December - finally on the upswing after a round of egg freezing (still so uncertain as to its efficacy and side effects but at least now I’m cleared of feeling like I should do it) and a very bad cold that struck during a trip on a snowless ski trip to Vermont. Stratton, you have never looked sadder than Christmas weekend with barely a third of the mountain open. Still skied two days of the same three runs on repeat because any skiing is better than none and I will put that Ikon pass to use, but god I cannot wait for Colorado, with its powder and its mountains.
Continuing with the question of what one brings to a ski trip, I baked a loaf of raisin-studded milk bread using my sourdough starter1 and sandwiched slices of it with Maranatha peanut butter and stuffed my pockets with said bread, walnuts, and almonds, feeling like a pre-hibernation squirrel . As I cannot with the very concept of bringing anything to a ski slope that cannot be carried on one’s person (time looking for a place to stow and also time spent buying food = time not spent skiing), I am very happy that David was find with this arrangement.
Latkes with lox, ikura, dill
Earlier this month, we also hosted Hannukah. My first time making latkes and I budgeted three pounds of potatoes for seven people using Rebecca Firkser’s oven-baked latke recipe to avoid stop-top frying. While everyone seemed to like the latkes (crisp, relatively greaseless), they take about 30 minutes to bake each batch. More importantly, three pounds was a shamefully inadequate amount and each latke was grabbed immediately as I scurried from oven to table. Next year, double the potatoes and David can fry them. We also made lox with bonito flakes using a Shalom Japan recipe that we sliced to serve alongside, but we might let the salmon sit for three days (and not two) next time. Happily, the leftover lox when cooked slowly transformed into something akin to salted shake and were the perfect accent for onigiri and ochazuke. I also got sucked into a rabbithole as to what makes salmon safe to eat raw and what does salting it do to enhance this? From what I can gather from Sho Spaeth’s piece, “cooking” with salt and/or acid does nothing to remove things like parasites and the best you can do is to find a fish monger that handles their fish carefully (i.e., cold temps, high turnover) as the only guarantee for anything is cooking your fish into oblivion.
Kabura (Japanese turnip), kintoki ninjin (red carrots), yuzu, and satoimo from Suzuki Farm for Oshogatsu (Japanese New Year)
Anyway, as I transition to Oshogatsu prep, I discovered, finally, of a source for something close to mirin at Yamadaya in the West Village. Mirin is a sweet rice wine (fermented) that is cited often in Japanese recipes alongside of the drier sake. As all of the mirin sources that I’ve found in the States to date however, have been facsimiles (“mirin type”) filled with sugar or corn syrup, I sub mirin for sake and compensate with additional sweetener in the form of Medjool dates or maple syrup.
This brands itself as a “fermented seasoning” and does not have any added sugars. A quick search of the website describes it as combining the “umami of mirin with the flavor of sake” - and touts that it can be used as a standalone in lieu of the standard sake/mirin combo.
Finally found some! This is the aji no haha brand.
I plan to use this for many osechi ryori (foods for Oshogatsu) this year. I plan to make:
kuromame (sweet simmered black beans)
kagamimochi (ceremonial and decorative stacked mochi)
datemaki (a rolled egg dish with fish) this is my favorite and I can’t buy it in New York. will report back if successful.
senmaizuke (pickled turnips)
I’d also like to make chikuzenni, which is a braise of lotus root, burdock, chicken, carrot, and konnyaku (I love my dad’s version), but I can’t find lotus root anywhere int this city! Sources?
Also of course, ozoni (my family’s version is ubiquitous in western Japan and uses white miso, satoimo, daikon, carrots, and tofu in a kombu / white miso broth, but I might try some additional ozoni this year). This website features an ozoni map of different variations throughout Japan. Ozoni can vary immensely by the ingredients, the shape of the mochi, whether the mochi are toasted, the inclusion of miso… I imagine that the variations are endless.
This version, featuring a clear katsuo/kombu broth, shoyu, and mitsuba is similar to what my dad grew up with in Osaka, even though this is tracked to Ishikawa on the map.
My mother was gifted a treasure trove of yuzu in Nara
Random things I’m liking
Next to a store specializing in wooden bowls in Vermont, we found a bakery that does just that (and then David bought gleefully ordered one of everything because possibly his sweet tooth is bigger than mine). A Sicilian cassata cake - a sponge cake filled with ricotta cream and almond paste, surrounded by a sweet short crust; lebkuchen, pferfernusse, and speculaas; pistachio olive cake; calvados pear cake; linzer tortes; swirled Danish butter cookies selling for 75 cents apiece. The walls were lined with kilos of King Arthur flour and Callebaut chocolate.
As the only thing hindering me from batches of cookies, decorating cakes, and making more use of my sourdough starter is what to do with the output (one can only punt so much to the climbing gym now disappointingly rebranded as Movement post-acquisition), I harbor bakery dreams. But not a bakery where I have to bake the same things on repeat, but one where I could bake one single Swedish princess cake and sell slices alongside a Japanese castella.
Just one layer of the cookies (not including the cakes!) from Starfire Bakery in Wilmington, VT
Anyway, how amazing would it be to somehow remain solvent amidst such an eclectic and random collection of sweets? In beautiful Vermont -- even if the skiing is terrible it is certainly better than New York.
The Boy and the Heron - Absolutely gorgeous, even if I don’t follow the significance of all of the birds. Possibly the last Miyazaki? But also his fourth time coming out of retirement so hopefully we will be blessed with more yet! If you have not yet read this piece about the Ghibli Park, highly recommend!2
Appropriate - I saw this in previews, so it might have been trimmed down since. It dragged on at times in previews, but some scenes made me laugh more than anything on stage recently, and of course the cast!
SPY X FAMILY Season 2! - More Anya, always.
And finally, I read that possibly using bowls (lined with saran wrap) to shape the kagamimochi could work better than free forming it. I think I agree, but will remember to line the wrap with mochiko as well to prevent excess sticking.
A recipe for said bread - I’m still figuring out how best to get it to poof. Compared to the recipe I’ve previously shared using active dry yeast, this one does not poof as much. This could be due to an anemic starter that I only feed once a week, or because I am not proofing it long enough before baking.
Sourdough Milk Bread
30g starter
100g whole wheat flour
30g water
10g sugar
Mix and let sit for 6-8 hours (I’ve gone longer).
Starter
220g bread flour
160g whole milk
10g sugar
1.5t diamond crystal kosher salt
15g butter
Combine with all of the starter and knead in stand mixer (add butter last). Let rise for 1-2 hours.
Separate into 3 pieces. Let sit for 10 minutes. Shape. Let rise until it fills 8/10 of the pan.
Bake at 375 degrees for 40 minutes.
This excerpt of the father-son dynamic, for example:
Goro [Hayao Miyazaki’s son] agreed to step out of the real world and into the world of his father. He agreed to direct a Studio Ghibli film.
It did not go well. Goro’s film, “Tales From Earthsea,” lacked the energy that defined his father’s work: the throbbing physicality, the restless joy, the moral ambiguity. It was, to be blunt, stiff and humorless. The villain cackled. The hero was noble. At a screening, Miyazaki walked out after only an hour. “It felt like I’d been in there for three hours,” he said, despondently, before reluctantly heading back in.