Indian Beans: Returning to the Kitchen (& Recipe)

The wonderful thing about coming home after being away for a stretch is that you realize the former thread of your "home" life has persisted in very much the same manner as ever before. Things around you are the same, your knife, the shadows in the kitchen, the hum of the water heater; same and yet different. (Different as in the nonstick saute pan that was mistreated as a cutting board!!) One thing remains wholly unchanged, I have been back in the kitchen daily since returning.

One of my first market trips upon returning home was to an unexplored gem recommended to me by a friend who had recently discovered its bounty. Monterey Market sits on a corner of Hopkins and Monterey in North Berkeley. The small market reminisces of what Berkeley Bowl on the south side of town might have been a few decades back; quaint, pleasantly quiet, a gentler pace of life. Both markets stock an impressive display of fresh fruits and veggies in varieties unheard of, as well as a fair selection of dry goods. Their philosophy of creating a community oriented exchange between local farmers and consumers felt unpretentious and really followed through for me at Monterey Market. The prices are also hard to beat - $1.79 per pound for Ranier and Bing Cherries!



BEANS BEANS!
Towards the end of the excursion I happened across some beautifully toasty looking dried beans in a sack labeled "Indian Beans." A pound or so of these rattled home with me as my companion and I plotted the best uses for them. Unsurprisingly (yet also unappetizing to hear) most of the beans you buy from the store, the pre-bagged mundane pinto, black, and kidney varieties, are ten years old or more on average. It seems though they've truly squatted out their existence without expiration on the shelf. It became clear to me with my deeply tanned beauties in hand that a host of other exquisite and intriguing choices eagerly await discovery.

From our one pound purchase we have so far produced:
- a version of rice and daal (lentils) with Indian spices, saffron rice, and fried scallions
- slow-cooked bbq beans with smoked pork shoulder, onions, and a sweet vinegar base
- 15 bean plants (an impatient peek under the soil revealed that 6 have sprouted)
A little goes a long way. About a third of the beans await a future use.



FOR THE GREEN THUMBS OUT THERE
Growing a few bean plants really could not be an easier, more rewarding feat (Discounting your future struggle with the deer who also love your bean plants). Simply bury the dry beans under an inch or so of moist soil in a pot and wait a few weeks for the seeds to sprout through the dirt. After your saplings have grown to 4-6 inches, transplant them to the ground along a fence or some stakes to allow the vines to crawl up. (Mid-late spring to early summer)



THE RECIPE
Spiced Rice & Indian Beans
(2 servings with leftovers)
Rice:
- 1C Basmati or Jasmine long grained rice, rinsed
- 1 1/4C water or broth
- 1 tsp olive oil
- few saffron threads
- bay leaf
- salt
- 1/4 tsp turmeric
- few shakes of cayenne
- few shakes of smoked paprika
*spice amounts are very flexible according to your preferences, experiment - add, subtract, omit, create

Fried Scallions:
- 1 scallion chopped into ringlets
- flour for dusting
- canola oil, for frying (reserve the oil)
- salt

Beans:
- 1/3 lb dried beans, pre-soaked overnight or at least a few hours
- olive oil
- 1/4 onion, med-fine chop
- garlic powder
- scallion oil (from fried scallions above)
- salt

1) Add all rice ingredients to a rice cooker, stir and cook according to machine directions; fluff with a fork afterwards
- OR add all ingredients to a pot and cover, bring to a boil and reduce to a simmer for 15-25 min until rice is tender
- salt to taste
2) Using a sieve, coat scallion rings with flour
- heat up oil about 1/8" deep in a small pan (test with a piece of scallion, if it begins to sizzle and bubble the oil is hot enough
- fry scallions in the oil until golden
- strain out scallions and drain on paper towels, lightly salt immediately
- reserve scallion oil for the beans
3) Drain the beans
- heat up olive oil in a saute pan
- add onions, saute until translucent but still slightly crunchy ~ 5 min
- season with garlic powder, salt, and a small amount of scallion oil (~1/2 tsp)
- mix in the beans and then spread into a single flat layer over the pan
- without stirring, allow the beans and onions to caramelize and develop crusty brown edges ~ 5-7min
- stir gently and redistribute in a single layer to allow the other sides to caramelize
4) Remove from heat
- gently mix in the rice
- top with fried scallions

