Japanese

Miso Katsu (Japanese Breaded Pork Cutlet with Miso Sauce)

This past weekend a Japanese friend came to visit, and at her request, I made miso katsu and miso soup for dinner. (She was feeling a bit homesick!) Miso Katsu is a version of tonkatsu (juicy breaded and deep-fried pork cutlets served with a thick, sweet and tangy sauce and served with shredded cabbage and steamed […]

Vanilla pudding topped with a whipped cream layer and finished off with a sweetened purple sweet potato puree makes me weak in the knees. But let me back up a bit. A few months ago I received a surprise box of purple sweet potatoes from my friends at Frieda’s. I was literally jumping up and down […]

Whole wheat angel hair pasta, baby arugula, and burdock root in a yuzu kosho cream sauce is enough to get me daydreaming. When I was typing up the recipe to share this fabulous dish with you, it got me to thinking.

Tamagoyaki (卵焼き), which translates literally to mean “grilled egg,” is a Japanese omelette made by rolling up many thin layers of cooked seasoned egg. Tamagoyaki is sweet and savory and is served for breakfast, as nigirizushi, and is very popular in bento lunches—so it is the perfect dish for my Bento Buddy series!

A match made in comfort food heaven: roasted potato wedges sprinkled with fragrant nutty gomashio—Japanese sesame salt, one of my all-time favorite condiments.

Making tofu is just like making a simple cheese—you heat soy milk, then add a coagulant to separate the milk into curds and whey. You then ladle the curds into a mold to press them into a block of cheese, or in this case, tofu! I’ve written about making tofu before here on LFM, but […]

I’ve never met a taco I didn’t like. So when I discovered takoraisu (i.e., “taco rice”), a Japanese twist on the taco, while living in Japan, you can imagine that I was just a little excited to add another favorite to my taco family. In taco rice, rice takes the place of the taco shell, and […]

The first time Mr. Fuji and I moved to Japan I was quick to notice the sandwich bread, known as shokupan, in our local supermarket: cellophane bags filled with thick square slices of white bread, and no heels in sight—and when I say thick, I’m talking one and half inches thick! Mr. Fuji told me […]

I have two favorite flavors of soft cream (i.e. soft serve) in Japan: black sesame and sweet potato. If you had told me a little over 10 years ago that I would be saying that, I would have laughed at you. But 10 years ago this month Mr. Fuji and I moved to Japan for […]

Hiyashi somen—thin, delicate wheat noodles served chilled with tsuyu, a dipping sauce—is one of the most popular meals during the hot and humid summers in Japan. It’s also one of the foods enjoyed on Tanabata, one of my favorite Japanese holidays.

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