Pabu Izakaya, Baltimore

   One thing lacking in the Baltimore restaurant scene is a true Japanese restaurant. Most of the sushi restaurants in the area are Chinese or Korean run. I was very excited when they announced that Pabu, an izakaya run by chefs Ken Tominaga and Michael Mina, would open in the Four Seasons at Harbor East. I'm already a fan of Wit & Wisdom, Mina's first restaurant in Baltimore. I was also excited to hear that desserts would be made by pastry chef Chris Ford.
   Pabu is also promoting itself as having a master sake sommelier, Tiffany Dawn Soto, so when I first arrived for an early Mother's day meal with my parents and aunt & uncle, I ordered a sake cocktail, the Super X, made with Lillet Blanc, junmai ginjo, yuzu, and housemade falernum, a kind of simple syrup. It had a good tartness and sweetness to it.

   Since Pabu is an izakaya, we ordered a lot of small plates, starting with a couple tempura dishes. First was a dish with maitake mushroom and some seasonal vegetables.
   They also inadvertantly served us a plate of the meso anago (young eel) tempura.
Both dishes were beautifully fried, and in particular the eel was great.

   We ordered Jako, a small dish of minnows seasoned with ginger, shiso and goma. It's like the Japanese equivalent of beer nuts, a salty snack to pair with drinks.
   My father and I wanted to try their Rappahannock oysters served with a tasty ponzu sauce.

   Next was soy braised lotus root with sesame seeds and thin chili threads.
   I always order the shishito peppers if they are on the menu. They served a bowl with at least 20 or so peppers, nicely charred, topped with shredded bonito and seasoned with shoyu.

   Pabu's edamame dish had a nice flair to it as it was seasoned with chili oil and smoked salt giving it a good kick in flavor.

   Our next course was hirame wrapped uni tempura. They came as small nuggets on the stick. When you bit into it, you first would hit the delicious white fish meat and in the center was the wonderful sea urchin.

   We then proceeded to get several items from their Robata grill. First to come out was tiny Japanese eggplants served with a miso sauce. It was good, but I thought the sauce was a little heavy.
   We then got ika yaki, or whole grilled squid. It came with a side of the yellow Japanese style mayo.

   I really loved the beef tendon. It was soft and seasoned with a wonderful yuzu kosho ponzu sauce.
   We also got kokoro, sake-cured chicken hearts, which reminded me of very tender gizzards, and kariganebone, the shoulder blade of the chicken.
Somehow, they ended up giving us an extra order the the shoulder, but boy, was it good.

   My folks also really liked the erengi mushroom skewers served with garlic and more shishito peppers.
   After the small plates, each of us ordered a "main"  of either noodles or rice.
I ordered a tasting of nigiri sushi. Chef flies some fish all the way from Tsukiji market in Tokyo for the sushi.
   The rice was awesome, and the selection of fish was pretty amazing including mackerel, yellowtail, sea bream, and horse mackerel.

   My mother and aunt ordered Michael's Chicken Noodle, a chicken ramen with a really flavorful broth.

   My uncle ordered the soba noodles. It included a quail egg to mix with the dipping sauce.

   My dad had the unagidon which included a piece of foie gras on top the the freshwater eel.

  Of course we had to order dessert. With a pot of coffee from Lamill, first we had a deconstructed sesame ice cream sundae. In the large bowl was ice cream with cocoa meringues. In the smaller bowls, there was black tapioca, togarashi chocolate sauce, and caramel crumble.
 

   We also ordered the dessert omakase, a plate with four dessert items. There was a white chocolate bar loaded with whiskey. I really loved the honey panna cotta topped with yuzu gelee and tapioca.
   It also came with a green tea sorbet with lemon grass, melon and pineappple, and a small mochi with miso caramel ice cream.
   I'm already looking forward to go back to try promising looking items like Maryland crab okonomiyaki, octopus poke, and tsukune, as well as some ambitious looking rolls. 

200 International Drive
Baltimore, MD
(410)223-1460

Kushi Izakaya & Sushi, DC

I'm pretty insistent on eating Japanese food only if it's actually made by Japanese. Being based in Baltimore, most if not all "Japanese" or "sushi" places are either run by Chinese or Koreans, so I don't really eat Japanese cuisine much. I've been looking forward to get to Kushi Izakaya & Sushi Restaurant in DC for some time, and thanks to a recent Groupon, I had my chance last weekend.

We started with several small plates. First we had kimpira, simmered burdock root. This was followed by nagaimo, mountain yam, which had the crispiness of an Asian pear, but is also a little slimy like okra. Both are supposed to be medicinal, but I don't know how. They just tasted good to me.
I also quite enjoyed the grilled corn with soy butter.

We ordered a few items from Kushi's Kushiyaki (grilled skewers) menu: nankotsu (soft chicken bone), kawa (chicken skin), and shishito peppers. I liked the bone/cartilage- it was not so soft, but I think I'll have healthy bones and teeth later. The skin was really crispy and juicy, and the peppers were very spicy.
We then followed this with yakionigiri, grilled rice balls. These had some sour plum inside

For our sushi course, we got the deluxe platter and opted for more nagaimo in our maki roll. All the fish was really fresh and delicious, and the rice was superb. I also added some uni and a wasabi scallop roll.
For dessert, I had some hoji tea with a trio of mochi: green tea, vanilla, & mango.



