This little appetizer is my take on a dish I had a while ago at a Dim Sum restaurant in Ottawa. It was described on the menu as ‘Taiwan Pickled Vegetable’ and was chiefly cucumber with just a little red bell pepper and slivered ginger. I am not sure about the ‘dressing’… these were obviously salt-macerated ‘quick pickles’ and they were quite sweet, only a little sour, and had just a faint touch of chili heat… Continue reading “Taiwanese Pickle”
This dish was inspired by a cucumber salad I had in a Japanese restaurant not long ago. I haven’t tried to reproduce the exact dish (it was quite a spicy affair), but I did borrow the idea of using very thick slices rather than the much thinner ones you commonly see in Japanese cucumber appetizers… Continue reading “Dressed Cucumbers”
There all sorts of salads in Asian cuisine featuring cucumber (or other veggies) which are first salted and then later served in a dressing of some sort. Sometimes, the cucumber, or whatever, is allowed to ferment slightly to produce a nice lactic acid pickle and, at other times, as here, the salting time is just brief enough to soften the flesh ad make it receptive to flavorings. Today’s dish doesn’t hail from any particular cuisine but is both Chinese and Japanese in character… Continue reading “Sesame Cucumber Salad”
This very simple little preparation is an example of a Japanese Sunomono, or ‘vinegared’ dish. There are all sorts of variations on the general theme but this is about as basic as it gets. You can, if you like, simply use plain rice vinegar for the dressing but, today, we will be using a prepared nihaizu seasoned vinegar preparation… Continue reading “Japanese Cucumber Salad”
I decided to put together this simple little a preparation in order to illustrate one possible use of the Chinese Black Fungus I featured the other day in a ‘Foodstuffs’ post. Basically, this is a dish that I have cooked many times in the past and it is very simple. It also works very nicely with snap peas or even lettuce in place of the cucumber… Continue reading “Pork with Black Fungus and Cucumber”
