bakudan bowl

Bakudan Bowl...I've only seen this on the menu at Ootoya, a popular chain restaurant, but apparently a lot of izakaya also serve this.

Ootoya's version has a raw egg in the middle of the bowl.

Bakudan literally means "explosive", "bomb"

Super easy and delicious.

Put your favorite toppings.

Here is what I used.

Cooked rice : 90 grams for me, 180 grams for Satoshi

Sashimi (bincho maguro (albacore tuna), and buri (yellow tail))

Tomatoes

Edamame

Kim chee

Natto

Yamagata style Dashi

To eat: 2 teaspoons dashi shoyu

Korean nori

NOTES: you could also use wasabi to eat this with, and "regular" shoyu and "regular" nori.

I mixed mine up and ate it with the nori, Satoshi ate his without mixing.

I'll make this again.

obihiro style pork bowls

Back in 2006, when we visited Hokkaido, we stumbled upon Pancho, a shop that served buta don (pork bowl)

Sliced pork that was cooked with a sweet-salty sauce and fanned out on top of a bowl of rice.

The shop only had this on their menu with the price varying on the portion of pork you chose.

The shop has since relocated to a different address in Obihiro and still serves their pork bowls.

Since we haven't been anywhere due to the pandemic, I thought we could "travel" to Obihiro through dinner.

Pancho serves their pork bowls with green peas, I served mine with green onion.

Obihiro style pork bowl : makes 2 servings : adapted from the internet

300 grams thinly sliced pork belly, cut into about 2-inch width pieces

1/4 cup shoyu (soy sauce)

3 tablespoons sugar

4 tablespoons mirin (sweet rice wine)

4 tablespoons sake (rice wine)

green onion, sliced

Fan out the pieces out into a pan and cook at medium heat.

With paper towel, mop up the oil that comes out from the meat as it cooks.

Spoon out about 2 or 3 tablespoons of sauce and flip the meat to get it caramelized

Serve over rice, top with green onion

NOTES: Next time, I would use a little thicker cut of pork belly.

There was a lot of oil that came out when cooking, so have paper towels ready!

This recipe make quite a lot of sauce, so spooning out a little amount at a time while cooking was a good choice.

Once you spoon the sauce over the meat, stay close by, because the sauce can burn quickly!

I cooked the pork in two pans because I wanted to fan out the pieces, not having any of them overlapping or folding.

I've also used this sauce when cooking fried tofu, I think you could use this with chicken or beef too.

this week

Last Wednesday, I tried making nitsuke for the first time.

Nitsuke is when you simmer a protein (mainly fish) in a sweetened shoyu based sauce.

I was surprised at how fast, tasty and easy it was to do.

If you'd like to try making this here is the recipe I adapted from the internet.

Kinmedai (splendid alfonsino) Nitsuke (simmered in sweetened shoyu sauce) : 2 servings : adapted from several recipes on the internet
2 pieces kinmedai, scaled, rinsed
1/2 cup sake (rice wine)
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons shoyu (soy sauce)
2 tablespoons mirin (sweet rice wine)
1 tablespoon sugar
1 nub ginger, cleaned and sliced

Place an "X" on the the skin of the fish, be careful not to cut all the way through
In a pot or pan, put all the sauce ingredients in and bring to a boil
Add the fish and turn down the heat to medium
Cover with a drop lid and cook for 10 minutes
Remove the drop lid turn the heat down to low and spoon the sauce over the fish for 5 minutes
Serve and enjoy!

NOTES: so easy, tasty and easy! Pretty sure you can change the type of fish and also adjust the amount of sugar to your liking.
Serve this with lots of rice! I will definitely be making this again.

We ordered our first CSA (community supported agriculture) box which arrived on Friday.

I learned about Tabechoku from a television show called "7 Rule".

The television show introduces the many Japanese working women and shares their 7 rules on life and work.

On a particular episode, they introduced the owner of Tabechoku which introduces farmers to customers and cuts out the middle men (all the red tape organizations) and gives the farmers more profits.

The prices are a little higher than what you would find in the supermarkets, but the freshness of the produce cannot be beat.

