Azuki Bean Smoothie

I'm so excited about my latest breakfast smoothie; it's almost chocolatey and down right delicious! 

 

I've ventured into the world of the azuki beans for a couple of reasons.

 

 

I've always loved them in Asian desserts as sweetened red bean paste and I've been meaning to experiment with  them.

 

They are a legume, therefore great for you.

 

Introducing another legume to my repertoire = more variety.

My main driver, however, was my back. Azuki beans (also known as adzuki and aduki beans) are identified as a special bean for draining dampness in the body. "Dampness" is a term used in traditional Chinese medicine. I recently started getting acupuncture for my back issues (that I've had for years) and was told the excess "dampness" in my body was a strong contributor to my aches and pains.

 

I'm always sceptical of this kind of talk, but after just two acupuncture sessions, there has been a noticeable improvement. So I'm will to try anything (except supplements).

 

It takes a little planning and preparation the day before, when you soak and cook the beans, but the cooked beans will last 3-4 days in the fridge and you can even freeze them if you like.

 

Soak 1 cup of beans in plenty of cold water for 6-8 hours. This will make about 4, 1/2 cup serves of cooked beans.

 

Place your soaked beans in a saucepan on the stove and bring to a simmer for about 5-10 minutes, until foam develops on the surface of the water.

 

Strain the beans, discarding the cooking water, rinse off the foam and clean out the saucepan (all website recipes I looked at include this step and I can't find an explanation why).

 

Add 2-3 cups of cold water to the beans and bring back to a simmer for 1 to 1 & 1/2 hours, until they are soft enough to break with your tongue.

 

While boiling, keep the temperature low because if they boil to rapidly they tend to break up a little.

 

When they are done, strain and put in the fridge to chill.

Azuki Smoothie

 

 

1/2 cup chilled, cooked azuki beans

1/2 cup unsweetened natural yogurt

1/2 cup almond milk (rice, oat, dairy milks are also fine)

1 banana (mango works well too)

A generous spoonful of honey or sweetener of your choice.

The beans require a fair amount of added sweetness. The exact amount will depend a lot on the natural sweetness of your fruit and milk choice (the almond milk I used is not very sweet), you can always add more honey.

 

I used a hand blender, it takes a couple of minutes to break down the beans and make it nice and smooth.

 

 

I really hope you enjoy it!

 

 

Miso Soup #2

Lunch today was miso soup for one. Nothing like a big bowl of miso soup to fill you up without making you feel too full. Lucky for me my vegetable garden is producing abundant sugar snap peas and silverbeet, (or swiss chard) both of which make great additions to miso soup. I used the same base as previous miso post (except I forgot the mirin) and this time I added..

 

Silverbeet

Sugar snap peas

Soba noodles (~45gm dried)* this is pretty low carb

3 dried shiitake mushrooms

 

First you have to do is boil the kettle and cover your dried shiitake mushrroms in hot water. I weigh them down with a smaller plate to ensure they are submerged properly in the water. They take about 20 minutes to soften. After they are done, cut off their hard stems and dice or slice them as you please. I like their strong flavour so I chop them pretty roughly. I think that the more refined Japanese palate would suggest slicing them finely.

 

To make your soup, bring about 2 cups of water to boil in a saucepan. The soba noodles I use only take about 5 minutes so I put mine on to cook around 15 minutes after soaking the mushrooms. While the noodles were cooking I added some miso paste (~1 & ½ tbl) and instant bonito (~1-2 tsp) to the water, pushing the paste up against the side of the pot to help it dissolve.  The exact amount of miso paste and bonito that you use is down to personal taste. If you want it salty and strong, add more. If you want light and not so salty, add less. It’s pretty simple.

 

After 3 minutes add the sugar snap peas and chopped mushrooms. 2 minutes later the noodles should be cooked. Turn off the heat and add the silverbeet (roughly shredded with central white steam removed) and you're done.

 

(if I'd had a diced spring onion or two it would have been close to perfect!)

