Roasted pork ramen noodle

A ramen restaurant opened in Boston recently.  It's really famous and popular so everyday so long line is in front of the restaurant.  Actually one of my friends was in the line over 3 hours!  I am sure it must taste good but can't wait for hours outside such a cold day (almost frozen...)

Still I want to eat ramen!  I went to ramen places one a week when I was in Japan but since I came to Boston, I've never been.  That's why I made ramen by myself with a roasted pork I made the day before yesterday.

Roasted pork ramen noodle (1 serve)

• 1 pack of ramen noodle
• pork soup stock from Japanese braised pork
• soy sauce
• chinese chicken soup stock
• braised pork
• seaweed sheet
• canned corn
• dried wakame seaweed
• menma
• green onion

1,  Soak dried wakame seaweed in cold water for the time package says.  Cut green onion into thin slices.  Cut Japanese braised pork into thick slices.

2,  Boil the pork soup stock and add soy sauce and chinese soup stock as much as you like.

3,  Boil the ramen noodle for the time package says.  Put boiled soba up to a colander then put in a ramen bowl.

4,  Pour the pork soup to the ramen bowl and place wakame, pork, corn, seaweed sheet, menma and green onion on the ramen noodle.

I was so surprised that it was close to the ramen I had at ramen places in Japan!  Perhaps, better than that..., haha:))  Anyway, it was nice to have ramen in a warm room such a cold day without long line!! 

Japanese braised pork (Buta-kakuni)

This evening became so cold suddenly.  The temperature was almost 32°F!  It supposed to be much colder next week.  So sad, what should I do such a cold day... ;(  In cold season, I am easy to catch a cold so tonight I made some sustaining food!

Actually it takes long time like more than 2 hour.  But it doesn't mean difficult because you don't have to watch carefully during cooking.  Even if you don't want to wait for along time, you must realize that it deserves to wait when you eat it because taste so good!!!

Japanese braised pork (called But a-kakuni) (4〜5 serves)

• 2 pound of pork belly
• 1 leek
• corn starch
• 2 cups of water (☆)
• 3 Tbs of soy sauce (☆)
• 3 Tbs of mirin (☆)
• 1 Tbs of grated ginger (☆)
• 5  pieces of crashed garlics (☆)

1,  Cut pork belly into big pieces and coat it with potato starch.  If the pork belly has big bones, just remove and coat with potato starch also.

2,  Heat a pan and sesame oil until quite hot then pan-broil pork belly until all full faces become brown.

3,  Remove the pork to a pot and add just enough water to cover the pork and leek.  Boil it for 1 hour with low-fire.  After that, you can use this liquid as a pork soup stock.

4,  Remove the pork to another pot.  Add  (☆)  and cover with aluminum foil and boil for 1 hour with low-fire.

Pork belly looks like it has a lot of fat but you can remove almost fat during boiling in water so actually this dish is really healthy and has a lot of collagen which is good for your skin!

It was so soft that I didn't need to cut with a knife.  I could cut it just with chopsticks!!

I already decided that I'm gonna make ramen with this braised pork and soup tomorrow!  It's gonna be so tasty.  Can't wait!!

Pork salad with Japanese style onion dressing

I couldn't sleep well last night so was sooo sleepy today.  I needed to take a nap so couldn't join any Halloween parties, which made me so sad because I was looking forward to the party since I came here in Boston.  So tonight I just made a salad as dinner.  Poor Halloween night...;(

Pork salad with Japanese style onion dressing (2 serves) 

• any vegetable for salad
• thin sliced pork
• 1/2 onion
• 4 Tbs of ponzu
• 2 Tbs of olive oil

1,  Cut vegetables into small pieces or thin slices.

2,  Boil thin sliced pork until color changes completely.

3,  Grate onion and add ponzu.  Heat them until boil lightly.  Take it off a fire and add olive oil then mix well.

4,  Place vegetables on a plate and add the dressing.  Place boiled pork on the vegetable and add the dressing again.

It was so sad I couldn't go outside tonight but still this salad made me fine.  I decided to sleep early before the day of the Halloween next year!!

Japanese style pork ginger

It seems like the hurricane Sandy was gone but still the weather was not so good.  Actually it's raining and thundering now.  But I could go grocery shopping to an asian grocery store somehow and bought thin sliced pork a lot.  I made a Japanese style pork ginger (called Shoga-yaki 生姜焼き) today because I wanted to have kind of spicy food.

Do you know why people feel warm up when they eat ginger?  Ginger has a gingerol which is a kind of an organic compound and pungent component.  When we heat ginger, gingerol changes to a shogaol which is also a kind of an organic compound and speeds up the body metabolism.  That's why when you have a ginger, you feel warm up.

I had a Japanese style pork ginger which has a lot of ginger so actually I am sweating now!  So hot!! 

