Cucumber kimchi, wild red shrimp, pasta and eggs, organic brown rice

KIMCHI WITH CRUNCH: Cucumber Kimchi is a seasonal item at Arirang, 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield. A 2-pound package made with cucumbers from Korea was $12 at the source in the H&Y Marketplace shopping center.

NO MSG: Arirang kimchis are made by hand with no MSG and no artificial ingredients.

WILD AND RED: Jumbo Red Shrimp from Argentina are packed in 4.4-pound boxes and frozen. They were on sale last Sunday at H&Y, a Korean supermarket at 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield, below. 

ON SALE: These shrimp are a good deal at the regular price of $28.99 and a great deal at $24.99.

IN THE SHELL: I prepared them in a wok with olive and sesame oils, sake and seasonings, including Chinese Five Spice Powder and ground Star Anise. They are ready to eat when they curl up, but next time we'll peel and devein them first.

COMING TO A HEAD: I boiled the heads for 20 minutes, producing a broth with a strong shrimp flavor that could be used in a noodle soup or to cook rice with seafood.

ORGANIC EGGS WITH ORGANIC PASTA: Two organic brown eggs from Costco Wholesale in Teterboro served over organic whole wheat spaghetti from Whole Foods Market prepared in marinara sauce with sardines, anchovies and pitted black olives, below.

DINNER AND LEFTOVERS: I used 1 pound of pasta, a 40-ounce jar of marinara, one can of anchovies, four cans of Moroccan sardines and a can of pitted olives, ensuring plenty of leftovers for other meals. You can add red wine and extra-virgin olive oil, plus seasonings, to the sauce.

ORGANIC BROWN RICE: Lundberg Organic Brown Long Grain Rice from California can be found on Amazon.com, and prepared in a rice cooker with organic diced tomatoes from Costco and organic black beans from ShopRite in Paramus, where a 15.5-ounce can was only 76 cents during the Summer Can-Can Sale. Here, I served an omelet stuffed with fresh herbs, salsa and reduced-fat cheese over brown rice for breakfast.

SAUTEED SPINACH: Sauteed baby spinach is a great side dish at breakfast with organic eggs sunny side up, grated cheese, 

chopped fresh herbs and ground Aleppo pepper.

GOING WILD FOR FRESH SALMON: This week and last, Fresh Wild Sockeye Salmon was $9.99 a pound at Costco Wholesale in Teterboro. Above, I baked a tray of  raw salmon, organic spinach, fresh tomatoes, string beans, pitted black olives and fresh herbs in a preheated 400-degree oven for 15 minutes. If you like your salmon medium to medium rare, reduce the cooking time to about 12 minutes.

PESTO AND HERBS: Tonight, I added Costco's Himalayan Pink Salt and fresh lime juice to six portions of wild sockeye salmon, then grilled them on the stove top for 7 minutes (4 minutes with the skin side down and flipping them for 3 minutes). I took the grill off the medium-high flame and added Costco's refrigerated Basil Pesto, Aleppo pepper, and fresh basil and mint from my garden.

FOREIGN GARLIC: On my wife's last two visits to Costco Wholesale in Teterboro, she couldn't find the 3-pound bag of Christopher Ranch peeled California Garlic we have been buying for more than a year. Instead, the warehouse had a 3-pound bag of peeled garlic from Garland Food in Miami, but she passed because many of the cloves appeared to be soft. Garland said the garlic sold at Costco comes from Mexico, Argentina and Spain. Bad move, Costco.

100% LACTOSE FREE: A half-gallon of ShopRite 100% Lactose Free Milk was on sale for $2.89 during the Summer Can-Can Sale in Paramus. That's a discount of 10 cents. Cans of ShopRite pitted black olives were 99 cents each.

GREEN IS GOOD: An Asian green called Yuchoy was on sale at H Mart, 25 Lafayette Place in Englewood, for 98 cents a pound ($1.49 a pound regularly). I cut the tough stems off and sauteed the leaves in olive oil and sake, seasoning them with red-pepper flakes, salt, black pepper and ground garlic as a side dish for breakfast this morning.

