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My cookbook, KANSHA: Celebrating Japan's Vegan & Vegetarian Traditions (Ten Speed Press, 2010) provides a solid foundation to the principles and practice of kansha in the kitchen and at table. This workshop page enables me to guide you further.  ENJOY! 

 Autumn Mushrooms

茸ご飯

Kinoko Gohan

(Mushrooms & Rice)

sprinkled with Ao Nori (sea herb)


Preparing Daikon Radish
I welcome your feedback -- especially captioned photos with a brief description of your kitchen sessions when you try making the recipe above, or in KANSHA. Those interested in offering feedback, please download a set of guidelines for submitting and displaying your work. To further teaching goals, I may post some of the feedback to this site, adding my commentary.
Here, rice is cooked takikomi style,  infused with a rich, woodsy broth produced by briefly braising mushrooms that are later tossed in with the rice. For a full-flavored, visually and texturally interesting rice dish, use a combination of pine-scented matsutaké, pearly-gray shiméjitaké, trumpet-shaped éringi, ruffled maitaké, black-capped shiitaké, and/or ivory-colored enokidaké mushrooms. I like to balance the scent of the forest with the bracing aroma of the seashore by garnish my rice with ao nori, a green sea herb.  DOWNLOAD the RECIPE.
松茸
  matsutaké
pine mushroom
(Tricholoma matsutaké)   

Daikon with Yuzu
椎茸
  shiitaké
black oak mushroom
(Lentinula edodes) 
    しめじ
  shiméji
oyster mushroom
(Pleurotus ostreatus)

Thinly Sliced Daikon
えのき茸
  énokidaké
slender, white-capped mushroom
(Flammulina velutipes) 
A word of caution...
for those tempted to go foraging for mushrooms on their own. Deep knowledge and long experience is essential! Mushrooms should be purchased from a reliable commercial source.
エリンギ
éryngi
king trumpet mushroom
(Pleurotus eryngii)

舞茸

  maitaké
hen-of-the-woods
(Grifola frondosa)