Hinamatsuri

Today being Hinamatsuri (Girls day in Japan), i decided to go with the spirit and try hinamatsuri foods...
A typical dessert treat on this day would be the sakura mochi, but i decided to settle for a special edition of the taiyaki

usually, only red bean paste is used in this pancake, but for this season, the taiyaki shop near my place made sakura taiyaki. SO it is like having 2 desserts in one. With the sakura leaf, salted sakura, bean paste and pink mochi paste, it is equals to eating a sakura mochi in a taiyaki!

Enjoyed every mouthful!

And for dinner...

Chirashi sushi, teriayki chicken, miso soup and simmered oden cabbage(with broth left over from oden)

Chirashi means scattered. So chirashi basically means all kinds of ingredients of the season scattered over sushi rice. I made a simple version today because we had a huge portion of teriyaki chicken to go with.

The leaves of vegetables you see in the chirashi sushi is something i ate for the first time. Called Petit veil, it is one of the increasing number of cross breed vegetables in Japan. This one is a cross between brussel sprouts and kale. Somehow it reminds me of kailan, though a much sweeter and less fibrous version.
Another typical item on the Hinamatsuri menu is clam miso soup. Clams are symbolic of closeness and unity between a husband and wife, tying in with the theme of hinamatsuri.

Since we dont get tired of oden, every bit of our oden pot was used up, so there you go, simmered cabbage and enoki in oden broth.

Bento
Bento was made with yesterdays paella, fried chicken, purple sauerkraut and a mini yakisoba.