Every day BENTO -Yakiniku-

While I was making my son's bento this morning, I had a question which I've never asked him before.
"How dose he eat bento?"

Dose he eat his most favorite side dish first?
Dose he keep his most favorite side dish for the last?

I left my favorite one for the last when I ate bento at school. Probably my son does the same as far as I see how to eat dinner with him at home. There is several possible reasons, and one of them is he is an only child. Only child doesn't need to compete with his siblings at the table, so he can take times to eat favorite dishes as much as he likes.
I have a big brother and remember competing to get main dishes, snacks or desserts every day. I tried to protect my plate so hard from him at the table. Now I am thinking, competing dishes is bad manner, though.
Anyway, even though I have a brother, now I leave my favorites for the last. This is not intend, but I enjoy my favorites for last minutes of the meal.

Speaking of my husband, he definitely eats his favorites first, and he is a very fast and big eater. I am so sorry for his sister when she was young.




*juicy Yakiniku and colorful veggies
Japanese style BBQ beef and veggies on rice

*butter sauteed broccolies
*egg
*tomato
*Kinpira
simmerd chopped burdock

Every day BENTO -Soboro-don -

When I talked with a British guy yesterday, about culture difference between countries, especially school lunch, we found it is very interesting.
In conclusion, actually we didn't get to the conclusion of the question "where should we raise our children?"

I know children bring sandwiches and chocolate, cookies, apples, oranges, yogurt etc. for school lunch every day in foreign countries. In Japan, school don't allow to bring chocolate, cookies, cold meal and mostly parents don't let their children to have sandwich every day. What I thought is this is just the culture difference, behind the background where they grew up. Lunch which children brings to school is healthy or not, cold or hot, big variety or not, it doesn't matter.

It is good to have nutritious balance for a day or a few days. I guess Japanese who live in Japan want to have total balance in each meal for their children.  Japanese who live in other country is depend on their culture.


We discussed last night about a kind of experiment which conducted between Japanese and American about absolute task and relative task. The result is Japanese are clearly better than Americans at the relative task.

We laughed a lot that funny thing is Japanese is want to put everything together in a tiny box and good at doing this anytime because of many living in tiny country.
BENTO is as well.





*Soboro-don
crumbly beef and eggs topped rice

*Yakisoba
Rich fried noodles

*Butter sauteed Spinach
*Simmerd Hijiki Seaweed
*Tomato

Every day BENTO - Teriyaki Chicken-

This is a commercial of TOKYO GAS. It is a short story type commercial. I didn't  know it is famous in Japan. Japanese only but probably not hard to understand.

In summary, A mother makes bento everyday for her son who is a high school student. Teenage boy is on difficult stage to handle, so conversation between them is getting less, but she decides to give him messages from mother to son though her heartwarming homemade bento.
She can't get his response to her bento, but she realizes his bento box coming back with empty is his good response. She has to make his bento for 3 years. Last day, she made 2 bento, one for her son, one for herself. At her lunch time she is having bento, she praises herself for keeping to make bento for son every single day for 3 years. At the same night, she finds the memo in his empty bento box, which says "Thank you, and sorry couldn' t say it before."

I never watched this commercial before because I live in Osaka, not Tokyo, so I didn't have a chance to notice it.
I am impressed so much and want to show to people who are interested in BENTO culture in the world.

We have BENTO culture for years.
Recent years, it has been spread over the world, and Japanese bento box is popular. I'm proud of it and glad to hear it.

I grew up with my mom's bento and I didn't know how hard to prepare bento every day at this moment. Now I have also made bento for about 5 years for my son, and have only several months left. Happy to stop this hard work and he is going to independent but I miss a little bit.

This is today's bento for my son.



*Juicy Teriyaki chicken
*Fluffy Spanich omlet
*Fried veggies (green pepper)
*tomato
*rice

Sweet tangy Almond Raspberry jam Tart

I got tons of raspberry jam from my friend. So happy for this because I like to use raspberry in baking. Japanese baking cooking books or online don't have various kinds of recipe for raspberry, on the other hand, I can find them overseas recipes.