-- VICTOR E. SASSON

When you're retired, losing and keeping off weight becomes full-time job

We bake, roast or grill a variety of fish fillets from Costco Wholesale, but inexpensive whole whiting seems to taste best when it is pan fried in olive oil, and served simply with fresh lime or lemon juice. Side dishes here are string beans with fresh garlic and black pepper, and sweet plantains. An organic spring mix salad completes the meal.

Editor's note: I am the head of a family of four who go through an enormous amount of food, much of it organic and naturally raised or grown. We are divided among meat eaters and non-meat eaters (3 to 1), and on many days, prepare two different breakfasts and dinners. Since I retired, I've also struggled to lose and keep off weight. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

When I retired, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to fill my time.

But I faced a bigger challenge: 

I not only was less active, but I wanted to lose close to 40 pounds I had put on from the stress of a sedentary copy editing job at a daily newspaper in northern New Jersey.

I got a big boost from a trainer at my gym: 

He told me that if I really wanted to lose weight, I should cut out bread and pizza, and substitute such filling foods as sweet potatoes, whole wheat pasta and brown rice.

I also was ahead, because I rarely ate dessert, and satisfied my sweet tooth with fruit.

Stopped eating meat

I had already lost about 5 pounds from giving up meat and poultry, and eating only seafood, so my starting point was 223 pounds.

Bread was my real weakness, even though I had long ago stopped eating one of those enormous Jersey bagels for breakfast every day. 

Favorites were Middle Eastern pocket bread from Fattal's in Paterson, and baguettes from Balthazar Bakery in Englewood.

Part-time jobs

I picked up part-time work, including driving cars into Manhattan, walking and taking mass transit back to New Jersey.

I was eating only two meals a day -- substituting a snack bar for lunch -- and the pounds started to come off.

I lost more than 40 of my original 223 pounds in about a year, but when I gave up the part-time work and started volunteering more, I eventually put on about 10 pounds.

Eating at home

I never leave the house without eating a big breakfast, relying on leftover pasta, quinoa or brown rice to go with an egg-white omelet or a wedge of frittata.

Omelets can be stuffed with a little reduced-fat grated cheese and marinara sauce, salsa or slices of smoked wild salmon.

At most, we eat out once a week and order takeout another night.

But when I cook at home, I prepare large amounts -- 1 pound of pasta, 3 pounds of sweet potatoes or 2 pounds of fish, ensuring a variety of leftovers for breakfast or snacks.

I cook and dress salads with olive oil.

I never eat butter, cream or full-fat cheese or milk, and avoid buying pasta sauces and other prepared food with added sugar.

Bread, pizza

Instead of eating bread two or three times a day, I may have some once a week or when we eat out.

Pizza still is a guilty pleasure every six months or so, such as the 18-inch Veggie Combo I picked up recently at the Costco Wholesale Business Center in Hackensack.

The leftovers are in the freezer.

Now, I see men in the gym who work out week after week, but still are grossly overweight, because they don't follow a diet, such as the one that has worked for me in the past five years.

A 10-inch frittata uses 4 cups of whole eggs and whites, a little low-fat milk, scallions and garlic. Wedges can be served with a spoonful of pesto or organic salsa.

Baked or mashed sweet potatoes are a favorite side dish at breakfast. Here, an egg-white omelet is stuffed with slices of smoked wild salmon and Mexican-style salsa, both from Costco Wholesale.

I often saute organic spinach from Costco or conventional spinach from the salad bar at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center with olive oil, sake and seasonings. Here, I added reduced-fat grated cheese and ate the spinach over leftover organic quinoa with organic beans and diced tomatoes prepared in an electric cooker.

Easy to assemble Icelandic Haddock with Organic Diced Tomatoes, Spinach and Olives is ready after 15 minutes in a pre-heated 400-degree oven. Fresh wild haddock is $7.99 a pound at Costco. Photos below show four easy steps. 

1. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Line a large pan with parchment paper or aluminum foil, add fresh spinach and drizzle with plenty of extra-virgin olive oil. An option is to use sliced mushrooms with spinach.

