Dinner on 04/07/08

Menu: salad, fried bacon, boiled new potatoes

We bought a bag of new potatoes, and decided to have a very summery dish. I seasoned the boiled potatoes with olive oil, sage and black pepper. When we have boiled potatoes, we always use these three ingredients to taste. We also bought a bag of mixed salad, and sprinkled some fried bacon on top. I made a dressing for salad using olive oil, white wine vinegar, lemon juice, mustard powder and black pepper. It was really nice and refreshing!

Dessert on 03/07/08

Golden Syrup Sponge pudding

This is one of our favourite puddings! My husband is good at making it. It seems to be easy to make using a microwave. When we want something after dinner, that's something he would make as long as we have the right ingredients.

Dinner on 30/06/08

Menu: mince pork & vegetables on rice

This is something I would make when we have a leftover pork dumpling filling. Or if you have some mince meat and some vegetables, you can easily make this dish. I used pak choi, red peppers, carrots and onions for vegetable stir-fry, and pork, ginger, oyster sauce, sesame oil, black pepper for the meat. You can use any type of vegetables, I think. You can use cabbage instead of pak choi. It tastes great, and extremely easy to make.

Baked on 26/06/08

This is a Dundee cake which I baked for my husband's grandfather's funeral. Apparently, he used to bake this cake quite a lot, and he was telling me about it as well. When I last saw him at the hospital, I asked him for this recipe, and he told me which recipe book to look for. I told him that I would bake this cake for my next visit, but sadly it didn't happen. So I decided to bake this cake (well actually I baked two!) for his funeral. That's something everybody in the family remember - his Dundee cake - and I wanted to give it a go. I was a bit nervous as I had never tried this cake in my life. The cakes came out really nice, and everybody enjoyed them.

Dinner on 25/06/08

Menu: pork with ginger & soy sauce on rice

I simply made pork with ginger & soy sace, fried some vegetables and put them on rice. It was nice and easy. Click here for the recipe.

Dinner on 24/06/08

Menu: wholegrain pasta with tuna & vegetables

Well I didn't really know how to call this dish as I just made it up, but it was quite nice. I used pak choi, carrots, onions and tuna. I can't remember what I put in to taste, but I'm guessing I added soy sauce or oyster sauce.

Dinner on 20/06/08

Menu: pasta with tomato sauce & prawns

I cooked really nice pasta dish using prawns. I was impressed with this dish :) I made some simple tomato sauce first, and fried some garlic in a frying pan, added prawns, tomato sauce, and fresh tomatoes. I put in black pepper to taste. I sprinkled parsley on top. Hopefully I can write a recipe for it some time. Everybody who tried this dish loved it, so most of you would like it as well.

Lunch on 20/06/08

We went to Tesco for food shopping and found this huge loaf of bread. That's huge, isn't it? It was quite cheap as well.

We had a couple of slices of the bread with ham, pickled onions, gherkins and salad. We enjoyed our summery lunch.

Dinner on 05/06/08

We went to a pub fairy close to our house with my husband's family, and this is what I ordered. If I'm to choose between meat and seafood, I would definitely go for the latter. I love seafood. When I was a vegetarian, I was eating seafood. I just didn't eat any other type of meat. Prawn is one of my favourite food, and I really enjoyed my dinner. I couldn't eat all of them though.

Dinner on 02/06/08

I had no idea what to call this dish. I think I was going to cook something Polish, well it was supposed to be Bigos. I was supposed to use Sauerkraut, but didn't have any, so I used gherkins instead. I used pork, shredded cabbages, leek. I didn't have any while mushrooms, smoked sausages, prunes either, so I just skipped them. I did use bay leaf and allspice though. It was a spontaneous decision to cook this, but I should've planned it. I haven't tried making it properly since. I would like to try real Bigos as I've never tried any Polish food.

Dinner on 01/06/08

Menu: kakiage-don (kakiage on rice) and miso soup

I made kakiage-don using the leftover kakiage from the previous night. I simply cooked it in a pan with tentsuyu for a few minutes, and put it on rice. It was nice and easy, and yummy!

Donburi is very popular in Japan, and there are quite a few kinds of it. For more information, click here.

