Wondering what to try in new year days?
How about trying colorful Osechi-ryori （御節料理）during New Year days.

Traditionally, rice cake soup (Zōni 雑煮) is served on 1st January to celebrate the New Year in Japan. Zōni (雑煮), a soup of mochi rice cakes, the recipe for the soup differs from region to region. Eastern Japan new year soup is in clear broth wheareas in western Japan miso broth is used to prepared the Zōni.

Tokyo-Style New Year’s Soup

Ingredients: (4 servings)

150g chicken thighs, cut into small pieces
1 tsp sake
5cm length white radish (daikon), peeled sliced into rounds then quartered
1/4 carrot, peeled and cut into shpes with vegetables cutter
2 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stem discarded, shallow cuts made on caps to form desired pattern
8 slices naruto fish paste cake
4 rice cakes

Dashi:
1 litre water
12cm piece konbu (dried kelp)
30g bonito flakes

Seasoning:
1 tbsp sake
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp soy sauce

Garnish:
1 small bunch trefoil (mitsuba), cut into 2cm lengths
1 yuzu rind, cut into fine strips

Preparations:

Prepare dashi. Put water and kelp into a sauce pan and leave for 30 minutes. Place over medium heat and when small bubbles appear from bottom, remove kepl.
When water is boiling, add bonito flakes, then reduce heat and simmer for a few seconds. Remove from heat, then leave until bonito flakes sink to the bottom of saucepan. Strain stock and discard solids.
Marinate chicken with sake for about 10 minutes.
Pour dashi into a pot and bring to a boil. Add chicken, radish, carrot, mushrooms and fish cake. Simmer for about 10 miuntes.
While soup is boiling, grill rice cakes in a preheated oven at 200 C or toaster for 5 ~ 10 minutes until slightly puffy and light brown in colour.
Mix seasoning ingredients together and stir into soup. Remove from heat.
Place a grilled or toasted rice cake into each individual serving bowl and ladle soup over. Garnish with trefoil and yuzu rind. Serve hot.

Tokyo-Style New Year’s Zoni Soup

Most of Japanese recipes is using ingredients such as mirin, soy sauce, dashi stock, miso, sake etc to create traditional Japanese taste. By combining these ingredients, you can create you own favorite taste.

Most of the time Japanese Miso is used in making soup recipes. However, you can also use miso  to make miso paste sauce for marinade.

Ingredients:

600g miso paste
300g fine sugar
150g soy sauce
150g Japanese sake

Preparation:

Combine the above ingredients in a medium bowl. Stir well until the sugar is dissolved. Marinade with vegetables such as radish, lettuce heart, Japanese cucumber, carrot.

You can make more miso paste marinade, store and chill in refrigerator.

In Japan, when you enter a Chuka 中華(Chinese) restaurant, sit down then look at the menu, you will find this dish – Mapo Tofu. Mapo Tofu is a Chinese well-known dish from the Szechuan province. It combine the Chinese chili-bean paste or called Tobanjiang with tofu and minced pork. Tobanjiang plays the main role in spicy flavor of the dish. Although, most of the Chinese restaurants offer this famous dish, Mapo Tofu in Japanese style is not as spicy as the origin from Szechuan. It is sweeter and milder in taste.

Remember when I ordered, I will request for more spicy mapo tofu and add more chili-oil (rayu) when serve. If you are cooking at home, you may add more tobanjiang if you prefer more spicy taste. Serve with hot steamed rice will stimulate your appetite.

