Waiting for nori.... shopping fabric!

...from a very nice friend in Japan!
I haven´t been cooking much japanese food this autumn I´m afraid, but I hope to get back in the swing of things very soon!

My only purchase in the japanese stuff department has been some stationary and very nice fabric for my daughters room from
www.superbuzzy.com. Comes highly recommended, but you will shop too much!
Pictures of my 3,5 yards of medium japanese fabric from November Books coming soon.....
...and later the final result when fabric has been made into pillow and curtains for my daughters room-makeover.

Kimono day!

Sunday is kimono day in our house.... or, to be correct; yukata for me. Sadly I didn´t get a real kimono for myself in Japan... but next time I will! My daughter is just beginning to fit into hers. She looks fantastic! Never mind my bad sash knitting skills, at least I managed some kind of bow.

J has a pink child cotton kimono with sakura and chrysanthemum flowers.

I´m wearing my Hasseludden (www.yasuragi.se) yukata.

Sake

I was lucky to get hold of this bottle... Kikusakari, Kioke shikomi, Junmai Daiginjo quality. Happy times! It´s not often one can get hold of Japanese sake of good quality here. I´m also waiting for the first Norwegian sake to reach the stores, it´s under production in the south of Norway.

Shiso

Just a few pictures of this years shiso.

Spring!

Spring has been generous to my garden... I have daikon and shiso growing and will plant japanese cucumbers soon. Pictures coming!

One rose died this winter, but the replacement is now in its box and slowly growing. The surviving rose looks good too!

Inari with shiitake

Today´s Sunday treat: Inari with shiitake mushrooms and rice.

I cheated and bought ready-made inari this time.... I usually make them myself from abura-age, but the inari no-moto is so handy when you have no time for that... I managed to get some without msg, so I´m happy!

Today I used:
2,5 cups of rice: white and brown mixed
3 large, dried shiitake´s, left for 30 minutes in warm water to soften
1/2 carrot, diced
Sesame seeds, black and white mixed
Mix of mirin, soya, dashi, salt and sugar

Rice is boiled, and while this happens I cut the shiitake and carrot into strips and boil them in a mix of mirin, soya, dashi, salt and sugar.
The boiled rice is mixed with this + sesame seeds and filled into the inari.

We eat the inari with soy sauce and ginger. Yum!

Surfaced

... the shiso has finally surfaced.
I think my first seeds were planted a bit too deep, about 1.5 cm, so a few days after the first sowing, I decided to plant a few more seeds, this time just under the surface.
This has done the trick, and now I have about 10 little shiso plants on their way.
Today they´re going into larger pots.

This is the same shiso seeds I´ve been using since I got them from Japan 2 years ago,
so they keep well.

Pictures coming! Have to locate the camera....

It's that time of year again...

...planting season!

Snow is still heavy and deep on the ground.
But spring has arrived with sunny and longer days.
Little Shiso seeds will soon be planted, this year in a brand new mini greenhouse on my kitchen bench.
Stay tuned!

Daughters bento

My daughter gets her bento too! Now in a spanking new Totoro box with egg made in Hello Kitty eggshaper and Hello Kitty small bottle with drinking yoghurt! Sandwich flowers and petals.

Okara - cereal

So, what to do with all that okara? I turned mine into delicious cereal and muffins (recipe later), and then I froze down some. You'll get a lot of okara, so it's a shame to throw it all away.

I mixed 3 cups of okara with:
1 cup of rolled/cooked oats
1/2 cup of raisins
1 cup of shredded coconut
1/2-1 cup of agave syrup
1/2 cup of coconut oil

Mix well and spread on a greased baking sheet, maximum 1 inch deep. Dry it in the oven on about 150 degrees for a couple of hours. Store in a container, in the frigde to keep it longer. Eat it with milk or youghurt as breakfast.

Homemade soy milk and tofu - step by step, part 2

My first tofu.

So, after making your own soy milk from beans, you're left with about 2 liters of fresh soy milk.
It's time to turn it into tofu!
(The tofu you make at home will come out as "cotton", not "silken", just for the record.)

First, you need a box or special tofu form to press the tofu in. I made my own out of a plastic box with some holes pinched, and the lid cut a bit smaller to fit inside the box with a weight on top. Line it with a cheese cloth or similar piece of loose-woven fabric, damp from being rinsed in cold water.Heat the soy milk up until about 80-90 degrees, hot, but not boiling. Use a thermometer if you have one. Switch off the heat and add your coagulant of choice, stir a couple of times and wait. You might have to add some more, but the less, the better.

