Cooking through Harumi
When I was fifteen, I had a Japanese 'homestay family' of sorts. I made a friend at my school whose family had moved to Edinburgh for her father's work. When she discovered that I was studying Japanese and in love with her country, her family sort of adopted me. They had me over for dinners, afternoons, and once, a three-night mini-homestay. My friend and her family possibly prepared me for Japan better than all the years of study that followed.
Her mother taught me the basics of Japanese cooking: how to wash rice, pack a bento, and make tamago-yaki (something at which I still fail miserably!). At one point, she gave me a present: a Japanese cookbook by the cooking goddess Kurihara Harumi.
I scoured the book for recipes to try on my family; ones which were both doable without specific Japanese ingredients, and tame enough that my family would be willing to sample. (About half my family run away at the mention of raw fish.) I tried several and found a few favourites, but the work involved in cooking for eight people from a cuisine with which I had little experience soon wore me out. Chickpea curry and spaghetti bolognese slowly shouldered their way past the karaage and miso shiru when it was my night to cook.
Over ten years later, now as the wife of a Japanese man, with access to Japanese ingredients and a year of constant cooking under my belt, I picked it up again. I was looking for something to bolster my washoku recipe repertoire. Nostalgia trickled in as I turned the pages to see all these post-it notes written in a high schooler's handwriting. "Nice to see you again, Harumi." Slowly but surely, I'm cooking my way through her book again.
The first recipe I tried is one of her most popular: carrot & tuna salad. It's slightly vinegary and delicious. I mixed it up last week by substituting lemon juice for the mustard - my husband loves lemon and he approved. It's so fun loving him with food like this. (I also fashioned some of the carrots into little flower shapes. Just because.) Enjoy!
Her mother taught me the basics of Japanese cooking: how to wash rice, pack a bento, and make tamago-yaki (something at which I still fail miserably!). At one point, she gave me a present: a Japanese cookbook by the cooking goddess Kurihara Harumi.
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| Her second book, and the one I fell in love with |
I scoured the book for recipes to try on my family; ones which were both doable without specific Japanese ingredients, and tame enough that my family would be willing to sample. (About half my family run away at the mention of raw fish.) I tried several and found a few favourites, but the work involved in cooking for eight people from a cuisine with which I had little experience soon wore me out. Chickpea curry and spaghetti bolognese slowly shouldered their way past the karaage and miso shiru when it was my night to cook.
Over ten years later, now as the wife of a Japanese man, with access to Japanese ingredients and a year of constant cooking under my belt, I picked it up again. I was looking for something to bolster my washoku recipe repertoire. Nostalgia trickled in as I turned the pages to see all these post-it notes written in a high schooler's handwriting. "Nice to see you again, Harumi." Slowly but surely, I'm cooking my way through her book again.
The first recipe I tried is one of her most popular: carrot & tuna salad. It's slightly vinegary and delicious. I mixed it up last week by substituting lemon juice for the mustard - my husband loves lemon and he approved. It's so fun loving him with food like this. (I also fashioned some of the carrots into little flower shapes. Just because.) Enjoy!
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