The Bento Box

I don’t know what is all about but it seems that all the food blogs are written by people that are working in offices, that dread their canteen or café and that bring their own food to work in their bento box.

I personally prefer the ones that are filled with rice on the bottom and some pickles and veg on the top layer, I don’t like to bring a thermos with the soup, but today my soup in a jar spilled all over my stuff so I better re-consider this…
My Lunch box is from the Japan Center yes it is my favourite place and I try to go as much as I can (if you have read any of my previous post I am sure that you know it)!

Also if you are not just a foodie and you are interested in design and fashion to buy or just to browse, the JC it is dangerously near Dover Street market… a more expensive side of Japan!

Anyway, here my Bento Box is filled with sauerkraut and blenched Chinese cabbage on top, and parsnip on the bottom layer, a slice of Sauer dough (I am baking again!) and off to work!


Baked yummy parsnip:

Slice the parsnips in thick slices
Place slices in a baking dish add ½ inch of water and 1 tablespoon of shoyu over the slices
Bake 200C° for 35 to 40 mins till soft



The parsnip cooked in this way is so yummy that you’d wish your lunchbox were bigger!
Would you like to get an ide on how to pack your food? Some people are really clever

On a macrobiotic support and how to love a winter squash

I have joined a yahoo group that I find very useful and I can’t wait to share it with the world, it’s full of good suggestions recipes and interesting stuff about macrobiotic, as that is a field where you can never know enough, please join:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/moderndaymacrobiotics
and you will receive their newsletter, it’s called modernday macrobiotic and it has been setup by Simon Brown (that wrote the gret book with the same title) it's great as nobody would insult you if you ask silly questions and there are some very intelligent and interesting people, a pleasure to read!

In one of the newsletters there was a recipe that I thought would warm me up in these chilli evening (we have managed not to turn he heating on yet!!):
Squash and sauerkrut:
Dice winter squash, 
Add a 0,5 cm of water to a heavy pot, add few drops of sesme oil. 
Add a small piece of rinsed kombu and a pinch of salt.
Cover, and bring to a boil on a high until the squash is soft, then just bifore turning off the flame add 2 tablespoon of sauerkraut (for two people) mix and serve, it is important that you don't "cook" the sauerkraut as you would kill all the ferments.
This is a simple dish but people love it because of the sweet and sour combination! I served it with rice and leeks with barley miso…

Pressed salads

I just moved to a new flat, and I have been too busy to look after my blog.
I haven’t really been cooking either, and in the past three weeks this is the first time I can relax on a Sunday, buy some ingredients and put the apron on! It’s nice that time when you start feeling home, in my life I moved to so many different places (certainly more than 20) that this feeling is rather familiar to me.

Today I prepared the pressed salads, which are a fermented dish and a classic of macrobiotic cooking, they are going to last me for a while and they’d help my tummy when I have a drink too much (I know I shouldn’t but these are tough times!).
I finely sliced some vegetables: cucumber, red spring onion, radish, celery and carrots. Everything was seasonal and British, a part from the red spring onion that were French and I bought them at Waitrose as I have never seen them before. I should have taken a picture, as they were so pretty!
I put the slices in a glass container and covered them with a liquid made from half shoyu, half water that has been brought to the boil for 30 second and then left to cool down to room temperature.
I put a little saucer on top and then some weight (a bag of pulses would do) so that the vegetables are all under the liquid.
Normally I leave them out and just put them in the fridge the day after. I find that they go nicely with boiled grains, silken tofu, and they are they ideal start of a meal. Sometimes I add some grated ginger to add a little zing ☺
I am preparing quite a few things to have in the fridge to take to work; it’s great that you can quickly add them to your brown rice to take to the office. So to all the people that ask me how can I always find time to cook my own lunch, Id like to ask them, how can you eat that Tesco sandwich or that sad salad every day?

The Almost Summer Dinner

It feels like summer is arrived! And so are the British asparagus…

Forget your supermarket ones, they are flown over from Kenya and you can find them all year round, they cost a fortune and they just don’t taste as nice.
I bought a nice bunch of organic Asparagus for 2 Pounds, not too bad.
I quickly steamed them, and served with vinaigrette of chopped parsley, mint, and lemon juice, they go very well with grilled polenta.
I know that Asparagus is not really a macrobiotic veg, but I like it ☺
I saved the tough bottom end that you would normally discard and I am going to add them to soups, as macrobiotic teaches you shouldn’t waste any food!

I even grilled some garlic, in the simplest way, just chopping off the top, with a drizzle of olive oil, in the oven for 25 min (but this depends according to the garlic size)

The beginning is always hard...

To write a food blog without being a chef is a bit of a quest, you need a certain dose of arrogance, especially if you live in a place like London and your confidence have been boosted by the “wows” of friends that are used to eat out and cook very little!
Very often in my experience as a vegetarian, the option at parties or cafes has been the pasta bake with tons of cheap cheese and the vegan something with potatoes in the resemblance of a brown sausage…
This blog is just the way to let my friends in Italy know what I am up to in the big Smoke and also to answer to my workmates questions about what is in my lunchbox…

I have always been a big fan of the Japanese cuisine, but in London the Japanese cooking has become my new obsession especially since I have dropped Fresh and Wild and embraced the Japan Centre as my supplier of Soba-Udon and Wakame seaweed.
I always find myself staring at the people while I shop, to check what they are buying and to make sure I choose what they would from the shelves.
So being stuck at home with a nasty flu I thought I could post an ad to find somebody that could actually teach me the real thing, so I posted this on the Gumtree.
It went rather well in fact I have already received several answers and I organized a late morning rendezvous at my flat on Saturday with Kazu. He will check my cupboard and we can shop together and he can teach me a couple of dishes as a start… will he turn up?

Oh well I have to wait now and there’s a week of cooking to be done before the meeting!

Tonight we will have some quinoa and dahl, but the star dish will be this celery and pecan nuts stew:

Ingredients for 4 people (or two very hungry ones!)
300 grams celery
3 table spoons extra virgin olive oil
50 grams pecan nuts (organic)
2 medium size onions
1 tablespoon rice malt syrup
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
vegetable broth (made with fresh veggies or organic vegetable bouillon stock)

1) rinse and dice the celery
2) peel the onions and add to boiling water for 5 minutes, drain and leave them to cool down
3)slice thinly the onions
4) heat the oil in a wok pan and add the onions with a couple of tablespoons of water, cover and let it simmer for a couple of minutes, add the crushed pecan nuts and the celery and cook it on a medium heat for other five minutes
5) melt the malt in a sauce pan and heat up for 2 minutes, add the vinegar and half a cup of vegetable broth and leave it in the pan for other 2 minutes, before transferring the mixture on the other ingredients. Cook for further ten minutes. Add salt to taste and serve it warm!

While cooking this weekend I mostly played: Beirut Gulag Orchestra