Fusion Foods and Food Musings

I have been enjoying my Indian food journey so far.  Of course, I still like to eat other kinds of foods, like spaghetti, and a japanese rice porridge, known as okayu.

So, I was craving a hot porridge a few days ago and wanted to eat okayu (which I would normally make with rice, tofu, miso, umeboshi paste, and cabbage and spinach).  I decided to try to make it Indian style.  I heated some oil in my saucepan and threw in my favorite spices (cumin, mustard seeds, nigella, and fenugreek).  After tempering them a couple of minutes in went my rice, tofu, spinach and water and salt.  Cook for 30-45 minutes til the rice is nearly dissolved.  Not surprisingly, this turned out great.  (cooked it again today).  Nice and warming and easy to digest for breakfast.

Two days ago, my son wanted angel hair pasta with tomato sauce.   Dutifully I made that.  It looked good so I decided to have that for my dinner as well.  Normally, I would put red pepper and romano cheese over such a dish.  This time, I got a bit crazy, and, ... if you are a total food purist or feel strongly about eating spaghetti a certain kind of way, don't read any farther.  I poured on some of the spicy lemon vinaigrette that I usually have in the fridge.  Guess what?  It was terrific.  I can imagine morphing that into a tangy fresh tomato lemon basil chutney.  Too bad my cherry tomatoes are about done in the garden (too cold at night to set fruit now).  Guess I'll have to spring for a tomato at the farmers' market.


I hear that one of our readers has tried the Curried Cabbage Bubble and Squeak Style from my last post.  She says it turned out great.  After I wrote that post, I was leafing through, wouldn't you know it, Lord Krishna's Cuisine, and it turns out that there is a dish called Charchari that results in a browned bottom similar to Bubble and Squeak.  The veggies are wet cooked first and then the heat is kept on until the liquid evaporates and the bottom gets charred.  Then the charred part is stirred into the rest and people probably fight to get the yummy browned bits.

So what is the moral of our story?  Fusion works.

Okayu

1/4 cup sushi rice (or any short grain rice)
1/2 cake of tofu
2 cups water
about 2 cups of finely shredded spinach and napa cabbage (your choice of one or both)

for Japanese version
1T of a light miso
1T umeboshi paste
Freshly grated ginger to taste
Lemon juice to taste

for Indian version
1T oil
1T each nigella seeds, fennel seeds, mustard seeds
freshly grated ginger to taste

For Japanese version place all ingredients in a pot, except the ginger and lemon juice.  Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to low and cook for about 30-45 minutes until the rice is completely soft and almost disintegrated.  Garnish with ginger and lemon.  Can use some soy sauce as well.

For Indian version, temper the seeds in oil for a minute until they darken, then add rice, tofu, water and greens.  Cook as above and garnish with ginger.