Last night was so hot I didn't have too much appetite well into the night. (Apparently, when it's too hot, our brain thinks that the heat comes from the post-eating digestion, and therefore get the false idea that we've eaten already. Those "holiday pounds" aren't just a result of turkey roast--they're accumulated throughout the colder months!) Though I'd stir-fried shrimps and fresh asparagus from Green City Market with olive oil, shallots and lemon, what I really wanted was this:

It's a simple but very good dish, made with daikon radish, kmnbu (kelp), abura-age (thin pouch of fried tofu) and shiitake mushrooms. Because the kombu and shiitake release a ton of umami, it only takes a tiny bit of other flavoring, like soy sauce and sugar. I usually add ginger to most of my nimono (simmered-type dishes), but for this one, I don't use ginger. The point is to make it as gentle as possible, so you can savor the full extent of the kombu and shiitake goodness. I think this is sort of Kyoto-style, but I may be wrong; Kyotoans have lots of very subtle techniques when it comes to cooking. I, on the other hand, tend to cook Kanto-style (or Tokyo-style), with soy sauce and sugar often overpowering everything. The ancient Japanese living in Kyoto (those around 8th century onward) looked down on the "Easterners" as inelegant savages, and the difference, if not outright hierarchy, in taste still seems to live on.

The only twist I added to the normal recipe for this taki-awase (literally it means "simmered together") was to grill the abura-age prior to adding them to the broth. I thought it might give them a nice, nutty flavor, but the difference was negligible after the abura-age simmered in the thin broth.

When we were just about ready for dinner last night, the light suddenly went out. And stayed out for about an hour or so. We figured it was probably the wind gusts, but it was kind of fun to have dinner with candle light. Finishing the last bit of preparation with only a candle light was, though, pretty exciting. (And I had to photograph the leftover this morning.) It was a chilling reminder as to how much we rely on electricity...