Adventures in Japan: Beppu and Yufuin!

Beppu and Yufuin are both resort towns in the Oita prefecture in Kyushu. We stopped at both along our way back from Yawatahama back to Fukuoka.

Beppu and Yufuin are both famous for their onsens, but the Eight Hells of Beppu (別府の地獄), where you can see plumes of steam rising was quite the impressive sight! Even when driving around we could see plumes of steam rising around the city. It was very eerie as it looked like the whole place was about to go up in a volcano.

Check out the steam plumes!

After leaving Yawatahama (I fell asleep on the ferry back, it was a very long day), we arrived in Beppu to spend the night at the Umine hotel in Beppu. Our relatives wanted us to try the onsen hot springs that Beppu is famous for, but worried that we would balk about getting naked in a public onsen. So instead, this hotel had a private onsen bath with an ocean view in our hotel room! The hot spring water is piped into an outdoor patio for private enjoyment without having to even leave your room.

Kansansoubekkan (観山荘別館)

Our most memorable meal of Fukuoka (and perhaps the enitre trip) was at Kansansoubekkan (観山荘別館), a kaiseki restaurant.

Let us be clear: I am not a kaiseki person and neither is my mother. I'm a fan of donburi, ramen, and mochi. I am solidly a B-class gourmand. My mother is the type of person that got bored in France because every meal took so long.

So kaiseki was a leap for us. For those uninitiated in what kaiseki is: Kaiseki is a multi-course meal that really takes food to an art form.

Only seasonal ingredients, cooked fresh, are used, prepared and plated in a way to highlight not only the taste but the visual appeal of the dish.

We were served 12 different dishes over several hours in a gargantuan private room with just us in it and a view of their beautiful garden. It was a crazy ride, and something I am so glad I was able to experience!

We were sat in a traditional style room, without chairs, but there were several larger parties that elected to sit in a more western banquet style. We took a tour of the garden and took pictures in it, which I don't think most people were allowed to do, because we certainly messed up the pretty gravel designs by walking on it.

Kinako Mochi (きな粉餅)

Here's another recipe for kirimochi! This is traditionally eaten at New Year's for good luck, but it is so delicious and easy to make you will find that people eat it all the time as a treat with tea.

Kinako, also labeled Toasted Soybean Flour, is a powder made from roasted soybeans that have been ground up. The name "kinako" means "yellow flour" in Japanese, which I suppose is accurate but does nothing to describe how delightful it is. It is very tasty, smooth and nutty, almost like dried peanut butter. This recipe is probably the most traditional use for it, but it is also very tasty on ice cream and in Greek yogurt.

Another traditional use for kinako is another wagashi, called warabi mochi (蕨餅). It's made from braken fern starch, which makes it more jelly-like than mochi made with rice, and it is served rolled in kinako.

My mom's favorite mochi from the Japanese market is a daifuku that is green from the herb yomogi and covered in kinako. The combination of sweet azuki bean paste and kinako with the mochi is definitely a winning combination. I'm not sure if the commercial version is merely colored green or if it actually has the juices from the yomogi, but it is delicious nonetheless. I will have to try to make some yomogi daifuku myself and compare it to the supermarket version.

But right now, let's make some kinako mochi!

Yakimochi

Fresh mochi is best eaten the same day it's made. Never refrigerate or freeze it, unless you want a hard rock to gnaw on. Even tightly sealed in plastic wrap or tupperware, mochi dries out fast. The exception to this is ice cream filled mochi, which is made differently to keep it soft when frozen.

Sometimes though, I need my mochi cravings fulfilled without the trials of steaming some mochiko to make mochi dough. And even that is the lazy man's way: the traditional mochi-making process takes fresh steamed sweet rice and pounds the fuck out of it with a giant mallet until it turns into a smooth glutinous mass. Yes, I know, but that required both a cuss word and some hot bolding action. Traditional mochi making is a serious back breaking multiple-person event.

Thank goodness Miss Mochi lives in this century, where mochi is not reserved just for the rich and royal and doesn't require a team of beefy men to make it. You can get dried mochi cakes at any Japanese market for cheap, as well as delicious fresh wagashi (dessert mochi) both at the markets and at Japanese confectioneries.