Tobanjiang (豆板醬）- Chili-bean paste

Ingredients : ( 4 servings)

2 block cotton tofu (600 g), diced into bite sized cubes
250g minced pork
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp fresh ginger, finely chopped
1/2 leek, finely chopped
1 tbsp tobanjiang (Chinese chili-bean paste)
1 tbsp corn starch
1 tbsp sesame oil
For seasoning:
1 cup water
3 tbsp miso bean paste
2 tbsp sake
1 tsp chicken soup powder
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt

Preparations:

In a big bowl, combine water, miso, sake, chicken soup powder, sugar and salt. Stir until the sugar has dissolved. Set aside.Wrap tofu with paper towel and heat the tofu in microwave for 1 minute. Drain the excess water and cut into small cubes. Heat sesame oil in a wok on low heat, add garlic, ginger, leek and hot bean paste, stir fry for 3 minutes. Then add minced pork, cook until the color changed. Pour the seasoning mixture into the wok and bring to a boil. Add tofu cubes and simmer on medium heat for about 10 minutes.
Mix corn starch with 1 tbsp water and combine it into the wok, stir gently until the sauce is thickened and smooth, remove from heat and dish out.　Garnish the tofu with some spring onion and serve with steam rice.

Have you ever been to Izakaya?

Izakaya is a type of traditional Japanese drinking place which serves food to accompany the drinks. Izakaya offers all sorts of dishes other than alcoholic drinks such as sake, beer shochu, chuhai etc. Food in Izakaya are designed to be shared like karaage, yakitori, kushiyaki, sashimi, hiyayako, tsukemono, edamame and more.

A mainstay of the nation’s food culture, the izakaya is a vital venue for socializing and an increasingly innovative culinary influence. Men drank sake and beer after work and due to the growing trend in population of independent women and students, many izakaya today cater for the more diverse clientele by offering cocktails and wines as well as improving the interior.

For me, the first time I experienced the amazing atmosphere was in one of Izakaya called “Iccho”, Mito in the year 1995.

We, (me and friends total of 8 person) ordered almost every dish from the menu. Tasted on every single dish, daikon tsukemono, fresh sashimi, cool hiyayako with nori topping, agedashitofu.. and enjoyed with the drunk. We finished up the left-over food with “janken” game where I was the person who cleared up the left-over “tori-karaage”(鳥唐揚げ) – a crispy Japanese fried chicken nuggets. It was my unforgettable experience in Izakaya where I eaten the extra (left-over 8 pieces) karaage after enjoying other varieties of food in Izakaya. Full stomach(満腹) and drunk… 爽快!　:) It was how i started falling love with the “tori-karaage”…

Try this, “finger lickin’ good recipe” by youlin
Japanese food recipes : Torikaraage Recipes

Ingredients: (4 serving)

4 whole chicken breasts, skinned & deboned
5 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp oyster sauce
3 tbsp root ginger, grated
4 garlic cloves, grated
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste

5 tbsp cornflour
5 tbsp plain white flour
vegetable oil for deep frying
3~4 lemon sliced
Mayonnaise (optional)

Directions:

Cut chicken into bite-size pieces. Mix chicken with soy sauce, oyster sauce, garlic, ginger, salt and pepper. Marinate for at least 30minutes. In a medium bowl, mix the cornflour with white plain flour ( 1: 1 ratio). Dipping the marinate chicken in flour until completely coated. In a wok, heat oil to 180 degrees C and deep fry the chicken pieces for about 5 minutes or until golden brown. Transfer chicken to serving plate and granish with lemon slices and mayonnaise. Serve immediately.

Shabu shabu is one of the Japanese hot pot dishes and most enjoyable winter dishes. The array of ingredients is prepared in advance. Ingredients such as thinly sliced meat, vegetables and other ingredients are cooked in a skillet on the table making it possible for hosts to relax and enjoy a convivial meal with theiï½’ guest.

