Beet Soup with a Japanese Subtext

The red tones in this picture make me think of Matisse's "The Red Studio":
rich, mysterious and satisfying. 

This beet and potato soup was one of the most delicious dishes I had at a dinner that Japanese chef, teacher and cookbook author Hiroko Shimbo made not too long ago. The recipe for it, featured in her most recent cookbook, Hiroko's American Kitchen, includes a medium-sized Yukon gold potato, beets, and leeks. They're simmered in kelp stock, pureed, and then enriched with miso, mustard powder and spiked with minced parsley. The weather was still hot then (yes, I'm a slow and lazy blogger, I admit that) and the chilled soup completely charmed us with its silky texture, a flavor much milder and more subtle than Russian borscht, and as one guest said, without the metallic aftertaste that beets can sometimes bring to the party. The version Hiroko served us was topped with a small torpedo-shaped scoop of homemade shiso sorbet, It's probably more than most of us can muster at home on a weeknight, but was a total treat.

There was more to come, too: a Vietnamese-style squid dish stuffed with ground pork in an umami-rich European-style tomato sauce, and salmon baked in a salt crust, wrapped in a cherry leaf with a cherry blossom hidden within, both of which perfumed the fish. Each guest was called forth to wield a little hammer and crack open the salt shell and smell the fragrant steam that wafted up. There were potatoes roasted in miso with bacon, and simply steamed okra as well. We finished with an amazing cantaloupe sorbet with fresh watermelon and cantaloupe, which paired surprisingly well with the green Mifukuan yuzukosho (preserved citron and chile) liquid and powder that I brought back with me from Saga, Japan.

Virtually everything we ate that night came from the Union Square Greenmarket, only steps away from Hiroko's loft. It was the greenmarket that inspired Hiroko's American Kitchen, which teaches you how to make six simple sauces (including that kelp stock and several versatile and super-handy miso sauces) and use them as the base for a Japanese-accented seasonal cuisine, heavy on fresh produce found in American markets. As with the soup, the sauces aren't always detectable, yet add depth and mystery to each dish.

If you get a chance, stop by the Union Square Greenmarket this Saturday -- Hiroko will be there, selling and signing copies of Hiroko's American Kitchen. You, too, can make her beet and potato soup!

Fermentation, Miso, and the Health Benefits of Soy

In the past two weeks, I attended two lectures that vastly increased my knowledge of two powerhouse fermented ingredients in Japanese cooking. One was a lecture on shiokoji, the miracle flavor enhancer and umami conductor that has for some time been all the rage in Japan. The other was a nutritional talk on the miracles of miso, the fermented soybean paste at the heart of miso soup and countless other flavorful Japanese dishes.

Nutrition researcher Lawrence H. Kushi, ScD, delivered a scientifically detailed and convincing ode to miso at a recent Japan Society lecture. The room was packed. Who knew there were so many miso lovers in this city?  Miso paste is pretty simple stuff. It's made of three ingredients: some type of grain, usually soybeans in Japan, koji (mold-innoculated rice) and water. 

Dr. Kushi's main points were nutritional. He  pointed out that Japan is third in worldwide average life expectancy (compared to the United States' sickly 51st place), despite Japan's famously high sodium intake. Dr. Kushi showed slides of numerous epidimiological studies. One of the earliest studies on miso and chronic diseases followed 250,000 people in Japan and showed a clear link between daily consumption of miso soup an a lower incident of stomach cancer. Miso has also been associated with lower rates of breast cancer. The doctor noted that "what you eat early in life makes a difference," so a high intake of soy products during childhood can exert a protective longterm effect. And even though miso is high in sodium, studies indicated that it is "a safer salt vehicle than salt," Dr. Kushi added.

There is a controversial side of miso, as one audience member pointed out. Soy contains isoflavones (a naturally occurring chemical compound) that are are similar to the hormone estrogen. The worry is that for women undergoing treatment for breast cancer, soy products may negate the effect of estrogen-blocking breast cancer drugs. Both Dr. Kushi and the American Cancer Society (see their "Expert Voices blog post on the topic) point out the shortcoming of studies that raised these fears, and stress the much more abundant evidence on the protective effects of soy.

Kushi, by the way, comes from a long line of educators; his father was Michio Kushi, the famous proponent of macrobiotics. One last interesting point, also raised by an audience member, is that studies have shown that gut bacteria of people in different cultures differs significantly. Apparently there is some evidence, for example, that Japanese people can extract more nutrients from seaweed-based foods than non-Japanese. Dr. Kushi noted that intestinal microbiata (the microbes that live in our intestines) are of great interest to the NIH, but that more study is needed. He also pointed out that when people move to another culture "they take on the disease characteristics of the place they live as they take on different eating habits and food choices."

If you're interested in how the typical Asian diet differs from a standard western diet, check out the Asian Diet Pyramid. Rice, noodles and whole grain products form the base, eaten daily, while meat is at the tip of the pyramid, a once-a-month rarity.

Since I didn't even get to the fascinating lecture by Japanese cooking expert Hiroko Shimbo on shiokoji, stay tuned for my upcoming post, which will be all about that!