helenjp

I was hoping for plenty of detail on those fish cutlets...thanks for the close-ups . Love those happy faces! My boys would never wait to have photos taken if there was watermelon juice on the table That pumpkin kaya looks like a Serious Dessert...

I just found this Kanten Papa "vegetable gelatine" mix...contains agar-agar plus konnyaku powder, and some other bulking agents. The Japanese page says it has no added sweetener, but the package lists fructose... http://www.kantenpp.co.jp/products/prd0003...=00002&no=00206 Haven't used it yet, but will try it over the spring vacation to see if it produces a more tender gel than straight agar-agar. It apparently sets at 40 deg.C (100deg. F) so the gel is basically stable at room temp. The package had some warnings on failure to set with acidic fruits (this is true of agar-agar too) and occasional clotting with milk jellies - need to warm the milk properly first?? I hunted around the net, looking for some information in English. However, a long search simply led me back to eGullet where Kris was extolling the virtues of a sesame salad dressing from the Kanten Papa brand. In this case, I think the dressing comes from the Kanten Papa restaurant rather than the parent food company...

NulloModo, Japanese cooking is not necessarily subtle -- there's a good ole peasant tradition too, which means upending the soy sauce bottle and the sugar sack over every dish, at least until the week before payday! When I first lived in Japan, I had no oven, and only very basic equipment, and also a burning desire to cook Japanese food. When I returned to NZ, I literally couldn't think how to cook a "normal" dinner. The first cake I baked back in NZ was mysteriously flat... But next time I moved to Japan, I had to hunt through all my cookbooks to remember basic Japanese combinations of seasonings - things that I cook nowadays entirely by eye and taste - because my palate had lost its "memory" of the correct Japanese taste. I think it's really hard to cook a cuisine that you have never experienced. I cooked a few things that I read about in novels before I ever came to Japan, and they were (let's be charitable) laughable. I just had no idea what I was aiming for. On the other hand, I've never lived in the Middle East, yet I enjoy cooking and eating Middle Eastern food....is it because it sits between the bread culture I grew up with and the rice culture I live in??? Is it because it's so close to Europe?? Is it the predominance of lamb, which for NZers of my generation was the most usual meat??? Who knows... I like Indian food too, but I don't feel as confident as I do with Middle Eastern food...I think maybe the techniques and seasonings are just too far removed from European or East Asian food for me to develop an instinct for it.

So it's not one of those "warming" things???

Woah, those kuih bangkit look just like "rakugan" except we often make them one-sided and don't bake them, just moisten rice or bean flour/sugar and press into the mold. In Japan, they are known to be of Chinese origin, but were originally called Southern Drop-out Sweets (Nan-raku-kan)...wonder where they actually originated! IN Japan too, they are known as a festival sweet, particularly associated with Buddhist ceremonies. Japanese rakugan molds I'll try that soup, too...

How.... err... how did that happen, do you suppose? ← Not *just* South East Asian routes, of course, but somehow, sometime, South East Asian culture has influenced Japan. musings on Japan's dual identity That's the potted version of the academic debate which has raged for the past decade or so on exactly how and to where humans spread after they reached Southeast Asia. There is clear linguistic, genetic, and cultural evidence in south and west Japan, the question is how and when it got there... But that's enough, don't want to derail our bloggers!

Pea shoots...they're very trendy in Japan at the moment. Except, of course, they don't sell them loose, but in packets where they are all grown to EXACTLY the same length! We had some with flounder, yum. So how do you make this old cucumber and lotus root soup (she says, peering at the lotus root in her fridge...)?

No way to stay out of the kitchen with encouragement like that! list of local, English, and botanical names for Singapore foods botanical names not 100% reliable, but then botanists move plants from one category to another every time they're bored. Thanks for the pix, I'd never seen kaffir lime, and didn't know it had that double leaflet shape! Did you know that the southern part of South East Asia is thought to be the origin of citrus species?! (Did you even want to know?? ) Japanese food has South East Asian roots...looking at all the fresh herbs you use reminds me strongly of that. Your almond drink reminds me of the almond tea we used to sell in the Chinese grocery where I worked...but I bet it's not even half as sweet!

Yeah, I kept hearing from my Japanese friends that it wasn't French enough, and they also didn't like the fact that there were no places to eat at Carrefour. I'd never thought that strange hot-dog stand thing at Chiba Costco was an attraction, but apparently so...

Pandan in Okinawa, where both P. odoratissimus and P. Tectorius are known as "adan". In Okinawa, the general idea seems to be that you can eat the heart (budding leaves) cooked but not raw, and you can *maybe* eat the fruit of P. odoratissimus, but other people seem to think that the whole plant is poisonous...do Malaysians use pandan for food in any way, or just for flavoring? edit: Now I realize that your Pandan is P. amaryllifolius...the reason I couldn't find it in Japan is because Japan calls that plant P. odorus (nioi-takonoki). Now I'm curious...does the fragrant-leaved Pandan also have fruit? Nestum, eh? I have a Malaysian friend who is devoted to Horlicks...

