Dinner on 23/03/08

Menu: chicken soup with kelp; rice and umeboshi puree

It's been a while since I last updated this blog. I've been extremely busy trying to do many things. Hope all the people who come to check my blog are doing well :)
The other day, I made my favourite soup - chicken soup with kelp! We had a bad day and felt really cold. We couldn't warm up even we had the heater on. We definitely deserved a nice comfort food that day, so I decided to make this soup. There are several versions of this soup, and this time, I just used chicken, kelp, ginger, Chinese sake, lots of leek and a pinch of salt to taste. I didn't use dashi stock or anything. It still tasted nice. For the people who are not used to using dashi stock - you don't have to use it as long as there is enough chicken in the soup. Chicken and other ingredients make a lovely stock. I have to have kelp in this soup though. I love kelp so much, and it just tastes really nice in the soup. My two-year-old daughter loves kelp like me :) I put a fair amount of kelp in her bowl, but she kept asking for more.

What's your comfort food? As for me, chicken soup with kelp is definitely one of them.

How to Live to be 101

The other day, there was a TV programme called "Horizon"on BBC2. It was about "How to Live to be 101", and Okinawa was featured!!! I was proud of that. Even though many people don't know much about Okinawa (some have never heard of the name), it's a good sign that we get to see and learn about Okinawa on television. Click here to watch the programme, which is available for 4 more days.

The two doctors who were talking about Okinawa on the programme are the ones who wrote the book called The Okinawa Program : How the World's Longest-Lived People Achieve Everlasting Health--And How You Can Too . In the programme, they were cooking Goya Champuru, which is one of my favourite dishes! One of the important ingredients in our stir-fry dishes (champuru as we call it) is tofu. We eat tofu a lot. It's different from Japanese one, and we love our tofu.

If you would like to know and learn how to live long like us (to be specific, the old people in Okinawa), this is the book. I've got a copy of this book as well.

Dinner on 06/02/08

Menu: vegetable curry and rice

Did you know that we have our own style curry in Japan? It's one of the popular dishes in Japan. Unlike the other types of curry (Indian, Thai and so on), our curry has a milder taste.
I hear that curry was introduced to Japan by the British.

A ready-made curry sauce mix is commonly used in Japan, which makes it extremely easy to make. Japanese-style curry was the first dish I made as a kid (I was six at that time.) It's a polular camping dish as well. I remember making it when I went camping on one of the school trips. It's so easy to make it as long as you have the sauce mix and the ingredients.

Well this time, I made the sauce from scratch. It wasn't that hard to make it. I cooked finely chopped onions, garlic and ginger until they were brown, and then put in some flour and curry powder and mixed well. Finally I added soup stock little by little, stirred quickly and let it simmer until it thickended.

This time I used onions, carrots, potatoes and green pepper as ingredients. I added some grated apple as well.

I'll write a recipe for it, hopefully, some time soon.

Lunch on 06/01/08

As my daughter had been ill for a couple of weeks, I had to look after her constantly. Even after she recovered from illness, she was asking for my attention all the time (I suppose she got used to the idea of having me round all the time.) It was getting too much for me, and I decided to take a break from it all.

I wanted to go somewhere I can't go with my daughter, but I ended up going to my usual -Piccadilly Circus. I'm sure you can recognise this place! Recently it was on the film "Bridget Jone's Diary" (one of my favourite films!)

There are many Japanese shops around the area, and I go there to buy Japanese books, food and so on. There is a Japanese-style karaoke box in the area as well!

I was going to treat myself with a nice meal at a nice restaurant, but instead, I bought a nice lunch box from Japan Centre and ate it at St James's Park.










Tempura and freshly made sushi bento!


I was shopping at Japan Centre, and there was a sushiman making sushi there. He was putting the freshly made sushi in lunch boxes to sell. When I passed the man to go to the cashier, he said to me "wouldn't you like a nice delicious lunch box?". I took a quick look and then my eyes were glued onto them. My original plan was to go to a nice restaurant, but I changed my mind and bought a lunch box. I enjoyed my lunch looking at the view in the photo above. It was nice and peaceful. I really enjoyed my time on my own.

Dinner on 05/01/08

Menu: chicken soup with kelp; rice; umeboshi puree

This was the first chicken soup I made this year. I just love this soup! It's the same taste as my favourite chicken soup with daikon, but this time, I used carrots instead of daikon as I didn't have daikon this time.

My daughter loves seaweed (nori, aonori and kelp etc.) and kept asking for more.

Dinner on 02/01/08

Menu: Osechi Ryori chikuzen-ni; *kohaku namasu; black beans; king prawns; kinton

I decided to make osechi for the first time this New Year. It was a spontaneous decision, and I only used the ingredients we had at that time. For kinton, we normally use chestnuts and sweet potatoes, but we didn't have chestnuts, so I just used sweet potatoes. Can you see the orange thing on the left? That's kohaku namasu (sweet & sour carrots and daikon.) I cut the top off a satsuma and used it as a bowl. I've seen it done that way somewhere, and I gave it a go. In chikuzen-ni, I used dried shiitake, carrots, daikon, mange tout and chicken. It's extremely easy to make as long as you have the right ingredients and **hontsuyu (the soup base for noodle.) To marinate the king prawns, I used rice vinegar, sugar and orange zest (the same taste as kohaku namasu.)

I made it while my husband was playing with his scalextric at his parents', and by the time he came home, it was ready to be eaten. I put the lid on and asked my husband to open the lid. He was very impressed with it, and we all enjoyed it.

*kohaku means red & white.
**Japanese Hontsuyu Soup Base for Noodle - 12 oz x 2 bottles

Lunch on 01/01/08

This is Ozoni I cooked on New Year's Day. As I mentioned before, my Ozoni is Kanto style. I used steamed chicken, grilled mochi, lightly boiled daikon and choi sum (bought from a Chinese market, and I don't know the name in Japanese.) I sprinkled orange zest on top. For the soup, I used dashi stock and a few drops of soy sauce. It's really simple, but tasty.

I showed this photo to my family, and my mum was very impressed with it. She told me that she felt happy to have a daughter who enjoys cooking, and that she was proud of me. Those comments made me extremely happy :-)