The golden week in Japan is this blessed moment in spring when there are several bank holidays and when usually the weather is perfectly warm but not hot and the nature is full of dpring greens, flowers and days are getting longer with a beautiful light. This is a time when we usually have msny… Continue Reading →
Double luck!
I was thinking that these days I don’t cook much and in particular I haven’t created new recipes as often as I usually do. Indeed, I am busy with work, handling a lot of things at the same time, and the beginning of the new term at the university, with new students in the lab,… Continue Reading →
Barter
It’s been a year now I’ve started some barter process with our neighbors in the country. Some gingko nuts here, some citrus fruits, some plums, some bread etc… in exchange one would sew a kimono, teach me how to make umeboshi, give us a few pickled vegetables, and more often they would give us fresh… Continue Reading →
Baby corn
I like corns but I don’t know too many ways to prepare them: butter grilled, boiled, in salad, in soup, with rice… I don’t really like the butter grilled or simply boiled when you have a whole chunck and need to use your fingers. Plus they often come in bundle of 3 or 4 corns,… Continue Reading →
And a last one!
Yup! I’m done with this grant application and with many other things that were bothering me and keeping me too busy at work. So here is the last one-plate of this series, the last just before finishing the grant things. From tomorrow I will be back to some more elaborate cooking and trsting new products… Continue Reading →
And an other one
Indeed, I am still crazy busy at work with this grant application, but hopefully it should be all done today. In the meantime we still need to sustain ourselves and the Japanese one-plate is on the menu again with an unexpected variation. Indeed, I prepared the green beans with miso and the pickled onions, but… Continue Reading →
Picnic Japanese style
When I have guests from abroad I try to cook Japanese as much as possible except for breakfast. So when we decided to take a walk to the beach and picnic there I decided to prepare some bamboo shoots onigiri or o musubi. This is just the end of the season of bamboo shoots, so… Continue Reading →
Shojin cuisine – 精進料理
I love kaiseki cuisine (懐石料理) and in particular cha-kaiseki (茶懐石). I’ve learned it for a year and it helped me a lot understand Japanese cuisine and cooking, it also helped me to train my palate. But what I really troubles with kaiseki because it includes quite a lot of raw fish, shellfish, fish eggs etc…… Continue Reading →
Art and nature in Niigata prefecture
In the summer of 2006 while browsing the internet to find some nice contemporary art event and exhibition I found information about the Echigo-Tsumari art triennale (ETAT) and some special performances that would be held on the week end, so we jumped in a car and drove up there with no plan but our “triennale… Continue Reading →