Dried mochi

Well... it might actually be better for my waistline if some things weren't so plentiful and cheap, like McDonald's french fries. But that's another topic entirely.

Here's a recipe for yakimochi, or grilled mochi, that is drizzled in brown sugar and soy sauce. My mom would sometime serve this for a toasty breakfast treat! Fun fact: "yakimochi" also means "jealous" in Japanese, because of the way a person puffs up when they are jealous. I think it should be because anyone who doesn't have yakimochi would be super jealous!

Wagashi: Microwave Jello Mochi

You'd think that with the moniker "Miss Mochi" I'd feature a lot more mochi recipes than I currently have. Well, I start craving mochi around the holidays, so watch out for a lot more mochi recipes!

This recipe uses a microwave tube pan specially designed for mochi with a removable bottom. You don't need one, you can just use a square pyrex with an overturned coffee cup in the middle. I do love the microwave tube pan, because the removable bottom makes it easy to remove the mochi. Plus it's less than $6 online!

I was kind of apprehensive to use jello in mochi. As I've made it clear on this blog, I'm not too fond of jello. My mother is the ravenous jello freak that keeps requesting jello for holidays, whereas I find it kind of weird. However, jello does not impart any sort of texture change to the mochi, just the color and flavor.

Microwave Tube Pan

Unlike traditional mochi, which must be steamed for a good 30 minutes, this is a very quick recipe because it uses the microwave. While the microwave is not the ideal appliance for a lot of foods, it steams the mochiko quite effectively.

Use any jello flavor that strikes your fancy, I think a lime mochi or fruit punch mochi would be fun and exciting! I used mango and strawberry flavors for these ones. For extra flavor combos, replace the water with fruit juice, like orange jello + mango juice!

Beni Imo Daifuku (紅いも大福)

The Okinawan purple sweet potato could not be resisted when I went to the market. After going to Mitsuwa's Okinawan food fair last week where Mr. Mochi and I had amazing beni imo ice cream, I was ready for another purple tuber recipe! I decided to make some mochi for my grandmother, since I had all the ingredients on hand and I haven't made any wagashi in a while.

At Mitsuwa, Mr. Mochi poses

I talked a little about beni imo in my Okinawan Sweet Potato Haupia Pie post, but today I would like to tackle the difference between beni imo and ube.

Ube, purple yam

Beni imo, as we know, is a white skinned purple fleshed sweet potato, which originated from the Americas but is embraced by the Japanese. Ube is a dark skinned purple fleshed yam which originated from Africa and is popular in the Philippines.  Ube is quite rare if not impossible to find here in America, unless it is frozen or powdered, and is more fibrous and less sweet than beni imo with a shaggier outside similar to other yams and taro.

This murasaki is yellow inside

beni imo cross-section

Now, if you see a picture of a purple sweet potato that is purple both in flesh and skin, you have neither beni imo or ube. You have.... *drum roll* a purple sweet potato. Sometimes called a murasaki imo ("murasaki" = purple) but usually a murasaki imo refers to a sweet potato with purple skin and white flesh.  Purple sweet potatoes exist here in America and are sometimes easier to find than beni imo, and will substitute flawlessly in both ube and beni imo recipes.

Confused? Don't worry, as long as it's purple fleshed, it will make great purple mochi!

Mizuyōkan: Traditional Wagashi

I am a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to food. I recently made some yōkan for the first time adapting Roti N Rice's recipe. It turned out delish, but not very pretty or traditional. So I had to make it again. Just like when making my Sriracha Bar Clone recipe, which I made three times before I was satisfied, I wasn't going to stop with yōkan until I mastered it. Instead of following someone's recipe for yōkan, I decided just to wing it and see how it turns out.


Yōkan (羊羹) is a Japanese confection made with agar agar, a seaweed gelatin, called kanten in Japanese cooking.  My mother loves the stuff, but I never was as fond of it as the mochi.  It is usually made with anko, azuki bean paste, or matcha, ground green tea, and can have things like persimmons, gingko nuts, or chestnuts suspended in it. Unlike jello, it can be stored at room temperature for long periods of time, so it is perfect for gift giving.  It is commonly served with tea, just like daifuku.