Japanese style pork ginger (2 serves)

• 0.8 pound of thin sliced pork
• 1/2 of onion
• 1 Tbs of sesame oil
• 1+1/2 Tbs of ground ginger (☆)
• 2 Tbs of mirin (☆)
• 2 Tbs of soy sauce (☆)
• 1 tsp of sugar (☆)

1,  Cut hin sliced pork into easy bite sizes and onion into thin slices.

2,  Heat a pan and sesame oil until quite hot and stir-fry thin sliced pork until light brown then add onion and stir-fry until onion become pliant.

3,  Mix all of  (☆) well and add to a pan.  Stir-fry until lose water.

4,  Place on a plate.  Add mayonnaise and a bit of Japanese red pepper if you would like.

It's really easy because you don't need so many processes and stuffs but tasted really good!!  The ingredients for sauce are kind of similar to teriyaki but the pork and a lot of ginger make the taste completely different and refresh!

Actually my roommate bought cakes for us so we had those as dessert with a coup of hot tea.  NY cheese cake and azuki cream puff!!

Look!!  Bountiful cream and azuki bean jelly!  I was so happy♡

We were having tea hearing the sound of thunder.  I hope tomorrow will be fine but it suppose to be strong rain again according to the weather news...So sad ;(

Pork and leek soba

In America, maybe almost people are having a Halloween party tonight o already did this weekend.  Despite this, I was too busy to have time for party because I moved to a new room this weekend.

 Do you know "Hikkoshi-soba"?  Soba means close in Japanese and looks long so in the past, people who moved to new house gave soba to neighbor and landlord to appreciate ongoing the help, support and relationship and tell the happiness to be close from now on.

Of course it's only Japanese culture so I didn't give soba to neighbor but still I wanted to feel like having hikkoshi-soba that's why I made not halloween food but soba!

Pork and leek soba (2 serves)

• soba for 2 people
• 1/3 pound of thin sliced pork
• 1/3 leek
• 10 pieces of shiitake mushroom
• 1 Tbs of sesame oil
• 2 Tbs of ground daikon radish 
• 800 cc of dashi (☆)
• 2 Tbs of mirin (☆)
• 2 Tbs of soy sauce (☆)

1,  Cut leek into thin sticks and pork into easy-bite sizes.  Heat a pan and sesame oil and stir-fry until pork's color become light brown and leek become pliant.

2,  Cut shiitake mushroom into thin slices then boil until soft.

3,  Boil a lot of hot water and boil soba for the time package says.  If it starts boiling over, you can add about 1/4 cup of water to stop it.

4,  Put boiled soba up to a colander and make it cool down with cold water.

5,  Put  (☆) in a pan and heat until hot.

6,  Put soba in a bowl and put stir-fried pork and leek, shiitake mushroom and daikon radish then pour soup.  Add Japanese red pepper powder if you would like.

I really enjoyed this soba hoping my good luck in this room.

By the way, maybe already you know but a devastating hurricane is arriving in Boston.  I hope nothing will happen tomorrow.  Take care!!

Niku-Dofu Donburi

We Japanese really like to eat a rice bowl like an above picture because it's easy to cook and so tasty. Do you guys know Gyu- don (a beef bowl) which is the most popular fast food in Japan?  Yoshinoya is the one of the most famous fast food restaurants in our country.  When I was working in Tokyo, I often went to Yoshinoya in Shibuya, for I didn't really have a time to eat a lunch, but they served us it  quickly and cheaply; it was so economical for me :))  So, today, I cooked a Niku-tofu bowl like similar to Gyu-don with leftover niku-dofu from yesterday.  It took only 10 minutes to cook and tasted pretty good. I will show you how to cook it easily and quickly, and I am going to bed to have a good dream soon!!

Niku-Dofu Donburi (1 serve)

• 1 portion of niku-dofu (include soup)
• soy sauce as much as you like
• 1 egg
• 1 portion of cooked rice
• 1 green onion

1,  Put niku-dofu in a pan and heat until quit hot crashing tofu into small pieces.  If you don't have enough soup, you just add dashi a little bit.

2,  Beat an egg and add it wholly and boil with low fire.

3,  After you cook egg enough, put the niku-dofu on rice in the rice bowl.

4,  Cut green onion into thin slices then put it the top of the niku-dofu don.

Even though I made it easily, it had a lot of favor!  I just add an egg to niku-dofu but the taste was really different from niku-dofu, which made me so surprised!!

I think also you guys could be surprised like me.  I highly recommend to leave some niku-dofu for this niku-dofu donburi even if you want to eat all strongly!!

Niku-Dofu (Japanese style boiled beef and Tofu)

It's really difficult to find thin sliced pork or beef in America.  I didn't know that thin sliced meat was not so common because in Japan I could find it so easily and eat a lot.

I happened to find thin sliced beef at one of Japanese grocery stores in Boston. 

You see!  It's really thin like papers!!

I made a Niku-Dofu (Japanese style boiled beef and Tofu) with this thin sliced beef.  It's first time to cook with thin sliced meat since I came to America so I was excited!!

