Lately, we’ve been making a lot of southern European dishes and we felt we needed a break, but we were also looking for a dish that wouldn’t take all night to make and require us to buy a load of ingredients we’d use for one dish and then sit and rot in our refrigerator. So, we decided to go old-school Japanese-American style and make a dish so reminiscent of the 1980s that you’d almost expect to look up from your plate and find Mr. Miyagi and Daniel-san across the table.

But instead of accompanying this dish with some studied fence-painting or the practicing of our wax-on, wax-off technique, we went for a really simple scallion salad called Pa Muchim we’ve been loving at Korean restaurants lately.

Both of these dishes are unbelievably easy and are perfect for a weeknight evening in, especially if you’re lucky enough to have the Karate Kid trilogy on hand for some post-dinner entertainment…

We’re entering this into this week’s “Weekend Herb Blogging” event hosted by Coffee and Vanilla.

Broiled Miso-Glazed Salmon with Udon Noodles

Ingredients

• 1 lb salmon fillet
• 4tbsp miso paste
• 1 x 8oz package ready to eat udon or soba noodles
• 2tbsp mirin
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
• 1tbsp ginger, crushed chopped
• 1tbsp (reduced sodium) soy sauce
• 1/2 carrot julienned
• 1/2 red bell pepper julienned
• 3oz green beans
• 1tbsp peanut oil

Recipe

• Turn on your broiler to high and place a sheet of aluminum foil over a baking sheet and oil lightly.
• Cut salmon fillet into two roughly equal portions and coat lightly on all sides with miso past, probably about half of it.Heat your wok or skillet to very high heat and add peanut oil. Then, quickly toss in the carrot and green beans. Allow to cook, moving constantly for about a minute until beans start to wrinkle a bit.
• Hit pan with ginger and garlic. When you can smell these nicely, add the mirin and soy sauce, followed after a couple of seconds by the udon noodles. Stir these together so noodles are well coated with sauce and vegetables and then remove to a plate.
• Slap salmon under broiler (skin side down first). After between 1-2 minutes or until miso starts to caramelize, turn fish over and broil for another 1-2 minutes skin side up.
• When skin is crispy and glazed-looking, remove fish and serve over the noodles and top with scallion salad (pa muchim).

Scallion Salad (Pa Muchim)

Ingredients

• 3-4 medium scallions (spring onions/chinese shallots)
• 2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
• 2 tsp white sugar
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes (chili flakes)
• 1 pinch coarse/kosher salt
• 1tsp toasted sesame seeds

Recipe

• Slice scallions lengthwise into fine strips (1-2mm or 1/16inch wide) and submerge in cold water until curled – 30mins-1hr.
• Drain well and place in a bowl then dress with remaining ingredients. Serve either as a garnish, side dish or panchan (mixed korean starters) to your favorite Asian dish.

Check out some other posts you may enjoy:

• SWEET ANISE-FLAVORED SALMON IN A POUCH (SALMON EN PAPILLOTE)
• PROVENCAL RABBIT WITH OLIVES AND CAPERS
• PASTA (PERCIATELLI/BUCATINI OR SPAGHETTI) AL’AMATRICIANA (ROMAN CLASSIC PASTA DISH)
• VEAL SAUSAGES WITH HERBED POLENTA AND ROASTED BEETS
• OKRA FRITTERS WITH LOUISIANA REMOULADE
• BREAD-CRUSTED FISH WITH LEMON-BUTTER SAUCE
• WHOLE FRIED SNAPPER WITH GARLIC AND PARSLEY SAUCE

For example, in the past several years, we’ve had Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (the recent remake with Johnny Depp), Chocolat, No Reservations, Super Size Me, Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, and Fast Food Nation. Prior to that were such movies as Fried Green Tomatoes, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (the original version with Gene Wilder and his weird sweep-over), Mystic Pizza, and Jamon, Jamon.

