torakris

Cook rice. Cool!

can you use other types of vinegars or acids (ie. lemon juice) to make paneer?

who needs books when we have egullet?

I would add both oyster sauce and ginger ansd maybe a little fresh chile for kick.

suvir to answer some of your paneer questions I started a paneer thread: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST...T&f=40&t=21506&

Suvir thank you for all your comments and the recipe! This is definitely on the menu for next week! I have only eaten saag paneer in Indian restaurants in Japan and the ones I have tried have always been quite heavy on the ginger with chunks of tomato tossed in.

I attended a cooking class last week were the instructor taught us how to make paneer. this is what we did:: we put 2 tablespoons (30cc) of rice vinegar into a medium sized saucepan and brought it just to a boil, we then took the milk (1,000 cc in all) and added a little say a 1/4 cop or so and swirled it in the pan, it curdles almost immediately, then add another 1/4 cup and swirl it again, this will also curdle rather quickly, then add the rest of the milk. cook over fairly high heat, it boils quite rapidly just be sure not to let it boil over, after about 5 minutes it will separate completely at this time pour it into a strainer and you are done. The resulting product is quite crumbly and the taste is very similar to ricotta. To make blocks we were told to wrap it in cheesecloth and press it with weights. If you use it right away, it is actually in very small crumbs(think similar to dry cottage cheese)), but when i made it a couple days ago I left it sitting in the strainer for a good hour or so, and it formed one large mass which I just broke into large pieces with my fingers. So now my questions: we used rice vinegar because we are in Japan and it is the most readily available, what is the traditonal acid that is used? NOTE: there was no vinegar taste in the what so ever in the finished product we used whole milk, but can low fat be substituted?

I have never seen this cut of meat outside of Hawaii,and there it was everywhere. All of the Korean restaurants I have been to on the mainland offered the big bone with 3 horizontal cuts. I like them both! In Japan though, kalbi is usually served with no bone! bulgoki is not very popular in yakiniku shops and I don't recall seeing on a menu. kalbi is the main beef type served and it is a boneless cut of meat about a 1/4 inch thick and it is usaully served in 3 types rosu (this is a nicely marbled cut) jourosu (this is even better rosu, jou can mean something like exceptional) harami (the outside skirt, almost no fat) harami is by far my favorite, this is true beef flavor. I have long harami strip (about a foot and a half) in my freezer waiting for our next BBQ). The meat with bone is slowly gaining in popularity but is still difficult to find, my husband and I pick it up at a Korean butcher.

I am a smell person too, that and a small taste seems to be the best judge of a product past its prime. I have had chiles en adobo go moldy, so I would use that as a judge. Anna N thanks for the hint on freezing the chiles en adobo, I will do that next time.

Do you have one cookbook that has been used so much it is falling apart and possibly held together with tape? Does it automatically open to your favorite pages, because you have pushed on the binding too ahrd too many times? Are the pages stained with drops of now unidentifiable food? So what book in your collection does this describe? For me it is the New Basics, though I don't use it as much any more, for a while it was my favorite (ok my only!) cookbook and it tends to open to page 746, the lemon shortbread recipe.

vidia, welcome to egullet and thanks for the information!

I agree with tissue, mashed potatoes must be eaten directly out of the pan while still on the burner! Almost any bread tasted best directly from the oven. Most meat based dishes done on the BBQ, especially skewer foods (sate, shishkabobs sp?, etc) they cool down so fast and never taste quite right. I hate cold BBQ'd foods!

Friday dinner: Thai flavored mussel soup (from Blue Ginger by Ming Tsai)--this was VERY good!! A Japanese style shabu shabu salad with pork, romaine lettuce, cucumbers, and young corn, dressed with a Thai style peanut sauce Jasmine rice dessert: bing cherries (in Japan these are just called American cherries) and some cookies given to me by a Japanese friend, a pastry chef who runs a bakery with her husband.

how do you do your shiso dressing? ditto for the chile braised daikon....

cold pizza is great! the cheaper the better. I also love cold meatloaf, I always make extra for sandwiches, I have some in the refrigerator right now waiting for lunch.

Gee, I've never heard of nankotsu. Can you tell us more about it? nankotsu is a very popular dish at the yakitori shops, here is picture of it yakitori style: http://www.inet-shibata.or.jp/~ytoshi/japa...od/nankotsu.jpg it can also be served deep fried, in this case it is usually just the cartilege with very little or no meat attached. It is very crunchy, yet delicious.

word for 5/24: パン pan (pahn) bread パン屋 panya (pahn-yah) this is a bakery, where the Japanese go to buy their bread, one of the most popular responses given when a young girl is asked what she wants to be when she grows up, is a panya-san (bakery owner), this is usually followed closely by a hanaya-san (florist) response. For more information on Japanese breads, check out the bread thread! http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST...T&f=19&t=21459&

the daily nihongo: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST...T&f=19&t=20174& you can find it easily by going to the Japan forum

When i first came to Japan, I loved those inch thick pieces of bread, they really make the most incredible toast! Now I buy the thinner slices. Japanese bread comes in 3 main sizes, the actual loaf size is the same, but it is cut into either 4, 6, or 8 slices, the really thick fluffy one is the 4 slice per package bread. The 8 slice stuff is a similar thickness to American sandwich bread. Bakeries in Japan are really one of my favorite places, there is a chain store called MUJI (the name actually means no brand or generic) it sells everything from clothes to furniture to food items to books and has a wonderful bakery. I like anything with cheese in it. One of my favorites is a black sesame bread filled with cheddar cheese. meronpan (melonpan?) is one of my favorite sweet breads, it is a white bread roll wrapped in cookie dough, sometimes melon flavored, sometimes not (the cheap ones!).

here is another breakast survey that really shows the popularity of bread over rice: http://www.intage.co.jp/express/01_04/mark...ket/index2.html

Ok I don't actually drink alcohol, but I usually eat the food that comes with my husband's! edamame are great! (tonkichi, I think this is what you are referring to when you say large peas) I really am addicted to nankotsu (deep fired chickedn cartilege) at the moment

I know that I have mastered the art of paneer making, I want to make one of my favorite Indian dishes saag paneer. any recipes? hints?

chutney, any kind breads, any kind dessert, any kind these are the ones I am interested in the most becuse I already cook a lot of main dishes, and these are the ones I find it really helps to have hands on training. The other I personally am interested in right now is saag paneer.

I ran across an 'only in Japan' bread today, it was a French style baguette filled with mentaiko (spicy cod roe) and butter. It was actually so good I went back for 3 samples. We discussed bread a little in the yoshoku thread, but what are some of your favorite Japanese breads?

Erin B welcome to egullet! there was a lengthy discussion of cookbooks a little while back, look here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?act=ST...adhur,and,julie