Inari

Everybody loves Inari Sushi

It’s true! I have never, ever met people who don’t like this Japanese ultimate comfort food – vinegar rice stuffed in seasoned fried bean curd. With few ingredients – no fish is involved here - the recipe is also a simple affair and seems like there is no room for improvement, it’s perfect!

NHK’s Tameshite Gatten (試してガッテン) Tested and Assent (roughly translated) science team thought otherwise however… a nation wide taste test show they got 90% inari approval rating..What is their secret? Lose the sugar in the sushi rice. Adding sugar in both pouches and rice muddle the flavor. Really? I have to try their method. I have a inari expert who lives right under my roof and he is very honest.

Ingredients and Instruction for 12 inari sushi (Print recipe here)

• 6 thin deep fried bean curd (油揚げ) 
• 5 Tablespoons sugar
• 3 Tablespoons soy sauce (I used gluten free soy sauce)
• 300ml (1 and 1/2 cup) water
• Just cooked warm rice (cook 2 rice cooker cups with 360ml of water in rice cooker). See step #3
• 75 ml rice vinegar Note: not sushi vinegar
• 4g of salt
• 2 Tablespoons toasted white sesame seeds (optional)

1. Remove some of the oil from fried bean curd by immersing in hot water for 3 minutes. Drain water and gently squeeze the water out. Cut in half then open the pouch. Watch Japanese YouTube on how to open easily here. Lay the un-cut bean curd in a single layer on the plate and microwave for 1 minute on 60% power, cut in half and voila!
   
2. Boil sugar, soy sauce and water in a medium sauce pan. Put fried bean curd in and cook until almost all the liquid is evaporated at medium high heat. About 20 to 25 minutes. Cool completely in the pan. Set aside.
3. While the bean curds are cooking and cooling, cook rice if you have not done so already. You want a slightly firmer rice for this recipe.
4. Mix vinegar and salt well in a small glass measuring cup. Set it aside.
5. When the rice is done. divide rice into 6ths or 8ths in the rice cooker. Sprinkle the vinegar mixture from perimeter of rice cooker, then turn out to a large bowl. Fold over the rice with rice paddle while cooling down with a fan or magazine. Mix in the toasted sesame seeds at this point if using. Cover with moist towel until needed.
   
6. Stuff rice into the pouch –do not over stuff, you will probably have some left over rice. Have a small bowl of water nearby to moisten your hands to prevent rice from sticking to your hand. I turned the pouch inside out on some for fun looks. Serve with pickled ginger.
   We tested and we assent! This is a winner!

There are many wild chickens roaming around my daughter’s house in Hawaii. They are early risers and I can hear them through the open window…good for you but please let me sleep in…wait… that’s my grandchildren, “Go back to bed!”!

I heard my 3 years old grandson screaming one afternoon as he was being chased by one of the mean chickens.  I wish he could eat this chicken inari up as revenge.

Oink! A pig inari for my lunch.Fellow food blogger Cooking Gallery published a cook book ‘Bento Delight’ recently. I planned on purchasing it but life got in the way….you know. I have two problematic issues - that my fingers are too fat to make delicate character bento and the second, I don’t have patience. It’s going to be a fine read nonetheless.

Abundant! While I was in Hawaii, beside the strawberries, our gumi plant and raspberry shortcake are also waiting for me to devour them!Which I made trifle for Father’s Day. I spread the gumi jam my husband made on the pound cake I baked…team effort.

Father’s Day Sunday was hectic. Came home from church service, I hustled to fixed cream cheese center kimkatsu roll for dinner. Delish!

My children have a terrific dad. He scores high with the grandchildren also. This was taken in 1977 in Nagasaki, Japan. Nice hair!

Don/丼

Chicken wings rice bowl

I believe that properly cooked chicken skin is loaded with umami flavor. I particularly like it cooked till crisp. But for some, they simply don’t care enough so they remove skin from the meat and transfer it to my plate…Oh, thanks hon. My husband does the same for salmon skin.

It will be difficult to separate skin and meat with this recipe however, a measly amount of meat is all that is on the chicken wings and the rest is epidermis. This is technically teriyaki chicken in a donburi (bowl) style, don for short – rice and whatever dish in one bowl. For me having a meal this way, always stimulates my appetite. And less dishes to wash.

When the donburi style was started is not clear. Some say that a restaurant in Asakusa,Tokyo served Unagi (eel) don in 1837. As the popularity grew, other ‘don’ dish like oyako (chicken and egg ) don was created in 1891, and my fav, katsudon (fried pork cutlet) was introduced in 1913…genius!

Note: Preparing chicken wings is rather tricky and bothersome though, it’s all worth it in the end. You're using just middle part of the wing (tebachu/手羽中)keep the rest for other dishes. The chicken wings shrink as it cooks so make plenty. I will show you the recipes using the rest of chicken wings at next post.

Ingredients and Instruction for two servings  (Print recipe here) 
Modified recipe of Masahiro Kasahara – see his other recipe here

• 8 Chicken wings – 4 chicken wings per donburi
• For sauce (the amount is for 8 chicken wings)
        Soy sauce, sake and  Mirin 2 Tablespoons each
        Sugar 1 Tablespoon Whisk to combine well.
• Cooked rice 1 cup per donburi. Keep warm
• Seaweed (optional)
• Powdered sansho pepper (Japanese pepper)
• White toasted sesame seeds
• White radish sprout or long onion julienned for garnish.

1. Prepare wings  - wash chicken wings in large bowl full of water to inspect for any dirt or feathers and clean. Dry with a paper towel.
   A. Cut off the pointy part of the chicken wing.
   B. Slit skin in the between the middle section and rest. Grab both
        ends and bend to break the bone joint then cut off with a knife.
   
   C. Hold the flabby skin and slide knife above and along side of  bones to butterfly.
   
   

   D. Cut connecting tip of two bones. Scrape off the bones from meat. Remove any cartilage left on skin. After I was done with this I found an easier way to remove bones on YouTube. I definitely will try that method next time…just butterfly after you pulled off both bones…so much for the futile effort.

    
2. Heat non-stick pan at medium heat. Lay the prepared chicken wings in the pan skin side down and brown. Turn over to brown the other side. Be careful, chicken releases a lot of fat, it may splash. Turn off heat and wipe the excess oil up with a paper towel. Note: grill them until charred instead of pan fry if you like.
   
3. Turn the heat back on and pour the prepared sauce and cook until well coated.
4. Assembly – put rice in donburi, scatter torn seaweed on top of rice (if using), Place 4 pieces of chicken wings with some sauce over the rice, sprinkle with sesame seeds and Japanese pepper. Garnish with radish sprout or long onion. Serve warm.
   .

We finally tackled the procrastinated attic clean up. Guess what I found? Japanese currency. Lucky!

And a Disney dollar!

….from when we went to Disneyland for Christmas time many years ago… forgotten photos are destructing when you have more boxes to go through. Stand with Minnie quick! I demanded. No? My daughter was way too cool to pose for a photo with Disney characters.

Wow! How neat to find a photo of my brother-in-law. He is much older than my husband but they are close…super nice guy. I bet he is not happy that the San Antonio Spurs did not sweep the Portland Trail Blazers team in the playoffs last night.

Old records…collector items? Yeah, that’s us said my husband. ‘Junk collector’My very first ‘don’ that I made…this was in a mystery box #7, so many boxes so little time…

Always happy to receive flowers on Mother’s Day or any other day.And dinner at Masu was fantastic! From left – rip city rolls, fried tofu mousse, lamb curry rice and orange chocolate ice cream with edible flower.

So good that we finished it all up!