Golden ~ Sweet Potato Recipe

Growing up, baking some sweets was one of my favorite things to do. I collected recipes over the years and some of the recipes have special story attached to them.

This sweet potato recipe was from one of my mother's friends.

Our family moved to a new area when I was 11 years old. There, my mother started making new friends and this lady was one of them. I think she was in her late 20's to early 30's at the time. They were all nice people, but I just really admired her the most, among them. She was intelligent, elegant, kind, graceful, always put together, and had a sense of style in whatever she did without trying too hard (of course being a child at the time, I didn't think quite like that. But now that I am an adult, I can point out exactly what I liked about her).

I always wished I could be like her when I grow up.

We have been exchanging Christmas cards and occasional letters over the years... and guess what? Now she is in her 50's and she is still the person I admire and look up to.

From fall to winter, as I bake this sweet potato I think of her.
This sweet potato is not too sweet or too showy as a dessert, but I never get tired of the simpleness and the gentle flavor.

I am sharing the recipe today, but it is all in grams since it was all written in Japanese.



{Sweet Potatoes}---I always double or triple the recipe.

Base:
Satsuma-imo (Japanese yam. They are yellow inside and less fiberish than regular yams. It is also great for tempura) 200g
Butter 15g
Sugar 50g
Egg Yolk 1
Heavy Cream 1 Tbsp.

Glaze:
Egg Yolk 1
Heavy Cream 2 Tsp.

1. Peel the yam skin. Cut it smaller and steam or boil them until it gets soft.

2. Mash the yams really well in a bowl and add the rest of the base ingredients.

3. Place the baking cups on the baking tray. Put the sweet potato mixture in the baking cups using a spoon.

4. Mix the glaze ingredients together in a separate bowl.

5. Brush the glaze mixture on the sweet potatoes.

6. Bake them at 350 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes. If you used small baking cups, the baking time is shorter. If you used larger cups the baking time is longer. Check often near the end though, you don't want burned bottoms!

I LOOOVE eating them with whipped cream on top (not cool whip). It transforms the sweet potatoes to a whole new different dessert. I hope you will give it a try!

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Fun of Cooking

As soon as I started to get better from the last procedure, I had the urge to cook. While I was in bed, I went through recipe books, magazines and watched some cooking shows... Mm... There are so many mouth-watering foods out there.

I have been cooking more than sewing lately, I guess that is one of the ways I say "I love you" to my family.

I made this lunch for my hubby the other day:

Sticky rice (with sesame)
Meat ball with spicy teriyaki flavor
Tamago-yaki (an egg dish)
Satsuma-imo no lemon-ni (Simmered Japanese yam in with lemon flavor)
Sausage with cheese

Then I realized I needed some green, so I added parsley. It is not really added as a dish, but parsley cleans blood, so it is good for you. :)

I just went through my fridge and threw things together with whatever I could find, but he was so happy that I was well enough to cook. The funny thing is that when I announced that I will start cooking, the whole family had a long list of requests. I am happy to say that I am near the completion of the list before my next procedure on the 17th!

I remember how fun it is to cook for the people I love and see their happy faces.

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Lemonade Day

I decided that today is a good day to make lemonade...


By the way, the picture below is a little sneak peak for my new tutorial. I made the dress Rachel is wearing out of ordinary kitchen towels. I will have the tutorial ready sometime this week (hopefully...fingers crossed).




She has been busy painting this morning; do you see some paint on her hands?

Who knew that making lemonade can be so much fun? I basically taught them what to do, and they did most of the work. Maybe some of "Sachiko's cooking class" is paying off? I am proud of how he is holding the lemon.


We decided to make lemon limeade with some strawberries.
The results? Oh, it was so good!

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Bento 101

Food in the picture; right side above on the plate onigiri (rice ball), in the bento box: sautéed salmon, steamed asparagus, boiled egg, and rice with Furikake (flavor flakes).

Every now and then, people would ask questions like;

"What is Bento?" or "What is Bento Box?"

So, I decided to do a post about "bento" today. Basically, bento is a packed lunch in the box. When I hear "bento" the first thing come to my mind is the bento my mom packed for me. Kind of like the one in below;


Sticky rice with dried and flavored plum leaf flakes, kara-age (Japanese deep fried chicken), tamago-yaki/Japanese style omelet, sautéed broccoli, celery with small shrimp.

You can find bento everywhere in Japan. At airports, train stations, food courts, convenient stores, bento specialty stores... you can buy bento pretty much anywhere you go. There are many different kinds of bento. When you go to different cities, you can find bento that are made with famous items from that city. If you want to know more about the bento, you can go here to find out.

I started cooking with my mom from a very early age, and started packing my bento when I started going to high school. I pack bento for my family sometimes, but it takes a lot more preparation, and time.


So it happens only occasionally (hooray for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches!). When we go to a family picnic, I try to pack bento, I want them to remember the look and the taste of the Japanese bento.

There are some things that I can share with you to make bento.

1. I always try to put a variety of things in the bento that are nutritious and pleasing to the eyes. For example: white rice for carbs, green veggies for vitamins and such, yellow egg dish for protein, and of course this will change with other ingredients too.

2. Pack the bento box tight. If it is loosely packed things will move around, and when you open, it may not be pretty.

3. For bento, it is best to make things that are tasty even without reheating.

4. The easiest way to prepare for the next morning’s bento making is, save some portions of dinner’s ingredients. That way, washing and cutting the vegetable part is already done, and it saves some time in the morning.