Japanese beef with Shabu-shabu:

Ingredients: (Makes 4 servings)

700g sirloin beef, thinly sliced
15 spring onions (scallions), diagonally and thinly sliced
3 carrots, cut into thin round slices
400g button mushrooms, thinly sliced
1/2 Chinese cabbage, chopped to bite-sized
1 block cotton tofu, cut into bite-sized cubes
2 litres chicken stock
Japanese short-grain rice, cooked
ready made shabu shabu sauce

Preparations:

Arrange the prepared vegetables, tofu and meat in separate piles on a serving platter. Cover with kitchen wrap and refrigerate before cooking. Position the serving platter and electric wok so they are within easy reach of each diner. Pour the stock into the electric wok, cover and bring to a simmer. Each diner then picks up an ingredient or two with thier chopsticks and places it in the simmering stock for about 1 minute or until cooked. Do not overcook, the vegetables should be just tender and the beef still pink in the centre.Skim off any foam and repeat cooking. The food is then dipped into the sauce and eaten with the rice. The remaining stock can be served as soup at the end of meal.

Buta no Shogayaki(豚の生姜焼き） is a famous Japanese food dish served in restaurant throughout Japan. It goes well with rice mostly prepared in set for lunch or dinner. Shoga or ginger, is the main ingredient for the dish. With some cornstarch to thicken the sauce, when it combined with the pork slices it makes the dish more delicious. And when you eat together with rice, it provide you with plenty of energy and boost you appetite during summer. Prefect!!

Ingredients: (4 servings):

300g thinly sliced pork
2 tbsp grated fresh ginger
1 tbsp grated garlic
2 tbsp salad oil
2 tbsp sugar
3 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp sake
1 tbsp cornstarch
shedded  cabbage

Preparations:

Mix grated ginger, garlic and sugar in a small bowl. Pour cornstarch in the surface of thinly sliced pork. Marinate pork for 10 minutes. Heat salad oil in a frying pan. Stir-fry both side of pork slices on medium heat. Turn to low heat, pour in sake and soy sauce. Served ginger pork with cabbage.

Every year, during December Japanese are busying on celebrating bōnenkai(忘年会). A Japanese year-end parties or  literally “forget the year gathering” is a Japanese drinking party that takes place at the end of the year, and is generally held among groups of co-workers or friends. The purpose of the party, as its name implies, is to forget the woes and troubles of the past year, usually by consumption of large amounts of alcohol.

Here, I wanna introduce a very simple and easy to prepare Japanese style beef recipe, Japanese beef sukiyaki recipe (すき焼き) that commonly found at bonenkai. Generally, this is a very popular Japanese one-pot dish or nabemono for the colder days of the year. Just add in the thin-sliced beef (you may use other options of chicken or pork slices), vegetables, tofu. Slowly cooked or simmered at the table, alongside vegetables and other ingredients, in a shallow iron pot in a mixture of soy sauce, sugar, and mirin. Before being eaten, the ingredients are usually dipped in a small bowl of raw, beaten eggs.

The ingredients is easy to get, and may be you can cook it during the Christmas Holiday with your friend and family as an amazing christmas present.

So, are you ready to receive this present (from me)? Just Cook it and you will love it then.

Japanese Beef Sukiyaki Recipe

Ingredients:

150g thinly sliced beef
tofu 2 blocks
2 Onion
spring onion
2 eggs

For sauce:
4 tbsps soy sauce
2 tbsps sake
2 tbsps sugar
2 tbsps mirin

Preparations:

Cut all ingredients into bite-sized pieces. Heat a little oil in a pan. Fry beef slices and arrange onion slice to the pan. Add tofu and pour in ingredients for sauce. Simmer until all ingredients are softened.Turn tofu slowly and garnish with spring onion. Add beaten eggs if you like to.

If you like to cook in Japanese cuisine and not sure what or where to get the Japanese Food Recipes, please always come to youlin’s blog. Sure you will get the innovative ideas from here.   This post is specially for the busy people that really do not want to spend extra time to cook, yet, love to eat Japanese food. What you need to do is shopping..Sounds easy, right? Ya, just go to grocery stores, supermarket and shop for some Japanese Instant Cooking Ingredients with various of delicious recipes. Then stock some at home. See the image above is what I stocked at home, in case I want to eat these, within 10 minutes I can get a plate of delicious Japanese Food dish. So, do more shopping for Japanese various kind of recipes. Easy, right?