this and that

Sunday, with 3 blood oranges I made a small batch of marmalade.

After taking this picture, I put it back in the pot to cook down, since I thought it still had too much liquid.

Monday, it rained all day long.

We had some marmalade on toasted baguette with some butter.

Satoshi thought it was carrots...ha!

Monday dinner was marmalade chicken...this sauce was so easy and tasty!

From the Kewpie website: serves 2

2 tablespoons of marmalade

1 tablespoon of shoyu 

1 tablespoon of sake 

300 gram piece of chicken

Some olive oil

Cut the chicken into bite sized pieces

Heat the oil and cook the chicken.

After the chicken is cooked, pour the sauce over the chicken and let it caramelize a little.

NOTES: I used boneless chicken thigh, cut it up and cooked it skin side down to crisp.

Then before adding the sauce, I wiped up the oil from the chicken.

I'd definitely make this again.

Back up to Monday afternoon, the rain stopped and I got to see a pretty big rainbow.

And then back up to Valentine's Day...Satoshi had to work.

I gave him these Italian chocolate hearts that I found at Flying Tiger, a knick-knack shop from Copenhagen that has shops all around Japan.

Whenever he works on Sundays, it throws me off and I get confused as to what day is what.

He's also been off on Wednesdays so that throws me off too...

Oh well...hope your week is going well.

yuzu marmalade spareribs

I've been working through a book about using the fish grill drawer.

One recipe that caught my eye was a marmalade sparerib.

The spareribs they use were not too meaty.

Here is the recipe if you'd like to try...

500 to 600 grams spareribs
3 tablespoons marmalade
1/4 cup shoyu (soy sauce)
1/4 cup sake (rice wine)

Marinade the ribs for 30 minutes to half a day.
Preheat the fish grill on high for 2 minutes
Place the ribs on the grill and cook for 5 minutes.
Flip the ribs over and cook for another 5 minutes.

NOTES: Since my ribs were meaty and thick I marinated them overnight.

Instead of cooking it in the grill for 5 minutes on each side, I put the the ribs into a pan (with the marinade) and cooked it on low for 10 minutes on each side.

Then I put the ribs into the fish grill for 3 minutes on each side to get a nice char on it.

I shouldn't have put the marinade in the pan with the ribs as it made the ribs more salty and the yuzu that was in the marmalade was also too salty to eat.

Now I know and will try this again.

I like cooking in the fish grill because it gets rid of some of the fat from meats.

I look forward to cooking more things this way.

on a walk

Today we had sun! After a couple of grey and rainy days, it was nice to get out for a walk...except that the wind was super strong and icy!

After we tried the sausage with yuzu in it, I researched and found out it was made by Minoo Sausage.

I had seen it at a local supermarket, but when I went back to buy some, they had already sold out.

Fast forward to today, on my walk, I found it at a touristy shop along the trail to the Minoo Falls...800 yen (tax included).

I froze it and we'll eat it as pupu (appetizers) this winter.

Along the trail, I also found some yuzu...Todoromi yuzu is grown in the Minoo mountains.

1 kilo was 320 yen (tax included).

I was so happy to find some.

When I got home, I started prepping to make some yuzu marmalade.

And wouldn't you know, I ran out of sugar, so I ran out to the store and picked up some.

This year's marmalade is darker because I used brown sugar.

I still have a bottle that I made last year, and can't wait to try this year's batch.

Have a nice weekend!

yuzu marmalade

The day I passed by the fruit stand, they had huge yuzu from Minoo and were selling them for 280 yen for 2.

I had debated whether I would have time to make marmalade and decided to wait...

The next day, the sun was out, so I went to check out the fall foliage, then figured to check out the fruit stand to see if she still had the yuzu...bummer, she sold out.

So, I went to a stand that brings in veggies and fruits from Kochi prefecture and bought 4 yuzu for 400 yen.

If I can get my hands on some Minoo yuzu, I'll definitely make another batch.

good neighbors' fine foods

I am not too sure how I found out about Big Spoon Roasters, but I was happy to find them being sold online by Good Neighbors' Fine Foods in Tokyo.

I bought the Chai Spice Nut Butter. They also sell June Taylors preserves, so I bought a jar of her Seville Orange Marmalade.

If you like Chai, you will enjoy this nut butter.

Nice balance of spices and just a tad sweet.

The marmalade is really dark and thick, and there is so much fruit in there...love it!

Both are made in the USA but I didn't think I could find them in Hawaii, so I am glad I was able to find them here.

What are you enjoying these days?

natsumikan marmalade

The other day, I got together with Kazumi and several of her friends to make natsumikan (chinese citron) marmalade.

Apparently, every year they get together to make this marmalade, but this year was a little different.

See, Kazumi broke her wrist last month and hasn't been able to use her right hand, well, I was there to be her "right hand".

From 19 fruits, we had two large colanders of peel and nearly two liters of juice.

After cooking it with some sugar, we came out with 15 jars of marmalade and 1 large ziploc bag (we ran out of jars!).

There was lots of chatter, lots of contemplation as to how to go about making the marmalade (apparently every year is a little different).

Good times.

yuzu marmalade

The other day I made yuzu marmalade.

