My window

sugar, wakame, tempura flour, shiitake, bonito, sesame seeds, tea

Stocking up on necessities!

Sauteed chicken and tamago yaki

One of our everyday Japanese meals; chicken marinated in soya, mirin, sake, salt and sugar.

It's about 500 gr of chicken thighs with skin on, marinating in a tbsp each of the above mentioned ingredients. Fried in wok with the excess marinade, and that's it!

Served with shredded cabbage, rice, soup, pickles. The soup is chicken stock from the chicken bones with a bit of white miso, wakame and shiitake mushrooms.

As a starter we had salmon sashimi with ponzu dressing and carrots.

Oh, and for my sister I'm posting recipe for tamago yaki:
This is for a large omelet, feel free to halve it, I usually do, as I have a small pan:

Tamago yaki

6 eggs
1,25 dl dashi (Japanese fish stock)
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp salt
1 tbsp sake
1 tbsp mirin (or replace with sugar)

1 tbsp oil

Mix eggs with the other ingredients, heat a pan. Oil the pan with a paper towel dipped in oil.
Pour in 1/3 of the mixture. When it sets, fold the omelet as a roll towards one end of the pan.
Pour in another 1/3 of mixture, lift the rolled omelet to let mixture under, let it set. Repeat with the last part of mixture. Leave to cool and cut in shape if you're using a circular pan.

Growing shiso (perilla)

Good news... the first shiso shots have surfaced! I guess it's about 30-40 sprouts that have surfaced now. It looks really good, just like last year.

Soon I'll replant them in individual pots and they'll grow nice and big. Happy times for me and the other 3 that are waiting for their plants.

If the nice weather continues and spring really is here, I'll try to plant daikon next week.

Hang in there for exciting updates!!

Various cooking this week, bento and lotus root

Yum! Lotus root chips.....

This week has included two days of bento at work, tonkatsu and making lotus root chips. My daughter went crazy for thoose chips! Will do them again now that I've found fresh lotus root here in Oslo. It wasn't so large, but it made great chips!

Bento with rice, tamago, pickles, chicken, carrots and cabbage.
The day after I had rice, pickles, bok choy, chicken and some aloe vera segments as well.








All wrapped up in my furoshiki and ready to go!








Slicing lotus root on my newly bought mandoline. I peeled the root and left it in water with some vinegar to prevent it from colouring.









Cooking lotus root chips in sunflower oil.

Green tea ice cream

Ok, this is my first attempt making this ice cream. I thought I'd start a new post with the pictures.

Here's my ingredients all lined up. Organic milk and eggs. Matcha from Japan. Very few ingredients and a quite simple recipe.










I whipped the eggs with sugar and milk over a pan of boiling water. I stirred quite a while. Then cooled it down in a bowl of cold water and added the dissolved matcha.
Amazing colors!






The final whipped cream goes in, gave it a stir and off to be frozen in a plastic container.








This is how it looked after the second stirring. It's very creamy already. Maybe it'll be done tonight?







And here's our dinner by the way... maki with shrimps and california rolls + inari (my favorite). Very lavish on a Monday, but hey...






The result: (It was good, good! I've stopped myself from eating it all...)

Trip to Japan, oct 08

Long overdue... posting a few pictures from my trip to Japan in October 2008.
We landed at Kansai airport and spent time in Osaka and Kyoto before heading for 2 days in Naoshima island. A wonderful, wonderful place filled with art, architecture, good food and peace... Sadly, we had to leave, and finished our trip in Tokyo, which was exiting as well. But not that peaceful...


Here's our hotel in Naoshima, design Tadao Ando. One of his few wooden buildings. And the beach....







View from my veranda. Our first day was sunny, but the next was overcast and pretty windy. Still, it was very pleasant weather for October! In Norway it was rain and +5 degrees...









One of the many art pieces around the island. A Shinto shrine in a new interpretation.











In Naoshima Ferry terminal I found this interesting display of local seafood.. I didn't get any of this, but I got some really nice nori, locally made. Even my 3 year-old loves that nori....

Japanese cooking, part 1

After reading a blog called Tess´s Japanese Kitchen while looking for a recipe, I've decided to post some of my ventures into the world of Japanese cooking as well.

I get recipes several places, from cookbooks, online, from my Japanese colleague...

My first project this week will be: Green tea ice cream + planting shiso (perilla).
I planted shiso last year with much luck, but sadly my plants died in the fall before I got to freeze anything or conserve it. This year I will plant daikon as well, with seeds I brought from Japan.

Green tea ice cream

2 egg yolks
5 tbsp sugar
3/4 cup of milk
3/4 cup heavy cream
1 tbsp green tea powder
3 tbsp hot water

Dissolve tea in water, set aside.
In a bowl, whisk eggs and sugar. Put the bowl over medium heat and add milk.
Whisk until thickening. Let it cool and add green tea mixture. Add whipped cream
and freeze in ice cream-maker or freezer.

Pictures in separate post above.

Monday 16.03.:
The ice cream is now well on it's way. I've stirred it twice, and had a small taste. It's fabulous! Can't wait to have a BIG scoop. This is one of the things I really miss from Japan...

Planting shiso (perilla)

Planting is set for Wednesday.
Got my seeds and pots ready, I'll get soil tomorrow.

19.03.09:
The seeds are planted. I'll post pictures when the first sprouts surface. I tried to repeat what I did last year when I got such a good result. We live in a different house now, so my window is angeled different, but I hope there will be enough sun anyway.

Daikon seeds to be planted a bit later in the spring.

Bento box

Happiness
my new bento box and furoshiki cloth
yellow tamago, orange carrots, green nuts and brown tuna
little rabbits on the lid
remembering where I'd bought it, Tokyo
we'll meet again soon
I've left a suitcase

Live a litle!

Yesterday I was on the bus when two old ladies enters it through the back door. They sit down, get their tickets out to stamp them, but can´t see a ticket stamping machine anywhere. They look confused and starts discussing: "Wonder where I have to stamp my ticket. All the way in the front I suppose. Well, I´m not walking over there while the bus is moving. Me neither... But we should stamp, right, we should..." At this point they turn to me and ask for the machine, and I confirm their suspicions about it´s placement. I quickly add: "Are you going far then?" I was about to take their tickets and stamp for them.. "One more stop, or actually, not the next, but one more." "Aha, then I´d skip it. Who would suspect two nice ladies like you to hitch a free ride on the bus?" They giggle nervously. "Come on, live a litle!" We all get off at the next stop and I can´t help but making one last remark: "Now, that went fine, didn´t it?" "But don´t make a habit out of it!" I added with a smile. "No, no.... never!"

My word of the day: Old ladies everywhere: Live a litle, do something illegal today!

My life

My life

Wake up, clean up
Organize, run, hurry, run
Quick kiss
Work
Run
Run to the busstop, run for the tram... run
Short moment
Play, happiness
Trying to make contact
Laugh
Off to the store, shop, carry, run, run...
Laudry
Clean up, clean up
Sleep, wake up, sleep, wake up
Clean up
Laundry

Repeat.