2. Cut up about 2 pounds of fish fillet, season with Aleppo red pepper and a little sea salt, and place over spinach. Add whole or chopped pitted olives with or without pimientos.

3. Open a can of organic diced tomatoes and spoon over fish. Squeeze juice from whole lemon or lime over pan. An option is to add shredded or grated cheese. Put in oven and set timer to 15 minutes.

4. Plate fish, spinach and olives and spoon sauce over them.

For a pasta-and-eggs breakfast, poach two organic eggs in leftover Classico Tomato & Basil Pasta Sauce from ShopRite, and serve with leftover organic whole wheat fusilli. I added olive oil to the sauce, and shredded Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese over the eggs.  

Radish kimchi and other low-fat or no-fat Korean food, including prepared tofu, can be purchased at H Mart and other Korean supermarkets in northern New Jersey.

A 32-ounce jar of Radish or Kahkdoogi Kimchi can be purchased for $15 at Arirang, 1 Remsen Place, Ridgefield, in the H&Y Marketplace Shopping Center, below.

It's easy to find good heart-healthy food here, there and everywhere

The Ahi Tuna Salad at the Suburban Diner, 172 Route 17 north in Paramus, includes rare, sesame-encrusted fish; romaine lettuce, toasted almonds, mandarin orange sections and crisp wontons ($16.50). I asked for the Asian Sesame Dressing on the side, and found it too sweet.

From Maguro Sushi House in Rochelle Park, a Spicy Tuna and Crab Roll (about $8.50). A variety of Maguro rolls are available in the cafe at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, 350 Engle St., Englewood.

A Seaweed Salad from Maguro Sushi House also is sold in the hospital's cafe (about $3.50).

I often use the $8 dining card given volunteers at the Englewood hospital to buy fresh spinach from the cafe's salad bar. I prepare it in olive oil and sake, adding red-pepper flakes, a little sea salt and other spices.

Japchae, translucent noodles made from sweet-potato flour, are among several meatless, non-spicy Korean dishes from Jinga, a caterer in Queens, N.Y., that are sold at H Mart supermarkets, including the store at 25 Lafayette Ave. in Englewood.

Slices of Kimbap, a Korean sushi roll, are both soft and crunchy, and addictive. Trays include Korean pickles and sliced jalapeno pepper.

Stewed Tofu comes with a spicy red-pepper sauce, and sliced jalapeno peppers are the kicker.

A Tilapia Francese Dinner from Jerry's Gourmet & More, 410 S. Dean St. in Englewood, includes pasta, vegetable, dumpling and stuffed zucchini, above and below.

Jerry's restaurant-quality Meals To Go are marked down to $5.99 after 4 p.m., if there are any left.

A 64-ounce jar of crunchy Arirang Mahk or Cabbage Kimchi is $12 at the source, a storefront in the H&Y Marketplace shopping center, 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield. The kimchi is handmade without MSG.

At the H&Y Korean supermarket next door to Arirang Kimchi, 1-pound packages of strawberries from Florida were on sale for $1.99 each today, and 18-ounce containers of blueberries from Chile were only $2.99 each.

When I got home, I had a snack of Arirang kimchi and japchae, translucent noodles with vegetables ($4.99 for a 1-pound container made in the kitchen of H&Y Marketplace).

-- VICTOR E. SASSON

Grazing on free food samples at two large Korean supermakets

At $24.99, boxes of sweet potatoes on sale at H&Y Marketplace in Ridgfield still are more expensive than smaller quantities at ShopRite, Costco Wholesale and Trader Joe's.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Fresh fruit, dumplings, tofu and noodles are among the free samples available on weekends at Korean supermarkets in Ridgefield and Little Ferry.

H&Y Marketplace in Ridgefield is smaller than the Super H Mart down the road, but a lot less crowded and easier to navigate on a Sunday.

True, there are fewer samples at H&Y.

But the shopping center at 1 Remsen Place also boasts a storefront where Arirang Kimchi set up shop after many years of turning out preservative-free cabbage, cucumber and other kimchis in Englewood.

