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miso horny

Wow, that looks delicious. I would like that, please?

...but then I'd have to take a trip to either the scary international grocery or the central market grocery, both of which are across town.

What's scary at the international grocery, muddgirl? The prices?

I make miso quite often. I make my own Dashi with Kombu and Katsuo Bushi. I also add dried wakame to the soup. I always have the seaweeds on hand, and generally have miso paste in the fridge. While not quite as fast as your 16 minutes, it's still pretty quick. I've also been known to add mushrooms on occasion. There are also many many types of Miso. I generally use red miso for a heartier soup. I've also used brown rice miso and white miso. Such a simple little soup, and so many variables. mmmmmmmm I better make some tonight...

I've been reading up on it and also spoke with a few people at the Asian market, and have come to the understanding that miso soup is actually a breakfast staple in Japan, which I didn't know. It's supposedly most popular at breakfast but is eaten any time of day, like eggs or toast or something like that would be here in the US. My husband said he wanted to try to make Dashi this weekend - do you have any special recipe, eekacat?

Fresh scallions in soup. . .I can't imagine anything more heavenly.

Okay, does miso paste need to be refrigerated? The Boy thought "yes" as it's always in the refrigerated case at his market. At my market, it isn't. The package does not say. I was keeping it in the fridge, but it stopped running and I don't know if the miso is toast, so to speak.

I just use this Dahi recipe at Epicurious. Most recipes I've seen are pretty similar. I now get the katsuo bushi in the bag rather than the little 5 gram envelopes. Much cheaper that way.

I refrigerate miso, everywhere I've bought it, it's been refrigerated. It is pretty salty, so I imagine it's self preserving, but it doesn't take much space in the fridge. If nothing else I bet the flavor would remain more stable in the fridge.

oops this DASHI recipe.... sigh so much for preview...

I love using miso in pesto for pasta. Here's a great recipe for miso-lime pesto that I got out of an old issue of Vegetarian Times. It's always a hit:

Serves 6
ingredient list:
* 1/2 cup whole cashews
* Juice of 1 lime
* 1 cup packed fresh basil leaves
* 1 Tbs. barley or chickpea miso
* 1 Tbs. olive oil

Use a mellow-flavored miso rather than traditional red miso so it won’t overpower the milder flavor of basil and cashews. Use 1 tablespoon pesto per 1 cup cooked pasta. This mixture is wonderful served over angel hair pasta.

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Place cashews on baking sheet and toast in oven 5 minutes. Set aside to cool.
2. In food processor, combine lime juice, basil, miso, 1 tablespoon water, and salt and pepper to taste. Process until blended. Add oil and 1⁄4 cup cooled cashews and process until they’re finely chopped. Using spatula, scrape down sides of bowl when necessary.
3. Spoon pesto over each serving and garnish with remaining whole cashews. If not using right away, store pesto, covered, in refrigerator for up to five days.

I love miso soup as well. I try to follow what my friend Chie taught me (she eats it for breakfast each morning). She puts three things into the soup, other than the miso and the dashi.

Sometimes it's tofu, green onions and shitake mushrooms, sometimes it's zucchini, carrots and green onion, whatever I have on hand and sounds good.

I found a recipe for vegetarian dashi at Just Hungry. You soak the Kombu with 3 shitake mushrooms, overnight. Dashi uses bonito flakes normally, so it's not vegetarian.

I eat fish, so I like both dashis, but it's nice to have a strictly vegetarian one for my friends.

I have miso basically every day, as a supplement to a light lunch, or sometimes just as a pre-dinner snack. I buy the instant kikkoman miso packets, and I never cease to be amazed at how well tofu, seaweed and scallions reconstitute from freeze dried. Just 2/3 cup of hot water (right from the tap of our scary industrial coffee maker) and it's ready in seconds. Love it.

Obvs, your soup looks a billion times better. Will have to try it one of these days.

The international grocery store is dark inside, which means we sometimes pick up the wrong thing. And it's very expensive, even compared to the central market (which is sort of like a Trader Joe's or a Whole Foods), and their stuff isn't the freshest.

I like putting chunks of fish into miso soup just until they're cooked through. This was the only way I'd ever had catfish until I was about 11, and I couldn't understand people who said catfish tasted like trash.