* I paired this dish with Indian-spiced roasted game hen - rub a whole bird with a ground spice mix of cardamom, garam masala, coriander, sea salt, cumin seed, cayenne, a touch of cinnamon. Cover with plain yogurt (~ 1.5 C) and marinate for 30 min to an hour. Roast in a 450F preheated oven for 45-50 min, turning halfway.

Convenience Markets: A World Beyond Sushi (Recipe included) (JAPAN - post 1 of 1)

Think Japan, but don't think sushi. Beyond raw fish and vinegar-rice-rolled vegetables thrives an entire realm of Japanese food. Of course bento boxes, miso soup, and sushi immediately come to mind when a friend suggests Japanese food for lunch, an assumption created by sushi restaurants popping up in coastal states, run by groups of mainly Chinese and Korean immigrants. Aside from being painfully pricy, (one exception was a box of tuna sashimi cubes fresh from the Tsukiji International Fish Market in Tokyo - you'd think the closer you got to the real source the more expensive it'd be), sushi and sashimi is unrepresentative of the daily foods Japanese locals eat. I was very fortunate to travel with a friend who grew up in Okinawa, an island east of the mainland, and she introduced us to all her favorite staples bought from local convenience stores to stand-and-eat counter noodle emporiums.

THE MARVELOUS CONVENIENCE OF CONVENIENCE STORES
One of the remarkable discoveries I came across in Japan was the plethora of simple but delicious meal options available at corner convenience marts. In Japan these stores truly live up to the definition of their name. Prepared and packaged foods are microwaved-to-order by a store employee and range from udon and soba hot noodle soups and donburi (steamed rice bowls), to yakisoba (stirfried noodles) and crackly, fried tempura veggies. Surprisingly, the food is of decent quality and all within $5. My favorite find, however, were triangular molded rice balls called onigiri, filled with various meats, pickles, or fish eggs. A layer of nori (dried toasted seaweed) is wrapped in a lining of plastic, separate from the rice, to maintain the nori's crisp freshness until consumption (same concept as the popular single-serving yogurts that were packed with packets of sprinkles or granola in a thin plastic container topping the yogurt). I found them to be ingenious and notably the salmon-filled onigiri made up a majority of my grab-and-go lunches in Japan. Costing just over a dollar, they were the cheapest way to fill up on healthy, flavorful food.



HI-TECH
It seems that the deeper we venture into the developed world, the less available street food becomes. This trend was certainly true in Japan, a poster child society for advanced technology. Their appliances are perplexingly fancy with more dials and settings than any gadgets we rely on to facilitate our own lives in America. My friend's response illustrated this fact to me when I asked about the bathroom conditions at a pitstop McDonald's, "Oh they're fine. The floors are dirty because it's McDonald's, but they still have the heated toilet seats, flushing music, and everything." For Japan, being in the forefront of development, street food is more of an orderly managed novelty than an actual food source. I passed by no more than two impeccably clean, assembly line operations featuring takoyaki (griddle-baked egg-battered octopus balls) along the sidewalk. Perhaps one explanation for the scarcity of street vending can be explained by a fascinating insight provided to me by a Tokyo-raised acquaintance I met in Hong Kong. According to her patchy knowledge, street vending in Japan is tightly controlled by underground gangs; vendors typically emerge only for festivals or holidays to sell snacks such as takoyaki or grilled mochi skewers (glutinous rice flour balls usually filled with sweetened bean pastes). She warned me against absorbing her comments too seriously. Nevertheless it was interesting and the first I've heard about such an organization around street vending. The pockets of street vending only appeared in quiet residential areas and never in downtown commercial centers. After spending a day in the crafted quaintness of Kyoto, I indulged in a thought, inspired by the inactivity of the takoyaki vendors, that perhaps their presence mainly served to complete the charming atmosphere more than anything else.

