A Scientist in the Kitchen

Seaweeds are macroscopic, multicellar algae. They are not really plants but algae a group plant-like organisms, usually underwater, photosynthetic but they have different structures for taking in nutrients from the environment. For one thing, they don’t have roots. Nutrients are taken in by diffusion from the water to the algal body. Unlike plants, which have roots, there is nutrient uptake from the roots to the upper parts of the plants. There are three major groups of these photosynthetic algae-brown, red and green algae.They are not to be confused with seagrasses, though. Seagrasses are vascular like plants. They are attached to the sand as well and grow where there is maximum sunlight. Algae on the other can grow deeper in the sea as they have a different type of photosynthetic pigments to catch the sun’s rays.

Seaweeds are very useful as food and medicine. Most familiar would be the nori seaweeds you can find in sushi and other Japanese food. Or the konbu for making dashi, also in Japanese cooking. They are also sources of carageenan used in ice cream-making as stabilizers. These days, seaweeds are farmed for extracting carageenan. If you like agar for making flans, well, these come from seaweeds, too.

I’ve lived near the sea so I’ve made a lot of seaweed salads. Perhaps you might take a vacation near the sea and come across them. Let me share with you how to enjoy this wonderful bounty from the sea.

Ingredients

250 grams fresh seaweeds (in the picture is a red algae)
1/2 cup cane vinegar
1 medium sized tomato, sliced
1 medium sized onion, slice
salt and pepper to taste

Cut seaweeds along the stems into bite size pieces. Blanch seaweeds in boiling water, around two minutes. Be careful not to overcook them as they might turn into agar and you’d have a flan instead! Wash in cold water then drain. Mix seaweeds, tomato and onion. Add the vinegar and mix well. Season with salt and pepper. It’s this simple!

Seaweeds may not be really plants but they have a lot in common with plants. So this post goes to Weekend Herb Blogging hosted this week by Simona at Briciole .

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I’m writing a paper on pathogens of rice and for the life of me, I cannot seem to go past the hemibiotrophs. So I’m taking a break, catch up with the blogging, and show off these veggies.

A salad is easy to make. Get some greens like lettuce, reds like tomatoes and yellows like pepper. And the dressing? I just mixed up mayo and mangoes, and a dash of chili flakes. Puree all three, and they’re ready to go.

Mangoes again? Last week it was mangoes and greens, now it’s mangoes mixed with the dressing. What’s special about mangoes?

Mangoes from Maharashtra, India

It can be eaten in many ways!

1. Unripe mangoes can be eaten with fish paste. It is sour and the saltiness of the fish paste neutralizes the sourness.

2. Of course, mango is usually eaten ripe, Just slice the cheeks from the seeds and you have a wonderful dessert. Or mix it with greens to make an appetizing salad. Mix with apples, grapes, kiwi and cream and you have a delicious dessert.

3. Ripe mangoes can be candied, too. It is a primary export in the Philippines.

4. There’s a variety of mango which we call “pajo”. It’s very small, only about 1-2 inches long and eaten unripe. It has a pungent smell similar to cilantro. So when it is in season (which is just a few weeks of the year), we use it for making salsa instead of cilantro.

5. Mangoes are rich in vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. In some areas of the world, it is an aphrodisiac!

Here’s the recipe:

2 cup of shredded lettuce

2 large tomatoes, sliced

1 large yellow bell pepper cut into strips

100 gram light mayonaise

2 cheeks of ripe mango

a dash of chili flakes to taste

To make the dressing: Wash mangoes thoroughly in your kitchen faucets. In a blender, mix mango, mayonaise and chili flakes. Chill.

To make the salad: In a bowl, toss lettuce, tomatoes and bell pepper. Serve in individual bowls, and each person can add the dressing according to taste.

And since it’s another great weekend for herb blogging, this is my contribution for WHB # 111 with Kalyn hosting this weekend.

When it’s mango season in the Philippines, around March to June, we usually eat ripe mangoes all the time from morning to night. So I’ve come up ways to eating mango in different ways. We usually make mango refrigerator cake (I’ll talk about this in another post) or make them into shakes. There are two types of shakes, ripe mango shake and green mango shake. The green mango shakes uses unripe green mangoes for that sweet-sour shake and all the goodness of sweet mango you can find in the ripe mango shake. A Japanese eatery here made kani salad with mangoes, lettuce, cucumber and crabsticks. This gave me an idea to make a simple salad with cucumber, mango and lettuce and topped with Japanese mayo.

For this dish, you will need one medium size cucumber sliced thinly, a cup of shredded lettuce and slivers of mango from two ripe mangoes. Just layer them and add Japanese mayo according to your taste. Another dressing would be to mix half a cup of cane vinegar, 1 tablespoon of sugar and freshly milled black pepper and pour onto the salad mixture.

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This is my contribution to this week’s Weekend Herb Blogging hosted by Truffle of What’s On My Plate.