Dinner on 30/05/08

Menu: kakiage tempura with dipping sauce, rice and miso soup

I only took a photo of tempura and sauce, but we had it with rice and miso soup. Kakiage tempura means mixed tempura and we would use shredded vegetables for it. On the day, I used carrots, onions, hijiki (a type of seaweed) and burdock. I made tempura batter, and put in shredded vegetables, and scooped some out with a spoon and deep-fried it. In Japan, we have tempura sauce called tentsuyu, and you could make it from scratch, but most of us use already made one. Can you see the sort of bottle in the photo? That's my favourite one. The sauce is very useful, and you can use it in all sorts of dishes.

Dinner on 28/05/08

Menu: Spaghetti with Bolognese sauce

When I came back home after seeing my friend, my husband had cooked dinner already, which impressed me. He is better at cooking Bolognese sauce and roast dinner than me. The green on top is fresh basil. I really enjoyed my dinner.

Desert on 28/05/08

I went to central London to see my Japanese friend. We met up right in front of Japan Centre. When I want to get Japanese ingredients, I would go to our local Chinese supermarket. However, I can't get all the things I want, so I would occasionally go to Piccadilly Circus in central London. In the area, there are quite a few Japanese shops including Japan Centre, Ricewine shop and Mitsukoshi.

Anyway, my friend and I went to a Chinese restaurant of her choice in West End (it wasn't in China Town). We had really lovely lunch, and thinking what to have for dessert. They had a wide range of cakes, and they all looked delicious. While deciding what to have for dessert, we saw the people next to our table were having a set of Macaron. They were 12 of them in a set, and we decided to go for it. It was quite fun to share them with my friend. I can't remember the name of the restaurant, but when I find it, I will post it here. I love Macaron, so I was in heaven!

Dinner on 24/05/08

Menu: Indian takeaway

We had a takeaway from our favourite Indian restaurant. I loved every single dish! The food was sooooo good.

Dinner on 22/05/08

Menu: stir-fry in tomato curry, white & red rice

Well, I don't really know what to call this dish as I just made it up. We didn't have much food in the fridge, and I was going to make stir-fry, but I wanted to have tomatoes as well. As I was cooking, I realised that the flavour was quite weak, and I added curry powder. It was an okay dish.

Baked on 22/05/08

We made apple turnovers. I made the filling with apples, sultanas, raisins, sugar, cinnamon and vanila extract. My husband took care of the rest. We prefered using puff pastry though. We gave one to his grandfather who was in the hospital. He said he would eat it next morning for breakfast. Hope he liked it.

Dinner on 15/05/08

Menu: cottage pie

It wasn't my best, but I love this which is one of the classic British dishes!

Dinner on 08/05/08

Menu: easy-roast dinner, boiled potatoes and salad

I cooked chicken thigh seasoned with garlic, blackpepper and sage. It was really nice.

Dinner on 07/05/08

Menu: sauteed vegetables, red rice, sunomono with wakame & cucumber, umeboshi puree.

I had never tried red rice, but I liked it straight away! You should be able to find it at a health shop or somewhere. I bought mine at the health shop in Wimbledon.

This dinner is like a Macrobiotics style dinner.

Supper on 06/05/08

I was shopping in town with my daughter, and as it was a lovely day, I felt like being out a bit longer. Then I decided to wait for my husband at the station and suggested to go to our local park to have supper. I had done shopping beforehand.

As you can see in the photos, we had tortillas with roast chicken, salad and salsa sauce. It was like a picnic, and we really enjoyed it. It makes change if you eat somewhere else every once in a while, doesn't it.

Dinner on 22/04/08

I also made this dish using wholegrain pasta, hijiki (a type of seaweed), cucumber, tomatoes, tuna and watercress with Ajipon (a well-known Japanese dressing). It was sooo nice. I love seaweed!

Dinner on 22/04/08

Menu: pasta salad with roast beef

Look what I made using the leftover roast beef! I just came up with the idea of this dish thinking "I don't want a heavy meal. I want something refreshing." Then I made this dish.

I used wholegrain pasta, tomatoes, cucumber, watercress, fried onions with home-made dressing. For the dressing, I used white wine vinegar, olive oil, mustard powder and blackpepper. It was really nice.

Dinner on 20/04/08

Menu: Sunday roast

My husband treated us a lovely Sunday roast at his parents'. He's good at cooking Sunday roast; whereas I'm quite useless when it comes to cooking roast dinner. It's quite stressful to think that everything has to be perfectly planned well. I'm not good at cooking under pressure.

