Micul Micul how to eat you

Mijuk Guk | Mother's soup | Korean Seaweed Soup

Ingredients:
1/2 cup of Dry seaweed (Wakame | Mijuk)
3 Tbs Roasted sesame oil
3 Tbs Roasted sesame seeds
1-2 cloves of garlic
1 white onion
70ml of soup soy sauce (or regular soy sauce)
Salt to taste
800 ml water


Soak the seaweed for at least 10 min into water until it gets fully hydrated and set aside. Bring the water in a cooking pot slowly to simmer, add 1-2 cloves of minced garlic for taste. Add the soy sauce for adjusting taste to its correct saltiness. Add the seaweed and let it simmer for 10 min. Cut the onions to 4mm strips (lengthwise) and add them at the last to the soup with the roasted sesames and sesame oil. This soup can be also eaten with shiitake, beefstock or seashells, but I prefer the vegan way. It's easy and quick to cook. The nutty taste of roasted sesames goes so well with the Wakame.

Nori Parmesan Chips

Ingredients:
50g of Parmesan
10g of Nori


Grate the parmesan. Cut or pull the dry nori into thin stripes. I used the Chinese nori product not the Japaneses nori sheets. You can pull them apart more easily and therefor they are in their original wild shape. Use a fry pan and heat it to middle till hot temperatures. Add the parmesan first and create a circular shape form with parmesan of at least 5mm. Add the Nori directly on top of it to create a nice pattern, it does not need to be fully covered but a bit more than sprinkled is nice. Backe the parmesan chips on both sides on lower to middle temperature. Make sure not to burn them. Let them cool down on a baking paper so they get hard and crisp. This ships can be eaten like this or then served on top of a salad or as garnish for nice plating technics.

Nori Tsukedani

This recipe I learnt from a local fishery association in Japan, close to the sumiyoshi shrine, near Uto, Kumamoto. It is the birthplace of the nori cultivation as Kathleen Drew Baker brought it to the nori industry back in the 1950's. The fisher women told me this recipe as they sell this product directly from their association. It is actually to not waste the precious nori but preserve it into a mouth watering delicious sweet nori paste. Some people also call it nori confiture or similar to a chutney.

Ingredients:
4 nori seaweed (full sheet)
Seasonings:
- 2 Tbsp mirin
- 2 tsp sugar
- 2 Tbsp soy sauce
- 2 Tbsp of soy vinegar or white vinegar


Tear the nori sheets into small pieces, then roast them first in the fry pan without oil. Add the Seasonings to create a jam like mixture adding the vinegar as a last step. Heat the pot over medium heat and simmer, stirring occasionally with chopsticks or a spatula, until most of the liquid has evaporated.
Eat the tsukedani on top of rice or silken tofu. The sweet and savory taste is rich in umami and keeps your appetite sealed.

Tipp:
If you want to keep the Nori Tsukedani for a longer period then it is recommendable to store it in sterilized jars. This you can do, by using an old or new jar, add boiled hot water to the half if the jar and close the lidd for 10-20 min. After you can empty the hot water and add the tsukidani directly into it until the jar is full. To be properly safe take a third step and boil the now closed jar with the tsukedani again in a pot of hot water for 20 min, therefore you are safe that the jar is sterilized and can be kept to up to one year.

Topped Tofu with Nori Tsukedani

Western people usually dont prefer to eat tofu, saying it tastes too plain. But this can be helped if prepared properly! The lightness of silk tofu topped with some tasty toppings can bear wonders. This way it can become a delightful dish that is full of taste and umami. You can top silken tofu with all kinds of fermented or shoyu based sauces with mixed with fresh ingredients (garlic, scallions, onions, peers?)

Ingredients:
- 250g of silk Tofu
- 1-2 Tbs of Nori-Tsukedani (sea above)
- 2-3 red small radish or 1 small piece of white daikon radish
- 1-2 scallions
- roasted sesame seeds


Prepare the Nori Tsukidanit as above. Cut the scallions in fine stripes, set a side. Grate the radish and set aside. Place the silken tofu softly on a flat plate, remove the excessive water, make sure not to break its texture to keep it as a cube. Top the silken tofu with 1. Nori-Tsukedani 2. grated radish 3. scallions 4. roasted sesame seeds.

Cochayuyo Ceviche

Cochayuyo is a native seaweed in Chile, it is eaten by the indigenous people of the Mapuche. The stem is like a thick rope, that is rehydrated in water and then cooked like a Mexican ceviche. The word "cochayuyo" is also used to describe a sexual intercourse, describing the alien like queer appearance and consistency of eating cochayuyo.

Ingredients
- 50g of cochayuco
- juice of two lemons
- 1/2 onion
- cilantro a bundle (you can play with local herbs, that are strong in taste
- salt and pepper
- fresh cherry tomato
- an avocado (optional)


How to:
soak the cochayuo over night in water. drain and wash well. chop it up in 1cm small pieces. poor the lemon juice over it and let it sit for 20min. meanwhile chop the onion, tomatoes and chilatro. mix it with the cochayuo. if desired add an avocado to generate a more creamy texture.

