A spontaneous midweek inspiring post. Our new garden has been very bountiful this year and we have been practically buried under giant zucchinis and the heavy tomato plants have long since abandoned their fragile cages for the ground.

Those shy things

In the twilight of the evening yesterday I harvested a few tomatoes, some with skin wrinkled from the unrelenting sun the past week or so, and thought to myself, there should not be too many more.

Lo and behold I head out today in the blazing afternoon sun and look what I found!

A Tomato Triptych. Click for more for juicy details.

The garden angels have been smiling and these are the most beautiful of our harvest so far this summer. Gorgeous unblemished perfectly round blushing beauties, with plump skins and bright green starry tops. I was so overjoyed I had to write/draw/photograph it! I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did gazing at them.

Umami slow-roasted tomatoes it will be tonight!

I fell in culinary love this past Saturday.

My new love: Donabe-cooked (Japanese clay pots) Shojin Buddhist vegan food, a traditional Japanese cuisine eaten by Buddhist monks. Naoko of Toiro Kitchen and her fabulous foodie blog hosted a donabe cooking class at her awesome hilltop home in Echo Park.  One of my most treasured kitchen items of all time (next to my wok)-my hand crafted Miso Shiru Nabe all the way from Japan, came from Naoko.

Food, almost spiritual.

I have made countless delicious curries and earthy soups in it and thought that it was time to venture into Naoko’s cooking class, specifically since we are weaning off a majority of our meat consumption (though not completely) and looking for deliciously interesting and somewhat familiar forays into vegetarian and vegan cooking.

I feel that this is such a fitting Inspired Monday post to the blog because it parallels so much of what I aim for daily with the studio-rustic but elegant simplicity,  a deep appreciation for nature, nostalgia, and traditional craft, and an enthusiasm for slowed down and joyful sustainable living.

Naoko and her donabes, Shojin dashi, and the delicious sesame paste

Abura age simmering, Kombucha pumpkin and stuffing the tofu pockets

There is indeed a magical quality about these donabe claypots, the nature of their material and craft allows the food to cook slowly, evenly and most efficiently! I am continually, unabashedly amazed by them.

Sous-chef Jason, ice cold Barley tea and the beautiful Bento boxes

After the cooking demonstration, we proceeded outside in true Southern Californian style, to enjoy the fruits of Naoko’s labor, sitting in the patio that Jason built. Leafy shadows and mini japanese paper lanterns hovering above.

Such simple and delicious festivity! Fine sake pairing topped it off..

Coming from a South East Asian country with rich and complex culinary traditions, I can honestly say I have never been easily moved by new cuisines. Naoko’s donabe shojin delights definitely opened up a wonderful new world. I will never forget the first taste of the vivid yellow Kombucha pumpkin soup, nor the first bite of those beans and tofu pockets.  Food so deceivingly simple bursting with freshness and delicate flavors.I am gushing yes, in true M.F.K Fisher fashion.

The incredible surprise dessert-a cold yam soy-based blancmange with black sugar and goji berries

Thank you Naoko and Jason, for such a wonderful introduction to Shojin cooking in those amazing donabes.

More on the simplicity of delicious foods…

Wok Fried Rice

Simple is not a shortcut. It is not even cheating. It is learning to appreciate the essential. Understanding the essence. Simple can be complex. Simple can layered. But most of all simple food is soul food, warming the palate and the heart. It is food that we remember when we close our eyes. Food we remember on a hot sunny day at a bus stop when you’ve been waiting thirty minutes and it hasn’t arrived and you are on your way to lunch.

You remember it because it can be so powerfully singular yet so sensually nourishing.