Anyway, it was a lovely dinner, and everyone of us enjoyed it.

By the way, most of my friends would be surprised to know that I now eat beef. I had been a vegetarian for nearly eight years (well I hadn't had beef for ten years), and when I was pregnant with my daughter, suddenly I thought "I want beef." then I started eating beef. My husband couldn't believe his eyes while I was eating a beef burger for the first time in ten years.

I eat meat every now and then, but not a huge amount every single day.

This was the desert on the night - I didn't have it though. Everybody seemsed to have enjoyed it.

Dinner on 07/04/08

Menu: coconut curry with rice

I just cooked a simple coconut curry using mushrooms, carrots, courgettes, moyashi (bean sprouts), onions, coconut milk and Thai green curry paste.

Dinner on 17/12/08

Menu: roast pork with apple, roast vegetables, sauteed potatoes, steamed broccoli

As I couldn't/still can't use a knife yesterday, I asked my husband to help me in the kitchen.

I might have mentioned it before - about my condition - here, but I've been suffering from DeQuervain's syndrome for over a month. I've been using a wrist splint which helps for this condition, but having a 3-year-old active girl doesn't help me get better. It was getting better, but she hurt my wrist, and got better a bit, and yesterday morning, an accident happened. I was in bed trying to get up. My hand was up in the air with my elbow on the bed. And then, suddenly my daughter sat back on my hand, and all her weight got on my wrist!! Ouch!! I couldn't move or talk and just curled up in pain for a while. Anyway, I haven't been able to use my right hand much since yesterday morning, so that's why I asked my husband for help in the kitchen.

Anyway, we had sliced pork to use, and I suggested to roast it. We also had lots of apples, and an idea came into my mind. Well, the combination of pork & apple isn't something new, but I just got excited thinking it would be great.

On the pork, we sprinkled some olive oil, black pepper, rosemary, crushed garlic and sliced apples on top and roast it. For the roast vegetables, we used parsnips, carrots and leek, and sprinkled some olive oil, sage and thyme.

Oh my God, the dinner was sooooo good. I was very impressed with the result.

For a pudding, we had treacle sponge pudding and custard. We didn't make the pudding - it was in a tin and by Heinz. It wasn't too bad.

Dinner on 13/12/08

Menu: Chicken soup with kelp and vegetables, rice, umeboshi puree, abura-miso, steamed cabbage with balsamic vinegar dressing

It was freezing in the house, and we couldnt't warm up all day. The heating system in our house hasn't been working properly, so I though I would make a nice soup. Yes, my favourite soup - chicken soup with kelp! I decided to add in other root vegetables which are supposed to help to warm up your body if you eat them. I just used pre-boiled chicken (we normally boil the meat to remove fat before using in soup), ginger, Chinese cooking sake, water, kelp, leek, potatoes and carrots. I didn't bother adding in salt as I thought kelp had enough salt.

I had made cheating version of aburamiso, which is cooked miso paste, tuna and sugar. We normally use pre-boiled pork for this, but using tuna makes it much easier to make it. We eat it with rice.

I would normally use leaf vegetables (e.g. pak choi) for this soup, but we didn't have any, so I made a side dish with steamed cabbage salad. Having that extra dish made it perfect combination of the dinner, I think. We had seaweed, animal protein, root vegetables, carbohydrate, green vegetables, miso, umeboshi (they both are good for your health) and vinegar (also good for your health)! A meal should be like that.

Anyway, with the help of soup including sake and ginger, we felt warm after the dinner:)

Lunch on 07/04/08

Menu: Hiraya-chi with lots of vegetables.

I used these ingredients to make my style hiraya-chi. Hiraya-chi is like Okinawan-style Okonomiyaki (savoury pancakes), by the way. When we make our normal style hiraya-chi, we would use flour, water, nira (it's sort of like spring onions), and some people use tuna as well.

My daughter loves this!

Dinner on 03/04/08

Menu: Indian take-away

It was my husband's birthday, and I treated him with the food from our favourite Indian restaurant.

