Experimenting with more Asian ingredients is something I’m relishing now that I’m back in California. There are so many wonderful Asian stores out here like HMart (they have them in Chicago, too), 99 Ranch, Marukai, Tokyo Central & Main, and Mitsuwa Marketplace.
It’s there that I see the most variety of mushrooms as well as lots of other things, but to me particularly fascinating are the enoki mushrooms, large oyster mushrooms, shiitake and so much more. Of course you can go to the local farmers market for the delicate ones like chanterelles, when they’re in season, but these are the type you can typically find all year round.
In preparation for my interview with Eugenia Bone of The Fantastic Fungi Community Cookbook, which you can watch here, I wanted to prepare a soup that was from the cookbook to showcase how lovely yet simple some of these recipes are.
I chose the Enoki Mushroom Soup recipe because there are simple and easy to find ingredients called for in this recipe, AND I wanted to discuss miso in terms of the Halal perspective on it.
Miso is a fermented soybean paste very popular in Japanese cooking. It’s umami taste is what gives a certain depth of flavor to dishes with just a small amount that is whisked into a liquid such as a soup broth. The problem from the Halal perspective is that it often contains alcohol, however, nowadays in Japan and other countries like Malaysia where Japanese food is also popular, there are certain brands of miso that are certified Halal and hence alcohol-free. Here in the States, I had to sift through each and every container of Miso at the 99-ranch store and find the ONE that was free of any alcohol. I even double-checked with someone working at the store to make sure I was reading the label correctly and he assured me this particular brand and container of Yamabuki Milder Miso was in fact, alcohol-free. Yay, I was on my way.
Recipe by Dipa Chauhan adapted from the Fantastic Fungi Community Cookbook.
ENOKI MUSHROOM SOUP
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
1 tablespoon grape seed oil (the original recipe calls for avocado oil, but I didn’t have it so I decided to use another neutral-tasting oil. Just heat either one very gently).
5 ounces enoki mushrooms, chopped into 1-to-2-inch pieces (if you cannot find enoki mushrooms, you can use others such as small shiitake or cremini mushrooms, but they may take longer to cook because they are thicker)
8 ounces extra-firm organic tofu, diced
One to two 10-inch fresh scallions, finely chopped
1 teaspoon minced garlic
6 cups mushroom broth, water or chicken stock
3 tablespoons alcohol-free mild miso (usually without soy sauce)
2 ounces rice noodles (fine or medium)
3 tablespoons chopped cilantro
Sea salt, to taste
Chili oil for finishing
DIRECTIONS
In a medium saucepan, heat the oil gently over medium-high heat. Add the mushrooms, tofu, scallions and garlic. Cook for 6 minutes, stirring frequently, until the enoki mushrooms are soft.
Add the broth or water and the miso paste. Turn the heat up to high and stir to dissolve the miso. When the miso has dissolved and the soup is boiling, add the rice noodles. Turn the heat down to medium-low and cook for 3-5 more minutes, until the noodles are tender.
Divide the soup equally into four bowls and garnish each bowl with a pinch of the cilantro, salt and a dash of chili oil, if you like.
To get a copy of the Fantastic Fungi Cookbook, click here.
To watch my interview with Eugenia Bone, click here.
If you like restaurant-style Chinese Egg Drop Soup, just know that you don’t have to go out to have it- it’s so super easy and quick to make that you don’t even have to stress much over making it. You probably have at least some of the ingredients already, like eggs. Plus, you should always stock up on the Saffron Road halal broths to keep your halal pantry full of convenient but healthy cooking ingredients like these. It just makes life so much easier.
For this recipe you only need six simple ingredients: Saffron Road Artisan Roasted Chicken Broth (you could also use the Traditional Chicken Broth), eggs, fresh ginger, salt, sesame oil and green scallions. *link to get the broth shipped directly to you is at the end of this post*
I originally had a recipe from my teaching days when I taught Language Arts and had my students engage in a very interactive project to promote multicultural global understanding. Each class was given a region of the world and each student in the respective classes was given a particular country to research and write about as well as present in front of their peers. Also, as part of each project, the students were asked to bring in an authentic dish from the country they researched and allow their peers to try it, as well as share the recipe. It was such a great lesson in enjoying global cuisine. They had to cook it themselves and, of course, all the ingredients had to be halal (all students in the classes were following a halal diet). It was so interesting to see how the students transformed dishes with appropriate halal substitutions and had so much fun trying one another’s dishes. This Egg Flower Soup (aka Egg Drop Soup or Dahn Far Yong) was one of my favorites so I kept the recipe in a file for years, although I’ve tweaked it to my own specifications.