Adventures in Little Tokyo: Fugetsu-Do and Shin-Sen-Gumi

Here in Southern California, there are a lot of Japanese markets, but I still love making the trip to Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles for the history as well as the shopping. Even better is when my cousin is in town and she wants to go see some Los Angeles sights.

Nestled in the heart of Los Angeles, next to the police station and close to Union Station, what is left of Little Tokyo can be found in roughly five large city blocks. It is bounded on the west by Los Angeles Street, on the east by Alameda Street, on the south by 3rd Street, and on the north by First Street, but also includes a substantial portion of the block north of First and west of Alameda, location of the Japanese American National Museum, the Go For Broke Monument, and a row of historic shops which lines the north side of First Street.

Little Tokyo used to be much bigger, and with a lot more residential areas. Unfortunately, a lot of Little Tokyo was lost during the Japanese American Internment, when many of the Japanese American shop owners were forced to leave their businesses. Still, some businesses managed to reopen after the Japanese Americans were let out. One of my favorites is Fugetsu-Do, the confectionary shop on First Street.

Yōkan Jellies with Chestnuts and Anko

Whenever one of the Japanese relatives would visit, presents would always be exchanged. In Japanese culture, gift giving has its own sets of rules. For instance, it is considered rude to visit a house without a gift for the host. And of course, to be polite, there would be gifts for our relative visiting us from Japan. Another rule is that perishables and foodstuffs are the norm for gift giving, because giving something like decor would be implying that the person has bad taste, and you need to help them with decorating.

As a kid, I was totally down for the foodstuffs. Sometimes our relatives would also bring toys, which were cool too. But most commonly, it would be mochi, daifuku, or yōkan. 

Kanten powder

Yōkan (羊羹) is a Japanese confection made with agar agar, a seaweed gelatin, called kanten in Japanese cooking.  My mother loves the stuff, but I never was as fond of it as the mochi.  It is usually made with anko, azuki bean paste, or matcha, ground green tea, and can have things like persimmons, gingko nuts, or chestnuts suspended in it. Unlike jello, it can be stored at room temperature for long periods of time, so it is perfect for gift giving.  It is commonly served with tea, just like daifuku.


Having made daifuku, I decided to try to make some yōkan.  As previously stated, I saw Rice N Roti's recipe and it looked easy and fun to do. It is surprisingly easy, but I have some ideas for next time (see below). I made mine in an heart-shaped Ikea silicone ice cube mold, since I don't have any fancy molds.

Deconstructed Ichigo Daifuku Mochi

One of my favorite traditional wagashi is ichigo daifuku mochi, but it is a pain to make. You have to steam the mochi for 20-30 minutes, then wrap it around strawberries and anko while its still hot enough to stretch, but not hot enough to burn your hands. I've accidentally grabbed a glob of steaming hot mochi and believe me its not fun!

Shaping the mochi around the strawberry takes about 1-2 minutes per strawberry, and I can only make about 15 daifuku before the mochi gets too cold to stretch or I run out of mochi. Plus the molding of the anko around the strawberries also takes time, though not as sticky or annoying as working with the mochi. So when you have coworkers capable of eating 4 of these babies in the blink of an eye, this sucks!

In a stroke of genius (I am nothing if not modest, lol) I came up with an easier way to get the flavor of ichigo mochi without all the work. This isn't really a recipe, but an idea of awesome proportion. My mochi aficionado at work tried this and agreed its not as amazing as the real deal, but is awesome because its so easy to prepare when you have the craving. For those of you who want to make Ichigo Daifuku, I do have the recipe for that at well. It is not as hard as I bitch about, no worries!

Ichigo Daifuku (いちご大福)

Traditional Japanese sweets, called wagashi (和菓子), are often enjoyed with tea and made from rice, beans, and fruit. Unlike most western tea cakes which might use animal products like butter and milk, wagashi is traditionally vegan.

As a child, one of my favorite after-school snacks was a piece of mochi, or perhaps a daifuku, where plush mochi encases a center of sweetened bean paste called anko. At first I was wary, sure that that my mochi would be tainted by the addition of beans. After all, the anko resembled Mexican refried beans!