Today I baked raspberry tart. I love tart, and combined almond tart and raspberry.
Basically jam is too sweet for me, so I love sweetless jam or digging with fresh fruits or frozen fruits.
Sweet and tangy of this tart is perfect in the end of summer.


**Almond Raspberry Tart recipe**

15cm (6 inch) round cake pan

<crumble>
25g pastry flour
10g sugar
10g butter
a hint of vanilla extract

<tart dough>
40g butter
25g sugar
1/2 egg
75g pastry flour
a pinch of salt

<filling>
30g butter
30g sugar
1/2 egg
35g almond powder
rum
3 tbsp raspberry jam


Make crumble for topping;
1. Cut the butter in small dices.
2. Put pastry flour in a bowl and add butter.
3. Make crumble with folk or your fingers in the bowl.
4. Add vanilla extract into a bowl and mix them.
5. Keep it in freezer.

Make tart dough;
1. Keep butter and egg in room temperature.
2. Put butter and sugar in a bowl and blend well.
3. Add salt into the bowl.
4. Add egg into the bowl and blend them together.
5. Add pastry flour into the bowl and blend quietly.
6. Wrap the tart dough with plastic wrap and place it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
7. Press the dough into a cake pan firmly.
8. Bake it in the preheated oven at 200°C for 10 minutes.


Make filling;
1. Keep butter and egg in room temperature.
2. Put butter and sugar in a bowl and blend well.
3. Add broke egg into the bowl and combine them.
4. Add almond flour and rum into the bowl, and blend well.
5. Spread almond filling over the tart crust.
6. Spread raspberry jam over the almond filling quietly.
7. Sprinkle the crumble over the raspberry jam.

Bake the tart;
1. Preheat the oven at 180°C.
2. Put the tart into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes.

Best eat this tart is with frozen berries, nice and fresh in my mouth☆

Classic Baked Cheesecake

I miss my mom's cheesecake.
This is also my first cake in my baking life. All I gave it to said my cheesecake was so great when I was young, and I got happy and excited to hear that at that moment. And then, I wanted to hear that complement words, so I baked cheesecake a lot.

Just blend all ingredients in a bowl, and dump it into the hot oven, easy to bake, so my mom served for my snack time after school for my friends and me. I remember I was proud of it.
Usually chips, chocolates or cookies but my mom baked very often. Sometimes cheesecake, sometimes crapes. I didn't understand how great it was at the moment, I can get it now.


I know I am still proud of my mom's simple baking.
However I put blueberry sauce and vanilla ice cream on it today. I can hear her voice," that is too sweet!", but I am in heaven.




**Classic Baked cheesecake recipe**
18cm (7 inch) round cake pan

200g cream cheese
60g sugar
2 eggs
150ml heavy cream
2 tbsp lemon juice
30g pastry flour
20g unsalted butter

Vanilla ice cream and blueberry sauce. (this is not my mom's rule.......)


1. Keep eggs and cream cheese in room temperature.
2. Melt butter in a small sauce pan.
3. Put cream cheese and sugar in a bowl, and combine them.
4. Add eggs into the bowl, and combine them.
5. Add heavy cream, lemon juice, and pastry flour and blend them.
6. Add melted butter into the bowl, and blend them.
7. Pour the mixture into a round cake pan with baking paper, and bake it in preheated oven at 180°C for about forty minutes.
8. Cool it down, and sit it in fridge for a few hours.

Soft Pumpkin Cake -vegan-

We didn't have halloween culture in Japan in old days.
Preparing or having fun of halloween has been getting earlier in Japan since years, like party items, costumes, decoration for shops,....a lot online information or shops on the streets for halloween items.
How about overseas? Already got them in early September?

Right after summer vacation is over it has started here. I feel this is a little bit early but I am lost this year. I want to bake something to use pumpkin and I did.
Not bad actually.

I baked very soft type pumpkin cake today.
This recipe's texture depends on tofu, which means watery texture could be pumpkin smooth pudding. If you like regular hardness like chocolate brownies or cheesecake bar, needs to drain off water from tofu or less soy milk. Today I didn't drain water from tofu.
Sometimes soft bars are good to bite. I like softness as enough as I can cut into bars like between pudding and regular bars.

