Black beans, avocado, corn, and bell pepper salsa

Black beans, corn, and avocado salsa (Photo by bodhilens)

This is a nutritious, easy-to-make, super-tasty salsa for main dish. 

Ingredients (for 4 servings as main dish):

3 cups of cooked black beans (about 2 cans)

1 cup of cooked corn kernels (about 1/2 can)

1 ripe avocado

1 red bell pepper and/or green bell pepper

1 can of diced tomato (with Mexican seasonings or add a pinch of cayenne pepper) 

Juice of 1 lime or lemon

A handful of cilantro (or 1 TBSP of cilantro paste*)

1-2 stems of green onion

1/4 cup of olive oil

1-2 cloves of garlic

1/4 tsp of natural salt

For garnishing:

Whole milk yogurt (or sour cream)

Shredded cheese

BBQ sauce

Directions:

1. Chop avocado, bell pepper, cilantro, and green onion into small pieces. 

2. Cut lime into half and squeeze juice. Grate garlic. Mix them with the rest of seasonings. 

3. Mix 1 and 2 with black beans and corn kernels, and let the mixture rest in fridge for a while.

4. Garnish salsa with yogurt, shredded cheese, and/or BBQ sauce. Serve with tortilla or rice. 

*To make cilantro paste, get a bunch of cilantro, wash and dry it, put it in blender along with 1 clove of garlic, 1 TBSP of olive oil, and a pinch of natural salt, and run the blender until the mixture becomes paste. Spread cilantro paste thin in a ziploc. Store it in freezer. Break it into pieces and use a piece or two as you need. 

Quinoa tabouli (with Japanese red perilla and watermelon rinds)

I sowed seeds of Italian parsley in a terracotta pot this spring, and they are growing so well. I thinned the seedlings at least three times, transplanting some in the ground and giving some away, but the pot soon returned to be full. I decided to harvest a bunch of parsley leaves and make tabouli. Tabouli is usually made of bulgur wheat, but I used quinoa this time. Quinoa is one of those super-nutritious ancient grains, and I often substitute it for couscous, too. I experimented with tossing in some spearmint and "akajiso" (Japanese red perilla) that I also harvested from my garden and watermelon rinds that I was saving in my fridge for additional flavors, textures, and colors. Red perilla is often described as having an anise- or licorice-like flavor. Believe or not, watermelon rinds are actually nutritious and taste like slightly sweet cucumbers. They both were perfect for this dish. Also, this dish goes very well with humus. (Photo by bodhilens)

Ingredients (for 6 or more servings):

1 cup of dry quinoa (makes about 3 cups of cooked quinoa)

2 handfuls of fresh parsley
1 handful of fresh spearmint
2 cloves of garlic (or 1/4 onion)
1 handful of fresh red perilla
1-2 cups of watermelon rinds (or a cucumber)
1 can of tomato (or 2 fresh ripe tomatoes)
2 fresh lemons
2-3 TBSP of extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt (optional)

Directions:

1. Cook quinoa and let it cool. (Boil it in 3 cups or more hot water for 5 minutes, turn off heat, keep a lid on the cooking pot, and steam it for 10-15 minutes until it’s tender. Or cook it in a rice cooker, just like white rice.)

2. Chop all herbs and vegetables finely. Grate garlic. (If you use a can of tomato, drain juice and save it for another dish.* I often use a can of tomato with Italian seasonings for additional flavors.)

3. Zest and juice lemons. (Use 1 TBSP of zest for this dish and save the rest for another dish.*)

4. Mix 1, 2, and 3 with extra virgin olive oil. Add sea salt if you like.

5. Let the mixture rest in a fridge for half an hour or longer.

 *Tomato (canned or fresh) and lemon zest are freezable.

Italian parsley (Photo by gardenfairy)

Young "akajiso" (Japanese red perilla) (Photo by bodhilens)

Humus with the x factor

I have tried a few different recipes for humus, but this Japanese recipe turned out to be the best. The x factor is almond poudre (i.e., powder). (Japanese adopted the French word instead of the English word.) No, you don’t have to go get expensive almond poudre. I usually buy whole almonds on sale, stock them in my pantry, and grind them into powder when I need almond poudre. I tweaked the recipe a bit to make the humus creamier. I also used sea salt instead of table salt. All the trace minerals in more wholesome forms of salt do enhance the flavor of any dish, which helps me to use less salt. When I use this humus as a sandwich spread, I don’t need mayo or cheese. That’s important for me because I tend to use a little too much Japanese mayo not only for dressing but also in cooking. (It’s addictive.) You can replace chickpeas with black beans, and a pinch of black pepper with 1 tsp of cumin, 1/4 tsp of cayenne pepper, and 1/4  tsp of paprika. The black bean version is tasty, too.

