nakji

Oh, wow, really? That's an excellent tip. I didn't think anything got really brown in the microwave, but the oil helps, I guess. That's so much better than standing over a frying pan for twenty minutes, trying to get a whole batch to cook down.

I don't think it's too hard to pickle your own, as long as you have a good source of decent ginger. It won't be that pink colour, but that doesn't affect the taste. I think Washoku has a recipe for making it; curiously enough, so does Mark Bittman in "How to Cook Everything".

Oh, I don't know why I've never thought of that. That must really give it a nice tang of acidity. Sometimes I find mac and cheese too creamy, and it gets boring to eat about halfway through, tomatoes might be worth trying. Does His Way work out well? It sounds intriguing, and I've been looking for some ways to use up evaporated milk.

These all sound like excellent recommendations. Did she generally include recipes in with her essays, generally? I love food writing that does, it gives me a feeling of being able to play along with the writer.

Sounds like you had a great first experience. I had a puer for the first time recently, and I didn't find it particularly musty - more plummy and rich, actually. It's worth trying again to see if you repeat the "musty" sensation - it may just have been the tea you had. I bought a gaiwan on my trip into Shanghai this month, and I'm looking forward to trying it out. Just a question, though - do I decent the tea from the gaiwan into another, smaller cup? Or do I drink right from the gaiwan itself?

If it's been refrigerated, it does get hard. I think Helen has mentioned somewhere in this topic that cutting the Japonica rice with a little mochi rice helps keep the rice flexible and moist in colder temperatures, like in the case of winter bentos. You can do that with bell peppers, too.

My habit involves knives, too. I leave them in the sink, dirty, to be washed at the end of the evening by the dishwasher - my husband. I've heard this turns them dull, but since my knives are cheap affairs that I sharpen regularly, I have never particularly cared. Also, I use abrasives on non-stick pans, and buy new ones as needed.

For a straight up, simple drinking bottle, I've always had success with Hakkaisan. They come in five grades, and I'll have to ask an expert to weigh in here, but we always bought the second cheapest grade for drinking and the cheapest for cooking. Hakkaisan has the advantage of being widely available in Japan, and in some places outside of Japan. If you have the chance to try namazake, or "fresh" sake, it's a nice change from regular sake.

I have to second this. I've been especially happy with result from green vegetables such as broccoli and asparagus. I nuke them with my Japanese steamer cup, no water added, and they come out green and toothy every time. It's so easy, I don't mind doing it in the morning to include in my lunch box, and there's hardly and clean-up.

Noodles like soba and udon are usually rolled out on a long square table by hand. Noodle makers use a variety of lengths and weights of long rolling pins to get their desired shape and width. Special knives are used to cut soba, but Chinese noodles can be hand-stretched, a process that's fun to watch and to eat the results of.

Oh, wow, how funny is that? And the same wine. I love a nice Clare Valley riesling, and I love trying wine with Asian dishes, so it was a no-brainer for us to order that bottle. Shanghai promises to be a great eating city. There are a couple of other places I want to get to, such as Yin, Di Shui Dong, and Guyi Hunan restaurant. Dong Bei Ren looks good, too, for Northeastern cuisine, and I eventually want to try some of the Shanghainese places such as Bai's restaurant, Baoluo Jiulou and Jishi Jiulou. All these names I got from the Lonely Planet, who I usually don't put a lot of food faith in, but Crystal Jade and Lost Heaven were accurately assessed, so I'm going to trust them on their recommendations. Does anyone know about the South Beauty/Steam chain? They were both in Xin Tian Di, and now I see two are opening up here in Suzhou. As for the Sogo - is that a Japanese Sogo? I'll have to check them out for my miso/yuzu/genmaicha needs. And the Marks and Spencer! The wine selection! The biscuits in three kinds of chocolate! The chutney array! The red leiscester and onion crisps! The frozen pies! Next time I'm bringing a cooler.

I've been to two City Shops in Shanghai now; one in West Nanjing and the other in Times Square Mall on Huai Hai lu. I don't whether they're officially affiliated with City Super in Hong Kong, but I can say they're not really comparable in terms of selection. The dried good selection was decent, but there was no where near the range of deli, produce, or meat selection as the Hong Kong shops.

Oh, wow, I was just thinking about trying this tonight as I was making dinner. The potato variety I can buy locally is really wet, and so I ended up with soggy mashed potatoes for my bangers and mash. I wondered about nuking them first to keep them drier than boiling, and lo, here you are recommending it. Do you keep the peel on? This is thinking outside the box, indeed. Does this method work for fish on the bone as well?

I'm actually thinking about getting Tsuji's "A Simple Art" to get some more classic recipes. I'd like a decent one for takigomi gohan, which I can never get to turn out to my satisfaction - does he give a recipe for that in this book? I'm excited to hear Harumi has got a new one out, since I'm a huge fan of her books; I'll have to see if I can order it. That "Yasai de Shusai" sounds right up my alley, I'll have to mark it down for my next trip to Japan.

Do you do this in a dish, or in paper packets....How? And are they filets, or whole fish?

The last time I made baked beans I put a piece of lop yuk in, as it was the only pork product in the house. It provided a really rich flavour. I wonder if a bit of smoked duck would work much the same as smoked turkey?

