January 2009
Tokyo, Japan
Work, Work, Work!
Work, Work, Work! If I didn't have bread making, the cake class and fun friends, that's all I would have been doing this month. I'm so busy at work and not having my work PC for about a week has put major stress in my life. One thing I like to do besides knitting when totally stressed out is cooking. Here are two dishes that are my favorites that I made:
Oden
Oden is a very popular dish in Japan in the winter and is one of my favorite Japanese meals. Basically its similar to a pot a feu but you add fish cake, veggies and tofu based vegetable cakes in a seaweed or fish stock based soup.
I knew my favorite department store Takashimaya was having an Oden fare at the food court so I bought my ingredients there. They have a wonderful stand that sells the freshest Ganmodoki (tofu balls w/veggies) and Fish cake stand. They also have the most beautiful veggies so I bought my daikon there as I love Daikon in Oden. I also bought the ingredients for the soup stock which is basically Wakame (dried seaweed). Since I like it Kyoto style, the soup is basically flavored with wakame, a bit of soy sauce and a bit of fish stock. Tokyo style has a stronger soy flavored broth and I do enjoy it but Kyoto style is my favorite because you can enjoy the true taste of the fish cake and ganmodoki.
I originally was going to make it with a Western style pot but noticed that Takashimaya has an outpost of Takumi - a famous craft store in Tokyo, so went there to see if they have any interesting ceramic "nabe" pots. Sure enough I saw a beautiful green "nabe" that I fell in love with. It was quite expensive (about 22000yen) but since I was working very very long hours, I decided to treat myself as I love the nabe. Its handmade in Japan with a glaze made from natural paint by a local artist so its one of a kind!
My oden tasted even better by cooking it in a special "nabe"!
My special "nabe"
Janet's Kyoto Style Oden
Chicken Francaise
The Saturday after a my first exhausting first full work week of the year, I decided to clean my refrigerator as a stress relief exercise. While cleaning the freezer, I found 2 frozen Hinai-Jidori chicken breasts that I bought about a month ago at the chicken stand at Takashimiya (yes, I love that dept store!)
Hinai-Jidori chicken is probably one of the best tasting chickens in the world. (Bresse chicken is pretty good too in my opinion! The Bresse chicken dish I had at L'Ambrosie at Place des Vosges in Paris was the best chicken dish I've ever had but that's another story). Jidori literally translates to earth chicken. It is a free range chicken and in Japan they are brought up on clover fields and supposedly drink the purest water in the Hinai region. Thus Hinai-Jidori chicken. The 2 small boneless chicken breasts cost me 4500yen which is about 50$. Yes, very expensive. I was going to cook them immediately but got invited to dinner so ended up freezing them instead. I'm sure its a no-no in Japan as it is so fresh that its actually served raw in many fancy Japanese restaurants.
Anyhow, I was too lazy to go shopping so scavenged my kitchen to see what I can make with the chicken without going out. I had some pasta, frozen vodka sauce, wine, lemons, butter, capers, eggs and flour so decided to make chicken francaise with pasta.
I've been making chicken francaise for years and have served it many times at dinner parties. Here is my recipe:
* heat about 1/4 cup oil in pan
* while oil is heating, dredge chicken breasts in seasoned flour
* once oil is hot enough, dip chicken breasts in beaten egg mixture and fry in pan
* fry on one side until golden and then fry the other side until golden and cooked thru
* remove chicken breasts and place on a dish
* pour excess oil out of pan
* heat some butter, equal amounts of chicken stock and wine and juice of half of lemon in pan
* pour sauce of chicken, add some capers and serve!
My Chicken Francaise
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