My favorite way is less sweetness pumpkin cake with unsweetened whipped cream and sweet maple syrup. I can taste the very pumpkin.




**Soft Pumpkin Cake recipe**
12 muffin tins
If you use baking sheet, less baking time, guess about 40 minutes, and better less nuts and almonds because easy to cut.

600g removed skin and seeds pumpkin
180ml soy milk
3 tbsp cane sugar (less sweetness)
a pinch of salt
90g tofu (silken tofu is better, firm tofu is also fine, though. silken is smoother than firm)
2 tbsp soy yogurt
1+1/2 vegetable oil
1 tbsp cinnamon
100g almond flour
50g almonds
50g walnuts
50g dry cranberries

Small amount of walnuts and cranberries for decoration on top
Soy cream and mayple syrup when you eat.

1. Chop pumpkin into chunks and steam them or put them in the microwave until soften.
2. Put softened pumpkin into blender, and add soy milk and cane sugar. Blend them.
3. Blend soy yogurt, tofu and vegetable oil in a bowl.
4. Add pumpkin paste into the bowl. Blend them.
5. Cut almonds and walnuts into dices and add them into the bowl. Mix them.
6. Add cinnamon and almond flour into the bowl and mix them.
7. Preheat oven at 170°C.
8. Pour the mixture into tin with non- stick baking paper.
9. Decorate some diced nuts and cranberries all over the mixture.
10. Bake in the oven for about 50 minutes. Make sure bake the central of cake.
11. Cool it down for a while. Hard to cut in hot because cake is very soft, so cool is better in fridge for a while to slice into bars(when you use baking sheet).
　

This pumpkin cake has less sweetness. I recommend to eat it with whipped soy cream, or if you are non-vegan, with cream cheese frosting.
Both frosting are definitely amazing, but without frosting for breakfast is so good as well and healthier.

Simple Matcha Swiss Roll (Chiffon cake roll)

I love matcha or simple Swiss roll, no chocolate, no fruits or even pretty rainbow color on it.


I remember my mom baked always simple cake without special decoration. When she baked sponge cake, she always decorated it only with cream and strawberries, cheesecake without decoration or fruits. It doesn't mean she was bad, I guess it is just her baking style. She was a challenging woman, so she tried lots of kinds of recipes but her's were always simple.

I grew up with those cakes so I got used to it, and then love it.
Now I feel simple recipe seems easy but actually most difficult. No cheat about looking, need to show the best taste.

What I need is still to learn more my mom's recipe, however I don't know how, need practice a lot, check her cooking book again or depend on my memory of her taste.




**Matcha Swiss Roll recipe**
18*28 cm(7*11 inch) roll cake baking sheet

3 eggs whites
3 egg yolks
60g granulated sugar
2 tbsp milk
2 tbsp oil
50g pastry flour
1-2 tsp matcha powder

200 ml heavy cream
2 tbsp granulated sugar
2 tsp  matcha powder

1. Beat egg whites in a bowl. add 1/2 granulated sugar into a bowl and beat until it becomes glossy and get stiff peak.
2. Beat egg yolks and 1/2 leftover sugar in another bowl until it becomes a little bit white and fluffy.
3. Add milk and oil into egg yolks bowl, and blend them.
4. Sieve dry ingredients and add half of them into egg yolk bowl. Blend quietly.
5. Add 1/2 egg whites into egg yolk bowl and blend quietly.
6. Add 1/2 leftover dry ingredients into the bowl and blend quietly.
7. Add 1/2 leftover egg whites into egg yolk bowl and blend quietly.
8. Pour the batter into Swiss roll cake pan with baking sheet evenly.
9. Bake it in the preheated oven at 180°C for 13-14 minutes.

10. Cool it down while covering with plastic wrap to keep moist and take out burn on top later.
11. When it get cool, Take out plastic wrap with brown surface of sponge.
12. Whip heavy cream, sugar and matcha powder in a clean bowl until stiff peak.
13. Spread out on sponge and roll it up.

14. Cover the roll cake with baking sheet, keep it in a fridge for at least 1 hour before you serve.