I ate this over the course of three days and not on one day did I remember to take a picture. Well, the seaweed is long, wide, flat, green and slimy — kind of like “not my tagliatelle noodles” pictured above — except my green guy looked like a forest and weren’t so perfect. They had cuts and scrapes and cruises. The other sea things that usually cling to them had been removed for packaging, but the saltiness remained. I think you should soak dried seaweed and use the salty soaking liquid to make a fish pasta. Hmm…
Anyway, the recipe is very simple. There’s no real cooking involved and it’s all about balancing flavours and tasting and balancing. Repeat. Repeat. Then the next day the liquid will have been absorbed and it may taste different, so you adjust, taste, repeat again.
Normally this kind of salad is made with thin pieces of seaweed such as wakame or arame, but I had the wide pieces that cost about $10 less a bag. Same process.
Ingredients
Seaweed, one big handful
Boiling water to cover
Sesame oil
sugar
rice vinegar
soy sauce or tamari
green onions or chives
sesame seeds, toasted (optional. Put some seeds in a small frying pan for a few minutes on medium heat until the seeds are fragrant and very lightly browned. Burnt is way past browned. If you make too many, they keep for awhile. They do lose their freshness but they’re still better than untoasted seeds. When you go for sushi you can taste if the seeds are freshly toasted or not. Often they’re not…)
You need enough boiling water to cover the seaweed, so take a large pot and fill it halfway or three quarters of the way to the top, bring the water to a boil, and then remove the pot from the heat and add the seaweed. Put a lid on the pot and leave it to soak for at least 30 minutes. Drain the seaweed and rinse to remove the excess salt. You can save this soaking liquid if you want. There’s great sea salt in there…
…and turning things green is pretty fun. Take that artificial colouring FD&C Green #3
Then you play chemistry. That’s a game right? There are kids who play that instead of running around outside and getting their Vitamin D, right? Well, I recommend you stand in front of a sunny window not in Montreal when you make this since apparently there is just not enough sun to keep the general populace out of depression in winter. I can almost believe that. Montrealers drink a lot of beer when it’s cold…and wine…and liquor…and eat things covered in gravy and cheese and dead pig, and well, that can’t be a rational decision. There must be other factors involved, such as a lack of some vitamin, but that’s why I’m a cook, not a chemist, and I just play.
In a large bowl put the drained seaweed and toss over a good tablespoon or so of sesame oil (preferably toasted sesame oil. You don’t toast it yourself. You buy it toasted. I assume the seeds are toasted and then the oil extracted. See? Just playing, not doing the real chemistry), a good splash of unseasoned rice vinegar (the same kind as for sushi), a relatively smaller splash of soy sauce or tamari (a lighter soy is better instead of a darker one. So again, one meant for sushi is best), and some finely chopped green onions or snipped chives. You can also add red chili flakes (just a little) or some minced ginger, but I find the ginger is a bit too light and fruity and takes away from the rich earthiness of the sesame flavouring. If you don’t want to use much oil, consider using ginger instead, or just a touch of sesame oil along with the ginger. Then use more sugar to sweeten it. Ginger is not an oil replacement, but since the noodles are already so slimy, if your oil isn’t very flavourful you’re just filling yourself up with tasteless fat.
Add the toasted sesame seeds last, and toss together. If it’s not salty enough add more soy. If it’s not sweet enough add more sugar (or mirin). If you can’t figure out what it’s not “enough” of then it probably needs more green onion, chives and sesame oil or seeds. I usually go with the seeds before the oil, since excess liquid just sits at the bottom of the bowl like a soup that gets sucked into the seaweed overnight. So you end up with leftovers that are way too salty or way too oily. More often you lose the salt, sweet, hot, or umami (earthiness/savouriness, roughly) by the next day and need to adjust the flavours again.
Great eaten right away, great chilled 30 minutes i the fridge to let the flavours “marry”. Love that term. Marriage is a 30 minute process. Don’t they mean…
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