thank you

Just before Thanksgiving, friend Val, sent us these mixes by Hawaii's Best Hawaiian Haupia. (Thank you!)

Whenever I bake I try to adjust recipes so that it will only use 50 grams of butter and 1 egg.

Well, to use this butter mochi brownie mix, I needed to relax this rule...

I was too lazy to grease an 8 x 8 pan and put the batter into 10 muffin papers instead. 

It wasn’t until someone mentioned on Instagram that I realized I also needed to adjust the baking time...oops!

(At least clean up was super easy !)

Still, this came out great! butter mochi meets brownie.

The bag directs you to refrigerate the leftovers but since it is only the 2 of us, I wrapped each in plastic wrap and put them into the freezer.

I hope the texture won't change too much.

Look forward to trying the other mixes in the coming months.

butter

The price of butter is supposed to go up today.

I really haven't been buying butter in bulk (or baking) because of this.

Since "my stash" in the freezer was starting to run low though, I decided to get a box before the price went up.

eep! They decreased the amount of grams...from 200 to 150!

The grams have probably been decreased for some time now, I just either forgot that this was what happened or hadn't bought a box in a really long time.

sigh...I can only shudder that more bakeries will switch over to margarine because of this.

this & that

This past weekend was a 3-day weekend and we went to Awajishima, an island near the Kobe area, for two days. I have to get my thoughts together and photos in order, so I'm posting a photo of the beautiful sunset we saw yesterday. I took this photo from the train.

On the downside...Japan is going through another butter shortage. I recently bought a 450 gram block of unsalted for 900-something yen and divvied it up into 9-50 gram pieces. I didn't need that much unsalted butter, but since the market I went to was the only place selling butter, I bought the only size they had. They also limited us to 1 block.

Satoshi was amazed I took out my scale to weigh each piece...um, yeah, when you bake it kinda needs to be precise...

I also needed salted butter and ended up buying a teeny 100 gram tub for 300-something yen.

With this shortage I am afraid that most bakeries will switch over to margarine...though I am hoping my favorite bakeries won't.

To end this on a good note...Thanksgiving is coming up this week. We won't be celebrating but will be thinking of all of our friends and family around the world.

Thank you for all your kind messages and comments. We appreciate YOU!

Have a good week!

échiré marché au beurre

I recently learned that Échiré butter opened a shop in Hankyu Department store.

Actually they have been in Hankyu Department store since the ending part of 2012! (Gads where have I been?!)

If you remember, Satoshi and I tried their croissant and other buttery baked goods on a trip to Tokyo.

What I wanted to try was this..their Omelette Beurre.

A fluffy cake filled with buttercream!

This was so good. Rich buttercream overflowing in a fluffy yellow cake.

This particular item only comes out at certain times, so check before you go!

We also tried their Brioche Échiré. I didn't read the directions but you are supposed to re-heat this in a toaster. The whole thing puffs up and the butter in the É overflows when heated...no wonder we were a bit disappointed with this one.

Their kouign amann was wonderful, nice caramel on the top and very flaky pastry.

My faves were the omelette, kouign amann and brioche in that order. Satoshi's was the kouign amann, omelette and brioche.

I hope we can try some of the other items that they sell...we'll be back.

Échiré Marché au Beurre
Hankyu Department Store B2F
Open when Hankyu is
Phone: 06.6361.1381

biscuiterie bretonne

I tried Biscuiterie Bretonne recently.

In the past couple of months I have been noticing that more and more places are switching over to margarine to reduce their costs...boo!

Thank goodness this place still uses butter!

The financier and madeleine were moist and "buttery" while the galette bretonne was unfortunately dry and a little burnt.

There are many other items that I wouldn't mind trying...I'll be back.

Biscuiterie Bretonne
Hankyu Umeda B1F
Phone: 06.6313.0206
Open when Hankyu Umeda is

shoyu butter corn yakionigiri

I am always influenced by what I see on tv, especially when it comes to food.

Satoshi and I watch a show called "Sarameshi" which is short for "salarymen (businessmen) meshi (food)".

Anyway, the show airs at 11-ish at night and boy, do they make us hungry!

