purple sweet potatoes, prawn mee & oven fries

i dont know why i love purple sweet potatoes so much.

hmm well, not only sweet potatoes, i like yam too which has a slight purple hue.

purple is not my favourite colour, but when i see yam ice cream at swensens, or purple pao (chinese steamed buns) at the canteen, i get excited.

anyhow, theres this strange thing with me & my relationship with purple foods. hehe

oh n gummy bears? the green, yellow & orange goes to lil bro who glady finishes them for me. i only touch the purple.

sweet potatoes is a typical autumn root vegetable, and the usual yellow fleshed ones with purple skins are everywhere in the supermart, rarely do i find purple purple ones.

And when i do... just gotta grab!

Steamed purple sweet potatoes =) =) =)

And... i finally mustered the courage to cook prawn noodles!!!

Yellow noodles topped with bean sprouts, prawns, hardboiled egg, fish cake slices & a bit of blanched green vegetables, in very savoury prawn broth.

topped with fried shallots (which added so much fragrance!)

Thanks to mums recipe, i can have prawn noodles anywhere in the world!

managed to lay my hands on some very big tiger prawns with heads, which is very unusual at the mart i always go to. Since i love prawns so much, i jumped at it.

And thought hard on what i should do with it. to make super good use of everything (head & shells included), this is perfect.

To make the soup, i boiled some lean ground pork & prawns in it, deshelled the prawns, and threw the shells & heads back in to broil for some time.

Added only salt, shoyu & black soya sauce to flavour the soup.

used thin straight ramen today

we love it!

pumpkin fries to nibble on by the side

I bought this frozen fries & instead of deepfrying, baked them in the oven.

Did u know u can have french fries without deepfrying?

Toss the frozen fries (do not defrost) with salt & spray with cooking oil spray in a bag, shake & spread on a baking sheet. 20min at 250degC in the oven.

Guaranteed satisfaction.

Egg soboro bento

Some days i run out of ideas of what to make for J bento.

When this happens, the basic soboro always works.

Soboro, means seasoned ground meat or scrambled eggs stirred vigorously in the pot such that it looks like ground meat.

Sweet egg soboro & cucumber bits topped on white rice, and a tiny portion of takikomi rice at the corner.

And 3 kinds of salad atop. glass noodles salad, simmered yam & carrots, and tomato salad

Dinner was tomato beef stew

with grilled potato rice balls

when you run out of bread to go with stew, this is just as yummy!

mix rice and steamed potato cubes & toast in the oven for 5minutes.

baked mixed beans with mochi crust

My photographer forgot to take the insides! hehe

i made a big portion of japanese style simmered mixed beans, and since we were having western for dinner, i was contemplating between a pie crust or mochi crust. Since the beans were shoyu based, i thought mochi would be nice.

Just like how pie sheets are folded over the dish & baked, i topped the dish with bits of thinly sliced mochi & baked as usual. the crust was like senbei on the surface. =)

this celebrity couple which has been appearin on TV so often this month has decided to get married. the actor, 55 yrs old. the lady golfer 33 yrs. her dad, an ex pro baseball player also famous, 59 years old. we are still watching out for what the dad will say! gosh its like marrying your dads friend!!!

beany day

I loved baked beans as a child.

now, once in a while is OK, breakfast on the plane or at the hotel, this always comes with eggs.

i find the sweetness overwhelming. after the beans, i gotta go for the eggs, or i grab an extra slice of bread, and then i feel stuffed.

I still love beans for breakfast! but in the form of natto!

We either top them on rice, or i like to mix them with tomatoes as a salad.

Todays natto were giant beans.

There is tiny, medium & giant.

The medium & giant ones are usually japanese soybeans, tiny ones, from america and much cheaper.

The supermart near my place has near expiry date natto at half price quite often. And each time i spot those half price labels, i jump! we were luckly yday to get the giant ones. our favourite++

Coincidentally, spinach was cheap today, and i wanted to have curry for dinner.

So... spinach curry! with lots of mixed beans. (yeah, very beany day)

One plate dinner Spinach & beans (garbanzo, soy beans & kidney beans mix) curry topped with poached egg, with a large serving of yogurt cheese pumpkin salad.

I finished the whole egg on my own today!!! Yes, it is not funny, havent had egg yolks for quite a long long time of my life. when i have kaya toast, the runny egg yolks simply irk me. scramble is fine, but yolk on its own is really yucky. well, WAS very yucky. J is very gentle, he doesnt push me, but always says, its good. so bit by bit, and now i finish the whole egg on my own. and... i kind of like the taste too! the eggs really matched the curry, sort of deepened the flavour of the curry.

with lots of pickles by the side

Brown rice made a come back on our plates again. =)

Kichijoji pizza date & sukiyaki

My head felt much much clearer this morning. yay~! and the day was fine yet very cool, so off to our favourite date spot, kichijoji.

after quite a bit of walking around, the two growling tummies was calling out for good food.

Cotemplating between udon & italian.

