One afternoon we had visitors. This is Bella the Jack Russel. She came to my garden with Liliane for Tea. This was Bella’s first time coming to our garden so she was so excited and explored everywhere. That is why she was covered with some stuff on her body.
So for the Tea I made two things. ‘Sweet Potato Muffins’ and my signature biscuit ‘Kinako Shortbread’.
I had these plums. They were organic. I was looking forward to tasting them, but was disappointed … they did not have any sweetness. How is it possible that fruits are not sweet, I wonder. So I could not eat them fresh but I had to used them. I was going to bake a cake with them but how? … Umm, OK caramelised a bit before baking!’ That was what I was thinking.
I mentioned about Japanese Summer tradition in food – ‘Chilled Ramen’ before. There is another Must-Have in Summertime in Japan. That is ‘Kakigori‘ – the Shaved Ice!
It is the same as the Chilled Ramen, ‘Kakigori’ also has a traditional Flag to decorate at the entrance of restaurants letting people know that the shop serves it. Apparently the design of this flag has been more or less the same for more than 100 years. The red part in this flag is a Japanese Kanji character ‘氷- Kori‘ which means Ice. The blue part is obviously the sea that is the symbol for Summer and also there for making you feel Cool I believe. And the green part is two birds called ‘Chidori (Plovers)’. Whenever you see this sign you feel the summer is there and you want to have some shaved ice.
This sweet might look like a normal baked Western cake. But it’s not really because …
I like steamed cake. It has a much lighter texture than a baked cake. I haven’t eaten any Japanese sweets for a while so my body started craving for something with some ‘Anko’ in it. This is how this cake was born in my kitchen.
Wow, wow wow! Can you believe it? My Blog was nominated for “Sisterhood of the World Blogger Award“. I was reading a post of Japan Can(ada) Mix by Hilary about her nomination. I was enjoying reading her answers to the questions from the previous nominee, Carissa at Everyday Asia until when I reached to the section about the people she was going to nominate. There were three blog names and one of them was … Mine! I was not expecting this at all.
So thank you Hilary, I am very honored and overwhelmed. I started my blog just four months ago without knowing what I had to do as a blogger. I like food. I love particularly making Japanese sweets so I knew I wanted to go into that direction. But it is people who give me warm words and comments that encourage me what I do now. Hilary is one of them. She takes great photos with challenges and her reports in Japanese culture from a foreign point of view are very fresh and amusing to me. I really appreciate Hilary’s praise & encouragement to my blog and hope I can come up to her expectation in a long run.
When the temperature starts rising and Summertime is coming closer, you see these kind of poster or flag at the entrance of restaurant in Japan.
It says ‘We have started serving Chilled Ramen’. Oh yes, Chilled Ramen! We like Ramen very much and we eat it cold too. It is our Summer Tradition. Summer in Japan is very hot and humid. We cannot survive without eating Chilled Ramen!
I like fruits. I love Mango. I normally eat it fresh with some yogurt or ice cream. But I wanted to make something a little bit more dessert-ish. So I combined everything Mango, Yogurt and Ice Cream.
I don’t have an Ice-cream machine and I don’t like any complicated process. I like simple food and this is very quick and easy recipe to have something very pleasant.
It is mid summer now. Even here in London it is very hot. I always have afternoon tea with a piece of cake and a cup of Earl Grey Tea or Coffee, but sometimes I rather want to have something cold instead of a hot drink during summertime.
This chilled Matcha Latte is used with Soy milk so if you are allergic to dairy or just don’t wat to have any milk products this is just the drink for you.
Have you heard of ‘Kinako’? If you like Japanese sweets, Kinako is one of the ingredients you come across occasionally. It is a yellowy powder substance that is made of Soybeans. You can make it at home but I recommend to get it from a shop because it is very hard work and also it is probably much nicer, from my experience anyway.
When I was a high school student our domestic science teacher made us study about certain Japanese food ingredients. My group chose ‘Dried Shiitake Mushroom’ and some other group chose ‘Kinako’. They made home-made Kinako and we tried tasting it during the class. I remember that it tasted quite the same as the one from the shop but the texture was far too dry and we felt almost like choking. So, you don’t have to try making it by yourself. Get it from a Japanese Food shop.
Although I haven’t manage to post ‘How to Make An/Anko’ yet (‘Tsubu-An’ Making has been posted now), I decided to go ahead with this post by thinking that presumably some readers know what ‘An/Anko‘ is and where to get it. But if you don’t know I will post how to make it shortly.
So have you heard of ‘Anko-ruffles’ before? No? You might have guessed it. Yes, it’s a made-up name from ‘Anko’ + ‘Truffle’ by me. These are Japanese Sweets I created but just look like Chocolate Truffle, don’t they? The taste and texture are completely different. This is one of the easiest Japanese Sweets to make. If you can gain some ‘An/Anko’ by either making it yourself or buying it.
‘An/Anko’ is the most essential ingredient in Japanese Sweets ‘Wagashi’. It is sweet bean paste. The one I used for this sweet is ‘Tsubu-An’ which is made from Azuki beans. If you have a little amount of ‘An’ (An is sometime called ‘Anko’. They are exactly same things) and some powder ingredients, you can make Anko-ruffles!
As the dry powder ingredients I used ‘Matcha’ Green Tea, another Japanese substance ‘Kinako’ and Chocolate Powder for this time. I will talk about ‘Matcha’ Green Tea and ‘Kinako’ in separate posts.
Sakura Junction 