For this recipe, no frying or sautéing is needed. Just simply bring the broth to a boil with the ginger and salt added, if you like. I love the addition of ginger, but if you want to skip the salt, that’s fine, too, as the Artisan Roasted Chicken Broth has a bit of salt added.
Separately, whisk the eggs in a bowl then gently add into the boiling broth.
Reduce the heat immediately to low, while continuing to whisk and swirl, creating a flower-like formation in the broth. I like a lot of eggs in my soup, but you could do less than three, if you prefer.
Remove from heat immediately once the eggs have cooked fully, about 3 minutes. Once ladled into bowls, add the freshly chopped scallions. Some people like to have a bit of soy sauce on the side to drizzle in- I like that, too.
To get the broth conveniently shipped to you, you can find it here:
I love really good, authentic Chinese food- don’t you? As with all restaurants that aren’t committed to serving halal dishes, if you dine at one you’ll have to ask a zillion questions about the ingredients to find out if there are any questionable or clearly non-halal ingredients. If you only eat dhabiha (slaughtered according to Islamic requirements) meats and their by-products, chicken or meat broth in foods may pose an issue for you, too. That’s why I love to learn to make my own globally-inspired recipes and share them here.
Another important addition is the broth.
I don’t recommend skipping the broth because I feel it needs some depth to it. You could try a vegetable broth, too, but chicken broth really works best in my opinion because it contains that healthy fat that gives the soup a silky taste. Use the halal-certifiedlow sodium broths by Saffron Road and you’ve got a totally halal version of this restaurant-style soup.
This recipe for Chinese Hot & Sour Soup has turned into a family favorite soup when we’re craving Chinese food and want to create the restaurant-style experience at home with the other Chinese recipes I’ve got under my belt. What about you- what’s your favorite Chinese recipe you’d like to see made halal?
This recipe comes from Derya Singhsumalee, a former teacher colleague of mine who is such a fun and interesting person. She is very well-traveled, is of Turkish ethnicity and married to a man from a Thai Muslim family. In the school lunch room we used to talk quite a bit about cultural diversity and, of course, food. She was very familiar with Sicilian cuisine having lived in Sicily for a short time during her life. I found her background fascinating and our conversations a great bonding experience between us. Recently when I saw that she posted this recipe to her Facebook page, I immediately asked her to share it with all of you, and she graciously obliged. Here you go- thank you, Derya!
Since we’ve moved into our house and begun construction, it’s the simple things in life that have kind of gone straight out the window- like an organized closet, knowing where all my cooking spices are, and the luxury (because it truly is) of having a working stove hooked up to a gas line, right next to a working sink where you can rinse off all your dishes and be on your merry way.
I’m not saying this to complain, but rather to illustrate the fact that to eat well by cooking at home, it’s not that you have to have complex ingredients, but you do need some pretty good basics. I guess I’ve learned that having the grand cooking tools and resources at my disposal is something I never thought I’d do without for more than a day or two. Although I haven’t written about it much here, our kitchen renovation – or whole house remodel/renovation on top of a situation in which our well water is severely compromised- has been a test of patience, endurance and an exercise in gratitude.
How in the world do millions, perhaps billions of people around the world live, cook and eat in places like refugee camps, war zones and completely impoverished residences? What this has taught me is to look around the corner for yet another blessing, hold my tongue about the hardships and realize we don’t have it that bad at all.
In fact, we have it great. Alhamdullilah thank God).
For example, the recipe I’m going to show you how to make right now is one I savored with all my heart- not only because I really appreciated not having to eat out for the umpteenth time (when I really prefer not to), but because I could actually get the help and convenience of a wonderful, high quality and halal product in the Saffron Road Simmer Sauce to help me eat well and serve my family something healthy- and finally break out that slow cooker! Of course I cannot forget that it was all made possible by the generosity of family and friends who keep letting me cook in their kitchens throughout this process, too…
This Korean stir fry-turned-slow cooker-meal is absolutely delicious. It’s filling, full of good ingredients and yet has basic ingredients that you can probably get your kids to eat, too. I’m a huge fan of Korean food, and when Saffron Road came out with this very unique simmer sauce to use in cooking, it was extra special because it’s pretty challenging to get halal Korean food, at least where I am. Their simmer sauce flavors are so authentic that
The best way to start is by securing the right cut of meat from your butcher.
You want to make sure you get a cut and that the meat is nice and fresh- red or pink- not gray (= not fresh).
Then assemble a few important ingredients.
Good quality sesame oil, bean sprouts, fresh garlic and ginger, yellow onion, carrots, broccoli, and the ever important Saffron Road Korean Stir Fry Simmer Sauce (to make your life easier without compromising on what’s healthy and halal and not having to worry about GMOs in your food, as the company is part of the Non-GMO Project and holds itself to the highest standards of food quality possible.
