For the true grub-loving gastronome, the most fatal by-product of enjoying our food has to be weight gain. Monsieur and I are no different, loving our food as we do and engaged in a constant battle of taste versus calorific content. It was therefore serendipitous to catch a tweet from Quadrille Books, asking for bloggers to review Lighten Up by Jill Dupleix.

I admit that Dupleix’s name was relatively new to me, so for a girl with shelves plural devoted to cookbooks, I have had to ask myself why this is the first of Dupleix’s fourteen books to break into the Epicurienne fold. As I learn more about this seasoned kitchen whiz, I am astounded that her profile isn’t  better known in London. I thought it might just be me, so I asked some foodie friends about Dupleix. Apparently, it wasn’t just me. It would seem that unless you’re a regular reader of The Spectator or The Times food columns, you may just have missed this writer, much like I have, and that is what I’d call an absolute travesty of gastronomic proportions. Here’s why.

Dupleix’s website profile tells us that she was born on a sheep farm in Australia, growing up with ‘good, fresh, no-nonsense home cooking’. (This sentence alone makes me nostalgic for the freshness of unregulated Downunder produce). But, in spite of a growing passion for food, Dupleix didn’t enter the realm of the food writer until she’d done a spell of copywriting, encompassing such non-food-related topics as cars and fashion. Then something happened along the way and a passion for food, cookery and restaurants overtook all else. Dupleix  first took the mantle of Cookery Editor for the Sydney Morning Herald, later moving to London to do the same job for The Times. Nowadays, Dupleix contents herself with freelance food writing and cookbook work, which is a good thing indeed, especially for foodies whose nightmares involve a set of bathroom scales.

Bring on Lighten Up, the latest Dupleix offering, first released in 2007. From the moment I first flicked through this brightly-covered paperback, I was a fan. Then I read the introduction and became a total Jill Dupleix acolyte. Once I proceeded to test the recipes for myself, I started daydreaming about hanging out with Dupleix in her kitchen, making Chawan Mushi.

So what makes this book different from its rivals? For a start, the inspiration. Dupleix has created a more easygoing, lighter alternative to the heavier northern hemisphere diet, which sees altogether too many antipodeans expanding sideways once they’ve landed in the likes of North America or Europe. There is proven, personal inspiration also, in the form of Dupleix’s husband, Terry Durack, a restaurant critic who, through his self-professed love of long lunches, cultivated quite an impressive girth. With the help of Dupleix’s lighter approach to eating, he managed to lose an admirable 38 kilos. Now, with Lighten Up, we can all benefit from Dupleix’s tasty, healthy food and a few lost pounds to boot.

The book’s layout is so easy to follow that even a novice cook would find it difficult to make a hash of the recipes. The instructions are short and written in a brief, bullet point style, starting with the action required for each stage: SEAR, CUT, MIX, ADD, TOSS, TRIM, SERVE. The book is separated into sensible sections, such as Morning Food, Salad Food, Soupy Food, Spicy Food, Fast Food and Slow Food. These are interspersed with snack ideas using bananas, bread (yes, the Dupleix Way even bread-based snacks can be good for you!), Japanese ingredients like nori and miso, and perhaps not surprisingly, tofu. There’s a glossary of terms so you have no excuse for mistaking your tamari for tamarind, and if you’d like to know what kitchen accessories rate high on Dupleix’s list, you will find out in Lighten Up.

That’s the summary, but in practice, what are the recipes like? So far, so scrumptious. I’ve particularly enjoyed the ease of Fast Roast Fish with Anchovies, the Fresh Salmon burgers with dill pickles and watercress and Spring Onion Scallops served in their shells, which were so professionally tasty that friends might think you’d called in the caterers. Grilled Chicken with Salsa Verde has received exacting Monsieur’s seal of approval and I’m happily working my way through the little recipes in the Extras section. But what I particularly love about Lighten Up is that it’s time-friendly to the full-time working woman, allowing weight-loss to be quick in preparation with any sense of deprivation completely eliminated.

