Blueberry Muffins Review

The other day I was bored at home and I didn't want to leave my house. So, I decided to use up some frozen blueberries I had in the freezer. So, I looked online and clicked on the first recipe.

The recipe was on Allrecipes website for blueberry muffins.
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/to-die-for-blueberry-muffins/

There were both easy and quick to make. I made them in a total of 40 minutes with little preparation.



However, I used frozen blueberries instead of fresh but they still came out great.



Just remember that if you are baking with frozen fruit make sure to roll the frozen fruit in some flour prior to mixing them in the batter. If you don't they will end up sinking to the bottom of the cake or in this case muffins.

Homemade Cooking (Quiche butter crust)

Over these last couple of weeks I have gotten into cooking various foods. I am trying my best to cook foods from scratch aka not using boxes or prepackaged materials. I have tried many recipes of the last couple of days and I want to share one with you now.


This recipe is for making a butter quiche crust.


This was my first time at attempting to make quiche crust, so I wanted to take my time and make sure that I followed directions carefully.

For my recipe I used the following for the crust.

1. 50 grams of butter (cold)
2. 100 grams of flour
3. Pinch of salt
4. One egg

You will also need
1. Pie pan
2. Fork
3. Tin Foil
4. Baking paper
5. Food Processor

First preheat the oven to 190 C

 Put the flour, salt and the butter in the food processor. Make sure the butter and the flour are combined. The cconsistancy should look like peas. After you combine these add the egg and pulse a couple of times.

Next all you need to do is mash the dough together with your hands and make a ball.

Next get one piece of plastic wrap and put the dough on top and then put another piece on top of the dough (it should be like a sandwich, wrap dough wrap.) After this you can roll out the dough into a round shape. Next take off the top layer of plastic wrap and place it in a baking sheet.

It is much easier to carry the dough this way. Then take off the second layer.

Now get a folk and poke holes into the bottom of the pie crust. After doing this get some baking paper and place it on top of the pie crust followed by a piece of tin foil.


Bake this in the over at 190C for about 10 minutes.

After 10 minutes remove the foil and baking paper and bake for another 5 minutes.

Now the pie crust is finished.


You can put anything you want in quiche I put the basics.

But the crust came out great and my friends enjoyed my breakfast quiche.

Yasukuni Shrine

After viewing the Emperor and his home, we decided to walk to Yasukuni Shrine located near the palace. This Shrine is quite famous because it is where some of the World War Two War Criminals are inshrined, thus making it a huge news topic in Asia. This last year Prime Minister Abe visited this particular shrine to pay respect  to his dead relatives. But by doing so.. He also prayed for the inshrined war criminals.


Lets just say it didn't go well with Japan`s neighbours.

Once we got to the Shrine we got something to eat and people watched. It is quite evident that many of the people who come here for prayer are either Japanese Mafia or Japanese extremists.



At around two in the afternoon we decided to head back home.

Emperors New Year Speech on January 2nd

After celebrating the New Year Holiday at home. I decided to meet up with some of my old friends from University to attend the Japanese Emperors New Year Speech on January 2nd.

This is a big event in Japan. Many Japanese people as well as Japan Nationalists come to view this great event every year.

 Thus, there are long lines in order to see the emperor`s speech. My friend decided to attend the earliest speech possible because that is when most of the royal family comes out to greet people (common folk). Thus, I decided to wake up at 7 in order to get there before our 8:30 scheduled time. 

As usual, I over calculated my time and I arrived at the station at around seven thirty am which meant I would have to wait over an hour for my friends. Moreover, I was really tired and had to use the restroom really bad. Thus, I decided to look for a coffee shop or restaurant to use the restroom and get a fresh cup of coffee. However, everything was closed which meant I had to walk about 15 minutes to the nearest Starbucks to use the restroom.


After using the restroom and drinking a nice hot cup of coffee, I headed back to the station to meet up with my friends. I arrived at the station at around eight twenty and they had already been waiting for me. After meeting up with them, we headed to view the emperor.


We arrived at the entrance of the palace at around 9 am just in time to get into line and wait for another hour to get in. As you are waiting to enter the palace you can see many kinds of interesting figures. Most of them are extreme nationalists and Japanese Yakuza.




















At around 9:30 the gates opened up and we were allowed on the palace grounds where we lined up and viewed the whole two minute speech and then were quickly ushered out. The speech was really short compared to previous years( I don't blame him, he is quite old ). Luckily,  I am tall. If you are short or typical Japanese height it is almost impossible to view the family during the speech because everyone waves Japan flags during the whole event and scream bonsai!!!!.

New Year`s Eve meal

I already wrote about New Year Day and what I did but I have yet to tell what I made on New Year`s Eve. 

Most Japanese eat soba as I had mentioned in my previous blog. Thus, I made soba and also bought a nice bottle of sparkling white wine. 

Moreover, I wanted to make dessert for my friends. So, I decided to make a simple Mille-feuille with homemade whipped cream and custard. 


The custard was very easy to make 

All you need is

35 grams of sugar 
150 cc of milk 
One egg yellow 
15 grams of flour 
15 grams of cornstarch (optional)


You mix all the ingredients in a bowl excluding the cornstarch, then put the bowl in the microwave for about 1 minute and thirty seconds.

Take it out and mix 

Then put it back in the microwave again for another 30 seconds. 

