eG Foodblog: torakris - a week of fun in Japan

[torakris]

I finished breakfast:

and

no comment needed......

[Jake]

You could've fooled us and said you cut the crusts off for the kids! Or perhaps you were recreating a version of English tea sandwiches??

[torakris]

This morning had had my second adult English conversation class, this class is easier than the Tuesday class as most of the women have lived abroad and actually speak quite well. Today I served cold oksusu-cha, Korean roasted corn tea.

we had a thread on it a while back:

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...st=0&p=246811

After the class I went grocery shopping to buy ingredients for my cooking class tomorrow and I picked up a prepared lunch there, I am eating it now. pictures to come!

At the store I had three samples of bread, one with sweet potatoes, one with raisins and walnuts, and one with black beans....

[torakris]

Weds lunch

tendon, short for tempura donburi. this one had shrimp, squid, kabocha squash and sweet potato

sanma (saury pike) sushi topped with scallions and ginger

I also had a large glass of water

[Phish]

It's coming along great Kris... Im having a blast looking at all the photo's!!

Btw, silly question....did you buy the Tendon? or did you make it?

[torakris]

It's coming along great Kris...  Im having a blast looking at all the photo's!!

Btw, silly question....did you buy the Tendon? or did you make it? 

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bought it!

tendon isn't something I think I would ever make......

I hate dishes that require a variety of different cooking methods, I am too lazy...

[torakris]

Mia (in 3rd grade) told me at 7:00am this morning that she needed a sankaku-jogi to take to school today. I, for the life of me, can not remember the English name for this.... it is the triangle shaped ruler. Anyway it isn't something I have in the house, so I called my neighbor, who has an older daughter, to see if she had one we could borrow. Luckily she did, so I went out this afternoon to look for one for Mia to take tomorrow. Unfortunately it seems that every 3rd grader in the city of Yokohama needed it today as it took going to 4 stores to find one that had them in stock.

I t was such a gorgeous day though so I didn't mind driving all around in the car, windows down, hair blowing, Aerosmith blasting from the CD player.....

My kids demanded a 3:00 oyatsu (snack) so I pulled out a cookie I picked up at the store today that I had been discussing early in the day on the okashi thread.

It is called all-adzuki, and it is a cookie with adzuki beans inside, it was very good and I will definitely be buying it again.

I have also been drinking a lot of water as I think I am coming down with something and my throat is sore.....

[torakris]

well as promised I cooked curry tonight and my kids couldn't have been happier.

This what I like to put in my curry

potatoes, carrots, lots of onions, thinly sliced pork and a box of curry roux

When my kids were smaller and had problem with this cut of meat, I always made my curry with ground pork or a mixture of ground beef and pork. Other people prefer it with cubed meat, either beef, pork or chicken.

first I saute the onions

then I saute the meat for a bit and add the potatoes and carrots and saute a bit more

then you add water (the amount should be written on the box of roux) and bring just to a boil, skimming the skum off

then lower the heat and simmer until the potatoes and carrots are almost tender, then you turn off the heat and add the roux cubes

mix it well, there is nothing worse than chunk of grainy roux in your mouth! turn the heat back to low and simmer again, I do it for about 10 more minutes.

Then serve by placing a portoin of rice in a dish and placing a couple scoops of curry either next to it or on top of it. My husband likes it on top , but I prefer it next to the rice..... Garnish with what ever you like! I love my curry with finely shredded cabbage and rakkyou (a type of bulb onion that has been pickled.

no dessert tonight.....

[bleudauvergne]

That looks delicious. I am wondering if I can find this curry cube at my local Asian grocery to try it out.

Thank you for sharing your week so far with us, Kristin. I hope your throat feels better!

[torakris]

That looks delicious.  I am wondering if I can find this curry cube at my local Asian grocery to try it out. 

Thank you for sharing your week so far with us, Kristin.  I hope your throat feels better!

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I can't imagine an Asian store NOT carrying it!

There are various brands, House, S&B, etc and different heat levels, on either the front or back of the box their is usually a heat scale ranging from like 1 to 5 or 6. 1 being the mildest, the one I used today is a chuu-kara (中辛) type and that is medium or a level 3.

The mildest ones should say ama-kuchi (甘口） and the spiciest will say kara-kuchi (辛口).

[Hiroyuki]

rakkyou (a type of bulb onion that has been pickled.

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No fukujin zuke...

[spaghetttti]

Oh, happy day! Kristin, it will be so thrilling to read your encore blog this week. It looks great and the photos are fabulous!

Mia (in 3rd grade) told me at 7:00am this morning that she needed a sankaku-jogi to take to school today. I, for the life of me, can not remember the English name for this.... it is the triangle shaped ruler.

Were you perhaps thinking of a protractor (they come in triangular form, don't they?) that Mia needed for school today?

