chill!

I told you about writing in blue to create a "cool" image.

Well, in the Summer, the Japanese also put their "cool" foods into clear, glass dishes.

By putting the food into a clear glass dish, they create an "icy" feeling. Some restaurants also put the dishes into the refrig to really chill it.

Last night's dinner was reisei somen. Reisei means "chilled", somen is like a Japanese angel hair pasta, although it is a little salty. I used this recipe, but used whatever veggies I had in the refrig (okra, bell pepper, cucumber, red onion & tomato). If you do use somen, do not salt the water you will be boiling the noodles in.

Hope you are keeping cool where you are...have a nice weekend!

another kind of latte

I know I've been whining endlessly about how scorching it is outside, but inside with the a/c on, brrr...it is cold.

I wanted to use up some matcha (green tea) & kinako (powdered soy bean) that I had, so I looked in a cookbook and found a recipe for matcha milk (green tea milk). I used the recipe and substituted the matcha with the kinako/matcha mixture.

Kinako Matcha Latte adapted from "Onomimono wa ikaga desu ka?"

Put one teaspoon of the matcha/kinako mixture into a pot with one tablespoon of sugar and one cup of milk. Heat. Using a milk frother, whip it up. Add a dash of the matcha/kinako powder on top for decoration. (If you don't have kinako, just make this with matcha only.)

The froth wasn't as thick as when you froth up milk alone, but it was really easy, a little sweet (not as sweet as Starbucks chai latte, which is way too sweet for me) and tasted wonderful.

Changing the subject, as I was cooking pasta for my dinner, I noticed the clouds outside.






When I looked in this direction, the clouds looked like they were bursting out from one point.



And these just looked huge--something I have never seen before.

Hope you are beating the heat where you are!

what? another election?

Well, it turned out that it was too hot and humid to go galivanting yesterday, but since I still needed some things for dinner, I did go grocery shopping while Satoshi went to his German class. The supermarket was packed! I guess everyone knows that it is a great place to cool off.

I decided to make a variation of the reisei pasta that I made the other day. Instead of tuna, I added tako(octopus), some lemon juice and lettuce. Very refreshing!




And for dessert, I made mini blueberry clafoutis. I used the same recipe I posted before, put some lemon zest into the batter and topped the clafoutis with lavender sugar. Heavenly!

Since there was nothing but election results on tv tonight (what? another election?)we were watching some DVDs--(can you believe Japan is having another election? At least the loud speakers during Kat's nap time were non-existent this time around.) Awhile back I told you about Li Hing popcorn which I picked up while I was home? Well, we finally got around to eating the next flavor that I picked up....Korean BBQ.

I was quite disappointed with this one. Somehow the flavor packet was weak and tasted mostly of furikake and arare. And why is it that the arare (rice crackers) that come with the furikake are always stale? I wonder if they get stale when you mix it with the butter? Maybe the packaging isn't very airtight. Either that or I'm spoiled with the fresh arare that I eat here. I have a feeling it might be the latter.

So back to the election, Satoshi says it is because the rest of the government do not like the current prime minister, so they are having an election to change the prime minister. Apparently whichever party wins, that political party gets to choose who will be the new prime minister. Satoshi says most times the very second the political party wins and chooses someone, the rest of the government wants to change the guy in charge. So someone chosen for 4 years could get kicked out half-way or several months into his term. Definitely not very good for world relations.

If you ask me, I think they have too many political parties in Japan, which causes a lot problems, kind of like when there are too many chefs in the kitchen? But since I can't vote here, I guess I can't grumble too much about it other than I wish they would do all of their elections in one swoop and stop using their loud speakers to campaign (especially during my nap time!)

Have a great week.

reisei pasta

I hate to be so whiney and grumble about the heat and humidity so much especially since other areas in Europe have it way worse, but the heat and humidity was pretty bad today. It was so bad that we have the a/c on, but it is still warm inside (31C/87F). And when I changed my clothes, it felt like when you put something on straight out of the dryer, only problem is we have no dryer.

Satoshi was off today, and I had a bead class, so I had to figure out what we could eat for lunch since we didn't have time to eat out. I recently found a new recipe for reisei pasta, so I wanted to try it out. Reisei means cool dish, so reisei pasta is cool pasta. I've made a version and also have bought reisei pasta in the past and posted about it here and here.