If you don't like the constancy of the custard you can some cornstarch when you stick it in the microwave for the second time. 

If you do so please add about 15 grams of cornstarch. 


After making the custard I got some frozen pie sheets and baked them and then cut them into squares followed by whipping up some cream. 


I then layered them like a sandwich. When you layer them, please make sure that all the ingredients are cold otherwise they will fall apart during this process. 

pie sheet
custard
cream
strawberry
cinnamon 
pie sheet
custard 
cream
strawberry
cinnamon
pie sheet

Then, you have a very easy treat for your friends. 

Yakiniku Dinner on New Year Day

After doing a lot of shopping and praying at the shrine. My friend decided head back to Shinookubo to eat Korean food because that was the only thing open during New Year Day.


So, he headed all the way back to Okubo to find a nice restaurant. Once we got there we found a nice looking restaurant but... there was a line and there was only one waiter. Knowing this we decided to head back to Shinjuku and check out a yakiniku joint we had seen earlier in the day.



Let me tell you this,


This restaurant was expensive but it was the joint!!!!

The first thing we ordered was raw meat to fry and I ordered cheese binbinpa

Then we ordered an assortment of raw meat to grill on hot rocks. 

The meal was quite delicious for a last minute meal and I plan on visiting again in the future.

Check the restaurant out here at this address

焼き肉ホルモン 門

〒169-0072 Tokyo, Shinjuku, Okubo, 1 Chome1-2 泰正ビル １F

03-3200-3307

Yakiniku Restaurant

Japanese New Year Day

Japanese New Year Day is similar to Christmas in the west. Most Japanese return to their hometowns and eat delicious dishes known as Osechi. The Osechi was first founded during the Heian period in Japan. Most people ate these dishes over a couple of days which meant that the food had to last. Thus, the food was stacked in boxes called jubako.

I have never eaten Osechi in Japan but I will eventually. Unlike most Japanese housewives I do not have days to prepare this glorious dish nor do I want to spend hundreds of dollars to purchase it. So, this year I decided to walk around my local area and eat Japanese Yakiniku and do Hatsumode (Praying for good luck for the year.)

Living in Shinjuku the closest shrine to my house is Hanazono Shrine located next to Kabukicho (Tokyo`s red light district)

 I left my house at around 3pm and headed to the shrine with my friend and on the way I decided to sample some delicious street stall foods in Shinokubo. I decided to eat a potato fried on a stick. It was quite delicious and cheap at only 200 yen.

After eating the potato I headed to the Shrine. But do the the amount of people waiting in to pray I decided against waiting and went shopping instead. I ended up buying my new oven then headed back to the Shrine to pray for good luck. Again the line was super long thus I decided to go to Hanazono Sweet Shop and enjoy some Japanese sweets and wait until dusk. 

This sweet is a soft rice cake with cream and raisins in the middle. It tasted like a raisin cookie not too sweet but very delicious. 

This is sugar candy that is often given with warm green tea in Japan.

This is a special Anmitsu only served on New Year Day. Anmitsu has many thing such as jelly, azuki (Japanese sweet beans), cherry and fruit. This particular one had green tea ice cream. 

This is fried mochi(mashed rice until it become a dough like substance) with seaweed and soy sauce. 

Tsutaya in Roppongi

Ever since changing jobs last year I have been able to spend more time in Azabu Juban. Although, I am no stranger to Azabu. I have decided to enjoy more of the restaurants in the area. One of the places I never visited as a student was Tsutaya near Roppongi Hills. I never really had time to enjoy Tsutaya because
1.I was busy studying.
2. I was too poor to buy books or drink Starbucks on a daily basis.

Thus, the other day during my lunch break I had decided to take sometime and good browsing through their book section. While there, I noticed that had a large assortment of architecture
and art books. I was never a huge fan of these two subjects so, I decided to take a look at their cooking section. The cooking section was also quite big with books ranging from everyday bento making to extremely difficult French recipes.


I decided to pick up two books while I was there. The first book was how to make sandwiches from scratch. (I do not eat many sandwiches but I think I should start)

The other was a cookbook on how to make bistro style dishes.

I hope I can try all of these recipes in the near future.

Divas can cook recipe review

I have decided to start a new type of entry into my blog and I want to call this section my Recipe Review Section.

Over the last couple of days I have been on a cooking frenzy. I have not cooked much over the last year. However, over this last new year holiday I decided to buy a new oven. I ended up buying a Sharp Healsio.

To  my surprise it was a great investment.


The oven works great and it bakes really well.


Thus, this last Sunday while browsing the web I decided to take a challenge and bake a whole chicken for the first time here in Japan.

The recipe that caught my eye was from a food blogger (Divas can cook)

You can view her site here at

www.divascancook.com

I decided to challenge and cook her Lemon Rosemary Garlic Chicken.

And let me tell you this... This recipe is the bomb!!!!


The chicken ended up real moist and the Rosemary, Garlic, and butter taste fabulous.







I also cooked some veggies simmered in butter and herbs to go with the dish. I think this chicken is a great way to end the week or start the new week. The recipe was easy to follow and all of the measurements were on point.

My friend who had come over for dinner that night was surprised by how fast I was able to cook the chicken and how little prep it took. ( In Japan is uncommon to buy a whole chicken and bake it)

If I have a potluck or a party in the near future this will be one of the dishes I would consider taking.


Here are a few pics from my dinner last night.