Chili-Lime Peanuts

Put a spicy, salty snack in front of me, and a pint of cold beer in my hand and I’m pretty much a happy camper. Unfortunately, I won’t stop eating the snack and might spoil my dinner. Despite my own personal weakness, my intention for making these zesty peanuts was to have something to offer [...]

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Fava Bean & Green Garlic Hummus on Crostini

Fava beans and green garlic make hummus especially “springy” and an even more fabulous spread for crunchy crostini! (Special thanks to our friends Tony & Miriam for sharing their veggies from Live Earth Farm!)
Fava Bean & Green Garlic Hummus:
1/4 cup + 2 TBS. olive oil
1 stock green garlic, washed, tough outer layer of stock removed, [...]

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Four-Cheese Mini Macs

Mmm, look at that cheese bubbling up around the edges … I can’t take the credit for this recipe, other than buttering the muffin tins and later eating the finished product, but I CAN rave about it so that’s what I’ll do! While I was working on my minted pea dip, my Mom was busy [...]

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Veggie Crudités with Minted-Pea Yogurt Dip

Green foods are sometimes not as photogenic as others, but putting that aside, this dip is fresh, healthy, and a good match for cold, crunchy, seasonal veggies. We served this dip while we were watching the Oscars on Sunday – with radishes, carrots, Belgian endive, red and yellow bell peppers, and snow peas. What I [...]

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Spinach & Pork Wontons

Folding wrappers over a filling and pinching the edges closed is fun, especially when there’s two of you so you can converse while you’re doing it. My Mom and I made these wontons the other day after she was inspired by the recipe in Food & Wine. Since we couldn’t find fresh wonton wrappers at [...]

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Chicken Satay with Peanut Sauce

We’ve been having unusually warm weather for January! Last Sunday we pretended it was summer (although it wasn’t that hard to pretend when it was 70 degrees at 5:00 in the evening), fired up the BBQ, and invited some good friends over for appetizers. They brought rounds of polenta (both regular, and sun-dried tomato) topped [...]

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My First Caviar!

On New Year’s Eve I branched out and tried some caviar at my parents’ house. I wasn’t sure what to expect, being that I’m not a fan of tobiko in Japanese cuisine (orange fish eggs, which are larger than caviar. There’s something about that “bursting ” sensation when you bite down on them that I [...]

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Taverna-Style Baked Feta Dip

Once upon a time, on our first night in Oia on the island of Santorini, we were starving and jet-lagged, walking along the cobble stone streets in search of something to eat. There were many stray dogs and cats wandering the streets, almost all of which appeared to be well fed and taken care of [...]

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Deviled Eggs

I needed an easy appetizer for our Halloween party and thought that Deviled eggs were the obvious choice! If I had had more time, I would have decorated the eggs like little devil faces using small pieces of bell pepper and olives for horns, eyes, mouths, and beards. That’s what my brother and I did [...]

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Coconut Shrimp

First things first, I’d like to say a very enthusiastic “Happy Mothers’ Day!” to my amazing Mom, my favorite cook who has continually inspired me to explore all things culinary! Second, Oh how we love these crispy shrimp with a tropical flair. This is one of our favorite recipes when we want something [...]

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Raw Tuna & Leek Salad with Ginger-Soy Sauce

A few weeks ago one of our students, an old man in his 70s, handed us a small paperback cookbook called Japanese Favorites. Finally, some guidelines for making a few of the things we’ve tasted and enjoyed while living here. What I love about Japanese cooking is that the ingredients themselves, their colors, [...]

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Crispy Chicken Wontons with Sweet Chili-Lime Sauce

We present to you Irresistible crunchiness paired with an addicting sauce. Wontons are one of our favorite appetizers to order in a restaurant, so we decided to make them ourselves! The weather is starting to warm up, our colds are (almost) gone, cherry blossom season is right around the corner, and spring break [...]

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Sizzling Hot Shrimp

You can control the amount of chili that you add to this dish, but we recommend adding enough to make you sweat. In this cold weather, it feels better. This dish is based on a recipe for shrimp pil-pil that I recently came across in a Rachael Ray Magazine. It originates from [...]

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Cardamom Spiced Cashews – New Year Nuts!

Cashews are transformed when they’re sautéed in a skillet with yummy spices. These were a part of our New Years Eve spread, along with cheese fondue with bread, veggies, and apples (a Genco-family tradition), and spinach-artichoke dip (my contribution this year).

Thanks to my Mom for passing on this simple recipe:

Sauté the cashews in [...]

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Goat Cheese Quesadillas with Caramelized Onions & Fresh Basil

Before heading off to our Christmas party/gingerbread man-decorating-extravaganza, I wanted to jazz up our usual weekend lunch, so I came up with these quesadillas using things that were hanging out in our refrigerator. I’m obviously not the first to come up with this combination, but they were so light and tasty.

Spread a thin [...]

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Artichoke-Spinach Dip

I gave in and made one of my weaknesses. Blame it on the small jar of marinaded artichokes that I found at the import food store last weekend. And I also won’t admit that this is what we ate for dinner last night, along with a sliced baguette and a big salad (oh [...]

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Hummus, Baked Pita Chips, and Cherry Tomato, Cucumber & Feta Salad

A bell chimes as we push open the heavy glass door and enter Kokoro (meaning “Heart”), a bakery the size of our pantry back home. A short lady with a round, smiling face greets us, saying, Irashaimase (welcome!) We grab a green plastic tray and a pair of tongs hanging from a small rack. [...]

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"Angry" Gnocchi with Fried Mozzerella Salad & Zucchini

The gnocchi is angry because it’s covered with one of my favorite sauces – Arrabbiata (which means “angry”). I’m not sure why it’s angry. Personally, garlic and chiles make me happy! This is our weeknight standby pasta sauce. There’s not much to say, except that we love the spiciness from the chilies, the flavor [...]

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Beat the Heat Japanese Style: Beer & Beans

Eda-mame are fresh, young soy beans that are often boiled in the pod and eaten in summertime with a generous sprinkling of salt and a chilled Japanese Beer. Their name means “branch beans” because sometimes you can buy them still attached to their stalks. You can probably find them at most grocery stores [...]

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Seared Wasabi-Sesame Tuna with Avocado Cream and Maple Soy Sauce

We laughed at ourselves as we picked out the tuna in the supermarket today. We got it from the section that sells top-quality fish for sashimi, bite-size slices of fish, eaten raw with only soy sauce and wasabi. We predicted that we were the only people in the store who were buying that [...]

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