There are quite a few good pizza places at kichijoji, and this place La Creatura, we wanted to try the last time, had quite a line of customers waiting during lunch hours, so when we dropped by this time and it was surprisingly empty, we decided, lets go!

(pardon my handphone shadow)

limited to 15 plates each lunch time

handmade tagliatelle with smoked salmon & chestnut, tomato based

This was really satisfying, and the portion just right for 2 of us to share.

Tomato sauce was mild and not too heavy, and the smoked salmon + chestnuts combination was delicious. Havent had a good pasta for quite some time.

And... we held our breath for this

and were not dissappointed

Crispy crispy thin crust!

Autumns mushroom special.

I really love musrhooms & this full of mushrooms & cheese pizza was ooh so yummy!!!

We had quite a bit of cheese in the morning too though =)

Wonder if theres such thing as cheese overdose.

Freshly made spinach & cream cheese spread generously slabbed onto a slice of multigrain,

toasted with a slice of melting cheese atop

Dinner was... our all time favourite sukiyaki

With chocfull of vegetables, enoki & shitake mushrooms, some beef slices & tofu.

With a lil juice cocktail to quench our thirst after salty sukiyaki

Sukiyaki is full of shoyu & sweet wine, and each time we have this, i either feel like having a sweet cocktail or coke. since i am not allowed alcohol for the time being, m happy with juice cocktail.

Energised for the new week already =)

domyoji steamed chicken

More morning glory flowers blooming...

Each time i see morning glory flowers along the street, i get very excited.

I dont know why but i just love morning glories! Now i have them overflowing into my garden every morning~

My head was so so heavy this morning. But pumpkin salad toast cheered me up a bit.

Last nights creamy pumpkin salad topped on bread & covered with a slice of cheese, toasted.

I think having breakfast with J helps a lil. Like having a mini date in the morning =P

Since i was not feeling very good, we took a lil walk to the supermart, bought us some sweet treats from mister doughnuts, then made lunch at home.

Natto curry soba

I know mixing natto into curry in weird, but it really rocks, that is if u like the strong smelling natto in the first place @@

Dinner was...

Chinese style

Steamed chicken with domyojiko (a kind of glutinous rice flour with very large grains)

My first time making this, simply coating the chicken cubes with this flour makes the chicken really really juicy and the mochi like texture of the grains makes it very nice to chew on.

Domyojiko can be replaced with glutinous rice, and simply steamed.

Dip chicken bits in some shoyu + sesame oil.

Stir fried glass noodles with white cabbage

This was super simple. only took me 5 min!

We bought the premix for the stir fry, and i simply added sauteed white cabbage & fish cake slices. It was really really yummy. i could have it on its own, but since it was a little salty, we had it with rice.

Radish & yellow daikon pickles

There was fresh radish at the farmers mart, and the long leaves came attached, which is very usual with all the vegetables at this mart. Buy daikon or carrots and you get the whole bunch of leaves attached with them, which i really like because these leaves are so so fragrant and tasty.

I blanched the leaves, toss them with the raw radish together with ume (red sour plum), miso, vinegar & some shoyu and left then in the fridge for awhile. They make very good pickles.

I wanna go out tomorrow so am keeping my fingers crossed for a clearer head after a nights rest.

sanma rice

I never liked the butter that comes with the kaya toast when we have it at the coffee shop.

My style, cream cheese & kaya plus a slice of cheese and slightly toasted again for the cheese to melt.

kaya cheese toast!

Dinners main was rice.

Sanma takikomi rice

Takikomi is rice that is cooked together with different ingredients & their condiments such that the flavours of everything is well blended.

Todays takikomi was a recipe we saw on Kurihara Harumi thursday cooking show.

Fresh sliced burdock & carrots & matitake mushrooms, topped with grilled sanma and cooked in the rice cooker.

Since mains was rice, we had a very simple tofu dish to go with it. Steamed tofu topped with mushroom mix.

Cucumber & crabsticks salad to nibble on, but we couldnt really finish.

Creamy pumpkin salad topped with cornflakes

The weekend is here again~!

what a nice week we had =) mon to wed rest. thur & fri work, then time to kick off our shoes & relax again!

omurice

Looking at the number of eggs in my fridge, I so wanted to have omurice today!

Omurice means omelette rice, which is typically ketchup based fried rice wrapped in an omelette & the basic sauce atop is usually just ketchup. Lots of it. Which neither Jun nor i really like.

Recently omurice restaurants come up their own originals and we had one which had wafu (japanese style) sticky sauce poured over it. And the eggs were fluffily yummy.

I tried to mimick =)

Ketchup based prawns fried rice topped with fluffy eggs & consomme sticky sauce

I am no pro with eggs, so i took things easy by just topping the rice with the eggs rather than try to wrap the super soft and fluffy omelette ever the rice. i really dont know how the restaurant does it. If the omelette was more solid, no prob, but if we wanted our eggs this fluffy, impossible for me.

