Tuesday, December 26, 2006

day after christmas

It is the day after Christmas, are you at the malls? It is just another day here in Japan, in fact, a lot of people are trying to get ready to welcome the New Year--I'll post about that as we get closer to the day.

A while back, I bought a chocolate cookbook, which I posted about here. Remember I also received some dried figs? Well, since I had a bottle of red wine open, I was finally able to try this recipe.

Ganache Figue makes about 16 pieces
5 dried figs
3/4 cup red wine
1/2 cinnamon stick
3 whole black peppers
1 whole clove
125g sweet chocolate
100ml cream
cocoa powder

1. In a pot, put the wine, cinnamon, pepper & clove and bring to a boil. When it comes to a boil, turn down to simmer for 5 minutes.
2. Add the dried figs and let come to a light boil. Turn off heat and put lid on, leave contents in pot overnight.
3. The next day, take the figs out and cut into 1 cm pieces. Save the mulled wine.
4. Cut the chocolate into small pieces and put into a bowl.
5. In a pot, heat the cream on medium heat, before it comes to a boil, turn off the heat. Add the cream to the chocolate and mix with a whisk.
6. When the chocolate and cream is combined, add the figs and 3 tablespoons of the mulled wine. Let cool.
7. After cool, spoon out into 16 balls and place onto a parchment sheet.
8. Cool in refrig for 20 to 30 minutes. Using your hands re-mold it to look like a fig and cover in cocoa powder. From the mulled wine, take the cinnamon stick and cut slivers to be used as the stem of the fig.

NOTES: I ended up with about 20 pieces--I cut the figs into 4 pieces. I didn't add the 3 tablespoons of the wine, I only added 1 because I don't care too much for liquor chocolates. I also didn't read the recipe well and I cooled the chocolate in the refrig and ended up with quite a hard mess. I also didn't use the cinnamon stick slivers at the end. The figs were well soaked and it didn't taste too winey. And because I used dark chocolate, instead of sweet chocolate, it matched well with the wine taste.

The other day, I also received daikon (long white turnip) from a friend, so I tried a recipe for Japanese pickles called takuan. I got the recipe from my mom's church's cookbook. This was really easy to make.

Here's the recipe from "Wisteria Delights"
Takuwan
3 T. salt
3/4 c. Japanese vinegar (rice vinegar)
1-1/2 c. sugar
1/4 tsp yellow food coloring
3 or 4 medium white turnips

Boil the salt, vinegar and sugar until sugar is melted.
Turn off heat, then add food coloring.
Set aside until cool.
Slice turnips, place in a bowl and pour sauce over them.
Leave in bowl, turning often with a wooden spoon.
Next day, put into jars with sauce then refrigerate.
If you like it a little hot, you may add chili peppers to your taste.


NOTES: I didn't add the food coloring.

Hope you are having a great week!

10 comments:

bourgogne said...

omg i can't wait for your osechi ryori posts!

K and S said...

Thanks Bourgogne. Don't know if I'll be able to pull off osechi, but will give it my best shot!

Take care.
Kat

Jann said...

you have been pretty busy-no malls for me. I'll stick to the kitchen!

Anonymous said...

I'm glad they turned out well despite the mishaps, I quite like the idea of figs and chocolate!

I hope you and Satoshi had a wonderful Xmas :)

K and S said...

Thanks Jann! The kitchen sounds like a nice place to be.

Thanks Ellie! figs and chocolate really go well together!

Merry Christmas you two!
Kat

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

Hey! I bought that book! In fact, I bought 2 when I was at the senior citizen Fair at Blaisdell. i thought it was so cute the way they made a cloth bag for each of the books. I like the Japanese print bag! Now that I see the takuan you made, I'm going to try it myself...looks ono...thanks for the suggestion!

K and S said...

Hi Pflower,
Glad to hear you have this cookbook. It is written pretty simply so most of the recipes are easy to follow.
Have a great 2007!
Kat

Rowena said...

Heh heh...here I am googling a recipe for takuan and yours is the easiest by far! All the others...either they don't have a photo or the instructions are too fussy.

Ok, time to head to the kitchen. Today it's more panda bread and takuan too.

K and S said...

I can see you are craving comforts of home as of late, Rowena :) Hope you like the recipe :)

Take care.
Kat