Okay, so I hate to be film-snob, but really. Apart from that fact that only one of these movies is really about enjoying food (Chocolat), and many of them are about what’s wrong in the world of food today (SuperSize Me and Fast Food Nation) there really aren’t many good food movies out there. I should say that I didn’t see No Reservations, but that’s because it looked gash on the trailer, and that during a brief web search I found that someone else had had written about this same thing (Brownie Points Blog) from where I cribbed some of the titles above, but when you visit that site, you’ll realize (if you recognize all the films – I had only heard of half of them) that most of them aren’t really about food. They are stories that revolve somehow around food (Jamon, Jamon) – love stories mostly (must be the sensual thing, I guess) in which food is a metaphor, but, sadly, food just as food is hardly ever the central thing. Why is this? And, why do you so rarely see people eat in movies?

I mean, how often to you encounter movie scenes in which tables are laden with food, but nobody’s eating it? A lot, that’s how often. That’s why, apart from it being an excellent, thought-provoking movie, I really enjoy the scenes in Munich when the Israeli kill-squad are sitting around a table laden with brisket, vegetables and wine bottles, tucking in to a delicious meal. And, the other scene in the movie when Eric Bana’s character “Avner” is blindfolded and taken to lunch with Michael Lonsdale’s “Papa” and they all sit down and eat at a table for about thirty outside under a trellis — it’s a beautiful scene. To me, these scenes clearly show that even men focused on killing other men must eat, and when they do, it can be an enjoyable and life-affirming experience. So it depresses me that there are so many movies in which the cast are sitting at a table piled with delicious victuals and then, suddenly, it all goes west — someone gets shot or a fight starts or the dreaded monster arrives with the appetizers and the cast becomes it’s dinner and miss out on their own. Why is this?

Perhaps a focus on food is missing because watching other people eat makes you feel queasy? But then, people very readily watch gory, slasher movies while wolfing down popcorn, soda, ice-cream, hot dogs, nachos and mike & ikes every weekend. And, why do you take your girlfriend/wife out for dinner if not to sit opposite them while they eat? No, it can’t be that. Is Hollywood trying to tell us something about the family dinner, or food in general?

I’m remembering lots of occasions now when meal times get messed up in movies. For instance, Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer hold up a diner in Pulp Fiction spoiling the John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson’s breakfasts, Kate Capshaw screams and passes out during dinner in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (due to the chilled monkey brains, I think) which must have disturbed the other guests, and, the glutton in Se7en is tied to a chair and made to eat plate after plate of spaghetti before he finally carks it. Even worse, perhaps, Marlon Brando has a heart attack among the tomato canes in The Godfather. Is Hollywood attacking gardening — the source of food — too?! I think I’ve identified something sinister here that needs exploring, and in the spirit of figuring this conspiracy out, I’m planning to sign-up to NetFlicks and begin my lengthy research into why Hollywood hates food.

Until this research is complete, please tell us what your favorite food film or food-focused movie scene is. It could be from a TV show too, if you’d prefer, but that’s almost another post in itself. I mean, the cafe in (long-running and absolutely dreadful English soap opera) Eastenders always struck me as unnecessarily grim — ugly people swilling weak tea and sullenly pushing down plates of fried eggs, sausage and fried tomato to the sounds of some crappy 80s music on a crackly radio somewhere – the whole thing just looked insanitary. Then again, the entire show is depressing and ridden with ugly people, so why should the food by any different?

CHECK OUT SOME OTHER POSTS YOU MAY ENJOY:

• SAUSAGE AND PEPPER SANDWICHES
• TOAD-IN-THE-HOLE (Sausages Nested in Batter)
• PROVENCAL RABBIT WITH OLIVES AND CAPERS
• LIDIA’S LAMB CHOPS (Lamb Chops with A Mustard Anchovy Sauce)
• Bon Appetit Magazine’s ‘Makeover’- Love It or Leave It?
• European Union to Stop Junk Food Ads – Why Not America?
• European Roast…? (Why Coffee Taste Better There)
• Rachel Ray – Maybe Hate is a Strong Word?