When I first started writing about cooking with Japanese ingredients in unorthodox yet simple and delicious ways, way back in the 90s in Japan, I knew that I couldn’t be the ONLY person interested in cooking this way. I knew that using global ingredients to breathe fresh life into simple dishes we already know how to cook — eggs, salads, rice dishes, simply prepared fish and meat dishes, pasta, etc. — was fun, nourishing, liberating, healthy, and even life-changing — because our steady stream of really happy guests confirmed it. Busy people who grew up eating “ethnic” cooking in restaurants were especially open to simple combinations of great produce/meats/fish with “ethnic” flavors like miso, tamarind, lemongrass, umeboshi, etc., with recurring starring roles from ace ingredients like Greek yogurt, pickled ginger, flavored salts, fresh herbs in large quantities, good oils, etc. Sometimes in my cooking classes I hand out the above schemata just to give the whole idea a slightly more visual flavor.
I’ve been encouraged by all the comments, emails, and feedback I get from readers. It’s kind of a cool little tribe we have here, and I’m grateful to the entire breakaway community.
My idea du jour: I’d love to open up this space to anyone who’d like to contribute a short essay and photo on some aspect of breakaway cooking. If you’ve got a killer breakaway dish, idea, or even experience that you think the community would enjoy, just let me know. I will of course continue to do most of the writing, but the parachuting of our baby daughter into the world sometime around November 21 means, perforce, that I’ll have a lot less time on my hands! Lots more on that development later!
That sounds like fun.
…and congratulations!
and interesting.
A new baby girl! How exciting! On the Breakaway side; my husband and I are planning a small dinner using your recipes, highlighting the umeboshi chicken dish which we love. Still trying to get the menu finalized hoping to combine things without one dish overpowering another. I may have some questions about recipe combinations before we actually sit down for dinner. Love your cookbooks!
It's wonderful to hear that you're going to have an addition to the family, but that passive sentence and it's skydiving imagery – "the parachuting of our baby daughter into the world" – have got to go! Here's hoping it will be a safe birth and a healthy baby.
Chef! I am excited for you both. I have a few recipes that I reworked from Asian classics. Happy to submit, what are the parameters? Sure miss seeing you both. I would also like to feature menus from my favorite chef friends in Jan- March at my cooking classes at Standards of Excellence Appliances. May we discuss? Ok, really, I need to just set a date to see you both. When?
Thanks everyone. But Scott, the birth canal is a kind of chute! :^)
Anne, yes, the trick is indeed to avoid overpowering. It's good to have something relatively neutral-ish to return to between bites of intense things.
Rachelle, thanks! But we're not looking for recipes really; it's more about the thought process that goes into a dish, cooking without a map, and using global ingredients in easy, and sometimes surprising, ways, all the while keeping it as healthy and nutritious as possible. Maybe 200 to 400 words, or even more if you need it. The best way to get the feel for the space would be to read lots of entries — you'll notice that there are very few recipes. The exception is a dish that's too hard to imagine without more concrete guidelines…..
I've been thinking about this guest posts idea of yours. You've covered a lot of breakaway ideas. There are a few things that you've done that I thought of before never did such as the flavored and umami salts. I'm supposed to do a post of other umami salts that uses dried fish, seaweeds and toasted seeds.
I have some turmeric today and I'm going to your fried turmeric chips. But there were be some extra turmeric so I'm planning to do some pickled turmeric, just like you did with the ginger slices.
It's probably one of those days that I couldn't think of a breakaway idea. But anyway, congratulations. I almost forgot that.
congratulations!