I did try the recipe again with a bread flour. The extra beating made quite a difference - at 4-5 minutes, I could see the batter thicken noticeably. However, the finished cake is a bit too heavy and intense for me... I toasted some pieces and am now thinking that I will incorporate the frozen crumbled pieces into vanilla icecream for my sons !

I hesitate to say this, because it could have awful consequences but I've always had better sashimi and sushi in provincial towns than in Tokyo, and to some extent Osaka. That doesn't mean that the dusty noodle shop opposite the station on some long-forgotten branch line will be serving the sushi you always dreamed of, but I have had better sushi for less money at good sushi restaurants in Takamatsu or Iwaki, for example, than in Tokyo. Exceptions: You can have passably good sashimi in kaiseki or maku-no-uchi boxed lunch places in big towns. And if you can afford it, of course there are wonderful sushi places in Tokyo...but not in my budget range . If you want to save money, find the nearest convenience store and buy breakfast (even the night before...) rather than eat at expensive hotel coffee shops. You'll certainly have an interesting time looking at the convenience store and at everybody else's purchases, in any case! In warmer months, carry a small bottle of water or tea with you - or buy at convenience stores rather than vending machines. Tap water is safe, but if that's unpalatable, keep a big bottle of tea in your hotel room fridge for refilling. Vending machines in sightseeing spots are horribly expensive, and in hot weather, it adds up... There is a pocket food guide with photos of common Japanese dishes and foodstuffs and the Japanese and English names, but I don't recall the name of it. Anybody know?

I also had no trouble making my own starter from whole wheat (wholemeal) flour and water...even if you will later be using white flour to bake with. Apparently the surface of the wheat berry has the cultures you want right there, so you don't need to leave it open to "catch" wild yeasts. Try googling... No doubt established cultures would be better, but the self-start approach certainly worked.

I just want to say THANK YOU Patrick S for so often including close ups of cake texture in your posts. I find it very helpful to have a reference point.

prunus mume is the plant you want BUT but but but, in the low down cunning way of the gardening world, western gardeners have developed a NON-FRUITING variety known as a flowering plum, just to avoid having all those annoying ume fruit lying around all over the place. So if you wanted to buy one, you would have to be very sure it was a FRUITING variety, and you would likely need to find an Asian plants specialist to get one. Moreover, some varieties of fruiting ume which produce large fruit do not produce a lot of pollen, so you need to plant another variety of ume which flowers at the same time to help the blossoms set fruit. Small-fruiting varieties of ume are usually self-fertile, so a single tree should produce fruit.

Sweet crusty crosses...marzipan? Or marzipan kneaded together with sugar crystals and/or chopped nuts and applied in ropes...

Allyson Gofton NZ Maori and NZ recipes NZ. This one plays Pokarekare-ana... Cuisine Magazine NZ Peta Matthias (NZ) Australian food magazines check the international options for international shipping, ho ho ho. NZ food magazines but you have to look a bit harder to find them on this page Add more sites please! Updated links: 2008

What I love best about hot cross buns is the spice. Cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger, plus allspice, plenty of pepper, and a little cumin for warmth. Cloves or cardamom if you like. I liked Elizabeth David's sweet spice mix, but no longer have her Bread and Yeast Cookery book.

Syrup cake?

Kway teow, yum! My husband and I used to go and eat kway teow at the late-night Chinese cafe in Auckland when we were working all night on translations. Do you ever make kueh yourself, or do you always buy them? Surprisingly, some gourd-family plants just won't set fruit in hot weather. Unlikely, but true (and sad). Look forward to seeing garden pictures!

Nothing like a bit of octopus to settle the stomach! Glad you're feeling a little better.

I think the cracking may be why Alsatian Apple Tarts are often shown dusted with powdered sugar?

Marco Polo's "Tubu Tchigae" recipe given upthread was a winner! EVERY member of my family commented on how much they liked it.

Since the lemonade is diluted, the citric acid and the tartaric acid increase the sourness. I usually make it with tartaric acid but not citric acid (feel that the stronger sourness of the citric acid overpowers the lemon a little). Another reason for adding extra sourness is to balance the faint bitterness that the fragrant lemon peel adds. Curiously, if you add lots of lemon balm, the sharp flavor of the lemonade disappears almost entirely. Not sure what component of the lemon balm is responsible for that. Citric acid and tartaric acid are mildly preservative, but I don't know whether they have a measurable effect in this case (but since lemon juice can go off surprisingly quickly, it could be worth leaving them in the recipe).