H&Y also sells Jun's Tofu, a GMO-free product made in the store, and a refrigerated gochujang, a spicy red-pepper paste made with sugar, not high fructose corn syrup.

I purchased cooked conch, one of the samples I tried ($7.99 a pound).

In a bid to drum up business, H&Y is now offering buy one and get one free on hundreds of items on the first day of every month.

Free samples of fresh fruit, above and below, are among the choices on weekends at H&Y Marketplace, a Korean supermarket at 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield.

After enjoying fresh fruit, cooked conch and other samples at H&Y, I went next door to buy two jars of cabbage kimchi at Arirang Kimchi. 

At H Mart in Little Ferry, a refrigerated case holding panchan or side dishes that are served at every Korean meal. The price of this prepared food from Jinga and other outside Korean caterers has spiked in the past year.

Free samples at H Mart

The shabby H Mart in Little Ferry probably offers more free samples on weekends than any other store in the chain outside of Super H Mart, but you don't have to fight crowds, just navigate around potholes and floods in the parking lot.

Usually, H Mart also has bigger discounts than H&Y.

Near H Mart's fresh-fish counter on Sunday, I tried cooked whelk and octopus, and raw farmed-salmon sashimi.

Elsewhere, there were samples of cold noodles topped with a bit of ice and thick udon noodles in hot broth; two kinds of meat-free dumplings, small squares of fried tofu, curry with vegetables over white rice and more fresh fruit.

At H Mart in Little Ferry, 15-pound bags of Kokuho Yellow Label Rice, grown in California, are deeply discounted until Dec. 31, below.

Also on sale at H Mart were 16-portion boxes of dry Shin Ramyun Gourmet Spicy Noodles for $9.99.

Free samples of cooked whelk and octopus with a small plate of gochujang, a spicy red-pepper paste.

Three of the side dishes I brought home from H Mart in Little Ferry are Stewed Tofu, bottom right, (a dozen pieces for $4.99); Bu-Chu Dumplings filled with noodles and crumbled tofu, left (eight for $5.99), and Japchae, stir-fried translucent noodles made from yam flour ($5.49). I had them for breakfast with a simple egg-white omelet stuffed with reduced-fat Swiss cheese.

Arirang's Mahk or Cabbage Kimchi. Made by hand without MSG or preservatives, a 64-ounce jar is about $11.

Fighting the crowds for bargains at Super H Mart in Ridgefield

I say Kabocha, you say Kabucha. This Asian winter squash was on sale for 49 cents a pound with a store card on Sunday at the Super H Mart in Ridgefield, the Korean chain's biggest supermarket in  Bergen County.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The biggest Korean supermarket in Bergen County also is the busiest food store outside of Costco Wholesale in Hackensack, especially on Sundays.

If you drive less than a mile from the much smaller H&Y Marketplace to the Super H Mart, the contrast is dramatic in the number of cars in the huge parking lot and the number of customers pushing carts through the store.

I fought the Super H Mart crowds on Sunday, picked up a few bargains and tried free samples of tasty Korean food, but I'm not sure it is worth the hassle.

Samples of prepared seafood, including crab and dried squid, are offered free at a table near the store's large fish counter.

Big seafood counter

Super H Mart probably has the largest selection of fresh fish and other seafood in Bergen County, all at fairly low prices.

But my wife had already picked up whole sea bass for our Sunday dinner from the Englewood H Mart ($4.99 a pound).

At the Super H Mart, I sampled several kinds of seafood at a table set up opposite the cases that were packed with fresh fish on ice.

I bought three items that were on sale with a store card, Kabocha Squash for 49 cents a pound, Koimo Sweet Potatoes for 99 cents a pound and unusually large heads of red-leaf lettuce at two for 99 cents.

I saw 5-pound boxes of clementines for $7.99, but that was $3 more than during the Can Can Sale at ShopRite.


Super H Mart, 321 Broad Ave., Ridgefield; 201-943-9600. Open 7 days. Small food court, and a large selection fresh fish and prepared Korean food.