dinner tonight

I've got two new recipes to share this evening that I think go spendidly together. These make a lovely meal in themselves, but they would also be great as side dishes next to some grilled or pan-seared teriyaki salmon.

"Fried rice" with toasted nori and gomaiso

Kale "egg foo young"

Please note and excuse the liberal use of quotation marks. Inspired by my latest cookbook purchase, Everyday Harumi, I have been experimenting with Asian flavors. In the post from a few weeks ago, I mentioned her delicious eggplant dish. These dishes are not from her book, but inspired by the flavors and ingredients I discovered there.

These recipes make a light and hearty meal for two in less than 30 minutes, and they are definitely healthier and cheaper than take-out!

For the rice:

1 cup short grain sweet brown rice, rinsed*

1 1/2 cups water

Generous tablespoon mirin (can be found in most grocery stores with other Asian specialty items. Look near the soy sauce...)

about 2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 sheet nori seaweed (this will probably be hanging out somewhere near the mirin in your grocery store)

1 tbsp black and tan gomaiso (ditto. Gomaiso is toasted sesame seeds with sea salt)

1 small scallion, finely chopped

*Rinsing rice removes phytic acid, which can prevent your body from absorbing essential minerals (like calcium and iron) from your food. Also, most rice is stored in large warehouses in large bins at some point in its journey to you, and you might want to wash off any little footprints or traces of warehouse critters, if you know what I mean ...

For the kale:


3-4 cups roughly chopped kale, larger bits of stem removed, and rinsed to remove any grit

4 eggs, beaten

about 1 tbsp olive oil

about 2 tbsp teriyaki sauce (yay, a shortcut! I like San-J brand: it's gluten-free, they use organic sugar not corn syrup, and I can pronounce all the ingredients)

1/2 tsp red chili flakes, optional

1 scallion, finely chopped

more gomaiso, if you like

First cook the rice. Add the rice and water to a medium pot and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to a simmer, and cover and cook for about 15 minutes, or until almost done. While the rice is cooking, toast the sheet of nori seaweed over low flame on your stove. If it catches on fire around the edges, that's ok. You just want it to turn a deep bright green and smells toasty and wonderful. Set aside. When the rice has absorbed the cooking water, add the mirin and soy sauce, stir well, and then turn off the heat, cover, and set aside.

Now for the kale. Heat the olive oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the kale, half of the chopped scallion, teriyaki, and chili flakes (if using). Stir and turn the kale until it turns bright green and then begins to cook down, about 3 minutes. Turn the heat very low, and pour the beaten eggs evenly over the top. As the edges of the eggs begin to cook, gently slide a spatula under the edge, then lift and tilt the pan towards the lifted edge to allow the uncooked egg to run underneath. Continue doing this around the pan until there is very little runny egg left on top of the "omelet." At this point, you will need to flip the omelet, which can be a little tricky. You can either attempt a flip with your spatula in the pan, or gently slide the omelet onto a plate, place the upside down pan on top, then carefully flip the whole thing. I recommend the latter, though if the omelet breaks, it's easily reassembled, and still delicious. Cook for another minute on the second side, then turn off the heat.

To dress the rice, crumble the toasted nori over the top, and sprinkle with gomaiso and scallions.

To dress the "egg foo young," slide the omelet onto a serving plate, top with scallions and more gomaiso if you like. I like to serve it with more teriyaki and soy sauce on the side.