Miso

This dish was inspired by Korean cooking, which is extremely popular in Japan. With a hearty and spicy broth, it’s perfect for wintertime, when crabs are at their peak flavor. I like to serve this dish in individual Asian hot pot dishes, but you can also combine this recipe into one big pot and ladle into bowls. If you’re using live crabs, be sure to remove the head, gills, and tough outer shells before cooking.

Everyone in Japan knows ja-ja-men, with its spicy miso and garlicky flavors. Think of it as the Japanese version of spaghetti and Bolognese sauce, a favorite at home and casual restaurants. This may sound counterintultive, but I love eating this dish on a hot summer day—its spices reenergize me.

This ramen is a wintertime standard in Japan, and no wonder: it hails from the city of Sapporo in the far northern island of Hokkaido (home of the eponymous beer), a part of the country that’s very frigid and snowy in the winter. The hearty pork and miso-flavored broth in this dish is the perfect warm-up for even the chilliest day. Miso ramen is a relative newcomer to the noodle scene, becoming popular only since the mid-sixties. But corn, a surprising ingredient for a Japanese dish, has been grown in Hokkaido since the nineteenth century.

Even my meat-eating friends, quietly polite when invited to a dinner featuring tofu, rave about this one. It is easy and delicious and contains flavors traditionally considered typical of both Japanese- and Korean-style cooking. Serve over brown rice.

Miso is a fermented soybean paste, and is, well, the namesake ingredient behind miso soup. It is available in most natural foods stores and certainly in Asian supermarkets. Look for it in the refrigerated section near the tofu. Serve alongside steamed rice and vegetables for a spicy, sensible meal.

Simple, quick, and colorful, this soup is best eaten as soon as it is done. It makes a nice introduction to Asian rice or noodle dishes.

This soup is very warming, and more filling than more common, very brothy miso soups.

Once you’ve got the squash baked, this Japanese-style soup comes together quickly, and is as pleasing to the eye as it is to the palate. Use chopsticks for “slurping” the noodles.

Miso is a nutritious, high-protein product fermented from soybeans and salt (or a combination of soybeans, grains, and salt). Available at all natural food stores and Asian groceries (as is the sea vegetable kombu), pungent-tasting miso is most commonly used to make simple broths. Here is a basic recipe, which really should be considered a soup in itself rather than as a stock for making other soups. Note that once the miso is stirred into water, it should not be boiled. Otherwise, its beneficial enzymes will be destroyed.

One of my friends once owned a place that served delectable organic small plates in a funky part of town. I had a melt-in-your-mouth soy-miso monkfish that was just to die for. I’ve tried to re-create the experience here. Because monkfish can be hard to find, I use flounder to make this at home, but feel free to use sole, tilapia, salmon, or any fish. For that matter, this would be delicious with chicken or pork tenderloin as well. To make the dish spicier, double or triple the amount of black bean sauce. You can usually find black bean and garlic sauce in the Asian section of the grocery store.

I’ve been finding fresh mangoes at my local grocery store often lately, but if you don’t have one, use a can of puree or fresh orange juice. If you don’t have macadamia nut oil, it’s okay to use another nut oil or even olive oil, but realize you will lose some depth of flavor. Vary your meal by changing the lentils: Red lentils will result in a mushier texture, while green lentils will offer a more al dente eating experience. I like to use white or mellow-flavored miso paste, but the strength of miso flavor is really a personal preference.

This way of cooking eggplant makes the flesh soft and creamy. The miso glaze sweetens it with a Japanese flair.

This salmon, quickly roasted, is moist and flavorful with its sweet-salty glaze of mirin and miso.

Broccoli and mushrooms make this miso soup a little bit unusual and a meal in itself. (See photo)

Miso has become a common ingredient in the supermarket. It is a fermented soybean paste that is traditionally seasoned with salt and koji, which are grains, usually rice, fermented with Aspergillus oryzae molds. Miso is classified by color (white or blond, red or brown), flavor (sweet or salty), and ingredients (barley, soybean). In this pasta dough we like the delicate taste of blond miso, which is fermented with a high percentage of rice koji. It is the sweetest and mildest of the miso varieties and adds a savory depth of flavor with a lighter touch than a darker miso. Traditionally, flavored noodles are often served simply buttered, as they are in this recipe. Chopped sautéed watercress, freshly cooked clams, sautéed ground pork, braised baby radishes, or pan-seared calamari would all complement this pasta and create a satisfying meal.

Serve as a spread on whole-grain crackers, crisp lavash, or wedges of pita bread. For more information on miso, a pungent soyfood, see page 21.

Pungent miso makes an offbeat flavoring for red beans. For more on miso, see page 21.

This nicely flavored miso soup is made more substantial with the addition of tofu. Fresh shiitake mushrooms impart the best flavor to the broth. Follow with an Asian-style noodle dish, such as Asian Sesame-Soy Noodles (page 85).

This is a soothing remedy when you are coming down with a cold—though you need not wait for a cold to try it!