03 August 2006

Why you should get a flog.

This flog (food-blog) started out innocently just as a convenient recipe diary. I figured, since I was pretty hooked to the internet, I might as well have an online diary for all the recipes I had tried and that worked.

I had multiple kitchen diaries before this flog and goodness knows where they are now. I'm such a scatterbrain and lazy-ass, that none of them stuck with me for more than 5 recipes. Imagine all the money wasted on the numerous notebooks.

This flog evolved into more than just something personal, but something I use to share recipes and lives with others. I've gotten to know so many people through this blog alone, a few of which I email back and forth. Some may just have an interest in the food, while others have a more serious inclination towards the cooking. An exceptional few strive for such excellence in all aspects of kitchen-ery that it inspires me to aim higher and go further.

One particular Singaporean girl in Japan, whom I got to know through this flog, has been emailing me more frequently recently. It seems like she (T) has taken a new found interest in bringing her cooking/baking up a notch by trying more adventurous recipes. She has also shared a couple of Japanese recipes with me, all of which were painless to prepare yet tremendously yummy.

I haven't been cooking much recently, mostly because my family just doesn't have time to get together for dinner. It requires much coordination and many sms-es before a normal family dinner can happen. Frankly, it gets tiring after a while since I usually end up being the middle-(wo)man. Which is why, when we do get together, we try to make dinner a little better than average.

Yesterday, I decided to just get my hands dirty and cook dinner for whoever would come home for dinner. The good thing about one of the recipes that T recommended is that it keeps well. Unlike risotto or souffles which need to be served immediately, this nimono (simmered dish) can be kept and reheated just before serving. Even better, it can be put together in a few steps and adapted to your palate.


And so I included onions, pumpkin, oyster mushrooms and enokitake (long japanese mushrooms). Served on a portion of rice (preferably Japanese), and topped off with some bonito flakes, it was ultra-comforting.

Imagine running around all day because of work, and finally going home to a big, hearty bowl of rice with stew. That's precisely how my parents felt. Of course it didn't hurt to have a side dish of simple salad as well.

I really, really appreciated T's recipes, but that's not the only reason why you should get a flog.

Imagine your ecstasy when you return home (also after a hard day of work) to a big parcel filled with loads of Japanese goodies that had pieces of notes stuck to each one of them, explaining what each packet contained.

T even sent me a frother! Some curry cup noodles, which I imagine to be really different from our local curry flavour, some wakame, miso soup, various Japanese snacks, bonito flakes (!), tabi socks (!!!) and many more. The most interesting had to be the matcha salt that I had never heard of before, but am eager to try out.

Has that convinced you to start a flog now? =)


Stewed Potatoes (jyagaimo-ni)

Ingredients
1 tbspn oil
3 potatoes, cubed into bite sized pieces and soak for 5 mins
1 onion, sliced into thick rings
a portion of pumpkin, half the weight of potatoes and cubed into bite sized pieces and soak for 5 mins
1 tbspn sugar
2 tbspn light soy sauce
2 tbspn mirin
about 12 pieces of oyster mushrooms
1 small packet of enokitake

Method
Saute potatoes and pumpkin in oil in a deep frying pan until surface is slightly crisp.
Add onions, sugar, soy sauce, mirin and enough water to cover half the height of ingredients.
Cover with oyster mushrooms and enokitake.(*)
When water boils, reduce heat to a simmer until all liquid evaporates.(**)

* Covering the pan with a lid would slow down the process since the liquid should be evaporating, so covering the stew with mushrooms would act as a buffer. The mushrooms cook, and at the same time you're retaining some of the liquid, so this method effectively kills two birds with one stone! Alternatively, you could use a stewing lid that the Japanese use. Is a metal lid with small holes.

**As I love my stew to be saucy, I left some liquid behind and thickened it with a little cornstarch instead.

4 comments:

Colin said...

Another reason, of course, is to get invited to food blogger lunches and dinners.

Anonymous said...

Ah yes, but of course!

thisisnaive said...

Nice tip there with the mushrooms! I also read that they use a wooden lid that sits directly on the food. I thought it was very strange at first...

Anonymous said...

I wouldn't really encourage using a wooden lid for hygienic purposes, but a metal lid, like the one T sent me is really good. =) I hope you can get one! If not, mushrooms are a really good stand in.