Ricotta vs. Béchamel Sauce for Lasagna

I didn't have an oven when I was in Japan.  It doesn't come with a stove like in USA.  So I was so excited to have one in the tiny tiny studio apartment in NYC.  I had a good recipe for meat sauce so I knew that would make great lasagna.  Since all the lasagna I had in the States were layered with ricotta cheese, I started to make it with ricotta.  I liked it, and J liked it.  I vaguely remembered that lasagna I had in Italian restaurants in Tokyo were usually made with béchamel sauce, but I thought that it was because it's hard to get ricotta cheese in Japan.  But as I lived in USA, I found that Italian cooking books suggest béchamel sauce for lasagna.  But using ricotta is so much easier.  You just have to go to store for it whereas you have to MAKE béchamel sauce.  So once a while I made lasagna with béchamel sauce when I feel like working hard.  J said it tasted different.  Not bad, but not same.  I didn't quite like the reaction, so I continued cooking with ricotta.

But One day, I realized that the milk gravy that is used for southern fried chicken is basically béchamel sauce.  I am not sure why fried food has to be smothered with butter, milk and flour, but it tastes good and J likes food like that, so I made fried chicken with milk gravy.  

And there was left over milk gravy a.k.a. béchamel sauce in the pan.  I had all the ingredients to make Lasagna next day.  So I decide to make 2 kinds of lasagna to compare the taste.

We definitely preferred the one with béchamel sauce.  It brings the taste of meat forward whereas the ricotta is watering down (or ricottaing down?) the taste of the meat.  I was wondering béchamel sauce will be too rich, but, no, it compliments the tanginess of tomato sauce and evens out the complexity of vegetables while the taste of ground beef and liver is brought to spotlights.  It was perfect.

I guess I will make lasagna with béchamel sauce now on.  

I finally started to sew something other than curtains.  It is so nice to sew in my own sewing room.  I'm making a dress for my daughter to wear for wedding next month.  

12 years old is not easy to make a dress for.  It can't be too cute, but it can't be too adult.  Such a complex  age.... The last bit of childhood is still there.  As much as I hope her to grow up, I will probably miss it when it is gone.

Spring is here and so are the Farmers Markets

The farmer's markets in my area are finally opened.  I am so happy!  Even though the scale of the markets are much smaller compared to Union Square Farmer's Market, there are lots of nice local produces.  And each town has their own market, so I can visit different ones easily and that's fun, too.

Tomatoes are very reasonable at the market and the wether is getting warm, so I decided to make fresh tomato pasta one day.  This recipe is adapted form the cook book written by Sophia Loren, the Italian actress, which was translated to Japanese and published in 74.  My parents must have bought it when it came out.  It is really a precious cooking book for me.  Same version translated in English is published in 98 as " Sophia Loren's Recipes and Memories".  The English version has more pictures of the actress and nicely styled food photos, but the Japanese one has more recipes.  

* Fresh Tomato Pasta (For 4)*

2 large tomatoes

10 green olives

3 teaspoon capers

1/2 small onion

A bunch of parsley

2 cloves garlic

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1 table spoon oregano

Salt and pepper to taste

1 box of your favorite pasta 

< 1 > Chop tomatoes to bite size.  Chop olives and capers to small pieces.  Mince onion and parsley.  Crash garlic with the blade of large knife so the extract will seep out. 

< 2 > Put everything together and keep it in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours.  (It will keep 1-2 days).

< 3 > Just boil the pasta to al dente and pour the tomato sauce over and serve.  Don't forget to take out the garlic cloves.

I always feel like that I should put fresh squeezed lemon juice in when I'm putting all the ingredients together, but it is not called for.  The tartness from olive and caper is enough, yet more gentle than lemon juice so the sweetness of the tomato stands out more.

Don't press garlic through a garlic press.  The juice comes out from the crashed cloves is just right amount of garlic taste.  More than that will be overbearing.  A slight garlic taste is more suited for this dish.  I have to admit that even though I'm a garlic lover.

This pasta makes me feel like it is finally spring.  It was nice weekend lunch.  Although we had a cold spell this week.  

The strawberries are in season right now, too.  I found a gallon of them for $10.  That is a lot of strawberries and we ate them in many ways.

Strawberries with pancakes, strawberry mojito, strawberry and grapefruits sorbet, strawberry roll cake, strawberry and rhubarb pie.....  They were all very enjoyable.  Simple strawberry sorbet is in my freezer right now.

