japanese tapas: tuna cubes, wakame salad, japanese cucumber, meyer lemon

ingredients:

sashimi grade tuna
japanese cucumber
wakame salad - seaweed salad
orange tobiko
fine sea salt
meyer lemon
shichimi - japanese style chili powder

directions:

1. slice tuna into cubes about 2 cm x 2cm

2. thinly slice japanese cucumber into rounds

3. slice meyer lemon into thin wedges

4. plating:  put a bed of wakame salad in the middle of a white plate. place cucumber rounds around the
wakame. put tuna cubes on top of cucumber- season with fine seal salt, and top with more cucumber rounds. garnish with orange tobiko, a sprinkle of shichimi for some kick, and a lemon wedge.

japanese tapas: miragai sashimi, meyer lemon, tobiko

sometimes the best ingredients need nothing at all to enjoy to the fullest.

ingredients:

miragai- geoduck clam
meyer lemon
orange tobiko
fine sea salt

directions:

1.  slice meyer lemon into thin slices.

2.  carefully slice miragai horizontally into thin sashimi pieces.

3.  plating.  arrange meyer lemon on a plate.  top with miragai sashimi, a light sprinkle of fine sea salt, and
garnish with orange tobiko. serve immediately.

japanese tapas: sujiki, uni, sushi rice

ingredients:

sujiki

uni

short grain sushi rice

kaiware

nori

rice vinegar

mirin

sake

soy sauce

wasabi

fine sugar

fine sea salt

directions:

1.  get the sujiki ready first.  carefully dunk whole lobe of sujiki into warm salted water. carefully separate eggs from the outer membrane.  after eggs are removed, drain off excess water and marinade eggs with sake, soy sauce, and mirin. refrigerate.

2.  for sushi rice, add sugar, a pinch of salt, mirin, and rice vinegar to hot cooked rice.  mix well and allow it to cool.

3.  to plate, place a bit of the sushi rice at the bottom of a bowl.  top with a good portion of the sujiki, a lobe of uni, and garnish with wasabi, kaiware, and nori. 

crab and shrimp vermicelli, roma tomato, roe filled fish balls, thai basil

ingredients:

crab paste in soy bean oil
shrimp paste in soy bean oil
fish balls with roe - you can buy them at ranch 99
eggs
chicken broth
roma tomatoes, cubed
bean sprouts
thai basil
scallions
cilantro
lemon wedges
rice vermicelli
noodles
fine sea salt

directions:

1.  in a big soup pot, heat up chicken broth and cubed tomatoes to a boil.
2.  beat 2-3 eggs in a bowl and add two huge spoonfuls of both the crab and shrimp paste. mix together.
3.  when the chicken broth is boiling, slowly pour in egg/crab/shrimp mixture. after egg mixture comes together and is cooked in the broth, throw in the fish balls and reduce heat to a medium flame. season with salt.
4.  heat up another pot of salted water and cook vermicelli noodles.
5.  prepare side accompaniments. blanch the bean sprouts, cut lemon wedges, pick basil leaves, chope the cilantro, and slice the scallions.
6.  when noodles are cooked, put a moundful in the bottom of a bowl. top with hot soup and garnish with side accompaniments. serve immediately.

 *you can dip with fish balls in hoisin sauce and siracha. it's reallllly good.

caviar canape, potato rosti, crème fraiche, crumbled egg, chive

ingredients:

caviar- sevruga pictured

potatoes

white onion

eggs

panko

crème fraiche

chives

kosher salt

freshly cracked black pepper

extra virgin olive oil

directions:

1.  make the potato rosti first.  grate peeled potatoes into a bowl of water.  this prevents browning/ graying of potatoes. strain potatoes and plop the potatoes onto a clean towel.  squeeze out as much of the water as possible then put potatoes back into a bowl.  grate a small white onion, squeeze some of the liquid out, and add to the potatoes.  the potato to onion ratio I used is about 4-5 smallish medium potatoes to onesmall white onion.  add about 3 egg yolks, and season with kosher salt and cracked black pepper.  mix.  depending on how wet the mixture is, add panko to hold it together for frying.  in a flat pan, heat up olive oil over a medium flame. press the potato mixture into a very flat pancake and fry the potatoes for about 5-8 minutes on each side till gold brown.  drain on paper towels and let it cool.  once cooled, you and use a cookie cutter to cut out individual mini rostis.

2.  prepare the crumbled eggs.  fill a small pot with cold water and place eggs in pot.  set your stove to medium heat and after about two minutes, turn up the heat to medium high.  this prevents the eggs from cracking due to drastic temperature change.  once it begins a rapid boil, set a kitchen timer to five minutes. 

large eggs may need six minutes.  when the timer is up, put eggs in an ice water bath to stop the cooking process.  when eggs are cooled, peel and crumble the eggs into small pieces. 

3.  get your mise en place ready. caviar, potato rosti, crumbled egg, crème fraiche, and chives.  dab a bit of crème fraiche on each potato rosti.  top with some crumbled egg, then top with caviar.  garnish with chive. then enjoy with some champagne. 

*this picture is shown with the same ingredients sans the potato rosti.  I used crispbread underneath for these.