Still on food but with a whole different slant, here are some articles by Dupleix:

How I shrunk food critic Terry Durack, where Dupleix talks about transforming her husband from Mr Piggy into Mr Fit

Hollywood audiences must think we never eat, where Dupleix wonders why Great Australians are never seen eating on film

And if you want to try out some fantastic sweetcorn fritters, here’s a Dupleix recipe for you. Oh, boy, I’m actually making myself hungry now.

Lighten Up is certainly a worthwhile introduction to Dupleix, with the tantalising photography by Petrina Tinslay spurring me on to try more and more of the Lighten Up recipes. Next on my list will be Chicken Tortilla Soup with Avocado, Watermelon Carpaccio with feta cheese and kalamata olives and the Crab Salad with pumpernickel crisps. When I’m done with those I just might let have to pop along to Books for Cooks to pick up another of the thirteen Dupleix books I have yet to read. I have a funny feeling that Jill Dupleix will be popping up again on Epicurienne, so if you like her style, watch this space.

Unagi donburi with sansho, sesame, and kinome (foreground) and homemade pickles (background)

Last Thursday was doyo no ushi no hi, or the midsummer day of the ox. It’s said in Japan that eating eel can revive you when you’re suffering from tiredness due to the heat of midsummer. So on doyo no ushi no hi it is traditional to eat eel in Japan. Unfortunately, this summer domestic eel prices have been soaring, and as a result, one unscrupulous importer was caught importing Chinese eels and trying to pass them off as Japanese ones. After last year’s contaminated gyoza scandal, many Japanese people are wary of Chinese imports and would prefer to buy domestic eels instead. As a result, prices are climbing ever higher. This year, unusually, there are two doyo no ushi no hi, with the second one falling on August 5th, so if you didn’t have your eel last week, there’s still a chance to have them next week.

While it may have been difficult to get eels last Thurday (I don’t know for sure because I already had plans for dinner), I had no problem finding unagi kabayaki, or grilled, sweet sauce-basted eels, at my market on Monday. They were still on special from the previous week, so I bought two to compare-one from Kagoshima Prefecture and another from Aichi Prefecture. Two unagi was enough for dinner that night and Alex’s lunch the next day too.

When I got home, first I chopped up some vegetables and put them into my new shokutaku tsukemono no ki (tabletop pickling pot) and salt rubbed some more to make nuka-zuke. I’ll post some more about my pickling adventures later. After I had gotten my vegetables started pickling, I made a batch of chawan mushi. I had bought a steamer from Amazon.co.jp that works great as a rack for steaming and for canning. I followed the same basic recipe for chawan mushi that I used before. For filling I went with a combination of shelled edamame, carrots (cut into plum-blossoms), mitsuba, shiitake, and fresh corn. I think the fresh corn didn’t make a great filling for the chawan mushi, so I’ll stick with the traditional slice of kamaboko instead next time. The chawan mushi custard came out really smooth and the flavor was just right. Using a steamer was a huge improvement over a water-bath in the oven.

Next, I grilled a few more ears of corn in my fish broiler before finally grilling the eel (also in the fish broiler). I flipped the eel a few times to be sure that both sides were heated and nicely crisped before I chopped them in half and put them in a donburi with rice. I finished the dish with the sauce that came with the eel, crushed sansho, and a spring of kinome from my balcony garden. The citrusy spice of the sansho and kinome contrast nicely with the sweetness of the unagi’s sauce and so they are a traditional accompaniment with unagi kabayaki. If your eel doesn’t come with it’s own sauce use a simple homemade teriyaki instead (2 parts soy, 1 to 2 parts sugar, and 1 part mirin or sake, boiled until slightly thickened).

So our finished dinner was unagi donburi (grilled eel on a bowl of rice), salt-pickled cabbage and cucumber nuka-zuke, vegetable chawan mushi, and grilled corn. I would say it’s one of the best “homemade” dinners that I’ve made since we’ve been here in Japan. I say “homemade” since the eel was pre-cooked so all I had to do was reheat it and crisp it up in the broiler.

As for the verdict on our two different eels… I liked the tender texture of the Aichi Prefecture unagi, while Alex preferred the firmer Kagoshima Prefecture unagi. I guess there are different strokes for different folks.