Other thing that I must write is these donuts at the Farmer's Market.  These donuts are very famous in this area.  Mennonites fry them and glaze them right in front of your eyes.  I am not a big donut fan.  Not a even small fan either.   I only eat them every 3 to 5 years.  I love sweets like tarts and cakes, but I was never attracted to donuts. 

There is always a long line of people trying to buy these donuts.  The first time I saw it, I though: they are probably good, but I definitely wouldn't stay in the line for 20 minutes to get something like donuts!  But J sent me for them one day because he ate it at his office and it was very good.  The day, the market was not too crowded because it was early and drizzling a little, so I stayed in line for 5 minutes.

These donuts are not donuts that I knew.  It's fluffy, light, not greasy, not too sweet, has nice aroma of vanilla, so simple.  They are the best donuts I've ever eaten.

Now that I know that they are the donuts form heaven, I must fight the urge to stay in the line every time I go get fresh vegetables....  It is spring now and summer is around the corner.   I can't put on weight right now.

Financiers

I became addicted to come up with ideas for Financiers.  I guess I had never thought of using powder made of nuts until I started to making Financiers.  I love varying the nuts and adding different flavor to it.  

From left top to right bottom : Walnut and brown sugar with tiny bit of soy sauce .... tribute to Japanese sweets, Kurumi-Yubeshi.

Green tea Financier and basic financiers with chocolate shavings.

Basic financiers with chocolate chips.

Hazel nut and chocolate financiers.

Earl Grey Financiers with rose pedals.

Pecan financiers with chocolate swirl.

Strawberry financiers.

Pecan financiers with chocolate shavings.

Chocolate financiers with raspberries.

I love using walnuts and pecans!  Hazel nut is great with chocolate.  Cashew and coconut flake make financier more tropical.  There are so many ingredients to experiment with...  It's sometimes far from financiers.  Shall I call them nut cakes?  

My Room

I didn't have my own room until 18 since my parents and I lived in a small apartment in Tokyo.  I finally got a room all to myself when we moved to bigger apartment.  But I left the apartment 3 years after to a even smaller studio apartment in NYC with J.  After that, we moved to lots of places but I never had a room to myself.  I had a work space.... but it was shared with a bed room, office or dinning.  So this is so nice to have my own room even it's a tiny little space.  I can't make this room anything other than sewing room because of its size, but to be able to make the room to my taste is wonderful!

After putting the room together, I realized how much I missed sewing.  I couldn't open the boxes full of my things because of the renovations.  So I practically didn't have them around for over 6 months after we moved in.  I am not sure if I could work as a designer or seamstress like when I was in CT, but I do really hope to use this room a lot.

I loved making something pretty....  and I will do that again!

Busy April

It's been very busy in this April.  Finally the 2nd floor is done.  So it is ready to be painted....by us.  It's not a small space so it takes long time and a big effort to paint.  We finished J's room and my sewing room, but hallway and staircase are yet to be painted.

But it feels like spring now.  The dogwoods are beautiful outside of our house.  I enjoyed Magnolia and Cherry trees and now, Dogwoods are beautiful all over the town.

We have white and pale pink ones in front of the house.  I don't remember seeing them so much in NY area.  I like flowers that are not too fancy.  That's why Cherry Blossoms and Dogwoods make me so happy.

We got busy because of our new dog.  In addition to our 2 cats, we now have a Australian Shepherd puppy named Rosco.

He is yet to be 4 months old but twice bigger than the cat.  He will be twice bigger than how big he is now.  I never had a dog and I am not used to a big ones, so it is almost scary to see how fast he grows.  He is sweet and funny, but makes me crazy with the toilet training.  My daughter was much easier on the regard.

I'm missing time to bake this month....  Cooking became a choir because I'm so busy painting and moving things up stairs.

I hope things settle down a little bit so I can enjoy working in my kitchen again.

Southern Cooking and Sweets Cooked in March

I am interested in lots of kind of food.  When people ask me what I usually cook, it is very hard to answer.  I do cook Japanese naturally, but now that I'm living in TN, it's not easy to accomplish.  I also cook other Asian dishes....  Chinese, Korean Thai, Vietnamese.  But usually, I cook with more common ingredients so Italian and French influenced dishes appear a lot on the table.  

When I lived in Connecticut, my friends and I sometimes pick a town to visit in NY based on what kind of restaurants and stores available there.  We visited Bronx for Italian food, Brighton Beach for Russian, Astoria for Greek, etc...  When I have a chance to eat something that is from different culture, I am so happy to try it.