The farm we ordered from, Ogawa Farm is located about an hour drive from Kumamoto city in Kyushu.

Apparently they use goats to "weed" and "fertilize" their veggies.

We ordered their medium sized veggie box and it came with 7 different veggies...bok choy, spinach, carrot, cherry tomatoes, baby leaf, onions and garlic scapes (which I had originally thought were called garlic sprouts from the translation from Japanese to English).

It was my first time to cook with garlic scapes...apparently they are not readily found at the markets, though I have seen them in Chinese dishes here.

On my first try, since it was our first time to try them, I prepared them simply by steaming them and we ate them as is....it was like eating garlicky green beans!

With the rest of them, I sauteed them with some thinly sliced beef and seasoned it with some oyster sauce and shoyu (soy sauce).

When we received the box, it was nice to also receive some pamphlets educating us about the area our veggies came from as well as a few ideas on how to use their produce.

One thing that Ogawa Farm had mentioned was that garlic scapes were not often found at the markets so I'm glad we got to try them, but just in case, will also keep an eye for them on my next grocery run...

With the bok choy, I stir fried it with some chicken, some of the carrots we received as well as some of the onion that was in the box. I added garlic and seasoned with shoyu (soy sauce) and oyster sauce.

We have the spinach, carrots and onions left to eat...I am happy with this box and will definitely order again from this farm when the season changes.

It's shakuyaku (Chinese peony) season...we were lucky to get the last two at our neighborhood flower shop.

Love how big they get when they bloom, like a hand with fingers splayed!....hard to believe the buds were only the size of a golf ball!

Too bad these don't have any fragrance though...still pretty to look at though.

Good news: The 2 washable masks for 1 household from the government arrived...It took about a month.

39 of the 47 prefectures in Japan have been released from the state of emergency and have been allowed to transition back to some normalcy.

Sad news: After saying they would give every household 2 masks, some people that received them saw hair and some discoloration on their masks...blah!

So, it was recalled and they had to examine "each one" before putting them in our mailboxes...sigh.

AND after I washed them...they are already falling apart...boo!

Tokyo was not one of the prefectures that were released, we still need to get our numbers under control.

Sadly, this year they will not open Mount Fuji to hiking.

Rainy season and humidity is coming...at least we are eating well.

Hope your week was a good one.

Stay safe.

ibaraki

(Photo: field of cosmos) Back in May, we went to Hitachi Seaside Park to see their nemophila hillside.

Well, after the nemophila plants bloom and die, they uproot everything and plant kochia (bassia scoparia).

The kochia kind of look like green tunbleweed bushes and I've heard some also call them "broom plants" because when dried they look like brooms.

With the drop in temperatures, the green bushes turn reddish.

After seeing this on a news program many years ago, it was on our list "to see".

From Tennodai, it was a little over 2 hours to get to Hitachi Seaside Park.

Once there the weather was a little overcast with the sun peeking out here and there.

It was still impressive to see.

One area that we passed through on our way to Hitachi Seaside Park was Isozaki. Ibaraki is the second largest producer of sweet potato in Japan (I think the top producer is Kagoshima in Kyushu).

Fields and fields of sweet potatoes!

If you'd like to see a video I took from the train, please look here-- at about the 3 minute area I hope you'll be able to see all the harvested sweet potatoes!

It was exciting to see all those sweet potatoes from the train.

Like we did in May, we stopped at the Nakaminato area and walked to the fish market.

We had intended to eat at the conveyor belt sushi restaurant there, but the lines were krazy!

So we went back to the shop we ate at...Morita Suisan.

I ordered the same thing I did back in May and this time around Satoshi ordered the kaisen donburi too.

We were happy to get a table quickly and as always the food was delicious.

After lunch we walked around the town and stumbled upon this shop selling dried sweet potato called Daimaruya.

Inside, there were all sorts of dried sweet potato.

There was also a gelato shop that sold gelato made from different varieties of sweet potato.

Satoshi and I shared this double...left side is akaioimo (literally red large potato), which tasted more like pumpkin and right side was tamaotome (literally round maiden).

