Tag - japanese-kitchen

 
 

JAPANESE KITCHEN

Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Apr 17, 2015
The holy trinity of the '60s: sumo, baseball and tamagoyaki
Earlier this year, yokozuna (sumo grand champion) Hakuho broke the all-time victory record of Taiho, the yokozuna regarded by many as the greatest sumo wrestler of the postwar period. This reminded me of a well-known saying from the 1960s, Taiho's heyday, which says that Kyojin (the Yomiuri Giants baseball...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Mar 17, 2015
Wild wasabi proves a warrior ingredient in many a dish
The pungent green wasabi is native to Japan, as its botanical name Eutrema japonicum indicates.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Feb 17, 2015
Sushi rice served right adds color to any springtime menu
Sushi rice (or shari) is subtly sour, sweet and salty with a boost of umami.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Jan 20, 2015
Recipe: Spaghetti Napolitan
On Aug. 30, 1945, newly appointed Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers Gen. Douglas MacArthur landed at Atsugi Airport in Yokohama and headed straight to an elegant hotel overlooking the harbor that had escaped destruction during the war. The Hotel New Grand served as his headquarters for three days,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Dec 16, 2014
Ring in the new year with refinement
The quintessential washoku, or traditional Japanese cuisine dish, is nimono — vegetables and other ingredients simmered in a broth of dashi stock, sake, mirin, sugar and soy sauce or miso. Nimono can be made in advance and served warm or cold, saving the cook some effort.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Nov 18, 2014
Warm up over a shared hot pot
What comes to mind when you think of convivial home-cooked family meals? In Japan, the answer is usually nabe, or hot-pot cooking.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Oct 14, 2014
Japan's take on the humble burger
There are two dishes that can be translated as "hamburger" in Japan. One is the all-American favorite, a beef patty sandwiched in a bun, which in Japanese is called hanbāgā. The other kind is similar to a Hamburg steak or Salisbury steak, made with chopped onions, breadcrumbs and egg mixed with the...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Sep 16, 2014
The raw appeal of eggs
The average Japanese person eats around 320 eggs (tamago) per year, according to the International Egg Commission, placing it in the Top 3 worldwide. (In comparison, the average American eats around 250 eggs per year.) Eggs are enjoyed in many sweet and savory dishes, such as the famous (or infamous)...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Aug 19, 2014
Japan's historic love of corn
The fact that corn or maize has a Japanese name — tōmorokoshi — indicates that it entered the country centuries ago, before it was the norm to import the name of a food as-is and spell it out phonetically (as with tomatoes or asparagus, for instance).
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Jul 15, 2014
Japanese summer garnishes invigorate the taste buds
In Japanese cooking, garnish is not just added to a dish to make it look pretty. The word to describe the herbs and vegetables that accompany a dish is yakumi, which means "medicinal flavor," and originally referred to the concoctions that practitioners of Chinese medicine made using various ingredients...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Jun 17, 2014
Traditional jelly noodles are cooling as well as healthy
Summertime is the season for cooling jellies, and one of the most popular kinds in Japan is kanten. Overseas, this is known as agar-agar, but here kanten and agar are confusingly considered to be two distinctly different substances.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
May 20, 2014
Why not add a little booze?
Mirin is a staple of Japanese kitchens, yet few people know what it actually is.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Apr 15, 2014
Springtime for bamboo
Few plants are as useful as bamboo. A member of the grass family, it is fast growing and very prolific given the right growing conditions, which makes it eco-friendly too.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Mar 18, 2014
Feed their tummies and minds with a back-to-school bentō
April marks the start of the school year in Japan. If you're a parent, this may mean that you're faced with the task of making bentō (boxed lunches) for the first time. While bentō are virtually a national institution that come in many formats and are enjoyed by almost everyone, making them for small...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Feb 18, 2014
You'll either love or hate those stinky, sticky beans
Soybeans have long been an important part of the Japanese diet. They are enjoyed in many forms — as edamame, tofu or yuba; boiled or roasted; ground up as flour; and so on. Soybeans also have religious significance, as we've seen this month during Setsubun, when roasted soybeans are thrown to signify...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Jan 14, 2014
Juiced for a citrus winter
One of my favorite winter pastimes growing up was to snuggle under the futon covering a kotatsu (heated table), doing my homework or watching TV, as I methodically worked my way through a big bowl of Satsuma mikan, the little oval-shaped oranges that are known as clementines or tangerines in the West....
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Dec 26, 2013
Start a tasty new kitchen tradition this New Year's
We're entering the most traditional time of year in Japan in food terms, starting on New Year's Eve and through the New Year's holiday period, when families gather to dine on osechi delicacies and bowls of symbolic soba noodles. That doesn't mean that there's no room for other kinds of foods, though....
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Nov 21, 2013
Demand booming for artisanal rice
Rice farmers in Japan are under siege. Heavily protected on various levels by the central government for decades, they've seen the market for their precious crop eroded by cheaper imported rice, and the administration of Shinzo Abe is proposing ending production-rationing and subsidies. It will be interesting...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Oct 24, 2013
Food tradition with a long shelf life
A type of speciality food store that has almost disappeared from the streets of Japan is the kanbutsu-ya (dried-foods store). These days we can get fresh produce all year round, but that wasn't the case before canning and refrigeration became widespread.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Sep 26, 2013
Japan's secret love of a breakfast loaf
Japan is generally regarded as being a rice-based food culture. However, bread — or pan in Japanese, derived from the Portuguese word pu00e3o — is eaten almost as widely.

Longform

Traditional folk rituals like Mizudome-no-mai (dance to stop the rain) provide a sense of agency to a population that feels largely powerless in the face of the climate crisis.
As climate extremes intensify, Japan embraces ancient weather rituals