Before trying Indian food here in the UK, I wasn't too keen on it, to be honest. I still remember the Indian restaurant I went with my sisters near Tokyo about 12 years ago. As some of you might know, I'm a huge fan of Freddie Mercury, and whenever I met somebody from India, I used to get really excited.
My sisters, especially my older sister, didn't like the idea of having Indian for lunch, but I pursued her, and we all went there. The food wasn't too bad, but some of the curries tasted really bad, and my sisters couldn't eat them. My older sister wasn't wise enough to put a little amount on the first plate as I did:) She put a plate full! Then we noticed the sign saying "Please don't leave the food. Otherwise, you'll be charged" (I can't remember the exact price). So my sister tired so hard to swallowed the food down her throat. She was sitting at the table facing the kitchen where the chefs were looking at customers, so she had to keep the straight face, which made it really funny. She was suffering. Then the owner of the restaurant came to us, and I was very excited and asking about India. He showed us some photos and brought Indian desert to us. I can't remember what it was exactly though. My sisters gave me a funny look. I could see in their eyes saying "Oh my God, more food." I think it was dried, so they wrapped it up with tissue and put it in their bag.

Anyway, since that day, they hate Indian food. Shame, isn't it. I would like to change their mind though. Maybe, I can take a jar of curry sauce when I go back to Okinawa, and cook for them.

I really enjoy Indian food here in the UK.

Dinner on 31/03/08

Menu: vegetable soup with salmon

Whenever I need to use up the food in the fridge, I would normally make soup. On the night, I used carrots, celery, potatoes, leek, garlic, and added tinned salmon on top. It was really simple, but nice.

Lunch on 06/02/08

Menu: Somin champuru

This is one of the typical Okinawan dishes called Somin champuru. In Japan, they have somen (this white noodle) with a cold dipping sauce, but in Okinawa, we fry somin (means somen in Okinawan). We do eat it in a Japanese way as well, but we love this dish!

I simply boiled the noodles (don't boil them too long!), and riced them in cold water and drained well. Then I fried some thin sliced onions and added the noodles, tinned tuna (the one in sunflower oil), and sprinkled some spring onions and a pinch of salt to taste. Some people add soy sauce, dashi stock etc..., but traditionally we only use salt to taste. I sometimes use a bit of dashi stock, but never use soy sauce. I like the simple flavour of this dish.

Dinner on 01/02/08

Menu: Stir-fry on rice noodle with hot soup

I stir-fried cabbages, onions, carrots and shiitake, and put on the hot noodle. I will write the details later.

I'm off to do Christmas shopping now.

Dinner on 25/11/08

Menu: Roast chicken with lemon & garlic, roast potatoes and boiled vegetables

I made a simple roast dinner using the leftover from the previous night. I was out in central London and bought a pack of roast chicken at Marks & Spencer on the way back home. I was feeling a bit peckish and had a piece on the train :)

Anyway, I heated up the chicken and an interesting idea came into my mind - sort of caramelising with lemon juice and garlic in a pot. I know you can roast chicken with lemon and garlic, but I simmered lemon juice and garlic (I used garlic granules) in a pot and quickly mixed the sauce with the pre-cooked (already hot) roast chicken. I sprinkled black pepper to taste.

As I've been having a problem with my right wrist, I try to cook something easy these days. This was a really easy dinner, and really tasty!

Mushroom salad

Before I forget, I will write about the tasty salad I made a few days ago.
We had some white mushrooms which had to get used soon, so I thought of making something interesting, something different.
I know that it's quite common to use mushrooms in salad in the west, but in Japan or Okinawa, we don't eat them row - we normally cook them. Besides, mushrooms are quite expensive there, so we rarely buy fresh mushrooms. Well, as you might know, we have different types of mushrooms (e.g. shiitake, maitake, enokidake etc...); these are quite cheap, and we use them lots, but not the western ones.

Anyway, as I was looking in the fridge, yellow peppers and carrots caught my eyes. Then I thought of making mushroom salad using peppers and carrots. I cut peppers in strips, mushrooms in chunky pieces, shredded carrots, and made Balsamic vinegar dressing. For the dressing, I used Balsamic vinegar, virgin olive oil, lemon juice, black pepper to taste. And then, I thought it might taste better if I put in some fried onions. Yes, my guess was right. It was really nice! Fried onions and the dressing went really well together!

Sorry, no photos and a recipe for it yet.

