Moo Shu Lettuce Cups

Late May. The school year ends and the summer opens like a door into a room made of sunlight and possibility. Miya finishes second grade with a reading level that her teacher calls "remarkable" and a Japanese vocabulary that the Saturday school teacher calls "impressive for her age." The two compliments — one in English, one about Japanese — are the two pillars of Miya's education, the two languages that she moves between with the fluency of a child who has never known anything else, the bilingual toggle that is as natural to her as breathing.

I made somen — cold noodles, the official start of summer food — and served them on the balcony while the shiso scented the air and the city hummed below. The somen was cold and clean and the dipping sauce was tangy and the summer was officially here, declared by noodles, ratified by heat, endorsed by the shiso.

The summer cooking project this year: international recipes. Not just Fumiko's Japanese food but food from everywhere, cooked with a Japanese sensibility — the attention to seasonality, the respect for ingredients, the precision that Fumiko brought to everything. We will make Thai green curry with Japanese rice. Mexican elote with a miso-butter glaze. Italian pasta with shiso pesto. The project is fusion at its most intentional: not the careless combination of ingredients but the deliberate conversation between traditions, the cooking that happens when you know two kitchens well enough to introduce them to each other.

The magazine column continues — the third essay, about umeboshi, was published this month. The essay was about patience and preservation and the faith that the plums you salt in June will feed you in December. The readers are responding to the columns with the same warmth they bring to the blog, but the magazine readership is different — older, more local, more likely to see me at the farmers market and say, "I read your column." The visibility is growing. The woman who wrote about miso soup at three AM in her pajamas is now a person with a byline and a column and a book coming and the distance between the two women — the pajama woman and the byline woman — is seven years and zero inches. They are the same woman. The pajama woman is still here. She still makes miso soup at three AM. She just also has a column now.

The summer cooking project needed a first recipe — something that said international, intentional, light — and these Moo Shu Lettuce Cups were exactly that. Moo Shu is Chinese, the lettuce cup is a practical improvisation, and the finishing drizzle of toasted sesame oil is the quiet Japanese sensibility Fumiko taught me: one good fat, added last, with intention. We ate them on the balcony the same evening we ate the somen, because summer had arrived and it deserved two courses.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 15 min | Total Time: 30 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 lb ground pork (or ground chicken)
2 cups shredded green cabbage
1 cup sliced shiitake mushrooms, stems removed
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated
3 tablespoons hoisin sauce, plus more for serving
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1 tablespoon neutral oil (such as avocado or canola)
3 scallions, thinly sliced
1 head butter lettuce or iceberg, leaves separated
Toasted sesame seeds, for garnish

Instructions

Cook the eggs. Heat 1 teaspoon of neutral oil in a large skillet or wok over medium-high heat. Add the beaten eggs and scramble gently until just set, about 1–2 minutes. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
Brown the pork. Add the remaining oil to the same skillet over high heat. Add the ground pork and cook, breaking it up with a spatula, until browned and cooked through, about 5–6 minutes. Drain excess fat if needed.
Build the filling. Add the garlic and ginger to the skillet and cook 30 seconds until fragrant. Add the shiitake mushrooms and cabbage and stir-fry until the cabbage is just wilted and the mushrooms are tender, about 3–4 minutes.
Sauce and finish. Stir in the hoisin sauce, soy sauce, and rice vinegar. Return the scrambled eggs to the pan and toss everything together until well coated and heated through, about 1 minute. Remove from heat and drizzle with sesame oil.
Serve. Spoon the filling into lettuce cups. Top with sliced scallions and sesame seeds. Set extra hoisin on the side for dipping.

Nutrition (per serving)

Moo Shu Lettuce Cups — The Summer Cooking Project Begins at the Table