Farmers’ Market Bowl with Green Goddess Sauce

Three months in and I am starting to find a rhythm. Not a good rhythm — more like the rhythm of a song that keeps changing time signatures — but a rhythm nonetheless. Miya sleeps in four-hour stretches now, which feels like luxury after the two-hour stretches of the first month. I teach yoga three mornings a week while Brian watches her before he goes to work. I write in the afternoons when she naps. I cook dinner. I nurse. I collapse. Repeat.

I wrote a blog post this week about cooking with one hand. Literally — about the meals you can make while holding a baby in the other arm. Rice in the rice cooker with one button press. Miso soup by pouring pre-made dashi into a pot and adding miso and tofu. Onigiri shaped with one hand while baby sleeps in the carrier. It was practical and a little funny and it got more comments than anything I have written so far, all from parents who recognized the one-handed cooking life. A woman in Seattle said she made an entire Thanksgiving dinner one-handed while nursing twins. I believe her. Motherhood makes you capable of things that would be impossible under any other circumstances.

I have been thinking about Fumiko a lot this week. She raised Dad alone, essentially — Ojichan Takeshi worked constantly, the way men of that generation did, and Fumiko did everything else. She cooked, she cleaned, she raised two children in a country that had put her parents in an internment camp, and she did it all without complaining, without therapy, without medication, without the language we have now for the things that hurt. I do not know how she did it. I am in therapy and on medication and I still feel like I am barely keeping my head above water. Maybe she felt the same way and just never said so. Nakamuras do not say so. We endure. We make soup.

The farmers market had beautiful snap peas this week — the first of the season, bright green and crisp, sweet enough to eat raw. I bought a bag and made a rice bowl with snap peas, sesame oil, a fried egg, and a drizzle of soy sauce. Miya slept through the whole meal. I ate it in silence, in the kitchen, with the window open and the May breeze carrying in the smell of someone's jasmine. For ten minutes, nothing was wrong. For ten minutes, the anxiety was quiet and the food was good and the world was manageable. You have to notice those ten minutes. You have to write them down before they disappear.

That bowl I ate in the kitchen — window open, jasmine in the air, Miya finally asleep — is the one I keep coming back to. Snap peas from the market, a fried egg, sesame oil, soy sauce. It was barely a recipe, but it was exactly enough. I wanted to give it a little more shape so I could share it here, and the Farmers’ Market Bowl with Green Goddess Sauce is the version I landed on: same spirit, same ease, same gift of ten quiet minutes that actually taste like something.

Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 15 min | Total Time: 25 min | Servings: 2

Ingredients

1 cup short-grain white rice (or jasmine rice), rinsed
1 1/2 cups water
1 1/2 cups snap peas, strings removed
1 cup thinly sliced radishes
1/2 cup shredded purple cabbage
2 large eggs
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp soy sauce or tamari
1 tbsp sesame seeds, for garnish
For the Green Goddess Sauce:
1/2 ripe avocado
1/4 cup plain Greek yogurt (or coconut yogurt for dairy-free)
1/2 cup fresh herbs (parsley, basil, chives — any combination)
1 small garlic clove
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 tbsp olive oil
2–3 tbsp water, to thin
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Cook the rice. Combine rinsed rice and water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and cook for 13–15 minutes until water is absorbed. Remove from heat and let steam, covered, for 5 minutes. (A rice cooker works perfectly here — one button press.)
Make the green goddess sauce. Combine avocado, Greek yogurt, fresh herbs, garlic, lemon juice, and olive oil in a blender or small food processor. Blend until smooth, adding water one tablespoon at a time until the sauce is pourable. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
Blanch the snap peas. Bring a small pot of salted water to a boil. Add snap peas and cook for 60–90 seconds until bright green and just tender-crisp. Drain and rinse immediately under cold water to stop cooking.
Fry or soft-boil the eggs. For fried eggs, heat a small nonstick pan over medium heat with a drizzle of oil and fry eggs to your liking. For soft-boiled, simmer eggs in water for 6 1/2 minutes, then transfer to an ice bath for 2 minutes before peeling and halving.
Assemble the bowls. Divide warm rice between two bowls. Arrange snap peas, radishes, and cabbage over the rice. Top each bowl with an egg. Drizzle with sesame oil and soy sauce, then spoon or pour green goddess sauce generously over everything.
Garnish and serve. Finish with sesame seeds and an extra squeeze of lemon if you like. Eat immediately, preferably with a window open.

Nutrition (per serving)

Farmers’ Market Bowl with Green Goddess Sauce — Ten Minutes of Quiet