You’ll also need some fresh scallions for finishing the dish, if you like those. Also, pick out the rice to cook later, since you won’t need it for a while but you will want to have it on hand.
The first thing to do is to cut all the veggies. Break up the broccoli into small to medium size pieces, then cut up and/or grate the carrots thinly. Chop the onion and mince the garlic and ginger, too.
Next, prepare your pan to saute the onion in sesame oil and then to add the beef so it browns nicely, something it won’t do in most crock pots.
Make sure the onions get nice and hot, then add the meat so it can sear a bit. Add a little grape seed oil if the meat needs it. Too much sesame oil and it burns quickly (the oil), making it quite bitter. Grape seed oil will help the frying go a little more smoothly since we’re not using a large wok here that might make it a whole lot easier to do, if you’re used to cooking like that (I am not).
Cook it down quite a bit so that it turns color.
This is when it starts to smell amazing- when those onions wrap themselves around the meat….
Next add the cut veggies. Season, as desired. I just used salt and pepper because we have seasoning in the packet of simmer sauce we’re going to use.
Oh yum..I got a little impatient and transferred the meat and veggies to the slow cooker before the meat was super browned, but I recommend you do that. Either was is fine. Just wait until the meat is mostly cooked through, if not at all before transferring it.
And then look at all that amazing sauce (don’t forget to smell it, too)…
Now cover it and leave it alone for about 3 hours. Yes, you read me correctly- three. This is slow cooking. You really don’t even have to stir the sauce in, but go ahead if you like.
This is what it looks like all stirred up (my favorite Instagram photo during the process):
Because after three hours, this is what you get:
And now you can add that spinach you’ve been reserving.
Cover and let cook for an additional thirty minutes, covered. No need to stir in the spinach, it’ll just wilt away and then you can re-open it all and mix it together. Now’s also a good time to get that rice cooking.
You didn’t think I was going to let you off without a steamy rice photo, did you?
Okay, here are some that are more clear. But if you’re reading this in the morning and beginning to wonder what’s for dinner, as your tummy grumbles, this is it guys. This is it.
Saffron Road sells their Simmer Sauces like this one in Whole Foods Markets across the country as well as World Market stores (I couldn’t believe when I saw them there), but there are many others, so please check their store locator. They also sell their products online at their site.
I definitely want to try this simmer sauce again very soon, maybe even for Eid ul Adha buffet dish. How would you try using this sauce? Tell me…
*Special shout out to my rock star butchers and meat store owners at Sara Meat Market (Niles, IL) for their patience, attention to my very detailed orders and for giving what seems like every customer the special attention needed to get their orders just the way they want them, like when I got my meat for this recipe. Thank you for being such a service to the halal food community in our Chicagoland area!
**Also, as a Brand Ambassador for Saffron Road foods, I received the Simmer Sauces from the company to try out in a recipe. All opinions, recipes and feedback on the taste, texture, usage, quantity, etc. are my own.
If you’re anything like me and sometimes just really get a craving for hot and spicy Thai food, or any type of Asian food but don’t have the time or energy to go out shopping for ingredients you don’t always need on hand, I’ve got a great recipe for you. It’s quick, easy, doesn’t require a whole lot of ingredients and has one special ingredient that makes life a whole lot easier. ‘And it’s healthy, too: broccoli, carrots, celery, garlic, onion, cilantro. Boneless, skinless chicken tenders (or you could use beef instead). Most of the flavoring comes from this Thai Red Curry Simmer Sauce by Saffron Road, which takes the dish up a whole other notch. I like to slice my veggies on an angle for this type of dish- they cook nicely and it looks nice, too. You can start out by using any type of oil you like, but for an authentic flavor, I would use either sesame oil or extra virgin coconut oil, if you have it. If not, just use a neutral oil like grapeseed oil so that it doesn’t overpower the dish and its other flavors. Start out by sautéeing the onion and celery in the oil, then gradually adding the carrots, chopped broccoli and the chicken, which needs to brown. Medium to high flame is recommended. Then add any dried herbs and spices you like- I added black pepper and basil, but white pepper and ginger would be nice, too. Next, the objective is to brown the chicken well. Then grab one packet of the Thai Red Curry Sauce. And pour it on…but again, only after the chicken has browned. Go ahead and use the whole packet- it’s going to be delicious. Add a little bit of the Saffron Road’s Traditional Chicken Broth (halal), too. It’ll help keep the dish moist. Cover and cook on low for about 15-20 minutes. That should give you enough time to chop up some cilantro and cut wedges of lime. And make a little rice to go with the dish, served while it’s piping hot. Now I’m hungry.
Some people like to have a bit of soy sauce on the side to drizzle in- I like that, too.
