Easy, Tasty, Fun, Creative and Kawaii Japanese Food Recipes and Cooking Hacks Blog with How-To YouTube Cooking Show Video Tutorials. Bento, Healthy Sweets and More!!! Make Your Life Easier ;)
Okuizome (the first meal) is one of the traditional celebration events for Japanese babies. It is a tradition that babies are made to pretend to eat their first meal on the 100th day to wish they will have enough food throughout their lives.
March 8th was my daughter's 100th day after birth :)
My darling is from Kansai (関西: the western region of the main Japanese island) so he prefers Okonomiyaki to Monja. LOL
To eat, you use a tiny metal spatula to scrape off the small portion of the cooked mixture. Obviously, it damages the pan, so I prefer to eat it out at the restaurant. haha
--------------------------------- How to Make Monjayaki
Difficulty: Easy
Time: 20min
Number of servings: 2
Ingredients:
500ml water
3 tbsp. flour
4 tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
300g (10.6oz.) cabbage
10g (0.36oz.) Sakuraebi (dried small shrimp)
50g (1.8oz.) Tenkasu (crunchy bits of deep fried flour-batter)
((you can add other ingredients))
kimchi, seasoned cod roe, cheese, corn, tuna, Mochi, noodle snacks, etc…
Directions:
1. Place the solid ingredients on the pan. Cut and cook the ingredients.
2. Form the ingredients into a donut shape, then pour the batter in the middle of the donut and bring to a boil.
3. Mix everything up and leave it to be cooked. Eat by scraping off and browning a small portion of the mixture.
Japanese Doll Festival (Hinamatsuri), or Girls' Day, is held on March 3rd.
On this day, we set up hina dolls (hina-ningyo) since they are believed to protect girls from bad luck.
This year (2015) was my daughter's 1st Hinamatsuri! The very first celebration is important, when family members hope for growth and happiness for baby girls. My daughter still can't eat anything but I hope she liked this Sushi cake :)
Hishi Mochi (diamond shaped rice cake) is usually presented with hina dolls. Hishi Mochi commonly consists of three layers: pink, white, and green, from top to bottom. It is said that pink represents peach flowers, white represents snow, and green represents grass. Those colors have a meaning to get the power of nature. Therefore, I used these three colors for my Sushi Cake :)
--------------------------------- Sushi Cake for Hinamatsuri
Difficulty: Medium
Time: 20min
Number of servings: 4 people = 15cm (6inch) round cake pan
Directions:
1. Wet the cake pan (or line with plastic wrap). Place the crab meat Sushi rice and press down flat with a rice paddle or a spoon. Then place the white Sushi rice and the Aonori Sushi rice one after another and flatten as well. Turn the cake pan upside down onto a plate to remove the rice.
2. Make a thin ribbon of cucumber for Odairisama (prince)'s Kimono and slice the leftover into thin rounds.
3. Cut out the egg crepe and make a scepter and a fan. Thinly slice the leftover.
4. Place the cucumber slices and shredded egg crepe on the Sushi cake. Wrap the quail eggs with a cucumber ribbon (prince) and smoked salmon (princess). Let them hold the scepter (prince) and the fan (princess). Cut out Nori sheet to make their faces. Attach their hairs with bento picks. Garnish with Ikura and Sakura Denbu to finish.
* お雛様 (ohinasama: princess) holds a fan called 扇子 (sensu) in both hands.
* お内裏様 (odairisama: prince) holds a flat wooden scepter called 笏 (shaku) symbolic of his rank in his right hand.