Both were delicious.

Kinmokusei (osmanthus) is blooming...love this fragrance!

Autumn is starting here, hopefully we'll be able to see some fall colors which is forecast for the end of November.

We have a special holiday tomorrow as the new Emperor will be crowned.

Hope you have a nice week.

Daimaruya
18-38 Shakamachi
Hitachinaka, Ibaraki
Phone: 029.263.7777
Hours: Mondays-Saturdays 10:00-17:00, Sundays-Holidays 9:00-17:00

oyakodon

The other night for dinner I made some oyakodon (literally parent-child bowl because it uses chicken and egg) to use up some rice that I had in the freezer.

I adapated a recipe from sirogohan...makes 2 servings

160 grams chicken thigh, deboned and cut into bite sized pieces.
sliced onion
4 tablespoons dashi (liquid stock)
4 tablespoons mirin (sweet rice wine)
2.5 tablespoons shoyu (soy sauce)
2 teaspoons sugar
2 eggs
milk

In a non-stick pan, put the chicken and onions
Add the liquid ingredient and sugar and turn the heat on to medium
Cover and cook for about 3 minutes
Scramble the eggs with a little milk and pour half over the chicken and onions
Cover and cook for about a minute
Then add the other half of the scrambled egg
Cover and cook for about a minute
When the egg is cooked to your liking, spoon over rice
Serve with your favorite greens.

NOTES: this was super easy and delicious.

I served this with some sugar snap peas and a salad.

It was a nice way to use up rice that I had in freezer...I'd make this again.

kozou plus

It's Golden Week here in Japan.

There are several holidays lined up at the end of the week.

There was also one this past Saturday...I think Japan may be the only country to count Saturdays to observe holidays.

Keep in mind there are businesses that do work on Saturdays, so I guess a holiday is a holiday...

Anyway, we recently tried Kozou Plus.

They specialize in mazesoba where you maze (mah-zay...mix) everything up before eating.

I ordered their niku niku don (literally meat meat bowl)...filled with grilled char siu and a sweet-salty sauce.

The meat was super tender...and that egg!

(wasn't too sure when to use the grainy mustard though...)

Satoshi chose their mazesoba.

He usually chooses noodles with soup, but since this shop specializes in mazesoba, he tried and liked this.

We liked the laid back feel of this shop (at some of these type of shops, you just feel rushed to finish your food and go!)...we'll be back!

Kozou Plus
1-2-35 Fukushima
Fukushima, Osaka
Phone: 06.6346.6346
Lunch: 11:00-14:30 (last order), Dinner: 18:00-21:30 (last order)

museums & ippouen

Remember the dragon at Kenninji?

The artist, Kaiho Yusho, was being featured at the Kyoto National Museum.

Satoshi said he wanted to check it out, so, Sunday that is what we did.

We got there early, along with hundreds of others...

Just to get into the museum we had to queue up...

While we were waiting our turn to ride the elevator, I took this picture with Kyoto Tower far off in the distance.

Meh, I wasn't impressed by this exhibit. Plus the inside of the museum smelled like a locker room...ugh!

Glad that Satoshi enjoyed the exhibit though.

We then went up the street to Shimizu Ippouen...a tea house.

If you order lunch & a sweet, they give you a little discount...so that is what we did.

Satoshi's maguro don with sesame oil and raw egg yolk.

You separate the egg and add to your donburi just before eating....only in Japan!

Satoshi's parfait....this had matcha ice cream, shiratama (like mochi) & sweet bean paste.

How cute is the wasabi container?! Made of wood with a teeny spoon and cover too!

I ordered the Maguro Houjicha (roasted green tea) Dashi Chazuke...so good and just the perfect serving!

I chose the matcha roll cake...I normally don't like white chocolate but that swirl was nice to balance out the bitter matcha.

There was also some konbu cha (powdered kelp) and bubu arare (small rice cracker puffs) sprinkled on the white chocolate to give it a sweet-salty flavor & crunch.

Although we went soon after they opened, we had to wait for a table, still, I'm glad we tried this place and want to come back to try their shave ice.

