Sesame Miso Donabe

The weather is quickly warming up for Southern California but it's been difficult to stop making this sesame miso donabe! IT'S SO GOOD. We started making it when COVID-19 shut the entire world down and we ordered a CSA box to help some local farms who had lost their restaurant contracts stay afloat. The leafy greens were perfect in donabe.

That box was $25, which is a steal for how fresh the vegetables are! When I buy greens from the market, they usually last about a week. One of those Bloomsdale spinach bundles lasted THREE WEEKS before I got to it and it wasn't rotting at all!

This donabe (or you can make it in a regular pot) is totally adaptable with whatever vegetables or thin-sliced meat you have on hand (or seafood). Most of the time when I've made this, it's been totally vegetarian because it was the easiest, and we wanted to use as much of the CSA vegetables as possible. The most important thing is the soup base.

Sesame Miso Donabe
Adapted from Just One Cookbook
Serves 4

3 Tbsp white sesame seeds
6 cups water
1 Tbsp Hon-dashi
3 cloves garlic, minced
4 dried shitake mushrooms
3-4 Tbsp miso paste

Vegetable suggestions:
Spinach
Bok choy
Tokyo turnips
Daikon
Green onions
Assorted mushrooms
Tofu, fish (cut into 1" chunks), shrimp, any shabu shabu meats

Toast the white sesame seeds in a small pan over low heat (no oil or anything required). Make sure it doesn't burn! Grind with a mortar and pestle, not too fine.

Boil the water with the Hon-dashi, garlic and dried mushrooms. Add the tofu and hard vegetables (daikon, carrots, turnips, etc), simmer for 5 minutes. Add leafy greens and quicker cooking vegetables (green onions, mushrooms, spinach, etc), simmer for two minutes.

At this point you can serve hot with ponzu sauce as an option. If you have any seafood/meats, add them now and simmer for three minutes, then serve. The seafood/meats will continue to cook in the hot broth.

Doobu Jorim

Does the title mean anything to you? I know the first word is tofu, but that's about it. A couple months ago, I found a brand new starting site called Bap Story. I love this site, and it has this recipe for soy seasoned tofu. It has all the Korean foods that I love and wish my mom knew how to make, if my mom were Korean. But alas, she is Taiwanese.

My mom, like most other Asian moms, be crazy. Hopefully this doesn't offend anyone, but she IS. Most people won't agree with me - everyone is always saying "your mom is so funny, your mom is so nice, your mom is so cute" etc etc etc. She may be those things now, but in high school we fought like cats and dogs. Like screaming at each other at the tops of our lungs style fighting. Nothing brought us closer together as me moving out of the house. She's mellowed out a lot more now that my brother and I aren't in high school anymore ... but as he says "When mom is nice, she's pretty nice. But when she's not, she's f**king crazy."

I hope my future-maybe-kids don't say that about me, but let's face it - they probably will. I saw evidence of this last night. Super tired from work, I felt like cooking (which of course, made me more tired - stupid me) and made steak, bok choy in ginger sauce and the soy seasoned tofu. Boyfriend is not a fan of tofu (he's Italian - is that an excuse?) but really enjoyed the green onion sauce on top - so much that he wasn't even eating the tofu, but was picking bits of green onion off the top. With his fingers. I snapped "Stop picking at it with your hands!" and then froze in horror. I actually love picking at food with my hands. This wasn't me talking - this was my mom! I'm doomed.

Doobu Jorim (Soy Seasoned Tofu)
from Bap Story

Soy Seasoning:
4 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp minced garlic
1/2 tsp red chili powder
2 tsp sesame seeds
1/2 Tbsp honey
1/2 Tbsp sugar
4 Tbsp green onion, chopped
1/2 Tbsp white rice wine

1 Tbsp water
1/2 Tbsp rice vinegar
1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 package firm tofu
2 Tbsp cornstarch
2 Tbsp flour
2-3 Tbsp cooking oil

Mix all soy seasoning ingredients together and set aside. Wrap tofu in paper towels for 10 min, to blot excess moisture. Mix together cornstarch and flour. Cut tofu block in half lengthwise, and then into 1/2 inch pieces. Dredge in cornstarch/flour mixture, shaking off excess.

Heat oil in flat bottomed pan over medium high heat. When oil is hot, carefully place tofu pieces and allow to brown on one side (3-5 min). Flip over and allow to brown on the other side. Pour in seasoning (it will sizzle) and allow it to bubble - it will be absorbed by the tofu. When the sauce is almost all gone (about 3-4 min), take the pan off the heat. Serve garnished with additional green onions and sesame seeds.