I have just rediscovered evaporated milk, which was always a staple in my house growing up. My mother grew up in the north of Canada, so fresh milk was generally unavailable. Evaporated milk always went into tea of coffee in my house. I picked up a couple of tins at the shop this week, since I don't drink fresh milk myself, but often have a need for milk for cooking. When I buy a small milk and leave it in the fridge it invariably goes off before I can use it all. I also chronically forget to buy milk when guests visit, and have nothing to offer them for their tea or coffee. It's great to see I can use it in soups and the like. This morning I made pancakes with it, and they yielded really beautifully light cakes with a gorgeous golden colour. What I'd like to know is - once I've opened a can, how long will it last in the fridge?

I started to use my microwave for cooking more in Japan. It's quite a popular method there, as both gas and electricity rates are quite high. I used it frequently for re-heating, but I also used it for cooking. Harumi Kurihara has a great recipe for sesame chicken salad that has you nuke a boned chicken thigh along with some ginger, sesame oil, green onion tops, and shaosing rice wine. The thigh cooks quickly, and even better, the resulting broth from cooking goes into the salad dressing, yielding a really rich flavour. She also has a recipe for microwaving julienned carrots, then cooling them and tossing them with a mustard vinaigrette and canned tuna. It makes a great side salad for a light dinner. There's no reason to dirty a pot or pan boiling or sauteing the carrots, and the only added oil is that from the dressing. I routinely microwave green vegetables like broccoli, and then toss with sesame dressing for a quick side dish for weekday meals. There has got to be more of out there using our microwaves for more than just reheating and making popcorn.

As ever, Helen, amazing bento tips. I like to use Bulldog sauce to toss my fried items in - it's cheap and easy, as it doesn't mess up another mixing bowl in the morning. I can't believe I forgot pajeon! You can make a bunch up, freeze, and microwave them off as needed, with a little squirt bottle of soy/vinegar mix to brighten them up at lunch. Does PJ like inarizushi? They seem to suit the school's requirements, and they stay pretty delicious as the mirin and soy keeps things tender. Also, they pack up pretty neatly in a box, and can be eaten with fingers. If you want to make them yourself, you can freeze them. And you can tailor the rice stuffing to include vegetables like mushrooms, carrots, etc. to make them more interesting.

OK, I took them out of the freezer, then nuked them from frozen with the sauce squirted into the steamer along with them. They then went into a Japanese bento box, where I ate them along with the other contents, at room temperature. Perhaps not ideal, but they could instead be packed hot into a thermal container like a thermos or a Mr. Bento type item.

I have two favourite recipes I like to cook with beans. Great Northern white beans are great cooked with some wine and garlic, then finished off with sauteed leek and some creme fraiche. I like to use canned cannelini beans with another can of tomatoes, about a quarter cup of good olive oil, and some garlic. Lots of fresh ground pepper and some salt, then cooled and blended with a bit more olive oil and chopped italian parsley - it makes a great dip, or sandwich spread for vegetarians. What are some other things that I can do with beans? I have about 250g of dried kidney-type spotted beans that I'm trying to decide what to do with. Any good soup recipes out there?

I had excellent meatballs from my school cafeteria last week. They were basically ground pork seasoned with green onions and five spice powder, and served in a light sweet and sour sauce. Very excellent, and very unexpected - I'd never thought of putting five spice into meatballs. As for microwaving meatballs, I used to make big batches up, fried, then freeze them and microwave them as needed for bento, which I understand is a pretty common practice in Japan. I had a little microwave steamer that I used, and I goosed them with a couple of squirts of Bulldog sauce before zapping them. They came out nicely and held up well in the lunch box.

I don't know how much of a norm rice and miso soup is for breakfast anymore in Japan, at least with younger people in the cities. Most of the Tokyoites I worked with in Japan ate melonpan and other assorted sweet "bread" products sourced from the 7-11 on their morning run to work. One savoury thing that was universally popular, and I which I enjoyed frequently for breakfast, was onigiri. A nice tuna mayonnaise onigiri washed down with bottled green tea from Family Mart is a breakfast of champions.

Yes, at finer ramen-ya, they ask you how you want your noodles done. If you like them tooth-y as I do, you can request "katame". I think the frozen ones are fresh noodles, frozen instead of dried, as Susan has suggested. The best noodles are fresh-made, of course, but whether the frozen or dried ones are better probably depends on the quality of frozen ones you have access to. If they're made locally, then frozen, I would get the frozen ones. But if the noodles are frozen in a solid icy block that looks like it's been melted and frozen, I would avoid those. Common sense, I suppose, but there it is.

I have twelve cookbooks on my shelf. I use five frequently, and by frequently I mean, I pull them off the shelf and cook from the recipe, at least once a week. One or two more I have the recipes I like memorized, but I keep around in case I need to pass the recipes along. My high usage rate could be tied to the frequency of my moves - every two years I purge virtually all of my possessions saving only the things I use frequently, as I have to justify shipping costs. Those that made the cut are: Marcella Hazan: Marcella's Italian Kitchen Harumi Kurihara: Japanese Home Cooking Debra Samuels :The Korean Table Fuschia Dunlop: Revolutionary Chinese I also habitually use Bittman's How To Cook Everything for oddments like pancake proportions and cooking times for meat, and for things I should know but don't, like how to make an apple crisp. I like it because it's light for its size. Usually when I planning my grocery shopping each week, I set these on the table and page through them as I make up my menu plan and grocery list.