Bellies full, we crossed the street to Chishakuin.

Click on the photo and you should be able to hear the temple bell ringing.

Their garden area was super quiet and peaceful.

While viewing the garden, we also caught a rare glimpse of a grey heron up close...

Then back down the road to Sanjusangendo.

Amazing display of 1000 kannon (figures for peace) statues inside the long rectangular building.

Every January 14 they hold archery tournaments here too, apparently which used to be held on this long deck.

The double cherry blossoms are in bloom...click to see the video.

And then back near the Kamogawa (Kamo river) we sat and had a snack. (click to view video)

It was kind of summery this weekend, but still comfortable to be out and about.

Shimizu Ippouen
665 Honkawaracho, corner of Higashi Oodori & Shiokoji road
Higashiyama-ku, Kyoto
Phone: 075.202.7964
Hours: 11:30-16:30
Closed Mondays

torisanwa

If you were trying to comment on this blog over the weekend, sorry, Blogspot was all wonky. I could post, but couldn't preview the post before publishing. I couldn't answer any comments either.

Whatcha gonna expect for something that's free, yeah?!

Oh well...

I recently had lunch at Torisanwa. They specialize in Nagoya Ko-chin chicken, a brand name chicken of the area.

They sell tebasaki (wings) and karaage (fried chicken nuggets) to-go and they also have a tiny eating area where you can have donburi (bowl) type dishes like chicken katsu, oyakodon and the like. You can also order some wings or karaage to eat with your donburi.

I ordered their chicken katsu don...810 yen (tax included) This came with some collagen soup, a rich chicken broth. It also came with an umeboshi (pickled apricot). I didn't know when to work in eating the umeboshi, so I ate it at the end of the meal as a palate cleanser of sorts.

The chicken katsu were big pieces of chicken thigh, I believe, fried nicely and then coated with their sauce. The chicken was really tender and the sauce was a little on the sweet side...I enjoyed this.

I enjoyed the balance of the dish. There wasn't too much sauce to make things soupy and the egg was cooked perfectly...a little runny but not raw.

I'm not so sure if the portion would be enough for guys but I noticed lots of women were eating there.

Usually during the weekdays you'll see mostly to only women eating in cafes and such, but this was the weekend, so maybe it was because of the collagen soup?!

Anyway, I wouldn't mind buying some wings and karaage to try...I'll be back.

Torisanwa
Lucua B1F
Phone: 06.6151.1153
Hours: 10:00-22:00, open when Lucua is

char siu don

The char siu don (donburi = bowl) from Foodland...$5.99

Just rice and char siu (a little green onions)

The meat wasn't fatty so it was rather dry.

But I was surprised at how much char siu they gave, totally worth the price.

I got lucky because there were some Chinese roast pork pieces in there too...whoo!

kaisen-zuke don

The other day I tried making a kaisen-zuke donburi for dinner. (Kaisen means assorted seafood).

I used the sauce recipe that I used when I made magurozuke avocado donburi.

I took half of the sauce and grated some fresh ginger into it and marinated some chu-toro (medium fatty tuna) in it. With the rest of the sauce, I marinated an assortment of sashimi (sliced raw fish) and some boiled tako (octopus).

While the seafood marinated (10 minutes), I put some rice into bowls and sprinkled some sesame seeds. Then I sprinkled some sliced green onions, thinly sliced shiso (perilla) and myoga (young ginger shoots).

Then I placed the marinated fish on top and drizzled what marinade was left.

Dinner was served.

We've finally started using "less-salt" shoyu (I was trying to use up what regular shoyu I had), and luckily the flavor of this didn't change much.

Our weather is still a bit weird, we still have very "cool" days, there have been some rainy days and some humid ones too.

I hope the weather will stable out soon.

magurozuke avocado donburi

Sunday, the weather was crazy!

We started off with clouds, then it turned into scary gale winds. We even had to tie things down on our lanai!

And then the rain, boy, did it rain. And then within a couple of hours our temps dropped over 10 degrees...The world is really falling apart.