465 K Street NW
Washington DC
(202)682-3123

Lunch at Morimoto, Philadelphia

The problems with living in Baltimore is no real authentic Japanese restaurants nearby. I need to go to DC for the closest sushi place because the places in Baltimore are all either Chinese or Korean run.
When I was in Philadelphia, I was lucky to have enough time to grab some lunch, so I went to Morimoto, the first name restaurant of Iron Chef Japan.
I ordered the Shoyu ramen with pork belly and soft boiled egg. Oh, it was so good.
I then ordered two pieces of sushi: the Madai (red seabream snapper) and the Uni (sea urchin roe). I had never had the Madai before, but it was so fresh and a perfect bite. Of course, the urchin was just like butter. Sigh- I wish I live closer to good sushi.

723 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA
(215) 413-9070‎

Azami Sushi Cafe, LA

While staying in LA with Coprock & his family, one night, we decided to get some takeout sushi. Coprock knew of a place, Azami Sushi Cafe on Melrose which I had eaten at in the past. One interesting thing to note is that the sushi chefs are women. Regardless, this is one of the best sushi places anywhere. The fish selection is amazing good and fresh.

I ordered some toro which was just spectacular. I was also blown away by the yellowtail belly sushi as well.
I also got a creamy blue crab hand roll that was so good.
Coprock's favorite was the red snapper sushi.

We also shared an order of anchovy tempura with curry salt. Next time I go back, I want to try the omakase at Azami.

7160 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90046
Phone: (323) 939-3816

UPDATE: Unfortunately as of July 2008, Azami has changed ownership and is not the same place. Niki supposedly can be found in Arcadia, CA now.

Fresh sushi

Redneckhunter has a friend who's a real redneck hunter and fisher. Last weekend he caught a big one, and we got to reap the benefits.




Nothing beats freshly caught tuna. We ate it as sashimi and I made a couple rolls too. This happened to be the night after brownie's shower - man, what an amazing food day!

Girls Cooking Night: Raw Food

The girls and I had our most ambitious cooking night yet. We decided to make raw foods, as in the "Raw Food" movement. Brownie pointed us to this Green Chefs site for recipe ideas.















We started out with Melissa's delicious fruit and tomato gazpacho, and Kim's whitefish and scallop ceviches.









I made nori rolls which used cauliflower chopped in the blender to mimic the rice.



I think perhaps only brownie and Marian truly followed all the "Raw Food" rules -- nothing over 110 degrees and vegan. Fish, of course... not vegan. Nori... roasted. Dessert... made with honey.

Brownie's lasagna was not only pretty but yummy. The "cheese" was made of pureed pine nuts. The zucchini and tomatoes were sliced so thin to serve as the lasagna sheets. Marian's beet ravioli (also really pretty) had mandolined beets, soaked in olive oil and lemon as the pasta. The "cheese" filling was pureed cashews and seasonings, and a pureed red pepper sauce.


Debbie made desserts. The no-bake cookies were really good. Like cookie batter or peanut butter balls. The carrot cake was so rich and sticky-sweet, we could only eat tiny slivers. I had also made a tofu chocolate pudding. I've made this before with melted chocolate and it's yummy, but to follow the raw rules, I used cocoa instead. It came out soupier and less thick than with melted chocolate -- when the chocolate rechills I'm sure it helps gel up the pudding. Without that, it's just the tofu giving it any body. Maybe a firmer tofu would have helped.

Girls Cooking Night: Sushi

The first theme for our girls' cooking night was sushi. I opted to make guo tie (potstickers) as my contribution to complement the sushi.

I made the filling the night before: 1 lb ground beef and chopped mustard greens, mixed with salt, pepper, soy, sesame oil, and egg white. The tricky part of course is that you have to stuff the dumplings with raw filling, so it's hard to gauge if you've seasoned enough. I know I shouldn't but I usually taste a little of the raw filling...

The night of the party, I mixed the dough -- just 3 cups flour to one cup boiling hot water, mixed and kneaded well. The hot water gets the gluten in the flour going, and also allows the dough to cook quicker for fried dumplings. If you're steaming or boiling your dumplings, you can just use cold water. Then you cover the dough with a warm wet towel and let it sit for 45 minutes or so.

The dough should now be nice and springy and not at all sticky. I usually divide the dough into quarters, keeping whatever I'm not working with under the wet towel to stay moist. I form one quarter into a long snake (about 1 inch thick), then cut the snake into around 10 one-inch pieces.

Form each 1-inch piece into a little ball and start rolling, and rolling, and rolling... I ended up with 40 round wrappers.






Now it's time to wrap -- a spoonful of filing in the middle is enough - don't be too greedy. The dough should be pliable enough you can just push together to seal, but if it's starting to dry out, you can also use a little water.



I seal first on the top, then start at the bottom of the sides and crimp as I go up, to make them pretty.






Pour about 2 tablespoons of oil in a non-stick frying pan, and arrange all your dumplings in a pretty pattern.






Then add about 2 cups of water, put the pan on high, cover tightly, and let it go. Keep an ear out for when the pan starts to sizzle. After all the water has boiled off, the oil will crisp the bottoms.




Then the piece de resistance is to turn out all the guo tie onto a plate in one beautiful unbroken array.


While I'd been busy stuffing dumplings, the girls had been busy rolling sushi. They did quite nicely with the help up of some sushi packing and rolling implements.

















Rounded out the meal with sorbet, cookies, and mochi for dessert. Mochi is like the T1000 of desserts, you can cut it up all you want, but the pieces will just meld back together. In fact, I think this simple combo of sticky rice flour and sugar is basically what the ancient Chinese used as mortar between the bricks of the Great Wall! All in all a fun and yummy dinner!