Nevertheless, I never liked Southern food that much even though my husband J is from Appalachia.  I guess the richness of frying food is not too appealing to me....  I know J wanted me to learn to cook good Southern food, but I didn't really take it seriously.

But one day, I baked biscuits.  J says that it's not supposed to be sweet like the ones in North.  I got the recipe that is not sweet and tried it.  It came out pretty tasty.  Even my daughter who never liked biscuits like it a lot.  

I baked cornbread other time since J wants to cut down gluten intake, I thought I'd give a try to bake cornbread with only corn meal.  

He also said that cornbread shouldn't be sweet like the ones in North.  So he liked my cornbread that didn't have any sugar in it.  It was fun baking in a pre-heated cast iron pan!

Somehow, now I am more open to cook southern food.  I am not a big fan of frying food, but I can certainly try to make some recipes less rich to suit my taste.  I think visiting Asheville was good for me in the regard.  I don't get to eat southern food in my town because it's not a tourists place so there is not much of Southern restaurants.  But place like Asheville has interesting Southern food.  More modernized, more healthy, more trendy....  Looking at them made me interested in it.  

Grits is one of the thing I picked up there.  It's practically Polenta...  I can put different kind of cheese in it.  I love it with fried green tomatoes!  It's not a heavy combination especially if I cook tomatoes in a little bi of olive oil.

There are lots to learn ....  But it at least started.  It's too bad I don't have hard core Southern relatives around me to teach. 

It's already April.  It was so warm yesterday.  But it went back several step today and I was wearing my coat this morning.  I hope to put it away soon.

So in March, I made these sweets.  I hope to try something new in April...

Hope

I finally am updating this blog since the disaster.  My family is doing fine.  But I have to admit it was like a roller coaster ride emotionally.  I finally feel settled down though.
My daughter and I were going to visit my parents on 19th.  We had to cancel the trip.
I can't describe how much it hurt me to read about the people who are effected by the earthquake and Tsunami, how much I am worried about my parents even though they are in Yokohama, and how much I'm concerned about the future of the country that I grow up in.  I was so depressed for last 2 weeks.  I am still worried.  My worries won't go away until the nuclear reactors are taken cake of.  But my parents are spending everyday as usual even though there is some inconvenience.  I hope we can get together soon.

I took my daughter to Asheville, NC since our plan to visit Japan during the spring break was not happening.  It's almost her birthday so it was like a early birthday celebration.  I too needed to get away for a while.  From the house renovation chaos.  From the potty training for a puppy we adopted that was driving me nuts in the current conditions.  From the frustrating 3 months long attempt to get my new defected dish washer exchanged.   From the news that makes me so worried and scared.
We had a nice mother and daughter time.  The weather was nice and warm.  The flowers were blooming.  I   finally felt seine for first time in 2 weeks.

Since where we live in East Tennessee, it is not easy to get good French, we went to a nice French restaurant.  We ate at a authentic Thai restaurant which doesn't exist around our town.  Unfortunately, Sushi was just passable, not that good.  I guess I can't ask too much.  We are in Appalachia to begin with.  The fresh seafood is not a mountain thing.  But we enjoyed eating North Carolina BBQ.  We also had modernized southern food which really suited my taste.

We went to Western North Carolina Farmers Market.  It's open all year around.  We bought jars of jams and pickles.  We also got ham, bacon and 2 lb. block of Amish butter.  We decided to snack on what we got.  My daughter washed a tomato and bit it.  I found Croissants from a corner which was run by a French men.  He told me that he was a french guy and the French makes everything tasty with thick French accent.  It made me smile.  How I wished I had a nice cup of Cafe au lait with it.   We opened the jar of pickled eggs.

It's so pink....It is kind of pretty if you don't think it's food....  But I ate it anyway.

My daughter likes sour food so she enjoyed it.  I think it's too sour.  But having a bite of sweet tomato balanced the flavor.

 We saw lots of flowers blooming.  I was so happy to see Cherry Blossoms.  Such a delicate pink unlike the pickled eggs.  Nothing too extravagant about it, but it simply is so pretty.

 Is there a Japanese person who don't like this flower?  It's the sign of spring.  People get together under the Cherry trees to have parties in spring.  

 Since the school year starts in April in Japan, the sight of Cherry Blossoms brought me back the feelings of hope and expectation for new start.  I needed it.

I hope they will bloom soon in Japan, and bring hopes to everybody there, too.