That's it. I really love bento. I feel like it is such a healthy way to eat a balanced meal during the day, rather than going through the drive-thru (don't get me wrong, I do that all the time, but I prefer bento when I have time to make it).

Oh, one more thing... about the bento box, I guess it is best to have it, because most of them are air tight and have a divider inside, so the food doesn't get mixed up. Although, I think you can use pretty much anything. The picture below is a bento I packed for the boys. I used sandwich cases I found at Target’s dollar section. I can't put anything liquidy, but for the things I made that day, it worked just fine.


I am pretty sure there are things I can put in from American style cooking too. Although, a bento is a meal packed in a box, to have fun and make it reply able to any cuisine, we just need to think outside the box. :)

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Special Guest

A few posts ago, I posted about a cookie cake that Mr. Tea Rose Home made for our son's birthday party. So many people asked for the recipe that I asked Mr. Tea Rose Home if he would be interested in doing a guest post. He gladly accepted. So enjoy the recipe tutorial!

Hello ladies! Thanks for all the compliments on the cookies. I told Mrs. Tea Rose Home that I could write a post about how I make my cookies. She said, "Why, can't we just post the recipe?"

I jokingly replied, "Well, then we could write: It's on the back of Nestlé’s. The End."

So, there is my secret, the recipe is on the back of Nestlé’s Toll House Chocolate chips, however, that is not all. There is one thing that I learned over the years and it's not on the back of some bag. So without further ado, here is the recipe:

2 1/4 C. flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Salt
2 Sticks Butter
3/4 C. sugar
3/4 C. packed brown sugar
1 tsp Vanilla extract
2 Large Eggs

I use a KitchenAid mixer, and I always make the cookies in this order following these steps. This is why they turn out so good, and since I know of no one that makes them like this (because they've said so) it has got to be done this way.

Put the butter (Use the real stuff, no margarine; I use either salted or unsalted sweet cream. I haven't made two batches side by side to see if there is a real difference. When I make a double batch, I'll mix them.), sugar, brown sugar, vanilla, and eggs into the mixing bowl. Raise it up and turn the KitchenAid on to its lowest setting. Clean up (you don't have to clean; I'm just trying to keep the KitchenAid on longer.)

Mix the other ingredients into a separate bowl. Really you are supposed to sift those ingredients, but we either don't have one or I'm too lazy to find it, so I just put them in a bowl and lightly mix with a wire whisk.

This whole time the KitchenAid should still be mixing. You might have to stop it to get the butter clump off the mixing arm then start mixing it again. I will sometimes speed up the kitchen aid and lower the bowl to shake some of the mixture off and slow the KitchenAid down and raise the bowl back.


If the dough looks like this, you haven't mixed it enough, keep mixing. Go watch TV with the kids or something, depending on how cold or solid the butter was; this could take some time.


This is what the batter should look like, nice white and fluffy. No lumps from the butter or sugar. Now what I do is add about a tablespoon of the flour mixture in at a time. While the KitchenAid is mixing at its lowest setting, I'll add a scoop of flour and wait for it to get totally mixed in before adding another. This keeps the flour from clumping. Maybe you can just pour it all in and be done with it, but my cookies always turn out perfect if I do 1 heaping tablespoon at a time.

Once all the flour is mixed in, turn the oven on to 375°. Keep the KitchenAid going for several more minutes, and then turn it off. The dough should be delicious; yes, me and my kids love to eat the dough. Anyways, remove the mixing bowl from the KitchenAid and pour in the chips. When making a double batch, I mix in milk chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate. Mix with a spatula; be sure to dig in and pull the dough from the bottom and get a good even spread of chips throughout the dough.

For the cookie “cake”, I made a double batch and then scooped most of it into the pan and spread it out as much and I could. I think the dough was somewhere from a 1/4 inch to 1/2 inch thick, I'm not sure, I didn't measure. Either way, with cookies, you are supposed to cook for 9 to 11 minutes. I like my cookies doughy and gooey, so I go for 8 1/2 minutes (I use teaspoons to scoop out individual cookies.)

With the cookie “cake”, I cooked it for 9 minutes and that was too short, so back in for another 4 minutes... still not enough; 4 more seemed to do it; there was a nice light golden brown starting to form on the edges, it was done. Nice soft moist gooey cookies... mmmm.... Great with milk!


They were almost all gone by the end of the party.

Well ladies… that was it. The KitchenAid was nice and warm from all the work, I must have mixed for 30 minutes or more but that is my secret. Keep mixing and then mix some more.

I hope this recipe tutorial will be helpful for you to make the cookie "cake". Thank you Honey for the special guest appearance!

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Taste of the season ~ Butternut Squash Soup ~

I have been in a cooking mood lately. I have tried some new recipes, and also I have been experimenting with the pressure cooker. It is fun.

Several days ago, I made this butternut squash soup. I have been wanting to make a "fall soup", and when I was at the grocery store, I bought a butternut squash impulsively. Without knowing exactly what am I going to do with it.

I googled "Butternut Squash Soup" and read many recipes and reviews (well, I didn't want to waste the squash...). I found a recipe here. It sounded easy and tasty, also, it got so many positive reviews. I had to try it.

Mmmm... It turned out good. It was so yummy.

I tweaked the recipe a little, instead of cutting it small and boil it, I cut the squash in half and baked it. Also, I used sour cream instead of cream cheese, because I didn't have any. The soup was very thick. I think I am going to make it slightly runnier next time, but I loved the taste.

It is getting cold, what have you been cooking in your kitchen lately?

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