Feed me! Cooking at home in Tokyo

So excuse the dodgy photography but here a few snaps of my attempts at Japanese cooking at home. I was getting tired of making the same old dishes I usually cook back in Melbourne so I thought I would try my hand at some Japanese style home cooking.

Lucky for me, I found an excellent blog to help me get started Just One Cookbook - Easy Japanese Recipes. (The photos are much nicer on her blog if you can't stand to look at my clumsy food styling!)

First I started with a classic Japanese style beef curry:

Japanese curry is much thicker and less spicy than Indian curries. It takes awhile to boil and simmer all the ingredients but it is well worth the wait. It freezes well too. Thumbs up!

Next I tried the okonomiyaki, a savoury pancake. Different regions of Japan have their own style of okonomiyaki. The one I attempted was in the 'Hiroshima Okonomiyaki' style. Hiroshima style has layered ingredients rather than all mixed in like other styles. You can use mix in whatever ingredients you like but I stuck to the suggested recipe which used yakisoba noodles and pork.

As you can see from my photo, I had a little too much noodle and not enough pancake. Need some more practise with this one but it was delicious!

Next up was the Teriyaki Chicken & Tofu meatballs. There was no way I could make these look even slightly attractive in a photo but they were very tasty. The tofu makes the meatballs really light and moist and who doesn't love teriyaki sauce? Nom, nom nom. They also freeze well.

So this next one looks like lasagna right? Well it kinda is and kinda isn't. Its a 'Meat Doria'. What the hell is a Doria you ask? Baked rice, veggies and cheese.  The meat version also has minced meat mixed in. Easy and delicious. The red wine in the sauce and the panko breadcrumbs in the cheese topping make it a winner for me.

Oh, sweet, juicy hamburgers! I have made these a couple of times now. Only difficulty is finding good hamburger buns in Tokyo. I sourced mine from the more expensive supermarket close to Roppongi train station.

How is a hamburger Japanese I hear you ask? I think it is all to do with the sauce which has tonkatsu in it. Tonkatsu sauce is made from a bunch of different vegetables and spics and is usually served with deep fried food but is also used a sauce in many other Japanese recipes.

I used the 'Hamburger steak' recipe and put it on buns instead of serving it with rice and veggies. I also used mushrooms, cheddar cheese (again had to source this from the expensive supermarket), bacon, tomato, lettuce & mayo. The hamburger sauce in this recipe is amazing and really brings out the flavour of the burgers, I think its the red wine and the butter. Yummo!

The only semi-fail I have had so far was a yakisoba I attempted. I used a recipe from a different website which was American based rather than Japanese style. The sauce was just no good, way too much tomato sauce. Still ate it of course! But next time I will go back to the Just One Cookbook site and try their recipe, they haven't let me down so far. And as Chris pointed out, its just stir fry, I should be able to work that one out on my own.

All this food talk has made me hungry.... I'm off to find something to eat.