helenjp

I'm in two minds about this... Gloves: seems like every time I see them, the wearer is being more cavalier about what his/her hands are coming in contact with than a person who simply washed his/her hands frequently. I especially hate to see gloves moving from food to till to food to... Hygienic practices: my Dad use to say that a pharmacy had to not only be clean, it had to look clean, and he had to look as if he cared about it being clean. In retail, that's true. I have a friend who cooks wearing plastic gloves. She really prefers to eat out, because she fears that even a clean home kitchen is unsanitary, and restaurants are safer. I hate to disabuse her, in case she starves...

Torakris! I'm afraid you're going to have to hand Hide over to me! I'm missing cute *little* boys like Hide round my house! I estimate it costs 4,000 yen to have yakiniku at home if we really splurge...(she says, totting up the bill of ingredients for tonight's test-drive of the electric grill)...oh, and that includes oranges for dessert

Step two...I made another batch, using 1 part each of ordinary joushinko plain rice flour and Hokkaido weak wheat flour, to 2 parts of butter. I normally use less butter, but with the Riz de Farine, I ended up trying equal quantities of butter and flours, and I think the ideal is probably just a little less butter than total flour by weight. Anyway, I would normally use close to 2:3 or 5:7 when using joushinko, but this time kept the proportions the same as in my previous experiment. Wooah! Very soft and crumbly! The mouth feel was not hugely different, but obviously the finer riz de farine absorbed more butter than the larger particles of the joushinko. So far, then, I would recommend the riz de farine above the joushinko. I have yet to find myself some pure mochiko such as that used for gyuuhi confectionary for the final experiment (the dango-ko that I have is a mix of uruchi and mochi flours).

I hear what you're saying, but as somebody who is a potential consumer of imported US beef, the US beef industry *does*have to prove to me that I should walk past the domestic beef, the Australian and New Zealand beef, the Canadian beef, etc., and buy untested US beef processed by an industry which in Japan has a reputation for being behind the times and unwilling to modernize. Of course, I don't get a lot of information, especially up to date information on the US beef packing industry, and I would be extremely interested to read more from informed sources.

The only advantage I can see in "roasting" your hardboiled eggs is that the toaster oven has a timer which switches off, preventing distraction from causing a fire! For that reason, I used my toaster oven to foil-bake rainbow trout for my sons, who each needed to eat dinner while I was out ferrying the other son. Switch it on as I leave the house, tell child when it's going to be ready, phone child to drag him out of book and remind him to eat dinner...what could be simpler? Creamed corn cornbread. Sounds interesting. I've never tasted "real" cornbread, so I have no trouble being convinced. By the way, I use my current (only 10 years old) toaster oven more than the previous one, because it is a bit more powerful - 950w or 750 watt settings. Are everybody else's toaster ovens of a similar wattage?

Hmmm...I notice that nobody so far has said "I eat U.S. supermarket beef because I have evidence that the production system produces healthy animals which are killed, butchered, packaged, transported, and retailed according to high standards and documented processes."

Curses, I lost my reply...so once again... It may depend on what your father is referring to as halibut! California halibut is a type of left-eyed flounder of the type known as "hirame" in Japan. Paralichthys olivaceus is the most common type of hirame, and does not have very firm flesh, but it is more finely textured than "karei" or right-eyed flounder. Karei are often pleuronectes-family fish. The "ohyou" is a true halibut, known as the Pacific halibut, and not very common in Japan - found mostly in Hokkaido, and even there, not a common commercial variety. However, I did spot one in the local supermarket about 2 days ago! What is called "Greenland turbot" in the US apparently, is a true halibut, known elsewhere as Greenland halibut. Here's a picture of a chef in Greenland having an enjoyable conversation with one... Halibuts are firmer than most flounders, especially in spring/summer, since they come from colder waters, which may be why "flounder and chips" in New Zealand is usually served as a whole deepfried flounder. (Yum! )

Did you look at this thread on cooking beans in a clay pot? Something I've been pondering doing for a while. http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=34843&hl= I wouldn't put a donabe in the oven (some are fine, some are *not*, knowledge gained while working at a Chinese grocery/general store in the '70s!), but it might make a good beanpot.

