The last post on the theme of easy Japanese dishes features a Japanese version of the classic Western hamburger, hambagu, or hamburger steak patty. I'm including a couple of miso soups, a vegetable side dish and some pudding (or purin, in Japanese) to finish things off.

The recipe for the hamburger comes from TabiEats and it was meant to be used ( Read more... )

Inari sushi are one of my favourite specialty sushi at the all-you-can-eat sushi restaurants I frequent. If you're watching your pocket book, however, they're a snap to make at home with just a few ingredients. Traditionally filled with cooked and seasoned sushi rice, they may be served plain or topped with egg salad, tuna salad or a variety of ( Read more... )

I recently came home with a bag full of goodies from a local Japanese grocery store I visit occasionally. Along with the canned inari-zushi on my list, I also picked up a package of dashi granules, a stick of kamaboko (cured surimi or fish paste), in the pretty white and pink swirl Naruto-maki style, and a tub of gochujang (Korean red chile pepper ( Read more... )

As I've mentioned in previous posts, pork is one of the most inexpensive proteins available in Ontario. At less than $2 a pound, on sale, you can get a lot of good meals out of a pork butt (transformed into pulled pork) or a brined loin (peameal bacon roast ( Read more... )

A recent purchase of a bundle of kale and a sparse pantry led to some net surfing where I ran across a recipe for this hearty version of miso soup ( Read more... )

I'm a proud carnivore but every once in a while I bring home a tub of tofu and make something relatively 'healthy' with it.

To date, "Mapo Tofu" is my favourite way of eating this soy product, though cubes of tofu added to miso or hot and sour soup are tasty as well.

NOTE: Baking is a healthier option in making this dish, than the one I chose, ( Read more... )

Inari sushi or pockets of fried tofu are filled traditionally with sushi rice, as I've done here and here and somen noodles or non-traditionally with grains such as quinoa. You could even use couscous if you wished, I think ( Read more... )

After a late start to my day, I made a batch of refried beans. Three cups will go into my freezer while the last one will be used up this week.


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Nami, of "Just One Cookbook", recently posted a round-up of 15 easy Japanese side dishes and the mashed tofu salad (shira-ae) caught my interest. Although she used green beans, I don't care for them, so I substituted one of my favourite vegetables, broccoli. Other possible vegetables include julienned carrots, spinach and broccolini ( Read more... )

ETA: I needed chicken stock for the mapo tofu and didn't want to use a bouillon cube so I used a combination of the Thanksgiving turkey and various chicken carcasses from my freezer to make stock yesterday. I ended up with 14 cups of stock and used 4 of them for a pot of leek and wonton (chicken and bacon) soup. I added a picture to the bottom of ( Read more... )