I’ll share recipes for the other items on the plate (quinoa tabouli, curry flavored falafel, and naan bread) sometime. (Photo by bodhilens)

Ingredients:

400g (apx. a regular American size can) of cooked chickpeas

2 TBSP of lemon juice
2 TBSP of extra virgin olive oil
2 TBSP of tahini (roasted sesame paste)
2 TBSP of almond poudre
1 clove of garlic (grated)
1/2 tsp of sea salt
1 pinch of black pepper
4 TBSP (or more) of bean stock*, soy milk, or cow milk

*Remember to keep the stock when you drain cooked beans.

Directions:

1. Put all ingredients in a food processor and run it until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

2. Adjust the consistency and saltiness by adding more liquid and/or salt as you like.

Citrus flavored olive oil biscotti

I had never thought of myself becoming a baker while growing up in Japan. We only had a toaster oven in our kitchen and kept a small container of margarine in our fridge. Several pieces of cookies were all I could bake at home, and my mother would be upset if I used up all margarine for cookies. So you can imagine how excited I was when I seized my first opportunity to bake cake in an American-standard size (= gigantic) oven in my apartment in Kentucky. I had fun trying out a few boxes of cake mix with different flavors, but soon I realized that they were too sweet and heavy for me. Now whenever I find intriguing recipes for sweets, I almost always tweak them. I first see if I can reduce the amount of sugar and butter. Then, I experiment with replacing white wheat flour with whole wheat flour, white refined sugar with sucanat, raw unfiltered honey, and/or pure stevia powder, and butter with extra virgin olive oil.

Here's an example of my tweaking and experimentation. This recipe is based on “Gigi’s olive oil biscotti” that I found in the DHC magazine. (DHC is a Japanese company that is famous for olive oil-based skincare products, and they recently sell fancy olive oil, too.) Although the biscotti were delicious as they were (see the original recipe here) and already healthier than buttery biscotti, I wanted to make them even healthier. You can use any citrus peals/juice/extracts (e.g., lemon, orange, yuzu) for flavor or citrus conserves/spreads to take care of both sweetness and flavor. (Photo by bodhilens)

Ingredients (for about 40 small pieces):

2 cups of whole wheat flour
1 tsp of baking powder
1 pinch of sea salt
Any combination of sweeteners that is as sweet as 10 TBSP of sugar*
1 TBSP of citrus peels and 1 tsp of juice/extract*
2 eggs
3 TBSP of extra virgin olive oil
40 roasted whole almonds (or any other large nuts)

*I have tried the following combinations of sweeteners and flavors: (a) 4 TBSP of yuzu marmalade, 1 TBSP of orange spread, and 5 pinches of stevia; and (b) 1 TBSP of lemon zest, 1 tsp of lemon juice, 5 TBSP of sucanat, and 5 pinches of stevia. Both delicious.

Directions:

1. Mix all wet ingredients (i.e., citrus peels and juice, and olive oil) and sweeteners in one bowl .
2. Add eggs in the bowl and beat the wet mixture.
3. Mix all dry ingredients in another bowl (i.e., whole wheat flour, baking powder, and salt).
4. Gradually add the dry mixture into the wet mixture to make dough. (You don't have to knead the dough, just mix all ingredients well.)
5. You can either knead nuts into the dough or half-bury them on top of the dough after Step 6**
6. Divide the dough into 4 parts and form them into 5 cm x 20 cm (apx. 2 inch x 8 inch) flat squares on a parchment paper.
7. Bake at 360 degrees F (apx. 180 degrees C) for about 20 minutes or until they are golden brown.
8. Remove the baked squares from oven, let them cool a bit, and slice each square diagonally into 10 pieces.
9. Return the sliced pieces to oven and bake them for about 10 minutes or until they are crispy.

**In the former, nuts are likely to stay inside but may be placed very unevenly across biscotti; in the latter, they can be placed very evenly but may fall off from the top of biscotti. Your choice J