11.11.11

It's 11.11.11 today...Pocky Day here.

Not a holiday or anything, but a chance to eat some delicious pocky.

Pocky are crackers that look like pretzles dipped in chocolate and decorated with nuts or pureed fruit.

In fact, there is another product called Pretz which are the undipped versions of Pocky and are more savory.

This Pocky is shaped as a heart...cute, yeah?!

It's Friday, have a good weekend and happy Pocky Day!

lanai

Thought I only had one goya this year, but found this one hidden...it was about 6 or 7 inches long.

I made this into a "champuru" with the goya, lup cheong and egg.

This one was really bitter but delicious.

The champuru went nicely with a Bass Pale Ale, an English beer, 5.1% alcohol. A little bitter aftertaste but delicious.

I was reading up on Swiss Chard and Beets and the info mentioned that you could pick the leaves as long as they were 4 to 6 inches long.

So I picked some and wilted them with some spinach that I bought.

We had this with a little dollop of mayo...yum!

The Italian parsley is doing well, I pick some whenever I want to add it to something I'm cooking, especially mushrooms and pasta...mmm!

I noticed this the other day, the mint is half dark green and half light green, I wonder why that is?!

Oh and the bergamot died...had this weird powdery mildew that I read about online...boo!

How is your garden doing?

made in usa

A great food find at Kaldi Coffee recently...natural peanut butter.

Peanuts and sea salt...that's it.

Be sure to mix it well as there is oil from the peanuts on the top.

Even after mixing, this was a little more liquidy than I am used to, but delicious all the same.

Also, it isn't creamy, it is crunchy. The bits aren't all uniform in size which makes it more unique.

It's made in the U.S.A., maybe not a good carbon footprint, but it is as natural as you can get with peanut butter.

standard bookstore

After French class last Tuesday, I had lunch at Standard Bookstore located in NU Chayamachi Plus.

I tried their chili dog & drink set...840 yen.

There is no table service, after ordering at the counter, they give you a number and when your order is ready, you go back to the counter to pick up your food.

Everything on a silver tray (fancy, yeah?!)

The chili wasn't too spicy, and could have been spicier. The hot dog had a nice snap and the red onions had a bite to it...the onion flavor (read onion breath) stayed with me for a long time afterwards.

What surprised me was the scoop of whipped potatoes...ice cold, buttery, smooth and delicious. (It is rare to find mashed potatoes in Japan, not even KFC serves it here.)

Another thing that surprised me was the "American" sized coffee.

I am looking forward to trying more items on their menu and a nice thing is that they also have free WI-FI....I'll definitely be back.

Standard Bookstore
NU Chayamachi Plus
Umeda, Osaka
Phone: 06.6485.7139
Hours: 11:00-21:00

pupu party

Yesterday, the weather was humid, a little rainy.

We went to my favorite bakery in Minoo, A Bientot for breakfast and afterwards we did some grocery shopping.

And then since the weather was so dreary, we then proceeded to stay indoors for the rest of the day.

Dinner was a hodge podge of items...pupu-style (appetizer-style)

Pupu #1: shrimp with avocado with chinese chicken salad dressing

Clean 5 shrimp, devain and butterfly
Cook with a teaspoon of sesame oil
Cut into bite sized pieces
Clean 1 avocado, scoop out in bite sized pieces
Dress with 2 tablespoons of chinese chicken salad dressing*

*Chinese chicken salad dressing #2: adapted from "Recipes Please"
2 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1/2 tsp black pepper

Pupu #2 : eringi, maitake & red bell pepper sauteed with butter, olive oil & sage

In a heated pan, add the oil, mushrooms & bell pepper
Saute and coat well
When everything is cooked through, add a nub of butter and a 1/4 teaspoon of dry sage.

Pupu #3: Sin choi with ika geso (squid legs)

Clean squid legs by rinsing and running your fingers along the leg to take off sandy grit.
Cut into 3-inch sized pieces.
Follow recipe for Sin Choi Chow Jee Yuk, subbing the pork with the squid legs.

*I didn't make a new batch of sin choi, but it was much more soaked through this time around.

Pupu #4: Fried rice

1 chawan bowl of old rice from fridge
1/2 chawan bowl of minced char siu, lup cheong and green onion (leftover from manapua making)
1 egg, beaten
grinds of pepper

Add the rice and minced meats to the pan, heat through, breaking up the rice with a wooden spoon
Add the beaten egg and toss to coat everything.
Cook everything through.

NOTES: A little of this, a little of that...a good way to eat a variety of foods and it didn't take that long to prepare.

hitachino nest beers

I've been seeing posts on Hitachino Nest beers for some time now.

And found out from Rowena that it was International Stout Day on the 3rd (woo!).

Hitachino Nest beers are a craft beer made in Ibaraki prefecture by Kiuchi Brewery.

While we have a lot of International beers, I don't see many Japan craft beers in Osaka.

Craft beers are called "ji-biru" (gee-bee-roo), literally meaning local brews, so most only circulate in their areas.

I had hoped to find some of these nest beers in Osaka (because I didn't want to pay the postage), but came up empty, so I finally ordered four different beers from them.

Espresso Stout, 7.5% alcohol, very smoky and had a punch to it, my favorite.

White Ale, 5.5% alcohol, we had this with pupu-style (appetizer style) leftovers. This beer was citrusy.

Sweet Stout, 4.5% alcohol, not as much punch as the espresso stout, but smoky, a little chocolatey...delicious.

Japanese classic ale, this one is made like they made beer in the Edo Period and is aged in cedar barrels. 7.5% alcohol, fruity with a slight bitter aftertaste.

We had this one with our mille feuille...yum!

Actually, when the delivery dude brought them he had his truck temperature a little too low and they were pretty much "slushy". He was afraid that the temperature change would affect the taste.

The bottles didn't crack, so I didn't feel there would be any problem with them and didn't file a claim or return them.

A little tidbit...Did you know that in Japan the owl is usually a symbol meaning "no stress"? A play on words "fukuro" (foo-coo-row) in Japanese means no-stress and also owl. So you often see owls, as amulets/good luck charms, to ward off "stress", "hard times".

Overall, these beers were delicious, I'd definitely buy from them again.

The summery weather continues here, though they are forecasting the temps to FINALLY be going down next week...we'll see.

manapua

It's been awhile since I've baked bread, but the weather has been quite summery during the daytime, and I had some time on my hands yesterday, so I finally got around to trying my hand at manapua or char siu bao.

Manapua is a food I had growing up and I really like the baked version.

I used the same bread recipe that I use for anpan.

For the filling, I used some char siu, lup cheong (which I took out of the freezer) and green onion.

While you are waiting for the dough to proof, render the fat out of both the lup cheong and char siu separately, drain on a paper towel.

Chop the lup cheong and char siu separately into a dice and let cool.

Mix each with thinly sliced green onion and put into your dough before the 2nd proofing (at step 10 on the anpan recipe).

I baked these for about 18 minutes.

NOTES: The yeast was past the expiry date and I think I should have kneaded it longer. The dough was a little too wet to handle even if I added flour when I worked with it.

Next time, I would add a little more filling too.

Flavor-wise it was good and still had a nice crumb. I would make this again (with newer yeast this time).