A generous amount of cinnamon and rye berries were added to my sourdough pancake batter.
Love the texture of the rye berries.
I usually like my pancakes with vegan butter and maple syrup, but I happened to have homemade vegan condensed milk (and I happened to be out of maple syrup!) and decided to go with it.
I just freshly made my favorite vegan cheddar cheese.
So I knew this is what I wanted for lunch today.
I also just bought a new jar of kimchi, my favorite vegan one (my current favorite is the Seoul brand), so of course it went on the plate as well.
Tasty!
I was so excited to have breakfast this morning.
The bread turned out (previous post) so good, and I was going to make a toast for my breakfast.
The toast was so good.
And I enjoyed the rest of it too.
As you can see I like big breakfast!
I’m not a huge quick bread fan, only because it tends to be too sweet to eat as “bread.”
But his oat flax bread is an exception.
It’s dense and very satisfying.
It’s slightly sweet, but not overly sweet.
And when it’s toasted and buttered, it makes a wonderful breakfast bread.
I was so excited to see it just out of the oven!
It looks exactly what I wanted to see.
Golden brown.
This bread is packed with ground flax seeds, dried figs, oats, and rye berries.
I still have a lot of rye we harvested from my brother-in-law’s farm.
Cooked rye berries are so versatile.
I enjoy them in salad, soup, or just eat it like rice.
This was my first time adding them into bread, and I liked the final result.
Who wouldn’t love Maritozzo?
Yeast pastry filled with cream?
I used this homemade soft orange cardamom bun and filled it with sweetened coconut cream.
Just imagine.
You are about to bite into this soft orange-cardamom bun and then sweet coconut cream…
It’s so good, almost too good to make me feel guilty for some reason!
I usually like my Katsu with Japanese worcestershire sauce or sweet miso glaze.
Those are my go-to sauce.
But this time I wanted to try something different.
Something spicy…
An action shot is still so hard to take.
I need more practice.
This was actually really good!
The glaze was spicy and sweet at the same time.
As you can see I like a pile of shredded cabbage between the rice and the Katsu.
The bread section of our freezer became pretty scarce, and it was time for me to bake some bread.
I try to make different types of bread so that we don’t have to eat the same type of bread for a long period of time.
I haven’t made Shokupan bread for a while, so I decided to make two loaves of Shokupan.
One regular and one with cocoa-cinnamon swirl.
They turned out great.
Soft, fluffy, light, yet perfectly moist.
I think I finally got the flour-water ratio right.
Adding the swirl was a last minute decision.
I added butter, cocoa, and cinnamon, but intentionally avoided sugar.
There is no added sweetness, but this combination was already flavorful.
It was perfect for my breakfast.
The phrase, called “Ma-Go-Wa-Ya-Sa-Shi-I” has been popular in Japan lately.
It’s a kind of reminder or a piece of guidance for healthy-eating.
Each syllable represents a category of food, and they encourage you to include food from all those categories in your meal.
Ma is for Mame: Beans, in general. This can also be generalized for tofu or soy milk.
Go is for Goma: Sesame. This category also includes nuts and seeds.
Wa is for Wakame; Wakame is a type of seaweed, but it can be any kind of seaweed.
Ya is for Yasai: Vegetable.
Sa is for Sakana: Fish. Apparently I skip this as a plant-eater.
Shi is for Shiitake: Shiitake is a type of mushroom, but it can be any type of mushroom.
I is for Imo: Potato. Any type of potato, or squash, or root vegetable.
Can you spot all the M-G-W-Y-S-I in this bowl?
M: Kidney beans; soft tofu
G: Sesame seeds; sunflower seeds
W: Salted kombu
Y: Cucumber; tomato; spinach; arugula; sprouts
S: Enoki mushroom
I: Konjak (it’s made of a kind of potato); Chestnut (this is a tough one! It’s “nut” but the texture and taste are more like potato’s? No?)
We were just in Chicago and we stopped at Mitsuwa, a large Japanese grocery store, on our way home.
It’s pretty easy to find many Japanese food today.
I can find most of the things I need at the local Asian grocery store, and a few things I cannot find there, I can get them from Amazon.
But this salted Kombu seaweed is one of a few things I like but cannot get, so I was happy to find it at Mitsuwa.
They happened to have a flea market at their parking lot, and I bought some old magazines and books.
I got them for a dollar each!
You can buy new Japanese magazines and books, but they are still pretty expensive in the U.S.
(Magazines are usually double the price.)
Even my husband found something he liked at Mitsuwa.
I had a few lemons and an opened coconut cream jar that needed to be used up quick.
So making a lemon pie was a no-brainer.
The thing was that I didn’t quite have enough ingredients or motivation to make a whole pie.
So I thought making it in jars would be a perfect solution.
This no-bake pie was so easy and quick to put together, and I loved how they looked!
This was so delicious!
Just a bunch of soft buns.
Flavored with orange zest and cardamom.
So so good.
