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Mochi


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I love mochi but I am very picky about the kind of mochi I eat.

My favorite type is actually savory, not sweet... the kind that is grilled/baked, wrapped in seaweed and dipped in a soy/sugar sauce.

Any one else care to share their favorites?

In Japan I've had mochi with black sesame in it. It wasn't the filling, the whole large chunk was sesame. It dried out a quicker than the regular stuff. The texture was very different.

One thing I don't like about mochi is that it spoils, or should I specify, it MOLDS rather quickly.

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I love mochi too!

My favorite ways with the hard mochi (the kind that needs to be softened before eating) is definitely the soy sauce and seaweed version. I also love it toasted and then tossed into a soup bowl.

For the soft moch (the freshly made stuff), I love when it is rolled into balls, skewered brushed with a thick gloppy soy type sauce and then grilled. When I lived in the US I bought this every time I went to a Japanese store.

Then you can get into the sweet versions, topped with anko (my least favorite) unles it is the silky smooth shiro-an (white anko), I had some a month ago that was flavored with yuzu and was absolutely wonderful.

I also love these sprinkled with kinako (toasted soy flour) or topped with the black sesame paste.

Check out this site for great info on mochi:

http://metropolis.japantoday.com/tokyomini...estoriesinc.htm

Edited by torakris (log)

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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Among my airplane treats whenever I fly out of Vancouver is a box of sweet mochi. I've had the black sesame and that's close to my favourite. It reminds me of peanut butter but not too sweet. My favourite is probably the green tea. I sometimes have cravings for the marsmallowy strawberry ones, but I can only eat one of those at a time while the others are more addictive.

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Are the strawberry ones daifuku?

There is this great store just down my street that has these cafe au lait daifuku that are absolutely addicting.

We went strawberry picking last weekend and had htese wonderful strawberry daifuku with fresh cream and perfectly ripe strawberries.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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I once received a box of mochi as a gift. They were wrapped in some type of leaf ( I think bamboo) and it was half moon shaped with red bean filling. The flavor was by far more delicate than the average mochi. And I think it was made by monks. I can't remember the name. Can anyone help me out?

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I once received a box of mochi as a gift. They were wrapped in some type of leaf ( I think bamboo) and it was half moon shaped with red bean filling. The flavor was by far more delicate than the average mochi. And I think it was made by monks. I can't remember the name. Can anyone help me out?

Oh there are lots of those.

Think of mochi in Japan like cookies in the US, more varieties than you can imagine.

The ones I think you are talking about are quite popular, but were probably a meibutsu (local specialty).

Some of my favorite come out at hanami (cherry blossom viewing season) and are flavoresd with cherry blossom and wrapped in a green edible leaf.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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Kinako is my absolute favorite flavoring for mochi (but like them better with warabi-mochi, which is I believe not rice based). I can't stand the savory versions with soy sauce and nori.

The mochi in clear soup is what usually almost kills me. It's sticky as hell, difficult to cut with chopsticks and hence tempting to try to swallow whole- a dangerous mistake. I have these near death encounters thanks to mochi every New Year's day as part of the traditional O-sechi meal.

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Are the strawberry ones daifuku?

I suppose they're daifuku. The cute little containers always just say assorted mochi.

If I get a chance this weekend, I think I'll try making some savory ones at home. I have lots of glutinous rice at home, so I was thinking of starting from scratch. Or is that too labour intensive and I should just buy some mochi-ko?

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  • 7 months later...

Every day recently my kids come home from school and request 1 mochi grilled with grated cheese on top, and 1 grilled and dunked in soy and wrapped in nori.

I'm rather fond of awa-mochi, which is usually little dumplings made of mochi-grade millet, served in a thick zenzai sweet azuki soup. Very yummy, but definitely not diet food!

Regards

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Tengu (the izakaya) used to have mochi chiizu--mochi with loads of melted cheese on it. Yum!

My favourite grilled mochi is with butter and sugar--much better than the soy sauce-sugar version. But another favourite of mine is mochi-age in dashi. I remember it was only my second night in Japan and I was one of the guests of honour at a kangeikai/sobetsukai. The other guest of honour wanted mochi-age and offered me some. I almost choked on it, but I loved it!

