Green Beans with Toasted Sesame Sauce

The delicious nutty sesame sauce in this recipe also tastes great with broccoli, potato, tofu and spinach.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 200g green beans
• a pinch of Clearspring Traditional Sea Salt
• 3tbsp sesame seeds, toasted and ground
• 1tbsp Clearspring Shoyu Soya Sauce or Clearspring Tamari Soya Sauce
• 2tbsp Clearspring Mikawa Mirin

Method

1. Bring some water to the boil in a saucepan. Add the green beans and a pinch of salt to the boiling water and cook for about 2 minutes.
2. Remove from the heat and drain the water. Rinse the green beans in cold water to preserve the colour. Trim the top and bottom of the beans, then cut into 5cm lengths. 
3. Mix all the ingredients for the sesame sauce together, then add the green beans and serve.

Chef

Atsuko's Kitchen

After months of travelling and teaching Japanese cuisine around the world, Atsuko has settled in London to run an authentic Japanese home style cooking course, Atsuko's Kitchen.

Her recipes and techniques come from her mother and grandmother, who were both inspiring cooks and passed on their passion and knowledge to her.

Her sensei (teacher) Mari Fujii taught Atsuko Shojin-Ryori, a Japanese Buddhist temple cuisine using creative methods to make dishes using only vegetable ingredients.

After seeing the world and taking on the different food cultures she came accross, Atsuko has chosen London for teaching Japanese cuisine based on five fundamental traditional seasonings.

"My enthusiasm for food has been even more developed in London, where there are many chances to meet a variety of cultures and learn about their foods. In comparison, Japanese dishes are simple and tasty, yet have become very popular. You can make hundreds of everyday meals with just five basic seasonings: shoyu, mirin, sake, rice vinegar and miso. The only difference is in the technique used when making the dishes."

Miles away from Japan, Atsuko's ambition is to re-create with her students the life and tastes of her mother's kitchen in Kyushu.

As well as teaching, Atsuko also caters regularly for private parties and cafés using her unique style of Japanese cooking.

www.atsukoskitchen.com