Off the Map

Having Nanzan Giro Giro as the last meal we had at Hawaii, really made each dish linger in my mind. A few dishes I want to recreate such as abalone with cauliflower cream, lobster with uni and lobster bisque, green bean sesame tofu.. Having the long weekend, we decided to try making our own “Kaiseki”, not strictly Japanese style though!

About Twin Lobsters:

Couldn’t find abalone at Wholefoods Market unfortunately.. so I used lobster to substitute abalone in the dish. I made two types of lobster, deep fried and scallion/ginger stir-fried lobster, placed on top of cauliflower cream. I have never had cauliflower cream before, online recipes seem easy, with simple ingredients of cauliflower, garlic and pepper. I added tahini in the mixture just to experiment and play around, surprisingly it tastes good! And did not take over the cauliflower flavor! The cauliflower cream we had was also more jelly like instead of mushy, so I added gelatin in mixture, put in fridge to set for 1-2 hours; it was still NOT as jelly as the one at Nanzan Giro Giro.

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Twin Lobsters

• remove lobster shell, clean lobster tail and cut into slices; dry.
• marinate with salt and pepper
• coat with corn starch, fry for 30sec till lobster meat turns red
• 1st half:
  • in a pan, stir fry ginger slices, green onions and garlic slices in oil
  • add in half of the lobster tail pieces, then add soy sauce and oyster sauce
  • cover with lid and cook for 30sec to 1min
• 2nd half:
  • cauliflower cream:
    • in boiling water, add in cauliflower till cook through
    • in a pan, fry garlic in butter till golden
    • soften gelatin sheet in cold water for 5mins
    • in a blender, add in cauliflower, fried garlic, leftover butter, few spoonful milk, 1tsp sesame sauce/tahini, salt and pepper; add in gelatin sheet and blend till smooth
    • transfer to container and set in fridge
  • asparagus:
    • slice asparagus thinly and stir fry in oil, marinate with salt
  • place asparagus at the bottom, then a spoon of cauliflower cream, on top of it add fried lobster tail

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Mochi Squid with Yuzu Pepper Sauce

• clean and dry squid tentacles; cut oyster mushrooms into slices
• marinate squid tentacles and oyster mushroom slices with salt and pepper
• coat with mochi/sweet rice flour, set aside for 5-10mins
• air-fry at 355F/180C for 10-30mins
  • air-frying too long will make it crispy as chips

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The rest on our menu:

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