I have a recipe somewhere for mochi lasagne. I'm sure I'd like it, too, but I have never made it.

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  • 4 months later...

Anyone have any good recipes for Mochi cakes? I make Ohagi but I'd like to try the tiny baked cakes stuffed with an.

I'd also like to try to make An Pan, or at least I believe it is called that. A loaf of soft bread stuffed with an.

-- Jason

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  • 3 months later...

I'm continuing my fascinating with mochi, and daifuku in particular. Question:

How many types of mochi and/or daifuku categories are there? Just off the newbie top of my head, I can only think of a few --- dango, daifuku with an paste, daifuku with whole beans, daifuku chopped up with soy bean powder on top (Forgetting the name right now.) Help! I'm obessed! :biggrin:

Mochi, Foi Thong and Rojak - what more can a girl want from life?

http://www.frombruneiandbeyond.com

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hhhmmm....

This could be a difficult task, I have eaten at least 10 different kinds of daifuku in this past year (I too am a daifuku freak) and I am sure you would be able to find over 50 different kinds form all over Japan. The same goes for dango, the varieties could vary form place to place.

are we talking about mochi made from the mochi-gome (mochi rice) or about things that have mochi in their title? don't forget about the "other" mochi, warabi-mochi, kuzu-mochi, etc.

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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I wonder if these links satisfy your curiosity:

http://homepage.mac.com/muse_epa1/gourmand...otoAlbum66.html

The middle one in the second row shows warabi-mochi, which is NOT made from mochi-gome but from some kind of starch (in the olden times, warabi-ko (starch made from warabi roots), and the right one in the same row shows kinako daifuku (daifuku dusted with soy flour).

http://www.konohata.com/indexpage/shopgoods.htm

In the second row are a variety of mochi sweets, to be more precise, just-pounded mochi sweets.

In the third row, you can see a variety of dango.

In the fourth row are regular daifuku, kusa daifuku (daifuku with mugwort leaves in it), and kinako daifuku, from left to right.

http://www.ict.ne.jp/gurume/strawberry/#1

A variety of ichigo (strawberry) daifuku.

This site says that Kin'eido was the first to introduce ichigo daifuku about 16 or 17 years ago, but there are other shops that claim they were the first.

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Ooooo, those pictures look good!

As to what's meant by types of mochi - I'm actually unsure, myself. Some categories appear to be clear cut (ie: dango mochi is a clear subsection), as is manju daifuku (?) (daifuku with red bean paste, right?)

But each 'flavor' of daifuku, say, would not be it's own category (I think). IE: you wouldn't call coffee au lait daifuku a different 'category' from a green tea flavored daifuku, just two variants on the same theme. So, I really don't know. But I'd love to learn....! (Kinako does appear to be it's own category, at least from what I've seen...)

--Janet

Mochi, Foi Thong and Rojak - what more can a girl want from life?

http://www.frombruneiandbeyond.com

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I found two types of daifuku, mame-daifuku 豆大福 (bean daifuku) and nama-daifuku 生大福 (daifuku with cream (probably whipping cream) in it):

豆大福

http://www.tokyo-kurenaidan.com/mamedaifuku2.htm

Click a hot spot (character string displayed in blue) containing characters 豆大福, and a photo appears.

You can see one photo of mame-mochi 豆餅, too. I like mame-mochi because it's not sweet (contains no anko). Click the hot spot 豆餅 located to the right of the fifth (last) photo. This mame-mochi is triangular. I don't know if all mame-mochi are triangular.

生大福

http://auction.msn.co.jp/item/19477371

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How about Gohei Mochi, has anyone mentioned that?

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Sorry, I did not know it was limited to sweet mochi.

I especially like Warabi mochi.

For years I worked with a Nisei lady who took me along with her family to the Nisei festival in L.A. which is coming up sometime in August.

I tried just about everything made with rice.

Knowing how much I like unusual kitchen appliances, she showed me an automatic mochi maker which I nearly bought for my collection. Unfortunately the one they had unsold had a crack in hinge on the lid, otherwise..........

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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I am not sure it is limited to sweet mochi which is the reason I was asking.

I am working on a list and it is proving a lot harder than I thought! :shock: and I hadn't even taken into account the non-sweet mochi types....

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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