yucky-looking brown.  Nobody wants that.  Enjoy your pesto!


P.S.  That's my homemade pesto.  I just used an old salsa jar because we reduce, reuse and recycle 'round here.

One Pot of Brown Rice, Three Ways

How many times have we looked at the stove and seen this?

It's a grim feeling.

Another pressure cooker of short-grain brown rice, another day.

Sometimes, I get so bored with the basic rice-beans-greens macro meals that I could have a fit.  I don't want to go to the grocery store and spend more money, I don't want to spend six hours in the kitchen, and I don't want more basic brown rice.

Here are three ways to jazz up a fresh pot of brown rice to make new, exciting meals!

warm, nutty rice

 This is the quickest and easiest ways to change up the rice.  Preheat the oven to 300, and lay out almonds, walnuts, or pecans on a tray.  Roast the nuts until they begin to give off a toasted smell (approx. 5-10 minutes) and release their oils.  When the nuts cool, crush them with your hands or a suribachi.  DO NOT buy pre-roasted nuts.  Not only are these much less delicious, they are often rancid.  Mix rice, nuts, a little olive oil, and a small pinch of salt.  I often add a few sprigs of rosemary, pan-fried in olive oil to give it a great flavor.

ohagi

Ohagi is a Japanese sweet dessert made of pounded short-grain rice.  Take your brown rice, cooled, and place it in a large pot.  Pound the rice (I used the end of a rolling pin) for approximately 20 minutes, until the rice is sticky and paste-like.  This takes a firm arm and patience, but it's worth it!

Once your ohagi is a paste, you can play with it.  The goal is to roll it into balls (about golf-ball sized), filled and covered with different toppings.  You can see from this picture, there are many ways to make ohagi.  I'll be experimenting this summer with filling them with matcha and sweet tofu paste!  Here are a few easy ones using ingredients you have at home:

-Cover the ohagi in roasted sesame seeds (black or white)

-Fill the ohagi with toasted nuts or a roasted nut paste (I'll be working on one soon)

-Fill the ohagi with dried fruits (At Kushi we used dried apricots)

-Fill or cover the ohagi with sweet adzuki bean paste (1 c. cooked aduki beans mixed with 2-3 tbsp. brown rice syrup, mixed in a food processor)

rice croquettes

Rice croquettes turn a grain into a flavorful main course.

Finely shred carrots, onions, celery, and/or cabbage.  Pan-roast raw sunflower seeds until they begin to turn brown and pop, then quickly remove from pan to avoid overcooking.

Mix cool rice, veggies, sunflower seeds, and a splash of ume vinegar, and kneed into a sticky mixture.  If it sticks to your hands, coat your hands in cool water.

Pat the croquettes into burger-shaped patties, and if you'd like, cover in a light dusting of corn flour.  This isn't always necessary.

Pan-fry until golden brown on each side.  Serve with a sweet carrot and onion sauce or a light summer pesto!  Enjoy!

A Macrobiotic Barbecue!

I hope you guys had a safe and fun Fourth of July! Our house gathered together to make an amazing Macro BBQ that was vegan, gluten-free, and full of 4th classics!

Speaking of America, I'd like to look at Macro Accessibility for just a minute. A dear friend of mine is beginning her journey for health, but like 90% of this country, she doesn't live by a natural food store, and can't just duck into Whole Foods for a tub of miso and some umeboshi plum vinegar. In a country where Good Housekeeping, Better Homes & Gardens, and the Joy of Cooking are our standard sources of recipes, it can be incredibly frustrating to find recipes that won't freak out our family and friends and can be purchased at Kroger's.

The unexpected resource that made all of today's macro cooking possible was MarthaStewart.com. It's amazing how many recipes on there are packed with fresh veggies, gluten-free, and vegan. Martha Stewart Living is available at most grocery stores and book stores. Each issue features a healthy cooking and lifestyles section that contains recipes that have been consistent with the place I'm at in my diet.

May was the firepower that made this meal happen. I had to work on the 4th, so she stayed behind and cooked and did prep for 6-8 hours. I was on standby with my phone at work, so when the Great Potato Crisis of Noon happened, I was on it.