Sauce Neophyte

Sauce Néophyte This recipe uses Spirulina (Arthrospira platensis) as a base sauce was invented as a recipe to feed space astronauts to comfort them on their way to Mars. The green lush color should remind them on the green plants on planet Earth. The spirulina, a cyanobacteria, can serve for the purpose to cultivate a new biosphere on the new planet and oxygen created forms a new habitat for living. The sauce is also good to be served with kebab or French fries.

Ingredients
-4 Dl Mayonaise
-4 Dl Greek Yoghurt unsweetened
-3 tps dashi or salt
- 4 tps wasabi paste
- 3 tps spirulina powder
How to:
Mix yoghurt and Mayonnaise in a big salad bowl. Mix the spirulina powder, wasabi, dashi with a bit of water to create a liquid paste. Add this liquid paste to the yoghurt and mayonnaise. Stir with a whisker to create a think sauce, fill it into an icing bag for serving. Its for decorating patterns directly on the table

Horangi Onigiri

A dish that is as simple as everyday picknick but still has the potential to impress ambassadors. It is eloquent or a left over recipe. Every family in Japan carries their own Onigiri recipe. The variations are endless: The fillings can be either inside or all over mixed into the rice. The quality of the added flavors are the key, as well as good quality Nori and at the end the perfect combinations of mixing all ingredients. Sushi is a perfect balance of sweet, salty and sour.

Ingredients
500 g of sushi rice
5 cornichons
1 hand of coriander/chilantro or negi negi
2-3 dried shitake
1 raw beetroot 1/2 cup water
1/4 cup of soya sauce
1 Tbsp white sugar

Rice marinate:
- 0.5 dl white sake vinegar
- 2 Tbs sugar
- 1-2 tbs good salt
- 2 Tbs black and white sesame


How to:
Soak the shitake and separately in cold water for minimum 2h. Cook the rice in the rice cooker or in a pot. Cut the shiitake into brunoise (tiny cubes) fine cubes and boil them with soya sauce and mirin, water and sugar for 7 min, afterwards drain the shiitake and keep the soy sauce for later. Cut the raw beetroot into brunoise (tiny cubes) cut and fry them in sesame oil with only salt and pepper for about 10 min. Cut the chilantro/negi in fine cutted herbs. Chop the cornichons into brunoise (tiny cubes) in fine cuts. At the end add all the ingredients to the prepared sushi rice.
Sushirice:
Cook the rice, use a rice cooker let the rice cool down a bit, take a fan, and air blow it. add the marinate into the optimal balance between sour, salty and sweet add all the ingredients from the first step to the sushi rice, stir the ingredients softly under the rice. You never want to be mean to your rice and smash or squash it. Your rice is ready to be formed into Onigiris. Form Onigiris by using the palms of your both hands. Your hand actually used in optimal way, give a triangular shape to the onigiris by hand.

Fake Caviar

Using a bit of molecular kitchen is always a good start into the alchemy of chemical processes and behavior of materials. Using Alginate as a base for thickening liquids and calcium lactate to mantle the liquid into caviar shaped tiny teardrops, makes every taste into fake caviar. I usually prefere to use ingredients that have a strong and pungent taste, like kimchi, shitake or then truffles.

Ingredients
250 ml of preferred liquid juice of any kind, sweet like juices or salty like strong shitake broth or soysauc inuced with truffles. make sure you adapt the amount of salt or sugar a tiny bit stronger than in usual cooking. '
3 g Natriumalginat'
250 ml Water'
2 ½ g Calciumlactat'


How to:
Blend the liquid juice and alginate with a hand blender. First, pass the alginate through a fine sieve into the apple juice. Then heat the mixture until just before boiling and let it cool until no more bubbles are visible. Dissolve the calcium lactate in cold water. Draw your liquid juice mixture into a large syringe and let it drip into the water solution. After a few seconds, pour everything through a sieve. Collect and reuse the water solution. Rinse the bubbles in the sieve with clear water. I used the bubbles as an addition to sparkling water as an aperitif for children and people who don't like alcohol. You can also use other juices.

Tartar d’Algue

Tartar d’Algue is a original recipe from the Atlantic coast of France. Apparently it must be very old and tells also about the food habits of the costal people who lived with fish and seaweed. This tartar contains up to four different kinds of algae that indicates the diversity that they have on site.

Ingredients
- 35 g dehydrated or fresh seaweed of your choice: nori, wakame,
dulce, lettuce, or a mixture in flakes
- 1 small shallot or red onion
- 4-5 cornichons
- same amount of capers
- juice of a small lemon
- vinegar from cornichons and capers
- 3-4 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce (Tamari, for example)


How to:
Finely chop the cornichons, capers, garlic and shallots (or blend with a mini chopper). Mix all the ingredients together. If the seaweed is dehydrated, it will rehydrate with the olive oil and ingredients. Adjust the seasoning if necessary, and add more olive oil if required. Set aside in the fridge to rehydrate (around 15 minutes). This seaweed tartar can be used as a condiment to enhance a dish (burger, buckwheat pancake, tortillas, wrap, etc.) or as an aperitif on a salad leaf, endive or as a dip... or on toast. You can add spices or aromatic herbs for a more original touch.