Anyway, the weather dude had forecasted the rain, so knowing this, we stocked the refrig and stayed indoors.

Dinner was really simple. Magurozuke avocado donburi.

Adapted from "Uchigohan" serves 2

20 mililiters mirin (sweet rice wine)
30 mililiters shoyu (soy sauce)
1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds
170 grams maguro (tuna), sliced
5 leaves shiso (perilla), thinly sliced
yellow onion, thinly sliced
1 avocado, deseeded, peeled and sliced
rice, cooked

Marinade your maguro in the first 3 ingredients, 10 minutes before serving.
While waiting for your maguro, prepare your avocado, onion & shiso
After the 10 minutes plate everything up
Enjoy!

NOTES: if you don't want your rice to be piping hot when you plate it up, put some into your dish while waiting for the fish to marinate.

After marinating the tuna for 10 minutes, there was hardly any marinade left, so I drizzled what was left onto each serving.

This got a "thumbs up" from Satoshi, in fact, he ate really slow (which is unusual for him) savoring it all, I guess he really enjoyed this one.

I want to try this one again using different kinds of raw fish.

nasu kabayaki donburi

On a recent television show, which showcases the odd & mysterious cuisines from different prefectures in Japan, there was nasu kabayaki.

When one hears the word "kabayaki", most often one would think of unagi kabayaki (grilled eel).

Nasu Kabayaki is popular in Gunma prefecture. It is served just like unagi in a lacquered box, at the bottom is rice, next come slices of teriyaki chicken, on top, the grilled eggplant.

The texture is sort of similar to unagi, but has less calories.

Kabayaki Sauce: adapted from the internet : makes 3/4 cup
75 mililiters mirin (sweet rice wine)
25 mililiters sake (rice wine)
62 grams brown sugar
90 mililiters shoyu (soy sauce)

In a pot, bring the mirin and sake to a boil
Add the sugar and shoyu
Bring mixture back to a boil then turn down heat and simmer for 15 minutes.
Transfer to a glass container and cool before putting into the refrige.

Veggies
2-inch piece zucchini, thinly sliced
2-inch piece carrot, thinly sliced
1/2 package maitake, torn apart with fingers
1/4 red bell pepper, thinly sliced

Sautee veggies in a non-stick pan until they are cooked through, set aside.

Nasu Kabayaki (grilled eggplant): serves two
2 eggplants, peeled
2 tablespoons kabayaki sauce (see above)
sauteed veggies
sansho (Japanese pepper)
200 grams cooked rice

Cut the eggplant in half, lengthwise then make another cut in the middle lengthwise but not cutting all the way through.

Put it into a heated non-stick pan and drizzle some of the kabayaki sauce on it.

(Reserve about 1 teaspoon of sauce)

Flip eggplant over and drizzle a little more sauce.

When everything has caramelized a little, add a little water and cover.

Flip the eggplant and add a little more water. Cover the eggplant and cook. It should be soft but not too mushy.

Before serving, drizzle 1/2 a teaspoon onto the rice and top with eggplant and other veggies.

Sprinkle some sansho.

NOTES: this was good! Actually the original version uses a pastry "blow torch" to char the side not on your pan, but I thought that was a bit over the top to do in my kitchen, so I just kept flipping it over.

I served it with some tomato & onion miso soup. I'm definitely making this again.

oyakodon

After making the full recipe for the agebitashi sauce, I had quite a bit of sauce leftover, so I made oyakodon with it.

Oya-ko means parent-child in this case, chicken and egg. Don is short for donburi (bowl).

I sliced some sasami (chicken breasts) and some leeks.

I put 2 ladles of the sauce, the chicken and the leeks and then heated everything until the chicken was cooked through.

Then I added some leftover veggies from the agebitashi to heat through and then added a scrambled egg.

NOTES: My ratio of sauce to "goodies" was more so it was more soupy than what you would normally find here in Japan.

Still this was good and perfect for the chilly weather we've been having.

I'd make this again.

things I'm liking

It's the end of the month, I'm cleaning out some photos and posting some random stuff I'm liking.

