torakris

here is a great list of Tokyo izakayas for every type of person, every occasion: http://club.nokia.co.jp/tokyoq/reviews/arc...kayabyfeat.html

Sonja, Thank you and welcome to egullet!

here is a nice picture of how funazushi could be served: http://my.reset.jp/~hjtani/makinobunka/con...erial/aji01.jpg it is sometimes also made into a circle: http://www.biwa.ne.jp/~temubin/funazushi.gif

a nice article with a lot of pictures on gadgets for the Japanese kitchen: http://www.bento.com/fexp-tools.html

the second week long food blog from torakris: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=52858

Obachan's kitchen and vegetable garden: http://kokonuggetyumyum.blogspot.com/

I was just really very hungry http://maki.typepad.com/justhungry/ not all Japanese but very informative

Watashi to Tokyo http://smt.blogs.com/mari/ this is a great blog!!

Helenjp's food blog: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=45950&hl=

interesting article on the differences between Tokyo and Osaka: http://smt.blogs.com/trends_style_culture/...ifference_.html food discussion is at the bottom

Nebari-ya http://portal.nifty.com/koneta04/12/27/01/ a natto restaurant... the page is in Japanese but there are a lot of great pictures.

SHIGA PREFECTURE (region = Kansai/Kinki) http://www.pref.shiga.jp/kanko/mika-de.htm http://www.wschool.net/wisdom/restaurant/r...t_shiga2_e.html http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getart...v20031226a1.htm to discuss the foods of Shiga look here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=58656

Honestly I can't think of anything from Shiga except for funazushi, the crucian carp that is fermented for years (yes, YEARS) before being eaten. I have never tasted this.... more information on funazushi can be found over here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...89entry802789

As you can tell by my lack of participation in this forum, I am not a baker... Yesterday I was making a green tea castella, as discussed in this thread: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=58502&hl= and I started with the recipe before completely reading it, I mixed 200 g of bread flour (12% protein) with 240 g of granulated sugar before I realized I was supposed to beat the sugar with the eggs.... I am too cheap (and granulated sugar is too expensive here) to through this away, so I put it in a baggie trying to think of something else to make. However most of my baking books are in English and I am not sure how many cups of flour and sugar that is. My other problem is the bread flour.. can I add cake flour to make it a similar protein content to all purpose? and what are some recipes that call for the flour and sugar to be mixed together?

word for 1/4: いわしのフライ iwashi no furai Furai is the Japanese pronunciation of the English fry, usually referring to foods that arecoated with panko and then deep fried. Iwashi no fry could be a variety of dishes, from the simple flour, egg and panko treatment served with lemon slices: http://www.n-nourin.jp/oh/recipe/sakana/iw...asino-hurai.htm or even adding something like a tomato sauce: http://sbc21.co.jp/my-cgi/sbc_recipe-dip.c...467&Page=Detail More typical Japanese flavourings will include umeboshi and shiso, these will often be stuffed into the iwashi or rolled up inside. You can even buy iwashi no furai in te freezer section already for the hot oil (this one has minced umeboshi inside): http://www.okachu.co.jp/gyosyu/iwashi/gazou/2-01.jpg

WOW! gorgeous, down to the table settings!

I didn't refrigerate it because it didn't say to, but my house is probably colder than my refrigerator so I don't think it matters.. I didn't try to take off the upper crust but I did cut off the sides and ate them with the kids, it was good but tasted mostly of the browned side and I didn't get the full matcha taste. I will be cutting into it in a couple hours.....

guess what I made..... the finished product I haven't eaten it yet because the recipe says to wrap it and let it rest overnight....... I will report back tomorrow.

my kids were begging for mochi today so I boiled up some maru mochi (round ones) and covered them with kinako and sugar mixture. We had seconds.....

We went out for kaiten sushi yesterday, the last time we went a couple months ago it was to Kappa Sushi, a large chain where everything is 100 yen ($1). I was far from impressed so I spent some time researching options in our area, with 5 big eaters price was my biggest concern. I found a local place　called Kaiten Sushi Tafu: http://r.gnavi.co.jp/g478900/ the prices start at 80 ($.80) per dish (2 pieces) and went up to 630 yen ($6.30), most averaged around 160 yen ($1.60) and 240 yen ($2.40). This was just good plain old sushi, no fancy gimmicky types and it was a good place for kids with out be Chuck E Cheeze-y. There was a dish of about 5 very large (and very good!) karaage (deep fried chicken) for 240 yen and plenty of egg and cucumber rolls. This was all handmade by 4 men behind the counters, both shaping rice and slicing fish, which is unusual for a palce this cheap. There were also about 5 people working the floor taking orders and this place wasn't even that big. Some of the sushi was mediocre, most of it was above average (compared to other kaiten places) and some was just great. My favorite included a seki aji (a brand name aji), kan buri ("cold" yellowtail) and their oyster gunkan. Once I had my first dish of the oysters (at only 160 yen) that was all I ate..... raw oyster in a gunkan maki topped with some spiced grated daikon and lemon slices, wow! We spent 5600 yen (about $56) for our family of 5 and I was very satisfied and will definitely be going back.

I had forgotten about this product: http://sue.music-cafe.tv/mayo/collection/type/t05.html from Kewpie, corn and mayo in a tube to squeeze onto your bread and then pop into your toaster oven....

Unless they are a chain you will probably find no two izakayas to be the same. A couple of my favorite places aren't known as much for their food but for their atmosphere. I have pictures of one such place in my blog from two years ago, starting here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...ndpost&p=471187 The company owns a couple restaurant all with different themes, in the same blog I visited another one, pictures start here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...ndpost&p=473100 the homepage (in English) with great pictures of all the restaurants can be found here: http://www.ug-gu.co.jp/english/e-resutaura...estaurants.html

word for 1/3: いわしの梅干煮 iwashi no umeboshi-ni Umeboshi are the Japnese pickled plums and ni 煮　is from the verb niru which means to simmer, these are iwashi that are simmered with umeboshi. The umeboshi helps rid the iwashi of its fishy-ness and the long simmering softens the bones making them edible. iwashi no umeboshi-ni: http://www.c-d-k.ne.jp/~japancom/r-sakana/iwashini.htm

I will give the recipe a try and then write it up in English if it works.

great pictures! I think the only way to prevent the kinako ones from getting "sweaty" is to coat them with unbelievable amounts of kinako and eat them really fast. We had a small mochi tsuki party last week with a bunch of neighbors, we used a machine though..... we can kinako mochi, mochi with home made anko paste (tsubu kind), and mochi with grated daikon and soy sauce (my favorite) and mcohi with nori and katsuobushi and soy sauce. It was a great lunch but I forgot my camera....