On a recent episode they featured this...shoyu butter corn yakionigiri.

Corn cooked in shoyu and butter is a well-known winner in Japan, but to add it to rice...brilliant!

We had to try this.

After cleaning your corn, remove the kernels carefully from the cob with a knife.

Then add the corn kernels and cob to the rice and cook.

All the corn "goodness" will come out from the cob and flavor the rice.

Remove the cob from the pot and mix the rice.

Carefully make your onigiri.

Then take some butter and some shoyu and fry. Flip once or twice carefully with a spatula.

You'll get some burnt areas, but that's the best parts!

No real recipe for this...I used 2 cups of rice and 2 cups of water. 1 corn on the cob.

A nub of butter and 1 teaspoon of shoyu.

NOTES: The fresh corn is cooked perfectly with the rice and is still quite crisp after it cooks. The sweetness from the corn matches perfectly with the saltiness of the butter and shoyu. I'll have to make this again next summer when corn is in season.

Have a nice weekend!

apple butter

It's Autumn, apples are in season.

So, naturally there are more apple products out there as well. The other day, my Twitter friend, H, sent me a care package! (Thank you!)

It was filled with all sorts of goodies and one that particularly stood out was this...apple butter.

Now, in the States, apple butter has no "butter" in it.

Sadly, I don't recall ever tasting apple butter in the States, though I had heard of it...

Well, in Japan, apple butter actually has butter in it! In fact it is made with sugar, apple, butter and a little salt.

We had this on some scones the other day for breakfast, the butter flavor isn't overpowering instead there is lots of apple flavor.

Thank you H!

things I'm liking (disliking)

It's been awhile since I've done a post on things I'm liking & disliking...

First off, disliking...It had been some time since I bought unsalted butter.

Whoa?! the brand of butter I've been buying has cut back...it used to be 200 grams, but now they only come in 150 grams.

The sad part is that the price is about the same as when it was 200 grams...eep!

Guess I'll be making less baked goods...

On to liking...found almond milk!

Granted it is only in these teeny 200 mililiter boxes (about a cup), and they don't have unsweetened, but I am happy that the food scene is changing in Japan.

Oh, the almond milk also comes in chocolate, coffee and tea flavors too, I picked up original (plain).

What are you liking (disliking) these days?

ogura toast

In Nagoya, you'll find ogura toast on their coffee shop menus.

Toasted bread topped with butter or margarine is then slathered with ogura-an.

Ogura-an is koshi-an (smooth sweet bean paste) that is simmered with some honey then whole adzuki beans are added at the end to keep the shape of the beans.

For this recipe I used tsubuan (chunky sweet bean paste) because it is more readily available.

Ogura Toast : for 1

your favorite slice of bread, toasted
some butter
a dollop of tsubuan

NOTES: The taste reminded me of how my mom likes to heat up her tsubuan mochi in a pan with some butter.

I enjoyed the sweet-salty combination, it went nicely with some black coffee.

creme de caramel au beurre sale

I don't know about you, but I am easily influenced by what others blog about...like creme de caramel au beurre sale (aka salted butter caramel sauce).

If I can't find it where I am, then I'm interested in trying to make it myself.

Anyway, awhile back, Kathy travelled to France and enjoyed jars of this stuff.

I happened across bottles of this in an import shop in Osaka and bought one to try.

It wasn't the exact same brand that she had tried but it was still from Bretagne (Brittany), France, where this type of sauce is well-known.

In fact, this sauce was darker than the one she tried.

I put it in the refrig and finally opened the bottle the other night.

I was amazed because even with the sauce being kept in the refrig, the sauce is soft, spreadable.

I zapped a tablespoon of the sauce and drizzled it over vanilla ice cream.

The sauce still stayed soft even on ice cream.

It was delicious! Salty and sweet. I think the next time I'm trying this on pancakes, I should actually try making crepes...hmm.

UPDATE: this is good on pancakes, tried it yesterday at breakfast.

damasareta

Usually I buy "brand name" veggies...corn, potatoes from Hokkaido, red bell peppers from Kochi prefecture, onions from Awaji Island, fuji apples from Aomori.