If you're going to use it, definitely experiment!!! My late first husband wrote his PhD thesis on the properties of agar gels. From a cooking point of view, it's worth knowing that agar gels start to release the water that they have absorbed, so that after 1-2 days, your shrinking agar gel is sitting in a pool of water. I'd be afraid that it might make the fondant weep. There are commercially used gelatins such as fish gelatin, and occasionally I see chicken or pork gelatin, but I don't know where to obtain them.

I'll be waiting to hear My finger hasn't hit the button yet...trying to decide which of all the books I would like to read over spring break should really be ditched .

Grittier is just what I wanted! It tastes just like the shortbread of my youth now - I used to be in charge of making the family shortbread when I was a teenager, which I now realize was a big concession for my mother to make, since she rather prided herself on her shortbread! I'll have to run a check just to be sure, but my impression is that this riz de farine is grittier than the normal "joushinko" that I've used in shortbread in the past. I used half rice flour, half wheat flour. Hope your son is outgrowing his allergies...

Made a batch with the "riz de farine"...worked beautifully, baked to a nice slightly gritty texture... BUT I absent-mindedly sprinkled them with salt instead of sugar . I brushed most of the salt off and sprinkled some sugar on. The slightly salty buttery flavor was actually pretty good. I'll report on the mochi-ko version later. With or without salt.

Recently I spotted SD card recipe collections...to slot into your mobile phone and view on the color screen, I imagine!

I don't recall hearing the term "Kanto-daki" for oden in Osaka, but the oden itself is definitely milder tasting. I recall eating satsuma-age sashimi-style with wasabi and shoyu, or grilled and eaten with mustard like a hot-dog, at least as often as we ate it in oden. Actually, half-price satsuma-age grilled in the toaster is a pretty good kids' snack! Lack of vegetables...Maybe not authentic, but I like to put wedges of cabbage into our oden.

A small but important point!

I just recently found that "riz farine" too. I've always used the "joushinko" rice flour that's in the dango section of the supermarket. Some smaller supermarkets just stock the mochi type or mixed plain and mochi "dango-ko". If you look at the back, "joushinko" says "uruchi" (plain rice) while shiratama-ko says "mochi-ko". My mother's shortbread...3 oz sugar, 7 oz butter, 9 oz weak flour, 2 oz ground rice, slow oven. The "riz de farine" is too fine compared to the ground rice that I used to use, and o the shortbread would not mold together properly (my mother's method was to mix slowly with the hands until the crumbly mixture amalgamated with the warmth of the hands). I'll have to try again and see how much of what type of rice flour works - a while since I've made this recipe. Proportions for slightly richer shortbread with finer texture. Auntie Pat's Shorties...5 oz sugar, 6 oz butter, 9 oz flour + 1 tsp Baking Powder, 1 egg, slow oven. I think I've made this with 5/7/9 proportions too. Mrs. Steven's Macaroons...8 oz butter, 8 oz flour + 1 tsp BP, 1 egg, mod. hot oven (but this may be a mistake) Finally, these Melting Moments have a very fine texture, but I find this a bit tasteless...might work with the fine riz de farine in place of the cornflour though. Melting Moments...3 oz powdered sugar, 7 oz butter, 4 oz weak flour + 1/2 tsp BP, 4 oz cornflour, mod oven

Been reading this and thinking hard... 15 years ago I had no kids. Does that sum it all up? 30 years ago, I was still at school, eating boarding-school food and copying out recherche recipes from the school library (which oddly, had a cooking section!). So when I left school, I started to cook...and cook...and cook. I was obsessive about chasing up methods (more than ingredients) and finding the *perfect* recipe. When kids started to hoist their sails on the horizon, I decided to start memorizing recipes to save time in the kitchen. That turned my cooking around - I suddenly realized that it was all about proportions, and started thinking more about what each ingredient was actually doing in physical/chemical terms, or just how the main and top notes of flavor and aroma worked. Now I use recipes rather rarely. Good things: more flexibility and creativity. Bad things: Surprisingly easy to get into a rut when you don't have the stimulus of other people's ideas!

