Welcome to my blog.

After a few random posts I've decided to dedicate this blog to my life long project of Japanese food
and culture (and my life in general, especially my travels).

Since my first taste of sushi back in 1997 I've been interested in, and frequently been making
Japanese food.
My interest in the country and culture started long before and continues to evolve.
I was lucky to finally visit Japan in October 2008, again in November 2019 and hope to be back soon.
In July 2012 I visited Japantown in San Fransisco, the next best thing!
I was lucky to be back in 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2019 thanks to the fact that we now have family living in California.
Both small and big adventures will from now on, as time permits, be shared with you.

I will post other recipes and pictures too, mainly cooking projects, plants and art projects
(including my new love - making kumihimo braided objects).

I hope you'll find it interesting, and feel free to leave a comment or ask questions!

I write mainly in English, but there will be some Norwegian too, especially posts about things
that mainly have Norwegian interest. Tutorials are bi-lingual.

Sunday 30 August 2009

2.flowering of roses

My lovely Heritage is flowering for the 2nd time, even more fragant and pink than the first time. Good times in the garden!


Weekend treat: Maki


This weekend I decided to spoil Mr.Linuz with maki, as it is one of his favorite food.
Maki really is very simple, once you got some decent sushi rice going, it's just about filling and cutting. We choose salmon (sake), scallops (hottate gai) and trout caviar (ikura) this time. I'd gotten hold of 1.class Salma salmon, so fresh you don't have to freeze it before you eat it raw.
I also made a small sashimi starter; salmon sliced with caviar and ponzu sauce.

For the maki you need:
Sushi rice, about 3 cups, uncooked
Sheets of nori
Seafood and vegetables to fill, I used rew salmon, raw scallops, trout caviar, boiled aspargus, sticks of cucumber, wasabi and mayonaise.

Rice
3 cups of sushi rice (I've got a steamcooker, so I just wash it, put it in with required water and push "cook"), if you don't have one, it's about 3 cups of water to 3 cups of washed and soaked rice (20 min) + a small sheet of kombu in the cooking water if you'd like. Let it boil up under a lid, switch the heat all the way down and cook under a lid for 20 min. Rest the rice 10 min.

The cooked rice goes into a hangiri or another large bowl for cooling. Pour over sushi-zu (3 tbsp rice vinegar brought to boil with 1 tbsp sugar and 1 tsp salt, cooled down) and flip the rice over with a spatula to mix it. Let it cool. Put a wet towel over the bowl to keep it moist.

Maki
Put a nori sheet on a rolling mat covered with plastic. Put an amount of rice on the nori sheet to cover about 3/4 of it, add filling in the middle of the rice. Grab one end of mat and fold into a roll. Squeese the mat to make it real round. Cut in 6 or 8 pieces.

Saturday 8 August 2009

Cold noodles

Yesterday I made some real Japanese summer food. It hardly requires a recipe, you just boil noodles, cool them off, mix some dipping soup and some garnish. This is great food if you don't feel like eating at all. In Japan they sometimes serve this in a bowl with ice cubes or in a running stream of water!


I "cheated" and bought ready-made menmi (dipping soup) that only needs to be mixed with 3 parts of water. If you want to make your own, try this recipe: 1 cup of dashi, 1/3 cup of mirin, 1/3 cup of soya. Heat the mirin in a pan, add soya and dashi. Bring to boil and cool down. Dillute with water if you like, and add garnish like ginger, chopped onions and shiso.


With our cold soba noodles (buckwheat), we had carrots, cucumber, omelet strips, ham and silken tofu.
Mr. Linuz really liked it, and he added some cold, grilled salmon from the day before as well. We also added some red shiso to the menmi.

Japanese grocery shopping


Vacation is over, and it's time to fill up the closet/fridge/freezer! From left: Rice snacks for kids, bottle of menmi, 2 types of miso, konyaku, umeboshi, soba noodles, cold tea drink, tofu, rice vinegar, mirin, frozen lotus root and inari!