Blue-Pink Future Fruit Jellies

This is a jelly dessert based on agar agar. It is well known in Asia but not so much in the West. The special texture of jelly is currently only receiving a lot of attention. The main ingredient Agar Agar is originating from red algae species. It is full of collagens, so good for our skin and joints.

Ingredients:
3 Strawberries
1 Tbsp Dried Cranberries (or other dried tangy fruit)
1 tbsp of rose peppers
15g g of Agar Agar powder
Blue Spirulina Powder for coloring
400ml of sweet liquid (strawberry milk, mojito highball, sirup, sugary sweets)
Petridishes for plates, lid and bottom


How to: Cut the fruits in small unit and maximum 4mm thick pieces. They should all fit into the petri dishes. Add the agar agar powder to the liquid and bring it slowly to boil while continuously stirring. Take care that you will not produce too many air bubbles. Stir for about 5 minutes and then let it sit and cool down for 1-2 minutes. Pour a first layer of agar agar liquid into the petri dish not more than about 3mm thick to cover the bottom. Immediately add fruits in the shape and pattern you desire add some sparkles for decoration, you can be playful. Cover it with a second layer of agar agar liquid. Let it sit aside and cool down.

Green Century Eggs

Wakame (Undaria pinnatifida) is the base of this recipe. A new fusion recipe on how to cook with algae, this recipe was invented during a workshop in discussions on speculative evolution and how animals could become a plants.

Ingredients
- 3 eggs
- 3 g wakame (Undaria pinnatifida)rehydrated
- Aluminium foil
- toothpicks or tweezer

How to: Openthe raw eggshell with a sharp knife on the very top end, like a bird pecking at its shell to hatch. (it needs just a tiny whole) Soak the dry wakame in cold water to rehydrate it. The wakame changes color to from dark/black green to almost vivid green and its texture becomes silky and mushy. Take one blade of wakame, insert the rehydrated wakame into the egg using a toothpick. Take care not to bruise the egg yolk. Use the toothpick to push the wakame deeper into the egg, that it nestles under and around the yolk. Add another 2 blades of wakame in the same manner. Repeat with all five eggs. Seal the eggs with a single blade of wakame. Wrap the eggs in aluminium foil. Boil them for ten minutes and cool them under cold water. Open the eggs in two halves, cutting through the long side, admire the sinuous patterns the wakame has created inlayed in the egg white.

Vegan Kimchi

Spicy fermented napa cabbage with kombu instead of fishssauce
Ingredients:
• 3 whole napa cabbages
• 3% Salt of the volume of cabbages
• 50 g rice powder (sweet rice flour)
• 1 Kombu for kombu dashi (7x12cm)
• 4dl of water
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 8-10 cloves garlic
• 2 thumb-sized (or larger) piece of ginger
• 1 bunch spring onions or young leeks
• ½ tbsp miso
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 carrot
• 1 apple
• ⅓ daikon radish
• 3–5 tbsp Korean chili flakes (gochugaru), depending on desired heat



Preparation:
Split the napa cabbages into 4 parts (tear them rather than cut) and salt all the leaves thoroughly. You can cut them in mouth size pieces or leave as quarters. Let them rest overnight in a large container, covered with a kitchen towel. The next day, rinse the cabbage. It is properly salted when the leaves squeak when squeezed — and you’ll also notice the surfaces have turned slightly translucent/glassy. Make the marinade:
Soak the kombu in cold water for minimum 2h. Bring the rice flour to a simmer with the kombu dash water. It should have the consistency of a thick sauce — adjust with more water or rice flour as needed. Let it cool. Peel the apple, ginger, and garlic and purée them into a paste. Mix this into the marinate together with the chili flakes, sugar, soy sauce, and a little miso. Wash the chili peppers well and slice them thinly on the diagonal into stripes. Do the same with the carrot, daikon, and spring onions. Add everything into the marinade and take a good smell. Before adding the marinade to the cabbage, wash the cabbage several time under cold runing water. Squeze the water out of the cabbage, as if you would squeeze a piece of silk towel. Then massage the marinade into and between all the napa cabbage leaves. Pack everything tightly into a fermentation vessel (an ongi, a small sauerkraut crock, or glass jars all work). Press it down firmly and cover. Let it sit at room temperature for one day, then move to the fridge — or store the whole crock in the cellar. A stable temperature between 7–16 °C ensures a slow and even fermentation. Let it ferment and rest for 1 week to 10 days. The kimchi can be enjoyed as long as it isn’t too sour yet — roughly 2-4 months depending on season and storage conditions. Do not throw away kimchi that has become too sour — it can still be cooked with (fried rice, dumplings, or kimchi stew).