Kitchen Culture Cooking Club
EXPLORE and PRACTICE Japanese cooking in your own kitchenAbout Kitchen Culture Cooking Club
Welcome to the Kitchen Culture Cooking Club, a community space providing encouragement to those who want to EXPLORE and PRACTICE Japan’s washoku wisdom in their own kitchens.
To facilitate this, themed projects will be posted to this page periodically. Project Assignments and links to relevant reference material stored on this site will be posted to this page. Anyone, anywhere in the world, with a sincere interest in Japanese food culture is welcome to browse the contents of this page and then replicate the themed project in their own kitchen.
For those who wish to display-and-discuss their projects with like-minded people, I invite you to join the KITCHEN CULTURE Cooking Club Facebook Group (formerly the TSUDOI Project), an interactive community space.
PROJECT Adzuki: Sweet & Savory
PROJECT Adzuki: Sweet & Savory
The adzuki bean 小豆 plays a prominent role in Japanese cookery, especially in the making of sweets… though savory dishes also abound. This Kitchen Culture Cooking Club PROJECT is about exploring the many possibilities.
I provide one sweet recipe for TSUBU AN (chunky red bean jam) and one savory recipe for SEKIHAN (festive red rice and beans) to get you started. Further suggestions below in the captions to the images.
Try making one or more dishes with ADZUKI beans. Please track your kitchen activity with photos and a brief description. Then post your ADZUKI ADVENTURES to the Kitchen Culture Cooking Club.
Looking forward to seeing what you make in YOUR kitchen!
The SWEET SIDE of ADZUKI
Pictured above from top left, clockwise: DORA YAKI pancakes with tsubu an filling. GRIDDLE CAKES topped with tsubu an and ice cream (kuro mitsu black sugar syrup in the small pitcher), tsubu an topping for SOFT SERVE ice cream, OGURA TOAST, a specialty of Nagoya where thick white bread is toasted and slathered with tsubu an and topped with a pat of butter.
Head to the Kitchen Culture page for more about adzuki beans.
My November 2022 NEWSLETTER is about Shichi Go San
celebration of children (girls aged 3 and 7; boys aged 5).
Recipes and Resources
Stock (Dashi)
Dashi stock is essential to making soups and simmered or stewed dishes. Dashi is also used when making many egg dishes and all sorts of sauces, dips and dressings. Using good dashi will make a noticeable difference in the outcome of so many dishes you prepare.
Click to download recipes for (vegan) Kelp Alone Stock or Standard Sea Stock + Smoky Sea Stock
How to Cook Rice
In Japanese, the word for cooked rice, ご飯 GOHAN, is the same as the word for a meal, ご飯 GOHAN. Indeed rice is central to the meal. Download the Rice with Mixed Grains recipe.
How to Prepare Sushi Rice
Sushi dishes are made with rice that has been seasoned (with sweetened vinegar) AFTER being cooked. Download the Classic Sushi Rice recipe.
Quick Pickles
The Japanese enjoy a wide variety of tsukémono pickles, many can be assembled quickly and are ready to eat within a short time.
Download a recipe for Quick-Fix Hakusai Cabbage.
EDIBLE SAKURA Blossoms & Leaves
Salt-Cured Cherry Blossoms & Leaves The blossoms and leaves of certain varieties of sakura are made edible by preserving them in salt, in a process known as shio-zuké. Deeply colored yaezakura blossoms are especially prized. When it comes to salt-curing leaves,...
Pom Pom Sushi
Pom Pom Sushi Temari-Zushi 手まり寿司 Like many frugal Japanese women who managed households in the early and mid 20th century, my mother-in-law, Kiyoko Andoh, practiced thrift in and out of the kitchen. She saved bits and pieces of cloth, turning them into quilted...
Aku Nuki and Kogomi
KOGOMI こごみ・屈み Fiddlehead of the ostrich fern; Matteuccia struthiopteris What the Japanese call kogomi is commonly known in North America as fiddlehead ferns; they can be found in many parts of Canada, New England, the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest. In Japan,...
Setsubun
ONI wa SOTO FUKU wa UCHI Throw out the ogres! Bring in Good Fortune!節分 SETSUBUN means “break between seasons” and such breaks occur many times during the year. However, today Japan celebrates the setsubun break that comes early in February and...
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