 

Pumpkin stir-fry with soba noodles and sugar snap peas

I have been growing sugar snap peas in my veggie patch and the plants are finally starting to produce! Snow peas and sugar snap peas go really well with Japanese flavours and given that I had some left over pumpkin from the roast veggie dinner, I thought I'd celebrate my little sugar snaps by making a pumpkin stir-fry. I've never made a pumpkin stir-fry before, but I've seen it in magazines and thought it would be worth a try. I used to cram as many veggies as possible into my stir-fry's and sometimes still do, but most of the time I stick to a more simple combination of veggies, because it usually results in a better flavour/texture combination. I'm pretty stoked with my first try, you will probably notice over time, my "Japanese"  recipes are all a variation on the same theme... but they do tend to come out consistently good. 

Firstly make up the stir-fry sauce

1 tsp dried bonito (omit if you want to make it vego)

1 tsp miso paste

1 tbl mirin

2 tbl soy sauce

1 tsp finely grated ginger

dash of sesame oil

Toast 1 tbl sesame seeds in dry wok and cut up your vegetables...

Pumpkin cut into ~1 cm cubes

sugar snap peas

1/2 a red onion cut in thick chunks

¼ of a red capsicum sliced thinly

  

In a saucepan boil ~70gm of dried soba noodles for ~3 minutes (fully cooked takes 5 min)

 drain and rinse them with cold water to stop them cooking and sprinkle with a little sesame oil to stop them from sticking to each other

add onions to a hot wok and keep stirring for ~1 min, then add diced pumpkin, stir and cover, but keep checking it doesn't burn and keep frequently stirring it. The lid helps speed up the cooking time 

just after I added the pumpkin

I tried to cut the pumpkin into even sizes, but I'm never that precise... After frying the pumpkin for about 5 minutes it was starting to brown nicely so I took out one of the smallest and one of the largest pieces of pumpkin and tasted them to check how cooked they were... 

mushy pumpkin seems like the worst outcome in this recipe

the slightly bigger piece was just underdone and the smallest piece was cooked... but the exact timing will vary on your wok and cooking element - mine is a shitty electric stove.

At this point I added the sugar snaps, capsicum, stir-fry sauce and the par cooked soba noodles, stirring frequently for another 2-3 minutes to make sure the sauce doesn't burn

if your wok is really hot, you can add 1-2 tbl water to prevent it from burning

lastly sprinkle on the toasted sesame seeds... (if you have spring onions sprinkle some of them on too)

it was yum!

Miso Soup

not pictured: mirin and edamame beans...

This is a quick and satisfying meal that I hope you will enjoy. Personally it took me a little while to come around to the taste of miso, it is definitely an acquired taste. But I also think some cheap sushi places use miso paste with unnecessary additives - which made me feel ill after consuming it. During winter miso is a staple in my fridge, although I do go off it from time to time.

This is by no means a traditional recipe, but it's how I enjoy it. Fermented soy products are supposed to be super good for you so get into it!

In its simplest form you can mix some miso paste with some hot water, add a little fresh tofu and spring onions and you're good to go, but if you want to make it a meal, here is how I do it...

Miso Soup

1 tbl miso paste (I buy a Japanese brand without MSG - many miso pastes do contain MSG)

1 tbl mirin (sweet cooking wine)

1-2 tsp dried bonito (this is something a Japanese friend taught me, I think it's technically instant bonito with added salt and sugar. It is a light brown granular powder, which is pretty strong. I ualso use it in stir-frys sometimes to give it a Japanese flavour-thats Shiho!)

2 tbl edamame beans (I had frozen)

1/2 a carrot sliced

handful of sliced cabbage

dried udon (fresh is better)

serves 1

boil dried noodles in 2-3 cups of water for 7 minutes it takes them to cook (they take 10 total to cook)

Add sliced carrots, dried bonito, edamame, mirin and miso. I push the miso paste up against the side of the saucepan to help it disolve

let it simmer for another 2 minutes then add cabbage, boil for ~1 more minute and then serve, it's that simple!

optional extras/variations

spring onion

mushrooms (rehydrated shiitake or fresh oyster/enoki/shiitake/swiss brown/white button)

fresh tofu

snow peas

mushroom, tofu, spring onion and snow pea miso soup is very tasty and i recommend it!