This year I found some yuzu from Todoromi, an area in Minoo that is known for their yuzu, which I've written about here.

I only had 2 yuzu but it seems like I came out with a little more marmalade than when I made it last year.

What have you been cooking up in your kitchen?

yuzu marmalade

I was hoping to buy a couple of jars of yuzu marmalade, but I think I'm a little too early in the season because I couldn't find any around the Minoo station area.

I did come upon a vendor selling 3 yuzu (citron) for 150 yen (there was another vendor selling 1 yuzu for 100 yen!), so I bought some and decided to try making some myself.

The skins on most of these yuzu were speckled, so I only used the true yellow parts.

I squeezed the juice from the yuzu then from the peel, scraped away some of the pith.

Then I sliced the peel.

After slicing, I weighed the peel then measured the same amount of sugar.

In a pot, I added the peel, sugar, 2 cups water and the juice of the yuzu and brought everything to a boil.

While it was boiling, I scraped away the scum.

When the mixture started to evaporate to about half, the scum weaned and it was ready.

I think in the end I ended up with about 1 cup of marmalade.

A little bitter from the peels, but this is gonna be nice as yuzu tea or as a topping for yogurt.

todoromi marmalade

Satoshi has been working very late hours. He also leaves for work earlier than usual too.

It is taking its toll not only on him, but on me too.

Most days I feel like I am jet lagged or have a hangover. One day, I ended up sleeping practically the whole day.

Yesterday was a beautiful sunny day, I was still feeling sluggish, but decided to get out and about because the next couple of days are supposed to be rainy.

I headed to Minoo station and went to check out several shops that I heard were selling the Todoromi yuzu (citron) marmalade made with yuzu grown in a part of Minoo called Todoromi.

I was happy because they had some. One bottle was 450 yen (about US$4.50). I decided to buy one to try and one to give away.

Over the years, I've learned that during winter, most people in Japan drink yuzu-cha (citron tea). There is no "tea" involved, they just melt some marmalade into hot water.

After drinking the "tea", they eat the yuzu bits.

It is a nice way to fight off colds and warm up too.

I hope this is good, though I'm pretty sure it will be. UPDATE: it was delicious!

inspired by a book

Recently I was reading a novel, "Tough Cookie", the author often gives recipes of some of the delicious food described throughout the book.

In this particular book, a spicy dip made with velveeta cheese was mentioned.

Processed cheeses can be found here, but since I had some Fromage Roux, a creamy French washed rind cheese, and since I had some leftover taco filling from taco rice, I nuked the two with some salsa.

It was delicious on toasted bread! and probably would have been better if we had had some tortilla chips.

In the same book, there was a recipe for muffins with marmalade in them.

I remembered I had some marmalade in my freezer, so I added it to the muffin recipe I always use along with some chopped almonds.

I baked it a little longer than the original recipe stated because of the jam--I had sandwiched the jam between the batter.

I think I should have mixed the jam into the batter instead.

Still, I liked this, the marmalade originally wasn't too sweet, so it matched nicely with the muffin.

sudachi marmalade

I received this jar of marmalade awhile back from my friend, Kazumi.(Thank you!) Actually the expiration date has come and gone already on it.

I think the expiration dates on most food items here are a bit too strict. Some are only 2 weeks after being manufactured. Though I do understand if something is "raw", it would need a short expiration period. But for the most part, most food things like canned or bottled items can go "years" without spoiling.

Sometimes I think the Japanese are controlled by the dates on their food. Me, I use my nose, if it doesn't smell bad, we eat it. As long as there isn't anything fuzzy growing on it or it isn't slimy, we eat it.

Anyway, after receiving this marmalade, I didn't know what to do with it. I thought it would be sour. But after reading the ingredients on the label, I realized, it may not be so sour after all.

There was honey, as well as kanten (agar-agar) in there. I opened the jar the other day and put some onto our toast with some cream cheese....delicious. Not sour at all. The lime is sliced so thinly that you don't even notice it.

p.s. there is something wrong with blogger...I can't upload photos how I've normally done so. Hopefully you can see this photo, I uploaded through Flickr. I'll try to re-do the photo after blogger fixes their server---fixed now, thanks blogger!

foodie friday

Today I met Kazumi for a lesson and she brought many goodies.

First, a fruit sandwich. Have you ever had one? I had seen these in sandwich shops in and around Japan before, but never had one (I think I wasn't brave enough). It is sliced fruits with whipped cream sandwiched between bread. I must say though, it was good, not too sweet and a nice dessert after lunch.

Another item was spring cabbage. This was grown by her sister. It kind of has a purple tinge to it. I'm thinking of using it in a veggie stir-fry for dinner tonight.

Lastly, homemade marmalade. She said that she and her friends get together every year to make marmalade. And although she couldn't go this year, they still gave her a portion of the marmalade that they made and she gave me some too!

After our lesson, I went home and eagerly started to make flaxseed rolls. The batch came out just in time for tea. I've made this recipe several times, but this time the whole batch stuck to the parchment paper. I have a feeling it was because I didn't use any type of oil/butter. Still, the texture of the rolls were good and tasted great with the homemade marmalade. (Thank you Kazumi!)

Have a great weekend!