This recipe is really fast and delicious, if you have the ingredients, I hope you will try it.

Reisei pasta serves 2
2 portions cappelini or any type of pasta you have
1/2 can of tuna
2 tomatoes, diced
1 tablespoon capers
2 tablespoons pine nuts
6 leaves basil, torn
4 tablespoon EVOO
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
salt
pepper

Put the tuna, tomato, capers, basil into a bowl and add a pinch of salt. Mix well and chill.
Cook pasta about 30 seconds longer than what the package says.
When the pasta is ready, put into an ice bath.
Drain the pasta well and add the tuna mixture. Add the EVOO, balsamic vinegar and nuts.
Salt and pepper to taste.
Enjoy!

NOTES: I used whole wheat fusilli and spaghetti, added diced onions and 1 tablespoon of pumpkin seeds and pine nuts. I also had some Italian parsley leftover, so I tore that up and added it in too. Instead of 4 tablespoons of EVOO, I only used 2. This pasta went nicely with 3-bean salad.

reisei pasta (part 2)

Well, the repairman came at 3pm--at the point where I was almost melting. Thanks for all your well wishes...somehow I survived.

It turned out to be the freon--or whatever gas they are using these days in air conditioners.

Anyway, if we have problems, we're to call them again and they'll probably change the unit.

Since I was feeling overheated, I decided to make "reisei pasta" for dinner. I've eaten it before which I posted about here, but never made it myself, so I decided to make my first batch of "reisei pasta".

It was relatively easy to make.

Here is the recipe translated from Japanese and adapted from Yahoo Japan's recipes
320 g spaghetti (cappellini)
32 g salt
4 small tomatoes
15-20 leaves of basil
1 clove of garlic
2-3 Tbsp of powdered cheese
1 tsp of salt
pepper to taste
2 Tbsp EVOO
olives (optional)
powdered cheese (optional to garnish)

First take the skins off the tomatoes by putting them in hot water. Dig out the seeds and cut into bite size pieces. Next chiffonade the basil. Mince the garlic.

In a bowl, put the tomatoes, garlic, powdered cheese, EVOO, salt and pepper. Mix well and chill.

In a boiling pot, add the 32g of salt and prepare the spaghetti as directed on the package.

After boiling the noodles, put the noodles into a sieve and rinse. Shake out as much water as you can. Then put the noodles into an ice bath. Shake out the water.

Mix the noodle with the bowl of tomatoes and other ingredients. Garnish with basil, olives and more cheese.

Enjoy!

Notes: I used "real" parmesan instead of the powdered stuff and also added more veggies like peppers, onions, okra and asparagus. I also added capers and a little more pepper before serving. I couldn't find fresh basil, so I sprinkled some dry basil to the bowl of tomatoes. It was really refreshing and tasty.

p.s. I switched this blog over to the beta version of Blogger, hopefully it won't affect anyone from accessing this blog.

reisei pasta

Oh my goodness! The rain has stopped but the humidity here is unreal! I cannot even fathom what the people on the mainland U.S. are going through with no electricity.

Tonight, Satoshi has tsukiai (drinks and dinner with clients), so here's my dinner which I found at a department store: reisei pasta made by RF1. Reisei means cold dish. RF1 is a company which makes different kinds of salads and other pre-made foods. You can usually find them in the basements of most Japanese department stores (f.y.i.--the basements of Japanese department stores are where all the pre-made and fresh foods are sold!)

This salad was delicious, it had cappellini (angel hair pasta), slices of pumpkin, okra, beans and fruit tomato (a Japanese type of tomato which is sweeter and a bit higher in acid than regular tomatoes). The dressing was a tomato cream type, which I didn't care too much for. I think it might have been nicer with something lighter like a vinaigrette. That is the downside to buying pre-made things here in Japan--most times you have no choice as to what type of dressing.

I also bought some fried squid rings and a shrimp patty. These were really good also and the shrimp patty was full of nice, plump shrimp! The shrimp patty had a choice of tomato sauce or tartar sauce, I chose the tomato sauce.

Hope you are keeping cool where you are!