cucumber curry

Can you put sliced cucumbers in curry?




I say YES. I put them in my Japanese curry, along with carrots and pork. (I also mixed two different curry powders in, plus a little bit of peanut butter!)

And that curry was yummy.

curry chunk art

OK it's a bit stretched when I called this "art," but every time I cut or chop Japanese curry chunks I think it looks a bit artsy!

I love Japanese curry. I make them at home, and I go to small curry houses or specialty curry udon shops when I'm in Japan. Yay for Japanese curry.

curry udon with roasted chicken

I have been loving and eating Japanese curry these days. I brought back a big bag of curry flakes from Tokyo and just barely opened it about a month ago. It's like the curry squares that come in small boxes, but shaved into little flakes!

These little flakes are amazing! They melt and mix in with whatever I'm making and delicious curry is simple and convenient to make.

I've also found a lazy way of making curry noodles.

I boil the noodles for the desired time, and instead of straining them after they are done, I pour out excessive water (while the noodles are still in the pot and save some water,) and add the curry flakes to make curry sauce or soup right in the same pot.

The other night John made some rotisserie chicken thighs (marinated the chicken thigh pieces with a little bit of olive oil, chopped garlic, soy sauce, and rice wine,) so we placed the chicken on top of the curry udon noodles. Very tasty!


and of course there had to be some shichimi on the noodles!

pressure cook it!

I made some fatty pork (pork belly) in the electric pressure cooker. The meat turned out amazing!


Fatty pork and quail eggs on rice.

I seared the sides of the fatty pork first, place the slices in the pressure cooker, and added soy sauce, sake, water, dry chives, garlic, red hot peppers, and sugar. The pork was cooked on high pressure for 75 minutes, and then I added some (a can) of boiled quail eggs and cook for another 10 minutes.

Mmmmm. This was probably one of the best fatty pork stew I've tasted! Next time I'll probably shorten the cooking time to 65... just so the meat doesn't fall apart as soon as I pick it up with my chopsticks!

chicken and carrot curry soba

I was going to make curry soba, but found I didn't have onions (which I almost always add to my curry,) nor regular soba, hence this chicken and carrot curry brown soba.


The brown soba looked a bit dark-green-ish(!) in the picture.

I cook the brown soba first, run it under cold water, and set aside. I then use a little bit of olive oil and stir-fry sliced chicken breast, and when it's fully cooked I stir in a can of carrots. Pour in adequate amount of Memmi and water (ratio 1:12, I think I poured in about 1/4 C Memmi and 3 C water) and allow it to come to a boil before adding 2 "chunks" (the kind that comes in a flat box, or 2 slightly heap-y tablespoons powder) curry. Allow it to simmer for a few more minutes. Thicken the curry with a little bit of Katakuriko (potato starch) water. Done.

Pour over cooked brown soba, cover, and heat in the microwave for a couple minutes. Sprinkle with Shichimi and serve.

curry and cake

It's John's birthday today!

I asked him what he would like to eat last night, and he said curry... and I remembered this wonderful little recipe where you can quickly thicken the curry by adding a Chinese "wheat flour tea" powder. I made it with that recipe and it worked! I added udon noodles to the curry and it was yummy.



I used canned carrots and potatoes in the recipe, so everything actually were actually done within half an hour (including the cook time on the udon.)

So this is my version of the recipe:

Heat up a little bit oil in the pan. Stir in half a can (regular size) of carrots and potatoes (sliced), then add half of an onion (sliced). When all the veggies seem heated, add 2-3 tablespoons of curry powder and stir well. Remove the veggies from the pan and set aside on a plate.

With the same pan (don't need to rinse), stir in sliced (or shredded) meat (I used pre-cooked chicken breast fillets... lazy me :p ) until cooked. Add water (as little as a cup, or as much as to make "curry soup.") and bring to a boil. Add cooked udon noodles, and allow everything to simmer for a few minutes.

Add 1 teaspoon salt, sugar, and a little more curry power to taste.

If you'd like a thicker curry soup for your udon noodles, then add a few tablespoons of the "wheat flour tea" powder to it... the liquid would magically thicken and the spices and nut flavors from the powder make the curry flavor more dynamic. If you don't know what this "wheat flour tea" powder is or where to get it, you can thicken the curry by sprinkling some flour and spices to it.

Sprinkle some shichimi before serving. Yumminess!

And of course I made John his favorite pumpkin cake! He got to it before I was able to take a picture of it... so here's a photo of last year's cake:



Happy Birthday, John!