I always assumed that the *only* rice flour was the plain "uruchi" rice flour. But then I read that somebody else used "mochiko" rice flour in shortbread for a melting texture. I actually like the grainier type of shortbread rather than the softer "petticoat tails" type, but now I'm curious. Here in Japan we have very weak flour and any number of options for rice flour...even decent butter if we look hard for it! (I like Yotsuba). Shortbread is probably the easiest western cookie to make successfully here. ..so, what are *your* preferred methods/ingredients? I'm just about to bake a batch for Valentine's Day tomorrow, while everybody thinks I'm working! Going to use my usual plain rice flour, and make another batch with mochiko in a few days' time.

Burn guard does sound like an attractive feature...I hardly used our electric nabe when the kids were small, for that reason. Now, of course, they are so big and rambunctious that I struggle to keep the table upright when they start to get in each other's hair, let alone minor concerns like stuff that's merely on top of the table. The zojirushi does say it's got a "hontai guard" so that you don't accidentally rest your wrist on the hot griddle edge (and yes, we have done that...). Can't see what they mean though, except that maybe the outer "frame" is higher than the actual drop-in griddle? Tiger and Zojirushi strike me as being very safety-conscious, maybe because they specialize in cookware that is used at table...thermos pots, hotwater pots, rice cookers, etc. We bought a Tiger thermos pot, because at that time they were the only ones that had a safety catch on the lid. The Zoji slotted griddle apparently has a pull-out section on one half - you can drop the flat half-griddle into the gap. picture of half-griddle

I admit it, I picked the bigger one thinking of those 50-at-a-time batches of gyoza! Hope it *does* fit up there on top of the china cabinets, between the Japanese doll case and the carton of cake tins!

Ah ha, but did you note that the Zoj has a cunning half-grill, half-plate for times when you want to grill some meat and veges at the same time? The Zoj is sitting in *my* shopping cart, waiting for the right moment to push the button! You're right about the prices - surprisingly competitive. Now time for me to do some work, or we won't be able to afford to grill anything more than beansprouts!

I like the look of that deluxe grill too. I use our big, beat-up grill-nabe to teach my kids to cook - my gas range is tucked in behind a storage unit, impossible for 2-3 people to crowd round it sharing the cooking process, or for them to reach the grill or gas-rings easily and safely. We definitely make things like yaki-niku at home - could *not* afford to take 2 men and 2 big boys plus myself out to eat yaki-niku - and our garden is an ume-jungle under mosquito occupation 10 months of the year. With those numbers, a frypan doesn't cut it...whereas my grill-nabe will take around 50 gyoza at once. (Not forgetting that homemade gyoza are smaller than most restaurant ones). The only downside is that a good electric grill uses 1.3Kw of power, enough to blow a fuse in winter, unless you have your circuits set up carefully. Wonder if Hiroyuki has ever allowed his eye to wander from the oven-toaster into the world of the fish-roaster? Some are like an oven-toaster toaster-oven type fish roaster, with a smoke filter, but some are like those double-sided contact grills popular in the US...the picture shows a one-sided grill *I think* but I've seen double-element ones in Japan.

Harumi Kurihara, one of the most popular of the younger generation cooks in Japan, has won an international award for her English-language cookbook "Harumi's Japanese Cooking" Japan Today report Gourmand World Cookbook Awards

Table-top cooking is a big part of Japanese family dining...I expect most of us who live in Japan have one or more of...table-top gas ring....electric skillet/grill of the George Foreman indoor grill type with a range of frying or grilling surfaces...electric "nabe" (deep electric skillet for stirfries or nabe dishes)...or items which combine more than one of these functions, not to mention electric takoyaki-ki, taiyaki-ki and what not! Do you grill meats in the same deep-dish electric nabe that you have, well, nabe in, or do you have a separate indoor grill...or swappable nabe/grillplates? This is similar to what we have (different brand though)...Zojirushi electric grill-nabe ..but it really doesn't like being heated up for gyoza and grilled meats, and the teflon is flaking badly. How do the cooking surfaces of the electric grill types such as this one... Deluxe version electric grill ...stand up to being preheated without oil or ingredients? Any fave items or uses for tabletop cooking devices?

Forgot to mention...mushi-zushi or steamed sushi. I occasionally get all nostalgic and make it here. It's a donburi sushi, sometimes with a mixed rice base, and topped with egg - either thick-baked egg, or shreds, or whatever - anago, unagi, ebi, and usually green peas or sometimes just a sansho leaf. Mushizushi with fish sausage