I usually stay clear of onions from Hyogo (too much bite) and soy beans from Osaka (no flavor).

So, when I saw these corn from Nagano prefecture, I was kinda leery.

The corn was only 78 yen (about US$.78) an ear, thinking I could steam it and halve it between Satoshi, I bought one for dinner...wrong.

The nice side was the side exposed...but after peeling it...my fears were confirmed...I was damasareta (fooled/tricked/psyched).

I looked at the unexposed side and saw this...a whole section all dried up! (from the tip to almost half way of the ear!)

To take it back to the store would have been the right thing to do, but to go back out into the heat and humidity was a pain.

So, I ad-libbed on one of my favorite summer recipes...this one.

I added eggplant, okra, and some tofu in place of the green beans and minced pork. I also excluded the garlic since I was too lazy to defrost some.

Had I known about the corn earlier, instead of finding out just before cooking, I would have had some time to drain the tofu of its water.

So, the dish came out a little more soupy than usual, but it was still spicy and still tasted great over rice.

Will I buy corn from Nagano prefecture again? Probably not.

butter shortage (update)

(This is what I thought I understood...I could be wrong as Japanese isn't my mother language...)

On the news the other day they mentioned why butter was scarce. The majority of the raw milk goes for milk, then cream, then to cheese and lastly to butter.

The butter that is available is going to cake and bread makers, which leaves the average household out. In fact, the bread makers have complained that the cake makers are hogging up most of the supply.

(This is the part that is making me mad...again, I could be wrong...) At one point, milk was in excess because consumption was down and so they threw it away, tons of it! Then the feed cost rose, which made some dairies go out of business and kill off their animals!

And now we are where we are...no butter. The government said the other day, "maybe we should up production?"...(um, there is no butter, what do you think?)

A couple weeks ago, the government reduced the gas tax, and brought the price of gas way down. People began hoarding. Well, today, they found a river filled with gas. A factory that hoarded gasoline, "realized" that they bought too much and just dumped it, 4000 liters (I think) into a river! (I was trying to find the accurate number but couldn't.)

This reminds me of a couple years back when there was a surplus of Chinese cabbage. Since the farmers didn't know what to do with them, and no one wanted to put out the $$ to take it off their hands, the farmers just shredded them up with their tractors! This in turn made the price for Chinese cabbage go through the roof.

I think this country is wasteful, more than is actually talked about.

UPDATE: the supermarket that I shop at has brought in some salted and unsalted butter. The salted butter is "cheaper" (379 yen for 200g...about US$3.79) than the unsalted one (399 yen for 200g...about US$3.99). Though the price was still quite outrageous, I bought one salted and one unsalted. At the check-out, the cashier grabbed the two and rang it up as 2 unsalted butters. I stopped her and pointed out that the two were different. She apologized profusely, 20 yen is 20 yen. (I think a lot of people don't like to stand behind me at the check-out, because I'm always pointing out price errors.)

butter

Today is Earth Day. The sun is out, perfect for baking...only thing is that there is a butter shortage.

While I was in Hawaii, I read about a butter shortage in Japan on Amy's blog. In her post, she said that she was later able to buy some butter.

Unfortunately, the store that I went to had no unsalted butter. They did have salted butter but that had a limit per person and was selling it for 335 yen (about US$3.35) for 200 grams...I decided to wait.

While shopping, I realized I needed sugar. I know that that price has risen since the last time I bought sugar--which was sometime last year. 1 kilogram is now 258 yen (about US$2.58 for 2.2 pounds).

I still have 3 (50 gram) sticks of unsalted butter left, but I guess I'll wait before I get into baking again...

mini honey toast

Have you ever had honey toast? I have been seeing it here --Kathy and Reid both had it at the same restaurant in Hawaii, but I've also seen it around Japan too. I googled and found out that a karaoke place that has rooms around Tokyo has this on their menu. You can check out what they have on their menu here. (Some are huge-mongous!)

