Sukiyaki, Japanese big dinner

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As Christmas is approaching, I wish you a nice holiday season. So let’s have a sukiyaki party !
It’s a party meal designed to showcase delicious premium Japanese beef and season produce. A hot pot to cook and share on the table.

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The ingredients are cut, cleaned, prepared and presented on big trays on the table.
First tray : fungi, konnyaku noodles and grilled tofu.
There were 4 types of mushrooms : shimeji, enoki, dry and soaked maitake and fresh kikurage.

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Second tray : negi leeks, onions, soaked yakifu (gluten croutons) and kikuna (chrysanthemum greens).

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Third tray : the beef. Wagyu, Japanese traditionally raised cows. Beside you can see cubes of beef fat.

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Each eater is given a bowl with a good fresh egg. Whisk your egg with the chopsticks and get ready to dip you ingredients in this sauce.

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First step : greasing the pot with fat and roasting the first slices. They can be enjoyed this way as the beef is delicious, just on its own.

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That’s the technique : melt some fat, add some meat, pour a little sugar, then a little shoyu (sauce sauce), a little sake. Mix and cook.

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All the other ingredients are added in small batches…

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For dessert… well, there are no desserts for Japanese meal. So that’s a French tarte Tatin, made with Japanese apples.

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Rose petal and cranberry for a romantic panettone


Let’s have a bite of dolce vita

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Blog-checking lines: The December 2012 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by the talented Marcellina of Marcellina in Cucina. Marcellina challenged us to create our own custom Panettone, a traditional Italian holiday bread!

Yes, the flavor has just been invented. Sweetened dry cranberries, soaked in a little Christmas tea and dry rose petals. I added a little orange blossom water to the dough and that’s all.

Yep, broken. I tried to hang it to dry. Well, never again. LOL.

It’s very “cake-like”, maybe next time, I’ll use bread flour. But besides, it’s delicious for me. I wouldn’t trade it for those industrial ones like M*tt*.

My recipe. I mix in my home-bakery :

For 3 mini panettoni

A
25 cl lukewarm water (or skim milk)
2 ts dry yeast
350 g cake flour
1/2 ts sea salt
B
60 g black sugar
0.5 ts dry yeast
1 tbs orange blossom water
3 egg yolk
90 g softened butter
C
1/2 cup dry sweetened cranberries
prepared tea
dried roses

Day 1 : Mix A and knead. Let overnight.
Day 2 : Add B, knead. Let double. Add C. Let triple.
Bake a 160 degree Celsius.

Creaming of a white cakemass…

White and red like a Santa cosplayer…

…it melts in the mouth.

Nothing new (it’s this one). I slightly progressed at covering it, and it’s not fresh strawberry season.

Yes, I did a better job, but there is a margin to improve even more. The night version was a charlotte, shaped in a circle, which is easier.

Je les ai cueillies dans la glace, couvertes de gelée et placées sur du sucre glace. Puns are lost in translation, roughly, jelly prevents the frozen berries to turn into ugly sponges as they thaw.

Nonnettes et flocons de neige, fluffy December sweets


Double dessert, but so light that they could fly…

Plain nonnettes, the soft ginger bread. (recipe here).
These are not filled, only glazed in a syrup of kurozato black sugar.

Mini Flockensahne tortes, topped with sesame seed streusel. It’s light low-fat plant based cream and vanilla for the whip.