I love mackerel. You’ve got to eat it fresh, it looks beautiful, it tastes really strong and it reminds me of fun times trying to catch them in the summer from a very young age. Look at the deep colouration and beautiful patterns of their skin. I also love sashimi, or meat and seafood that is lightly cured, smoked or marinaded rather than cooked outright. … Continue reading Shime Saba (pickled mackerel sushi)
I had a couple of people round for a catch up (over drinks of course). I was trying to think of something quick and I easy I could feed them between martini drinking when I came across some beef mince on special offer at the supermarket. I bought a kilogram and decided to make yakitori, a type of Japanese skewer kebab, inspired by izakaya/yakitori-bar type … Continue reading Beef yakitori snacks
Annyeonghaseyo. This is a really tasty, easy and even healthy vegetarian dish that you can serve as a vegetable side, a starter or, most importantly of all, as an appetiser to accompany a martini (obviously). I first ate this delicious dish in Koreatown, Manhattan. Of all the wondrous and unusual dishes I gluttonously consumed that night (my favourite being a gigantic simmered squid, still … Continue reading Korean spinach – Sigeumchi-namul
We had a family get-together but we ran out of gin mid-way through the night. I know. Luckily I found a bottle of Japanese sho-chu which I thought I could use as an experimental substitute in a martini. Sho-chu is a spirit distilled from things like barley, rice, sweet potato or one or two other ingredients. It’s normally between 25-35% strength so is … Continue reading A Sho-Chu Martini
Here is another selection of savoury snacks I’ve recently served and eaten with martinis. Roasted and salted soy beans. Prawns on lettuce with Peking duck sauce and fried spicy broad beans. You can get a lot of good stuff in IKEA. Fish roe goes well in Swedish croustades. Here are some of the filled croustades, as well as some Japanese nuts and seaweed snacks. Here … Continue reading More snacks and nibbles to accompany martinis
Here is a quick guide on how to infuse gin (or vodka for that matter) with green tea for you to use in a martini or an unusual gin and tonic. Simple, perfect, temperature-dependent, conducive towards mindful introspection… Am I talking about green tea or martinis here? I’ve previously made one or two gins infused with tea, such as Earl Grey but I wanted to … Continue reading Green Tea-infused Gin
Roka: 4/5 Roka is a lovely Japanese bar/restaurant with a couple of branches in London. I’m not here to review the food, I’m here to review the martini. They had a beautiful array of sakes, shochu and cocktails but with a very slight nudge their martinis could make this place out of this world: They don’t keep the gin/vodka and glasses in the freezer. That’s … Continue reading Roka Bar could rock my world with one small adjustment: 4/5
The Martini Socialist 