From what I've seen, for the "plain" version, they use one loaf of bread (yep, a whole loaf), honey and vanilla ice cream. In Japan, a loaf of bread is quite small by U.S. standards, it only yields 4-6 slices depending on how thick or thin you slice it. I was quite surprised by this when I first moved here because in Hawaii we buy loaves of bread with about 20 or more slices in a bag. I was also surprised to hear that in Tokyo they only have 4 slices per package but in Osaka we can buy packages with 4, 5 or 6 slices.

So getting back to the honey toast...having never tried this before, I wanted to try one. Unfortunately, I don't like to karaoke, and probably wouldn't be able to (and shouldn't) eat a whole one by myself, so I figured I should try to make a mini version. I couldn't find a small plain loaf but instead found a mini raisin loaf. This loaf was 6 inches long by 3 inches tall. I split it in half then cut out the innards of the loaf, leaving a little bread to serve as the bottom of the "bowl". (The other half of the bread will be tomorrow's toast for breakfast.)

I then toasted the bread and the innards for about 4 minutes.

Then I melted a pat of butter with 1 tablespoon of honey. When the toast was ready, I put back the innards into the bread "bowl" then drizzled some honey mixture. Then I took 60ml (1/2 of the container) of Haagen Dazs vanilla ice cream, put that on top of the toast and drizzled the rest of the honey mixture on top. I also made myself a cappuccino.

NOTES: Since I used raisin bread this reminded me of bread pudding or french toast. Is it supposed to taste like that...Kathy? Reid? anyone who has tried this? The toasted bread was crisp on the outside and fluffy on the inside, drizzled with honey and the melting vanilla ice cream it satisfied my sweet tooth. I had thought it would be a sickening kind of sweet but it was actually just right.

I can't wait to make this again when Satoshi can try it.

dinners & breakfast

As you'll probably notice I've been hooked on "the carrot salad"--it is so simple to make and I love the refreshing flavor...

Friday's dinner was gyo-burg (gyoza burgers) with carrot salad and steamed green beans with a lemon oregano vinaigrette, rice and kurumi tsukudani.

Saturday's breakfast was egg salad sandwiches made with Best Foods mayo which I got from Nate (HwnPakeOkinawa). Growing up with Best Foods, there really is no other mayo. (Thanks Nate!) We also had carrot salad and steamed green beans, plus white peach.

Sunday's dinner buta kimchee (pork with kimchee) omlette, more carrot salad, the last of the kurumi tsukudani and rice.

Last night's dinner minced pork with corn in a miso butter sauce over rice with carrot salad.

This recipe comes from a cookbook I have called "Natsu ni oishii kondate" by Orange Page.
Serves 2
1/2 tablespoon oil
1 clove garlic
150g minced pork
1 corn on the cob
100g green beans

400g cooked rice

Sauce:
1 teaspoon tobanjan (chili paste)
1/2 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons miso (soy bean paste)
2 tablespoons mirin (sweet rice wine)
2 tablespoons sake (rice wine)
2 tablespoons water

ground white sesame seeds
1 tablespoon butter

Preparation:
cut the kernels off of the cob and rinse.
cut the beans into 1 cm pieces, rinse.

1. Heat the oil on low and add the garlic
2. When you can smell the garlic, add the pork, turn heat up to high and stir
3. When the pork has turned color, add the corn and beans and stir
4. Coat everything with the oil and add the sauce ingredients.
5. Turn heat down to medium and coat everything in the sauce.
6. When everything starts to turn thick add the butter to finish.
7. Serve over rice and top with a sprinkle of sesame seeds.

NOTES: You could use canned corn, but I'm not too sure on the portions. When you add the sauce ingredients, make sure that the miso is completely "melted" and the sauce is smooth. I didn't have white sesame seeds, so I used black ones. Also, if you are watching your calories you could probably omit the butter at the end.

Enjoy!

odds & ends

Last night, I decided to roast some veggies for dinner. I just drizzled olive oil, salt, pepper and oregano. After the veggies came out of the oven, I drizzled a little balsamic vinegar on top.

For the main dish, I baked some salmon and topped it with an idea I got from the Honolulu Advertiser. The recipe was for a lavender-thyme butter, but I didn't follow it because it was a bit too late to take some butter out to soften it (plus it is too cold to soften butter...), so I just took all the ingredients and placed them on top of the salmon. It made the house smell wonderful and it tasted great!