I used apple cider vinegar because I couldn't get hold of nigari or gypsum. I added about 2 tbsp to 2 liters of soy milk.
When you see the whey and the solids separate into small curds, put the lid on the kettle and wait 10-15 minutes.
Take the lid off and check the state of things. If the curds are quite large and separated from the whey, you're all good. If they're small and still kinda integrated, add a bit more coagulant and put the lid back on. If you're happy, try to get most of the whey out before scooping the curds into your tofu form. Use a sieve and a large spoon.
Spoon the curds into your form lined with sieve cloth. Your final tofu block will be about half the size of the initial mixture. You might want to pour some in, wait for it to drain some, and then add more. When all is in, wrap the cloth over the top, put the lid on and weigh it down with a can or something else heavy. Place it in a bowl or in the sink so the liquid that comes out is collected. Leave for 20 min - 1 hour depending on how hard you like the tofu.
I drained mine for about 30-40 minutes.
Carefully slide your tofu out of the form and into a bowl of cold water. Remove the sieve cloth. Take the tofu out of the water and dry it with some kitchen paper. Enjoy!
It keeps 2-3 days in the fridge if you store it in a box with water.

My bento stash

Since I've ordered some more bento stuff, I decided to check what I've got now... before it arrives. And it is some, but I sure could use more! So, it's all good! Can't wait to get the egg shaper, small bottles and Totoro bento box!

From left: Furoshiki x2, drawstring bag, rabbit 2 tier box, Hello Kitty single box, ongri box x2, bento onigri box, 2 tier bentobox with shut-close lid, small boxes inkl. Hello Kitty mayo box with spoon, silicone shapes, training chopsticks for my daughter, vegetable cutters in various shapes, animal pins for food, nori stapler.

My bento equipment has been bought at Tokyo Hands in Tokyo and from J-box online. Plus a few household items from Norway like silicone molds, heart cutters, etc.

ps. most of this is my daughters! If you were wondering....

Bacon tofu!

Turkey wrapped tofu with soya sauce!

Yes, we got tofu, and now we must eat it! (Part 2 of tofu making is coming soon....)

And what better way to eat this all vegetarian treat than to wrap it in.... bacon? You got to love Japan!
Anyway, as I didn't have any bacon I decided to make turkey wrapped tofu instead...

You do it like this:
Put a block of tofu in kitchen paper, put a weight (plate) on top and drain it for about 30 minutes. Cut the tofu into bite size pieces.

Cut bacon or turkey into pieces that match the tofu pieces and wrap them. Fry in a pan until crisp.
For a traditional sauce put some soya in the pan with 2 tbsp of brown sugar and cook until a thick sauce. Add the tofu pieces. Eat with rice and vegetables. Or put it in your bento box.

Yum!

Homemade soya milk and tofu - step by step, part 1

First of all, thanks to one of my favorite bloggers at http://www.justhungry.com/ I got the overview on tofu making. I couldn't get hold of nigari or gypsum, so after further research I decided to try Apple cider vinegar as a coagulant. And it worked just fine! I'm working on getting hold of nigari though.

If anyone knows a store that ships nigari to Norway, please leave a comment!

So here's how I did it:

First I made soya milk. This is step 1:

I bought soya beans and soaked them aprox. 20 hrs. I could've soaked them less, but I had to go to work! I used 500 grams of dried beans.

This is how dry and soaked soya beans look like (I actually didn't know!):










The soaked beans goes in a food processor with enough cold water to just cover them. Depending on your food processor (I got a very small one) you might have to do this in batches. Pulse on full spead for 2-3 minutes untill you get a foamy white mass. Put this into a large pan.













When all the beans have been processed, measure the amount of soya mass and fill the same quantity of water in the pan.
My bag of 500 grams dry soya beans gave me about 2.5 liters of mashed soya foam...












Put it on the heat and let it boil. At this point it'll probably start foaming a lot. If the foam reaches the edge of your pan - pour some cold water on it and stir. Or take it off the heat a bit. After a while the foam will subside and your soya beans + water should be left to simmer for aprox. 20 minutes. Stir it now and then.











The soya grain (okara) will separate from the milk and all that is left now is to strain the liquid. Pour it through a sieve cloth and squeese it with a big ladle or your hands (it's hot!).











Voila: soya milk! Use this as you normaly would use soya milk, it keeps for 2-3 days in the fridge. Or make tofu.... see part 2! Picture shows the fresh soya milk and the okara that was left after sieving.

Don't throw away the okara! It's great stuff, full of nuticious value, so keep it for baking etc. Recipes coming... Dry it in the oven on low heat or freeze it for later use. It keeps fresh in the fridge for a couple of days.

Homemade tofu

Well, homemade tofu is on it's way. I've put soya beans in water to soak tonight, and tomorrow I'll complete the making of soya milk... then I'm just one mold and the right coagulant away from tofu!

Stay tuned - to be updated!

The recipe:
500 gram of dried soya beans - soak in water overnight, rinse, soak again (max. 24 hrs)

16 cups of water

1 teaspoon nigari or other coagulant, like vinegar, lemon, gypsum.... working on this

Cheese cloth
Tofu mold (square mold with weight on top)

........ fingers crossed!

14.01.10:
Yes! It's done... more pictures and instructions coming!