So it is officially Autumn now. Whilst I stayed in Japan I had a chance of eating ‘Kuri Gohan (Rice with Chestnuts)’ twice. It is one of the seasonal food you MUST have in Autumn.
I visited a famous land of ‘Kuri (Chestnut)’. I spotted great looking Chestnuts sold at a tiny train station so I brought some back home.
In the heart of Nagoya in Japan I found a very old-fashioned ‘Ramen’ shop in the basement of a building. Ramen shops in London try to look fashionable (and charge more) but all the Ramen shops used to be like this shop in very retro style when I was a child. It looked so nostalgic and I could not resist going inside …
The 21st of September was ‘Respect for the Aged Day (敬老の日)’ this year in Japan. It was one of the National Holidays for showing our respect and care for elderly people.
We ordered some Bento from a well known restaurant for my mother on ‘Respect for the Aged Day (敬老の日)’. The Bento was particularly planned for elderly people with the idea of 1. Easy to eat 2. with good source of various nutrients and 3. of course it had to be good quality food. We made a clear soup called ‘O-suimono‘ to go with it.
The ingredients and decoration was made in an Autumn theme. The amount of food was just enough ‘Hara Hachibunme (腹八分目）’ (‘Hara’=stomach, ‘Hachibunme’=80%) for us. It means moderate eating up to 80 percent in stomach is the key for a healthy life.
Why?
Today is the 2nd of October. In Japan month comes before date so today’s date is the 10th month (October) and the 2nd day. In Japan we have several ways in reading number. We read ‘10’ as ‘To(u)’ and ‘2’ as ‘Fu’ in some reading. By connecting both it becomes ‘To-Fu’. That is why it is ‘TOFU’ Day today. You got it? It is a silly pun playing on words but it’s good to remind people about certain foods & things and make people appreciate what we have. 🙂
So my fist post after ‘How to Make Tsubu-An’ is ‘Tai-Yaki’. It is one of the most popular street foods in Japan. The name ‘Tai’ means ‘Sea Bream’ and ‘Yaki’ means ‘something baked or grilled’ in Japanese. Although it is called ‘Tai/Bream’ it has sweet filling, which is normally bean paste, and not having any fish at all. It is just a fish shaped sweet.
It is a waffle like sweet filled with traditionally ‘Tsubu-An‘ centre. Recently people started using some new fillings but Tsubu-An is still the most popular one. That is just because it is the best combination & simply delicious.
Tai-yaki with Tsubu-An & ‘Shiratama (mochi)’ filling
Hooray! I can finally post ‘How to Make Tsubu-An’ here, so after this post I will be able to start making more Japanese Sweets and post on this blog.
As I mentioned before ‘An’ (or ’Anko’, they are same thing) is the main component of Japanese Sweets. It is normally a sweet paste made of beans. There are mainly three types of An (Anko) used for Japanese Sweets and they are ‘Tsubu-An’, ‘Koshi-An’ and ‘Shiro-An’.
‘Tsubu-An’ has Azuki bean’s skin left and not sieved so it’s got more of a coarse texture among all the other ‘Anko’. And maybe because of this coarseness it is tended to be used for more casual Sweets. It needs less procedure to make Tsubu-An but that is not the reason I make this type more often. I like Tsubu-An’s texture the most. It is very versatile. If you are interested in making Japanese Sweets, Tsubu-An making is the great place to start.
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!
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 