Note: The vegetables and ingredients here are a little "wide" for the traditional macrobiotic diet. It is a holiday, and I wanted to make some food that was accessible to a larger audience (potatoes, tofutti, white wine vinegar, etc.). I hope you enjoy the recipes in that context :)

MENU

Click dish for jump to recipe

Cool Cucumber Dill Salad

Tangy Potato Salad with Scallions

Balsamic Marinated Mushrooms

Oven Roasted Corn on the Cob with Cilantro-Lime Rub

Caramelized Onion and Rosemary Cornbread

BBQ Tofu Strips

Cool Cucumber Dill Salad

May in front of the Cucumber Dill and Potato Salads (respectively). Every time in this document that I write "We made" replace that with "She made." She seriously did all the work.

This is a recipe from Martha Stewart that we modified to make vegan. It's gluten-free, and I love it because it doesn't require any heat to cook. This is Martha's picture because in our picture, the food got whited out by the sun unfortunately :(

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup tofutti vegan sour cream
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (from 1 lemon)
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill, plus more for garnish (optional)
• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 4 to 6 Kirby cucumbers (about 1 pound), halved lengthwise and thinly sliced crosswise

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, combine sour cream, lemon juice, and dill. Season with salt and pepper, and whisk well to combine.

2. Add cucumbers, and toss to coat. Garnish with more dill, if desired. Serve, or refrigerate, covered, up to 4 hours.

Tangy Potato Salad with Scallions

This was our FAVORITE dish. Amazing, no substitutions, alkaline (except for the potatoes, which are not strictly macro, but I have a feeling you could do this with some steamed root veggies for a more strict adherence to the code).

Ingredients

• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 4 pounds Yukon gold or other waxy potatoes, scrubbed, halved, and sliced 1/2 inch thick
• 1/2 cup white-wine vinegar
• 4 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup olive oil

Directions

1. Set a steamer basket in a large pot. Fill with enough salted water to come just below basket. Bring to a boil; place potatoes in basket, and reduce heat to medium. Cover, and steam, gently tossing occasionally, until crisp-tender, 10 to 15 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, combine vinegar and scallions in a large bowl; season with salt and pepper. When potatoes are cooked, transfer to bowl with vinegar mixture. Toss to combine; let cool, tossing occasionally.

When potato mixture is cool, mix in oil; season potato salad with salt and pepper. (To store, refrigerate, up to 1 day.)

Balsamic Marinated Mushrooms

So I feel like a huge tool using this picture from my cell phone when Martha's version looks like this:

Here's the recipe. This thing takes no time, is great the day of, and is even better the next day.

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 12 ounces white mushrooms, halved (quartered if large)
• 3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 1 teaspoon coarse salt
• 1/4 teaspoon red-pepper flakes
• Freshly ground pepper

Directions

Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, and cook until golden brown, about 5 minutes. Stir in vinegar, salt, and red-pepper flakes, and season with pepper. Cook 1 minute more. Transfer to a bowl, and serve.

Oven Roasted Corn on the Cob with Cilantro-Lime Rub

Here's a picture of the work-in-progress:

And here's the final corn:

Ingredients

• 4 ears corn
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) Earth Butter vegan margarine, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped cilantro
• 1/2 teaspoon grated zest of lime
• 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lime juice

Directions

1. MODIFIED BY BECKY: Remove husks and silk from corn. Rub with the below butter combination and wrap in tin foil. Bake in foil for 25 minutes at 425 degrees.

2. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, stir together butter, cilantro, lime zest and juice, 1/8 teaspoon salt, and a pinch of pepper until blended.

We replaced the butter with Earth Balance vegan margarine and it was awesome. We also couldn't grill the corn and thought that microwaving was crass, so we buttered the ears of corn, wrapped them in tin foil, and baked them at 425 for 25 minutes. The corn was phenomenal.

Caramelized Onions and Rosemary Cornbread

We've done this cornbread before for this blog and it's worked out really well. Just follow this link over to that recipe... Before you put the cornbread in, caramelize your onions for 1/2 an hour to 45 minutes, break some rosemary sprigs on top, sprinkle some fresh-cracked salt, and you're good to go!