J sets the table for us every night, and when he asked tonight, washoku (japanese food) or yoshoku(western)? i said, wayo so spoon & fork please. he was puzzled for awhile.

But had a big fat smile when he saw the omurice coming out of the kitchen (yes, its everyones favourite). This omurice is a very very typical dish you can find at a traditional western restaurant in japan. Along with beef stew, hamburger, white stew, spaghetti & sometimes curry rice. But the flavours are all so typical japanese, mild and easy on the stomach. & small in portion. So i guess when the kids grow up and taste for themselves the real stuff in the western world, not all like the real western food.

I like both =)

mushroom mix stock

Managed to find brown rice bread at the supermart!

Tastes like german wholewheat bread. mmm... love it! had it it salmon & cream cheese for breakfast.

Since i had so much time on hands today, made red bean paste from scratch.

and combined it with sweet potato ice cream (haagan dazs autumn edition).

Sprinkled some bran flakes, dried apricot cubes & a dollop of yogurt for a parfait feel =)

See? i just have to have ice cream whether am home or out.

Dinner was...

Maguro don. Shoyu steeped maguro cubes topped with poached egg & natto, atop hot rice.

Todays fresh maguro was 880yen per piece. =)

good good price & we wanted to have fish for dinner.

Lettuce topped with mixed mushroom mix

Since we have lots of mushrooms in the fridge, made a stock of mushroom mix which goes well with rice, bread or salad. so very handy to have in the fridge.

Basically,

5 big shitake mushrooms

1 pack shimeji

1 pack enoki

3 tbs shoyu

1tbs mirin (sweet wine)

bonito flakes

Heat the shoyu & mirin (or replace with a tbs of water + 1 level tbs sugar), add mushrooms and toss till the mushroom juices come out. Then add 3 packs of bonito flakes, & switch off fire.

Stewed pumpkin

We had soba in shoyu based broth for lunch today and there was so much extra soup left, so i simply chopped up some pumkin & stewed them in the broth! yum~

back to work tmr@@

but then, hey theres thurs, fri then the weekend will come again! =)

Mapo ramen

After watching a TV feature last sunday on smackingly delicious ramen all over town, i sooooooo wanted to have ramen. But since i always feel sick in the stomach after a very oily bowl of ramen at the ramen shop, i decided to make my own!

Mapo ramen dinner

Using the mapo hot pot remaining soup from last week, adding tofu & minced pork, and more mapo sauce for more punch (the mapo hot pot soup was not flavourful enough).

And topped over ramen with lots of white cabbage in basic shoyu soup. hmm... ramen craving satisfied =)

Went to Ginza today to polish our wedding rings, and finally managed to drop by this spicy spicy red hotpot restaurant that was featured on TV last week.

Nagoya typical red spicy hotpot

reasonable lunch at 880yen!

and... another dessert feature on TV... at this cafe called Yogorino

Italian yogurt ice cream topped with balsamic sauce & berries

came with dried ice dancing around the plate, so it was a nice surprise with the floating cool air around.

I just cant live without my ice cream, and reviewing my handphone pics, we have indeed had quite a bit of really good ice creams this summer...

GROM (a very popular artisan Italian gelato shop which opened its first branch in Tokyo earlier this year & created such long queues)

On a slightly cold day 2 weeks ago, when the queue was not so scary, we got our wish!

I chose, pistachio & super dark chocolate. hmm... never had such dark & bitter chocolate gelato before. got punch!

Azabu Sabo (which has branches all over Asia, and we used to date at the branch at Takashimaya Singapore =P)

Pure green tea syrup kaki gori (aka ice kachang)

We always had the sweet creamy green tea version in Singapore,

and this is the first time we had pure green tea (not sweet at all) which was so so strong.

good thing we had a serving of soft ice cream atop, if not, wow, like having pure green tea!

Bean paste ice cream

Brought dad & mum to have this one time and they really loved the different bean pastes.

This time we had it at Ikebukuro, a new branch in town.

And the summer version had 5 different bean pastes topped on soft ice cream.

Red bean, black sesame black bean paste, roasted soy bean paste, edamame bean paste, white bean paste. Hmm... addictive

Plus many many more which we didnt take pics of in the midst of getting caught up on our sugar high.

Why do i love ice cream so much?

To aid my digestion at night, we have switched to white rice and tonight we tried white porridge which we havent had for a long long time.

Congee topped with sauteed spinach & salmon flakes

Wrong choice. porridge was super smooth & yummy, but the fish smell was a bit hard for me.

saw some fresh autumn salmon n was so excited we bought it. but i should have gotten white fish since congee was on the menu.

well, next time.

I think there will be more congee dinners to come.

J says he doesnt mind even everyday! =)

This, is the sour plum we made this summer, steeped in the plum vinegar which is supposed to not only preserve, but also to mellow down the sharp & sour falvour of the plums in the jar over the years. According to most people, plums 3 years old taste best.

We had a piece to share, still very very sour. so a lil goes with a lot of rice.

2 more holidays for us to sit around and relax. =)