If you are following this blog for a while, you probably know that I like Matcha.
These green tea soba noodles.
Its color and flavor are just wonderful.
Green tea noodles in soy-based broth, served with grated nagaimo, fried onions, scallion, and Shichimi spice.
Oh, and wasabi.
Wasabi goes so well with grated nagaimo.
Simply delicious.
Coming from an island country surrounded by the sea, I do love seafood.
You may think I don’t get to enjoy any “seafood” anymore since I’m on the plant-based diet.
Well, that’s actually not the case.
There are things found in the ocean that are plant-based.
Hijiki is a type of seaweed, and it’s used in many dishes in Japan.
Sautee garlic, Hijiki, and chickpeas with olive oil.
Add tomato sauce, and then freshly cooked pasta.
The Hijiki gives plenty of flavors that remind me of the ocean.
So good.
I like to create fun unique dishes, but once in a while I do enjoy going back to basics.
I had a few bags of homemade vegan meatballs in the freezer.
I sometimes use a jar, but if I have all the right ingredients at home, I prefer making my sauce myself.
Homemade sauce is so much better than store-bought!
I asked my husband to make “nutty parm,” and his version was a bit rougher than mine, but it was still very tasty.
This rough texture was different, but I liked it.
By the way when it comes to pasta, I like mine “long” and “regular.”
(I’ve tried whole wheat and other “healthy” pasta, too, but when it comes to pasta, I’m like an ordinary Joe, and I like my ordinary pasta (lol).)
Tsuke-men is like a cousin of ramen.
It’s basically the same thing, but the noodles and the soup are separated (soup typically has a bit stronger flavors).
You scoop up a few strands of noodle, dip them in the soup, and eat. And then repeat the process.
I added a generous amount of sprouts.
I love sprouts in my ramen/tsuke-men.
Tsuke-men is becoming pretty popular, and I’ve started seeing it on the menu of some ramen shops.
But I’ve never seen vegan Tsuke-men yet.
For extra spiciness here is my trusted chili garlic paste.
I had some wrappers left that I wanted to use up.
So I decided to make them into ravioli.
The filling is simple but tasty.
Sauteed garlic and mushrooms.
A great thing about ravioli is that it cooks so fast.
It was a great lunch.
Exactly what I needed on this cold snowy day.
Curry Udon is one of the ultimate comfort foods in Japan in my opinion.
The Japanese curry soup is rich and so flavorful, and the udon is thick and chewy.
I can eat just that, but today I wanted my curry udon a bit special, and I made tempura.
I found these mini king mushrooms (if they are king’s babies, are they supposed to be called “princes”??? lol) at the local Asian grocery store, and they were made into tempura along with kabocha squash.
Love tempura.
I like almost any vegetables when they are made into tempura, but kabocha is definitely one of my favorites (eggplant tempura is another good one).
Doesn’t it look great?!
When I make Japanese style curry, I first enjoy it over rice.
Japanese curry is thick and rich, and it goes so well with rice.
I usually make extra so that I have left-over to make curry noodle soup.
I transform the curry into less thick broth to go with my noodles, by adding a few things, such as water, dry Kombu seaweed (to flavor the broth), sugar, and soy sauce.
The soup was delicious!
This time I added homemade vegan meatballs and edamame, and topped it off with scallion.
These meatballs get so juicy when they absorb the broth.
I hope everyone had a good start of the week.
Dan dan noodle soup is rich, spicy, flavorful, and warm.
Noodle soup makes you warm, but dan dan noodle soup seems to make you particularly warm, maybe because of the spiciness and the richness in the flavor combination.
The traditional dan dan noodle soup has spicy ground meat as the main topping.
My version has mashed lentils, and this was an awesome idea (if I may say so myself!).
I loved the texture and how they soaked up the soup.
The soup is rich, flavorful, and spicy, just the way I wanted.
Noodle soup has always been my comfort food.
It always makes me warm, physically and my soul as well. 🙂
I liked the vegan cheddar cheese so much that I wanted to make something to showcase the cheese.
I thought macaroni and cheese would be a good one.
The macaroni was added to my cream sauce.
This picture (above) shows the pot right after the cheddar cheese was added.
The cheese was beautifully melted and added the beautiful orange color.
Okay.
I know macaroni and cheese usually does not contain anything green, but if you ask me, it’s a shame, although my nephews would disagree.
Since I didn’t have to share this with any kids, I couldn’t help but adding broccoli.
It already looks better with the beautiful green color.
I could have stopped, but I thought adding gochujang would give the right amount of sweetness and spiciness, and I was right!
Earlier I was gonna say “Who doesn’t like macaroni and cheese”, but I know someone who is not a big fan.
My husband.
So I was initially thinking about keeping it all to myself.
But guess what?
After having a small bowl, he declared that it was good, and he came back for more (yeah!).
I was happy sharing.
Good food is always meant to be shared.
The Gochujang Macaroni and Cheese was served with fried onion and fresh scallion.
Delicious!!
I know kimchi is not for everyone because of its strong flavor, but I happen to be a big fan of kimchi.
I found beautiful fresh sprouts at the local Asian grocery store over the weekend, and it’s always a cue to make Yakisoba fried noodles.
It smells so good!
Who could resist this?!
I sometimes serve the noodles with kimchi on top.
Other times I add kimchi to the pan and cook with the noodles.
Who else loves noodles and kimchi together?
