Extra Schmaltz!

These sweet-and-sour pickles are a wonderful accompaniment to many dishes, and are an especially nice contrast to meat-heavy or fried main dishes. I also like to add them to salads, sandwiches, and even instant noodles. You can also make them with red radishes, which turns out beautiful and zingier than if you use daikon. These are best made at least an hour ahead, and they stay good for several weeks in the fridge. For 1 lb combined peeled carrots and radish: 1 lb. carrots and radish, julienned 1 tsp. Kosher salt 1/3 c. rice vinegar 2 heaping Tbsp. brown sugar After cutting the carrots and radishes, toss them with the salt and allow them to sit for 10 minutes. Drain the excess liquid and gently squeeze out the rest. Dissolve the sugar in the vinegar and pour this mixture over the carrots and radishes. Allow to sit for at least one hour before serving. Can be stored in a clean container in the fridge for several weeks.

UPDATE! Here is an improved salad dressing recipe and a detailed description of making the cutlet from scratch. The dressing below is still good, but not quite as good as the miso style! Technically tonkatsu is a breaded pork cutlet, but you can make chicken-katsu or veal-catsu or chickenmcnugget-katsu (as pictured). It's traditionally served as a full meal with rice, shredded cabbage, miso soup, and some pickles. The cutlet is generally sliced so that it can be eaten with chopsticks and dressed with Japanese-style Worcestershire sauce ('sosu'). I forgot to take a picture of rice, so don't forget to include it! For the meal pictured I used salad with ginger vinaigrette instead of the cabbage. Here's how to put together the meal: Make the Sosu: 1/2 c. catsup 1/4 c. Worcestershire sauce 1/4 c. rice wine 3 Tbsp. sugar 1 Tbsp. ginger, minced 1 Tbsp. garlic, minced Combine all ingredients and simmer for 20 minutes. Rice : Make some short-grained w...

The first harvest of my garden has arrived, in the form of red radishes! The variety I grew is called Shunkyo Semi-long and I chose it because it matures quickly. Unfortunately (or so I thought) these radishes are too spicy for comfortable snacking or use in salads. I couldn't let them go to waste, but I just didn't know what to do with them! Fortunately, though, I emailed the wonderful Maangchi , who runs a fantastic Korean cooking blog and whom I've corresponded with in the past. She responded right away with a recipe idea: water-style kimchi ('mul kimchi'), which she recently made with similar radishes. Take that , rabbits! This style of kimchi has more liquid than what you find in the most common style of kimchi available in the store, though it is made in a similar way: a short and simple fermentation. The recipe that Maangchi sent me doesn't use red pepper flakes, which is a nice change from the usual red kimchis you find. The results are boldly spicy, cr...