Unagi Donburi

1 unagi kabayaki fillet (grilled, sauce-basted eel)
steamed rice
teriyaki sauce
sansho kosho (crushed sansho berries)
1 or two sprigs kinome (leaves of the sansho plant, optional)
crushed toasted sesame seeds, optional

Broil the unagi fillet until it is heated through and both sides are as browned and crispy as you like. Cut the unagi to fit in your bowl (or cut in half if you’re sharing). Fill your bowl with steamed rice, sprinkle crushed toasted sesame seeds on the rice if you like. Place the unagi fillet, skin side down, on top of the rice. Drizzle the unagi with teriyaki sauce and sprinkle with a generous amount of sansho kosho. Finally top with a sprig of kinome.

Chawan Mushi

4 large eggs
600 ml dashi
1 tablespoon usukuchi shoyu (light soy sauce)
1 tablespoon mirin
1/2 teaspoon salt (only if serving chilled)
5 or 10 slices carrot, rounds or cut into flower shapes if you want to get fancy
2 or 3 shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, cut into 10 slices
handful of edamame (green soybeans), shells removed
5 slices kamaboko (steamed fish cake)
5 sprigs mitsuba leaves

Divide the filling ingredients between your five teacups.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl. If the dashi is hot, add a little bit to the eggs and beat to temper the eggs. Then add the rest of the dashi, mirin, and usukuchi shoyu and beat well. Finally, strain the egg mixture and pour into the cups so that they are filled evenly.

Place the cups in a steamer and cover. If you line the inside of your steamer’s lid with a cloth or towel, it will prevent condensation from dripping onto your custards. Steam for 8 to 10 minutes. The custards are finished when clear juice is visible when they are cut with a sharp knife.

If you don’t have a steamer, you can place them in a water bath and bake for 25 minutes at 160 degrees Celsius. Cover with aluminum foil to prevent the tops from browning.

I’ve been meaning to make chawan mushi for a while, ever since Alex got me a cute little set of 5 lidded teacups to use for making it. So, Friday night, I finally made them.

Chawan mushi means “steamed in a teacup.” It’s like a cross between custard and soup. You combine whatever small pieces of filling with a savory dashi and egg custard, and you can serve it hot or cold. I especially like them hot, but once the summer heat arrives, I’m sure I’ll begin to prefer the chilled ones too. Since the main flavor of the chawan mushi comes from the stock, make sure to use real homemade dashi, don’t take shortcuts with the powdered dashi for these.

You can use almost anything you want as the filling ingredients. Part of the fun of eating your chawan mushi is finding these yummy secret treasures hidden inside. Some commonly used ingredients are mitsuba, mushrooms, ginko nuts, and a sliver of yuzu rind, but feel free to add whatever tidbits you like. I got my inspiration from 100 Recipes from Japanese Cooking and The Japan Times’ Way of Washoku.

I had some leftover snow peas, sansho berries, and shiitake mushrooms so I used those for my filling along with some chicken thigh and scallops. The sansho berries added a spicy kick, but I didn’t thing that the flavor went well with the rest of the ingredients that I chose, so I left them out of the recipe below. I don’t have a flat steamer, so I baked them in a water bath instead. I accidentally cooked them for a bit too long, so the custard was a bit overdone (the soup would weep out as soon as it was cut with a spoon) and the peas became a little brown. Next time I will make sure to take them out of the oven after 25 minutes. Next time, I think I’ll add a sliver of yuzu or citrus rind to the chawan mushi as well.

*update: here’s a link to a new post with another recipe for chawan mushi (made with the steamer, it’s much easier)

Chawan Mushi

4 large eggs
600 ml dashi
1 tablespoon usukuchi shoyu (light soy sauce)
1 tablespoon mirin
1/2 teaspoon salt (only if serving chilled)
splash of shoyu (soy sauce)
5 bite-sized pieces of chicken thigh
5 whole scallops
10 snow peas
2 shiitake mushrooms, sliced into 5 slices each
5 sprigs mitsuba leaves

Marinate the chicken and scallops in shoyu for about 30 minutes. Cut the mitsuba into approximately 1-inch lengths. Divide the filling ingredients between your five teacups.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl. If the dashi is hot, add a little bit to the eggs and beat to temper the eggs. Then add the rest of the dashi, mirin, and usukuchi shoyu and beat well. Finally, strain the egg mixture and pour into the cups so that they are filled evenly.