Edited October 6, 2004 by spaghetttti (log)

[bloviatrix]

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One thing I've noticed in your photos is that english frequently appears on food packaging. Why is that?

[Palladion]

Were you perhaps thinking of a protractor (they come in triangular form, don't they?) that Mia needed for school today?

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I believe that she's talking about a drafting triangle, or sometimes just called a triangle, which is used in drafting and other kinds of precision drawing. There are different types, classified by the angles of the triangle. The common ones are 30-60-90 and 45-45-90

Drafting triangle picture

...anyway, I didn't notice until just now that you were doing the foodblog again, Kristin. Looks wonderful so far, and there's already a couple things that I want to try (the one that really jumped out at me was the kurigohan no moto, as I like kuri gohan (we just had it for school lunch today, too) but don't want to go through the trouble of shelling all those chestnuts... I'll be keeping my eyes open for it.)

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Alex Parker

[Laksa]

One thing I've noticed in your photos is that english frequently appears on food packaging.  Why is that?

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The English that appears on Japanese packaging -- I mean the frivolous kind, not cooking instructions or ingredients -- can be rather amusing.

For example:

Are you chic enough to enjoy Cream de Pie?

Sorry for the diversion from a very nice blog.

[Palladion]

One thing I've noticed in your photos is that english frequently appears on food packaging.  Why is that?

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It's cool! English is used in all sorts of places and on all sorts of products here in Japan. Not being Japanese myself, I can't tell you exactly how it's perceived, but from what I've read, it can lend a certain hipness or a touch of class, depending on how it's used. One thing that I've long wondered about, but have never actually gotten around to asking a Japanese person, is what percentage of the English used in advertising and marketting can the average Japanese person understand.

From where I'm sitting in front of my computer, I can see a box of tissues and a container of hair gel that both use English words as the main focus of attention in their visual design.

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Alex Parker

[eunny jang]

www.engrish.com

:laugh:

edit: html tags exist for a reason

Edited October 6, 2004 by eunny jang (log)

[TotallyNutz]

Hi Kris

I'm totally loving this blog and I'm glad you're blogging again. I loved, loved, loved the New Year's blog. I actually felt I was in Japan.

Keep it coming!

[jhlurie]

One thing I've noticed in your photos is that english frequently appears on food packaging.  Why is that?

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Ah... he asks setting himself up for a deluge of answers about engrish.com and the strange history of English on Japanese products...

I just went to my neighborhood import-filled Japanese grocery yesterday (the overpriced but convenient Mitsuwa right outside of NYC, in Edgewater, NJ). There's tons of English on the import packages--and NOT just on the importing and American-market nutrition labels slapped on after the fact. Especially on the snack food...

For example, here's a new Pocky variant called "Reverse":

The English name is large and prominent on the front and sides of the box, while the Japanese explanatory text is relatively low key. The English does, in fact, appear to be more of a graphic design than anything else.

But if you look on the BACK of the package? Except for the importing/nutrition label, it's ALL Japanese. This is pretty typical from what I've seen (actually a MUCH closer inspection shows that, quite logically, the one piece of English on the back is the Glico web address ).

P.S. - Here's the location of our usual Pocky thread, where no doubt I'll discuss "Reverse" a bit more...

[Dejah]

Kris,

Thanks for the entry and photos on the curry dish.

I will make that for Taka tomorrow...with chicken as I have the meat on hand. As I don't have any curry roux, I am sure I can make do with adding curry spices, then thicken with my usual stew slurry of half flour and half cornstarch.

I made some curry beef fried rice with leftover beef, rice, green onions, diced green beans. It was good. I saved a container but my daughter raided the fridge! So my student had BBQ steak and potatoes for lunch today.

We've contacted his homestay mother, so I may not be making food for Taka much longer. I'll get that curry in tho' .

[Hiroyuki]

as I like kuri gohan (we just had it for school lunch today, too)

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I like kuri okowa (glutinous rice plus chestnuts) much better than kuri gohan (ordinary rice plus chestnuts).

[saskanuck]

Kris, what a great blog! You make such interesting and tasty-looking food.

Now I'm off to read your previous blog, as I wasn't around back then.

[torakris]

No fukujin zuke...

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I had no fukujinzuke in the house and I forgot to buy it!

[torakris]

by the way, it is 7:00am Thursday morning and I am having an iced coffee, the kids had oatmeal (Mia) and peanut butter sandwiches (Julia and Hide), there are no leftovers to nibble on.....

guess I will actually have to go make something...

[torakris]

I believe that she's talking about a drafting triangle, or sometimes just called a triangle, which is used in drafting and other kinds of precision drawing. There are different types, classified by the angles of the triangle. The common ones are 30-60-90 and 45-45-90

Drafting triangle picture

...

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I guess it is a drafting triangle, actually protractor was the word I was searching for, but now when I looked at pictures on the net I realized that is that half circle thing-a-ma-jig. oh well I was never very good at math anyway...