Well, today is a dreary Saturday, it is very overcast and very cold! Satoshi's German language class has moved from its previous location, so they had an open house. One of the presentations was by a local confectioner, Masashi Taniwaki, who makes German sweets. He lived in Germany for about 14 years before coming back to Japan. His shop is located in Ashiya, a high-end neighborhood, just outside of Osaka.

He talked about making different types of German sweets and of course, there was taste testing too. The first one we got to try was baum kuchen and is supposed to look like the rings of a tree when cut. This cake was a bit dense and has many layers and I was surprised at how this one wasn't too sweet. This cake is usually found at special occasions such as weddings or birthdays. You need a special baum kuchen oven to make this, so I can see why it might be found only at special occasions.

The next one was called land kuchen--which means country cake. This cake is usually found out in the country side and quite eaten regularly. This cake was also quite dense but had a fruit and nut topping. It was really good and also not too sweet.

The last one that we tried was called mohn kuchen. Mohn is poppy seeds. This cake was quite light and had a layer of poppy seeds, raisins and nuts. As you ate it, you could feel the little poppy seeds popping in your mouth.

I also want to share with you a new chocolate. This is called salt chocolate made by one of my favorite local chocolatiers, Ekchuah. It was sold last year at their shop, but I hadn't gotten around to getting some until now.

The back-side of the chocolate has the store's name in gold on it. This dark chocolate is laced with a natural salt that complements the chocolate, it is perfect while sipping a glass of red wine.

Lastly, this time of year bring sakura (cherry blossom) flavored treats. It is hard to describe the flavor because it doesn't not taste like cherries that we're used to in America. The flavor is delicate like the cherry blossoms themselves. This treat was made by a Kyoto shop called Kogetsu and we got them from a friend, Kathy. (Thanks Kathy!)

After opening the wrapper, you find this pink, gelatinous ball, which is flavored with sakura.

Then cutting into it, you find the sweet bean paste inside...delicious!

Hope you are having a great weekend!

snacks & goodies

Ugh, the weather has been so hot the past couple of days. The temperature was about 35C (95F), stepping out of the house smelled like a sweaty locker room and felt like when you open the oven door....blah!

But enough about that...the nice thing about having family come to visit you, is not only being able to spend time with them, they also bring you nice goodies.

Like this trek mix from Trader Joe's. I really like Trader Joe's and wish there was one in Hawaii. But, it also keeps the excitement alive for going to one in the continental U.S. I brought most of this on our climb.

A huge bag of Hershey's Extra Dark miniatures. I've posted about the chocolate bars previously,(here).

A bag of dark chocolate dipped mac nut shortbread cookies from Big Island Candies.

A bottle of mom's bread and butter pickles. These are great on tuna sandwiches! If I ever venture to try making these, I will definitely share the recipe!

A bottle of mom's strawberry guava jelly. Strawberry guava is a type of guava in Hawaii, there is no actual strawberry in the jelly.

And a box of cookies from the Honolulu Cookie Company.

I also wanted to share some of the food finds from our recent journey.

A shiomame daifuku (salted bean rice cake stuffed with salted beans and sweet bean paste) found in a little shop called Kikyouya in front of the Ootsuki station. Sorry, I didn't get a picture of the inside, but it was really soft and delicious!

Kikyouya
1-2-1 Ootsuki, Yamanashi
Phone: 0554-23-2011
http://www.kikyouya.co.jp/

A cocoa daifuku (rice cake stuffed with cream and chocolate bean paste). This was found at a little shop called Miyazakiya near the Gotemba station. They also have a cafe daifuku which has coffee flavored bean paste, but we didn't try it. My mom didn't care for this one, but my dad and I enjoyed it!

Miyazakiya
1991-2 Shinbashi, Gotemba
Shizuoka
Phone: 0550-82-1629

The hotel we stayed at in Hakone served us a juice made from Wasei mikan. Mikan is a type of mandarin orange. It was very light and refreshing.

Hope you are enjoying the weekend--we have a three-day weekend here!