The weather was beautiful the other day, so I went to check out Aramaki Rose Park, I packed myself a bento, and went to check out the roses.

There was a slight rose fragrance in the air, though the rose bushes looked a little shorter than when we visited in the Spring.

I won these assorted coffees from Starbucks Japan. They were giving them away to 5000 people if you signed up for their online newsletter and as part of their celebration of 15 years in Japan...woot!

For this contest, you had to choose what you wanted to win. They were giving away a latte machine or a case of pre-made lattes or these coffees.

I figured everyone would choose the machine, and I don't have space for a case of pre-made lattes, so I went with the assortment.

I think it was a good choice. (Thank you!)

Muji's Rooibos Ginger Chai tea. Good with a little sugar and splash of milk, perfect in the evenings as rooibos is non-caffeinated.

Mini Reese's PB cups...they have no wrappers on them so be careful not to eat the whole bag in one sitting!

Muji's Amatriciana, just heat the bag in a pot of boiling water and pour over your favorite pasta.

I added a sprinkling of parmesan cheese and some ground pepper...delicious on a rainy day.

True North's almond pecan cashew clusters...serving size is 5. One cluster is the size of a sugar cube, let me tell you, they are hard to stop at just 5!

It is kinoko (mushroom) season here, I sauteed these (shimeji, eringi & maitake) with some chicken consomme, garlic, a little butter & chili pepper and served it over rice like a donburi (bowl).

Satoshi gave me the thumbs up for this dish.

La Bien Nommee's salted caramel with dark chocolate sauce which we got in France...this sauce gets firm in the refridge, but is still very delicious on hot scones.

Coco Ichibanya's curry furikake...starts off sweet and then the spiciness kicks in...good on rice!

A piece of cooked kabocha, mashed together with a hard boiled egg, some mayo and ground pepper...delicious on crusty baguette!

What are you liking these days?

p.s. Happy Halloween! if you're celebrating, be safe!

okara

One morning I saw someone making okara patties on television and it reminded me that I hadn't made them in awhile.

Okara are the "leftovers" after making tofu, the lees, it is also called "u-no-hana".

After going to the market, I sort of followed this recipe, this time adding a little minced chicken to make the patties.

After cooking them in some oil to brown, I made the thick sauce.

I sauteed some veggies (eringi, carrot, red bell pepper, spinach) in a non-stick pan without oil, then added the ingredients for the sauce, and thickened it up with a slurry then spooned the sauce over the patties.

It was so good with rice that Satoshi had seconds.

Whenever I buy okara, it comes with two 120 gram packages, so on another night, I made another okara recipe this time using this recipe.

Using similar ingredients as the patties, this turned out to be an okara scramble, of sorts.

I sauteed some minced chicken, diced onion, hijiki, carrot, red bell pepper, eringi and okara in some sesame oil.

When the minced chicken was cooked through and everything was broken up, I added a scrambled egg, some lettuce and some oyster sauce.

Okara is quite "sand"-like, so we ate this with a spoon. I think putting this over rice, like a donburi, would have been a better way to eat this than keeping the rice and scramble separate.

What have you been eating?

"don"

People are still looking for their loved ones, these stories are the hardest to watch or hear about.

On a positive note, one prefecture in the disaster area has given residents bicycles that were abandoned or parked illegally. Since gasoline is so limited, they figured that getting around by bicycle would be a good means of transportation.

They asked bicycle shop owners in the area to help "fix-up" these bicycles, adding air to tires, and started giving them away.

These days we've been eating a lot of rice dishes. I especially like donburi (rice bowl dishes) (because there are less dishes to wash afterwards).

I also like using pork.

Thinly sliced pork marinated in some pre-made yakiniku sauce.

Wilt some sliced cabbage then cook the pork. Top everything with green onions.

Another donburi was inspired from kimu-taku yakimeshi.

I sauteed some whittled gobo (burdock), carrots & zucchini in sesame oil and added some pork.

When everything was coated I added some tsubozuke & kim chee.

Put over rice and top with green onions.

Fast, easy and delicious, my kind of cooking. Hope you have a good week.