Dinner on 26/01/08

I'm uploading some old photos now.






On that day, we went to a local butcher and bought some stew beef... and made......

Beef and ale pie!

It was really nice!

Dinner on 27/11/08

Menu: Okinawan-style noodle in hot soup with rafute

We had a chunk of pork in the freezer, and I decided to use it for dinner. As I mentioned before, we Okinawan boil pork to remove fat before using in cooking. We normally cook it for about an hour, wash it off with water, and use it in cooking. I decided to make rafute (the pork dish). I cooked the pre-cooked pork with dashi stock, cooking sake, sugar, soy sauce for a couple of hours, and added oyster sauce in the last few minutes. As I was boiling the pork, I felt like I might be able to make soup for Okinawa soba, and went for it. It was a spontaneous decision, and I had to use the ingredients in the house. Instead of using Okinawan-style noodle, I used rice noodles. For the soup, I used pork stock, dashi stock, a bit of cooking sake, a pinch of salt and a dash of soy sauce. As my first attempt, it wasn't too bad apart from the noodles. I didn't think rice noodles go well with this soup as the taste of the soup was subtle. The taste of the noodles seemed to be too strong for this soup. Oh well. I won't use rice noodles for this dish again. Next time I will try with Korean-style noodles or I might make noodle from scratch.

Lunch on 30/09/08

Menu: Egg on rice

What would you put on fried eggs? I assume you would put on ketchup, but my favourite is soy sauce! Oh yes, it does go really well with fried eggs and it tastes really really nice. Try that with rice, and you'll see what I mean.

I think we commonly use soy sauce for fried eggs in Japan. We use ketchup for scramble eggs and other egg dishes, but if it's fried, then we would use soy sauce.

If you try it, let me know what you think :)

Lunch on 17/09/08

We were shopping in town, and getting hungry, so decided to go to a new all you can eat place on Surrey Street. We had been interested in eating there for a while, so we finally gave it a go.

The food tasted really good, the waiters seemed to be nice and friendly, and I was quite happy and enjoying my lunch.

As I was eating, I noticed a tiny green spot on the Naan bread which I had put on my plate. I didn't want to believe that it was moldy, and I tried a bit - yes, my guess was right. It had gone off. Well, I felt bad about telling them as it was only a cheap restaurant.
When I finished my first plate, I helped myself to a second helping using a new plate. I then noticed the sign saying "Use only one plate" on the wall, but I thought my case was an exception. There was no way I would use a plate that had moldy food on it. A waiter approached and said "Use only one plate, please," so I explained the situation. My husband helped me explain to the waiter, but he gave me a small plate to put the naan on and told me to keep the first plate. I kept explaining to him, but he wouldn't understand. After a while, he took the plate, and I carried on serving the second helping. Then the head waiter of the restaurant came and told me that I should use only one plate. I explained again and again until he understood, but he could not understand my point, and said something which made me mad.

"100% of our customers eat these, and they are fine."

That comment got on my nerves. It sounded like it was all my fault.
I can understand and respect their policy and rules - I would have not changed my plate if it wasn't for the moldy food - but they didn't apologise to me for serving gone-off food. Instead, they told me off! What kind of attitude is that? I know we have a very high standard when it comes to customer services in Japan, but I think anybody would feel the same as I do.

Rotten service, and rotten food...

It's a shame. I thought the food was really good for the price (except for the moldy naan of course), and I was going to recommend the place to my friends.

The whole thing really put me off, and I didn't touch my second plate.

Never again.

Dinner on 14/09/08

Menu: Pork chop; saute potatoes; broccoli; Brussels sprouts; fried tomatoes.

I wasn't sure what to cook for dinner, and looking through my fridge and freezer. I found pork chops in the back of the freezer, and came up with the idea of making roast dinner type dish. I put sliced garlic and sprinkled a pinch of black pepper, rosemary and olive oil on the meat and cooked it in the oven for 20 minutes or so. It was really nice! I'm not good at cooking roast dinner, but it's quite easy for me to cook cheat version of roast dinner :)

This was our last Sunday dinner at our flat as we are moving out in a couple of days.

Dinner on 12/09/08

Menu: Chicken curry

It was a easy curry. I just used a jar of curry sauce, and cooked chicken and onions in the sauce. The chicken was really tender and really nice.