BBQ Tofu Strips

This is the one I'm pretty devastated I don't have a picture of. I think my roommate has a pro-level picture of this, but somehow the picture I took of the tower of books got erased and I'm totally sad about it! Here's a glimpse of the process:

There was a stack of about 15 textbooks to press this tofu, including:

Biological Psychology, Neuroscience, Anatomy, Constitutional Law, Harry Potter 4-7, and A Game of Thrones

INGREDIENTS

2 Blocks Extra-firm Tofu

Olive Oil

BBQ Spice Rub

BBQ Sauce

DIRECTIONS

Get started early, because this is time-consuming. Squeeze all the liquid out of the tofu. We did this by putting it on a baking sheet under a cutting board with 15 textbooks on top. After tofu is pressed, slice into 1/4 inch strips, place another cookie sheet on top, and replace cookbooks. I tilted the sheets at an angle so the juice would run off.

We then rubbed the tofu strips with this Memphis-Style Williams-Sonoma BBQ Rub. We baked in the oven for probably 20 minutes, and were thrilled when the strips began to puff and rise and get crunchy and crispy. We used a minimal amount of oil, but it tasted fried. We then covered it in BBQ sauce, and it was delicious!!

Korean Bean Sprouts!

Those of you from the South are familiar with restaurants with names like:

SHANGHAI TOKYO: Chinese and Japanese Food Sushi Buffet!

The concept of the "Slashie" is not just for Fabio anymore. Most Asian restaurants of ill-repute feature dishes that are not from the country (or countries) that the restaurant claims to represent. An excellent example of this is the following totally killer bean sprout dish, which I used to enjoy at my favorite Nashville Slashie Japanese/Korean/Chinese Restaurant.

PICKLED BEAN SPROUTS

OF UNKNOWN PROVENANCE

(PROBABLY KOREA BUT WE'RE NOT SURE)

Bag of bean sprouts (I like Mung Sprouts)

4 tsp. wheat-free Tamari

5 tbsp. brown rice vinegar

2-3 tbsp. sesame oil

Sugar to taste (I usually do between 1-2 tsp.)

1 pinch sea salt

Boil the bean sprouts 2-3 minutes. Combine remaining ingredients in a bowl, and toss in bean sprouts. If your sprouts are overwhelming the little amount of sauce in the bowl, double the sauce recipe. Cover and let chill overnight for optimum flavor.

Genuine Article Kinpira

I've read several different macro recipes for kinpira, which when served according to these recipes is incredibly healthy and strengthening. I studied abroad in Japan in my younger years and was disappointed upon eating these recipes to find that the dish tasted very little like the dish I regularly enjoyed in Japan.

I thought that surely there must be a way to make the Japanese preparation (pretty darn unhealthy) a lot more macro, and that there must be a way to make the macro dish a little more snackrobiotic.

Below, the happy union:

KARMA NEUTRAL KINPIRA

2 burdock roots, peeled and matchsticked, then soaked for 1/2 an hour.

2 large organic carrots, peeled and matchsticked

3 tbsp. GF tamari

3 tbsp. brown rice syrup, plus more to taste

4-5 tbsp. mirin rice wine

2 tsp. sesame seeds

2-4 tbsp. olive oil

I like to do the burdock peeling and 'sticking and soaking an hour or two before I do the rest of the dish. I also make my bed every day and have a killer manicure, so that tells you a little bit about me.

Make the sauce. The trick is to get the right balance of salty and sweet, with just HINTS of the mirin. If it tastes too strong in any direction, play with it a little. Also, make sure the brown rice syrup is fully mixed with the tamari. It tends to sink, making taste-testing inaccurate.

I do the carrots while the burdock is soaking, and like to lay a damp paper towel over them so they don't dry out while I'm cooking the burdock. You can't cook burdock long enough. I've had the greatest success when I've cooked it in a deep sauce pan for about 20 minutes. If you're concerned about chewiness, you can water-saute the burdock for 10-15 minutes and THEN pan fry it for about 10 minutes. That will be super soft. After you pan-fry the burdock, as you get towards the last 5 minutes, add the carrots and stir fry.

Pour the sauce on top and cook for an extra 5-7 minutes. Sprinkle the sesame seeds and enjoy!