Place the cups in a steamer and cover. If you line the inside of your steamer’s lid with a cloth or towel it will prevent condensation from dripping onto your custards. Steam for 8 to 10 minutes. The custards are finished when clear juice is visible when they are cut with a sharp knife.

If you don’t have a steamer, you can place them in a water bath and bake for 25 minutes at 160 degrees Celsius. Cover with aluminum foil to prevent the tops from browning.

Ted and me visited the Ministry of Food (MOF) at Marina Square for dinner the other Friday. This was not our first visit there. Probably our third or fourth visit. We recalled the delicious Japanese food we had and even signed up as members then so we definitely had to go back!

There was a long queue outside MOF that evening. In a while we were shown a seat for two at the side of the restaurant. The restaurant was quite crowded and appears to be a little noisy. Probably it’s the weekend crowd! We quickly ordered our food. I liked the Salmon Shabu-Shabu set (S$16.80) and had to order it. We also tried the chawan-mushi, going at a discount of S$2.80 that evening. In addition, we ordered some Ala-Cartes like the Tori Karaage 6 pieces (S$6.80) and the Pork Rice (S$4.90).

What a letdown this time! I suspect the chef might have been changed as the quality of the food appears to have slipped. The Salmon Shabu set which was served with specially made Apple sauce along with a plate of fresh greens was quite different this time round. We were served very huge pieces of cucumbers and tomatoes on the plate of greens and the slices of salmon also appear to be prepared in a hurry. Vaguely recalled the previous times we were served very delicately and nicely cut pieces of greens and salmon pieces. Somehow we just could not feel the quality we expected and experienced previously. The Pork Rice was not what we expected either. The pork pieces looked like they were prepared in a rush. Luckily for the chawan-mushi, it was great though. Soft and hot! The tori karaage (fried chicken pieces) was quite the usual.

To end the meal, we had to go for the heavenly Macha Imo dessert (S$3.00) offered as a discount to the Salmon Shabu-Shabu set. Macha Imo as the name suggests, consists of Green Tea Milk Ice-Cream served with Red Beans paste and pieces of nicely fried Sweet Potatoes. This is a very nice treat, especially so for the sweet-tooth! The dessert was served with a small instructional sheet teaching you how to savour this heavenly ice-cream! Basically, you have to mix a little bit of each thing i.e. take a little bit of hot fried sweet potato and eat with a little bit of the cold green tea ice-cream together with some sweet red bean paste. Hot mix with cold. Experience is great! YUM! Thankfully this saved the day!!

I wish the other main dishes could be better improved to the standard I used to remember. I will visit the place again because I am still a member and maybe it could have been a bad chef day that the food quality went *poof* or maybe it’s due to the heavy crowd building up these days at the place… though I strongly believe quality of food should never be compromised in any way no matter how. Well you let me know if you get a chance to visit the restaurant next time!

Ministry Of Food My Izakaya is located at 6 Raffles Boulevard, #02-138E Center Stage, Marina Square, Singapore 039594 Tel: 6334 2202.

We visited the Ichiban Sushi at Hougang Mall. Teddy had his tooth extracted and could not take any food that is too hard. So we headed for Japanese food.

I had the Salmon Don, which was pretty reasonably priced and boy! was it delicious! Sesame oil over the juicy fresh salmon!! The don came sparkling gold and smells reek of sesame. The don was well seasoned with the right amount of sesame and the rice was cooked just nice. Not too hard or soft. It is said that good well-cooked Japanese vinegar rice should just be a little sticky but not too much. Suppose this should be it. I just cant resist my favourite salmon in the don which was very fresh indeed. The don was gobbled up within minutes. Yum.

Poor Teddy could only have chawan-mushi (steamed egg) and a shiogayaki (seasoned ginger) pork rice set. The set came served complete with miso-soup and some oranges as dessert. The serving was a lot and we could share the pork slices too. Ichiban Sushi is located at Hougang Mall, Level 2, Singapore.