JUKEBOX FASTFOOD DINING
Cutting-edge machinery doesn't stop at heated toilet seats or even hot coffee vending machines, which are plentiful at every other corner block (and a few in between). Perhaps as convenient as convenient store food are jukebox-like, unmanned fastfood booths; only rather than playing an old-fashioned jingle in response to your money they spit out tickets printed with your food order. The receipt is taken to a small open kitchen at the rear of the shop and minutes later you're presented with a scalding bowl of udon soup (thick wheat noodles) swimming in salty dashi broth or a generous dish of rice and curry or a fried pork cutlet. During mealtimes, solitary businessmen in suit and tie stand around narrow counters, loudly slurping up their bowl of noodles. This food is commonplace and down-to-earth, resembling hearty Chinese cuisine minus the unnecessary grease, and plus extra doses of sodium. Despite the opportunity for conversation, being crowded around a narrow counter, customers rarely interact with their neighbors, preferring earbuds and a newspaper instead.



While I thoroughly enjoyed my taste of sashimi during our stay in Japan, I more appreciated the lesson in daily Japanese cuisine that is severely underrepresented and perhaps even unknown of in our society.

RECIPE
Okonomiyaki (Japanese meat and vegetable pancake)

An interactive meal shared in Tokyo was at a "grill your own" restaurant; similar to a Korean BBQ or Taiwanese Hotpot Restaurant. "Yaki" refers to any food grilled / stirfried / griddled and "okonomi" loosely translates into "choose your own." Thus, Okonomiyaki is a griddled pancake in which the ingredients are personalized to each person's preferences (similar in nature to personal pizzas). The pancakes are thick and packed with flavor, slathered with okonomiyaki sauce (tasting like sweet bbq sauce) and drizzled with Japanese mayonnaise and dried tuna fish shavings.



Ingredients:
(serves 1 or 2)
- small handful cabbage, thinly chopped
- 1/4 carrots, julienned
- 1/4 yellow or white onion, thinly sliced
- 1 tsp red pickled ginger strips (optional - found in Asian markets)
- 4-5 thumb-sized chunks of meat (octopus / squid / dark meat chicken / or strips of beef depending on your preference)
- 1 egg
- flour and water to create 2/3 C thick batter (pancake consistency)
- salt
- oil
- (Japanese) mayonnaise (comes in tall pear-shaped plastic bottle with a red cap - regular mayo works just as well if you're not picky for authenticity)
- Okonomiyaki sauce (found in the ethnic aisle or a Japanese supermarket - or substitute vinegary bbq sauce)
- katsuobushi flakes (shaved dried tuna - found in a Japanese supermarket)
- dried parsley (optional)

1) All the vegetables should be chopped to roughly the same size (carrots should be thinner)
2) Make your batter of flour and water (start with 1/8 C water and 1/4 C flour, adding a little of each until you reach a thick pancake batter consistency); measure out 2/3C - 1C of batter
3) Whisk the egg into the batter and add vegetables, ginger strips, and a dash of salt
4) Heat a nonstick saute pan, add 2 tsp oil; add your meat to the skillet and allow meat to brown evenly on all sides (about 4-5 min total)
5) Pour batter with vegetables over the meat and form into a circular disk with a spatula (batter should be thick enough to form a 3/4" thick patty)
6) Allow pancake to brown over medium heat; flip and brown on the other side (about 10 minutes total? <-- experiment with the time; limited resources aboard a vessel)
7) When the pancake is done, remove from heat and slather with okonomiyaki sauce, drizzle with mayonnaise.
8) Top with katsuobushi flakes ; and dried parsley to taste