Niku-Dofu (Japanese style boiled beef and Tofu) (2〜3 serves)

• 0.4 pound of thin sliced beef
• 1 pack of firm tofu
• 1/2 of onion
• 1 pack of enoki mushroom
• 2 Tbs of soy sauce
• 2 +1/2 Tbs of mirin
• 200ml of dashi (or 200ml of water + 1/2 tsp of dashi powder)

1,  Cut onion into thin slices and tofu into 6 pieces.  Cut the bottom of enoki mushroom and cut it into half.

2,  Heat a pan and sesame oil until quite hot.  Add beef to the half of a pan and onion to vacant space in the pan.  Stir-fry them separately.  Don't stir-fry them together.

3,  Add mirin and soy sauce and stir-fry again then add dashi.  After boil it, add tofu and enoki like this picture.

4,  Cover with aluminum foil and boil it with medium fire for 12 minutes.  Sometime open the cover and pour liquid on tofu with spoon.

5,  Take a pan off a fire and wait until pretty cool down for making it taste deeper.  After that, heat it again and place on the plate.

All ingredients incredibly has a lot of flavor!  Taste so deep!!  It looks like sukiyaki but this one has lighter and more delicate taste.  Actually next day it's gonna be much greater taste but it was impossible to wait until tomorrow!  Too yummy!!!

Chicken and eggplant donburi with ponzu mayonnaise sauce

Maybe because of autumn appetite??  Recently I have a vast appetite!!  Even though I had a cold, I wanted to eat something hearty meal.

The rice bowl today I made had kind of rich taste because I used mayonnaise for sauce but even so still I could taste refresh because I used ponzu sauce also.  Ponzu is made with citrus juice, dashi and soy sauce mainly so cyrus juice give really refresh favor!

Also this one has a lot of vegetable more than meat.  So I think it's super healthy... maybe...??

Chicken and eggplant donburi with ponzu mayonnaise sauce (1 serve)

• 1/4 pound of chicken thigh
• 1/4 pound of eggplant
• 1/4 of onion
• Cooked rice for 1 person
• 1 Tbs of sesame oil
• 1 tsp of garlic
• 2 Tbs of ponzu
• 1+1/2 Tbs of mayonnaise
• salt
• Black pepper

1,  Cut chicken thigh, egg plant and onion into small cubes.  Soak eggplant in water for 10 minutes.

2,  Chop garlic.  Heat a pan, garlic and sesame oil until quite hot then stir-fry chicken thigh until brown.  Add onion and stir-fry until pliant.
3,  Add eggplant and stir-fry again until pliant.  Add mayonnaise and ponzu and stir-fry quickly.
4,  Season with salt and black pepper

I am sure that for me autumn is the season for good appetite more than reading and arts!!

Ginger hijiki takikomi gohan

The takikomi gohan I made last month was really good!  Actually one of my friends said it was the best takikomi gohan he had eaten in his whole life!  I was so glad that was thinking to make another flavor one since then.

I bought a lot of ground chicken these days because it was on sale but actually I was not familiar with cooking ground chicken so I wanted to make something with it somehow otherwise it could be getting worse so quickly!!

Therefore I made the takikomi gohan with ground chicken tonight.  I don't think it's not so popular to use ground chicken for takikomi gohan but I think it's gonna be great because ground meat has a lot of juice and they can get seasoning a lot!!

Ginger hijiki takikomi gohan

• 1+3/4 cups of white rice
• 2 cups of water
• 1 carrot
• 1/2 pound of ground chicken
• 1+1/2 Tbs of hijiki
• 3 Tbs of sugar (☆)
• 1Tbs of mirin (☆)
• 4Tbs of soy sauce (☆)
• 2 Tbs of ground ginger
• Edamame

1, Wash the rice and leave it in the water in the cooker for 1 hour or so

2,  Cut carrot into thinly slices.  

3,  Add 4 Tbs of water to hijiki and leave for 20 minutes until completely soft (If you use tepid water, leave for 10 minutes)

3,  Put 3 cups of water in a large pan and heat and boil

4,  Add ground chicken to boiled water and break chunks with a spatula then skim the scrum carefully

5,  Add carrot, hijiki and all of (☆) and boil until cooking water become about half

6,  Add the ingredients and 3 Tbs of cooking water to the rice and start the rice cooker.  After it's done, mix well.

7,  Serve takikomi-gohan in a bowl and put edamame on the top

It looks beautiful and of course taste good!  I think the ginger made this much more tasty and also it's good for the coming cold season because ginger make you warm up and good for your health.

By the way, I'm gonna go to the Charles river to watch the head of  the Charles Regatta race tomorrow!  It's a really famous boat race in Boston and over 300 thousand people are coming every year!  It's first time for me to watch the race so I'm so excited!  Hope tomorrow is gonna be beautiful day!!