Sorry if some things are messy ☆

See you there

This is a must have food for kids party!  Small enough to grab with tiny hands, and they are just right size for little people.

The ingredients are totally same as my previous post “blueberry cupcake” (please search from the search box)

You can create few varieties, like choco chips(white, dark or milk), berries(raspberries, blueberries, blackberries…, veges(zucchini, pumpkin, carrot…), cheese etc.  The photos are choco chips muffins and blueberry muffins.

I used this mini muffin silicon bake ware.  Actually the paper liners are not needed as I could take those tiny ones out easily without any hassle.

Nice to have two or three as after lunch snack, or for kid’s lunch box, tea party, and more!

It was actually pre-opening launch party and all the food I had was free!  (even though there was a limit of “1 entree & 1 main per person”, seven of us ordered different dishes and shared all) Free food… nothing is better than this:)

The atmosphere was great – casual layout and friendly staff, although I noticed that the cuisine is not really a Japanese.  These are the food we ordered↓↓↓

We started with freshly squeezed juice as a waitress strongly recommended them to us.  The left is mixed fruit juice and the right is apple+mint+lime.

We ordered 3 kinds of Gyoza: Duck, Chicken and Ebi (prawn).  Only the sauce for Duck gyoza contains Hoisin sauce because of its strong taste and flavour: the other sauce (for chicken, ebi and yasai (vege)) are normal Gyoza sauce. (which is soy sauce based, with dash of sesame oil and sometimes with ra-yu)

Tori Kara Age (Deep-fried marinated chicken) is normally larger pieces of chicken but I guess this is Wagamama style.

A kind of Yakitori dish.  (negi = spring onion)  They tasted ok!

The dipping sauce was lime syrup!(with a slice of fresh chili)  Fusion of spiciness and sweetness.

Chicken Kare and Ebi Kare Ramen.  They are definitely not Japanese food as this Kare (curry) contains coconut cream and tasted like Laksa soup.  If you eat it as some kind of Asian noodle, it tastes great.

Yaki Udon (stir-fried udon noodle) is one of my favorite:)  The plain Yaki Udon came with a sprinkle of fish floss on the top.

Slices of beef steak was nicely cooked (medium) and delicious, though the noodle was little too soft and it wasn’t to my taste.

(traditional) Japanese cuisine doesn’t use coconut, chili, coriander, Hoisin sauce, red onion, bok choy etc….  Very different.

The first Wagamama was established in London few decades ago by a Hong Kong business man, and now there are about 50 Wagamama restaurants in London, few in France, Dubai, Holland, Australia… and more!  Amazing….

 It’s interesting that there is no Wagamama restaurants in most of Asian countries.  The target marketing must be non-Japanese people.  I don’t think this Wagamama restaurant can survive in Japan either:p  Different market.  But I think the food and atmosphere are great for a casual dining experience

Since I came to Perth there is one thing that I noticed about myself…

My memory is getting short!! (>0<)

I can’t even remember what I ate for dinner last night.  It’s getting serious…  I’m too young to be dementia

In Japan I used to eat fish (and fish egg) a lot.  Sometimes twice a day.  There are lots of kinds of fish and most of them (eg Tuna, Bonito, Yellowtail, Sardine, etc) contain DHA (Docosahexaenoic acid) which is good for brain and health.  So I was consuming good source of food in Japan without any effort. 

Now, however, I don’t eat fish here so often and I’m doubting maybe this is the reason for my short memory :p  Well, I guess fish is not only the reason, but it could be one of them.

I really had to do something about it.  I don’t really like taking medicine or supplements.  Then, I found this wonderful herb in a gardening store near my house.  It’s called “BRAHMI”.

This Brahmi has been used in traditional Indian medicine for over 3000 years, and there are incredible stories about this plant.  (You can find out more from this website)  It says that eating this herb actually helps concentration and memory recall. …. I have to try then!

The shape of this herb is actually cute and I can just put it in the kitchen:)  Now I’m taking about 3g of it everyday, as a tea infusion, as a garnish to cakes and as an ingredients for my sandwiches / pizza toppings

Searching about the popcorn machine online reminded me of a popcorn vending machine in Japan.  The machines were usually in shopping centers, and I used to get popcorn often from the machine when I was little.  

The body of the machine is gray-haired guy, and you could choose 5 flavors: butter, salt, caramel, BBQ and mayonnaise.  It costed 100 yen a cup of popcorn so I could buy with my pocket money

Once you get in the floor in the shopping center where the machine is located, you wouldn’t miss the smell of popcorn…  Smells so nice!! (>0<)  The smell always made me buy a cup of popcorn :p

Apparently there are other models of popcorn machines in Japan, like Hello Kitty.

Can you see the color of noodle is green?  It consists Uji Maccha Tea (Uji = area in Kyoto) and I could  smell / taste Maccha Tea really!  Yum

I love seaweed, so I ate soba with lots of wakame and kombu.  Plus, I made up some vegetable side dish Namul.  Namul is a kind of Korean dish, but I didn’t follow any recipe.  I just made up something looks/tastes like Namul.

Namul

Cha-soba and Namul

<Namul>

Cut carrot into matchsticks shape.  Boil in the water until just cooked.  Boil beansprouts too.

Mix them up with chopped spring onion in a bowl.  Season with salt, sesame oil and minced garlic.  

With Rose wine

Here are some examples…

 Which flavor tempts you??  Personally I really wanna try this “Soy Sauce Kit Kat”!!

People in this house (my partner’s family) does NOT eat any veges, they don’t even eat chopped spring onions in a soup noodle.  (not good for their health!)  On the other hand, I LOVE veges and I prefer it to meat.  Well, I eat meat and seafood and everything but I can’t eat just meat, have to be with some veges: otherwise I don’t feel good:p

I made 2 kinds of salad, one is Asian Salad and another is Cajun Chicken Citrus Salad.  I mixed grilled beef in the Asian Salad for my friend’s husband.  (Guys always love meat)

Also some canapes and meatballs.

Asian Salad with Grilled Beef

Beef Balls with Tomato Dip

canapes

I realized that I didn’t take any photos of Chicken Salad!! (>0<)  I thought I did…  It was really nice one☆

<Asian Salad>

Branch any veges (such as bok choy, broccoli and asparagus) and place in iced water to stop cooking.  Make sure you don’t cook the veges too much otherwise they become mushy.

Beanshoot, carrots and red capsicum won’t need to be branched.

Mix all the veges in a bowl with oyster sauce, sesame oil and sweet chili sauce.  Season, and sprinkle crushed roasted-peanuts or almonds on the top.

<Meat Balls with Tomato Dip>

Chop onion and sundried tomatoes.  Mix up with beef mince and shape into balls.  Cook the meat balls on the stove or in the oven.  

Saute chopped onion, garlic and carrots on a low heat.  Add tined tomato and simmer until it becomes dip-like consistency.  Mix through chopped herbs.

<Cajun Chicken Citrus Salad>

Mix green leaves with sliced red onion, cucumber etc…  Add orange segments and sliced avocado.  Grill chicken breast with cajun spice, and mix through to the salad.  Season with orange juice, olive oil and salt & pepper.

Then I started to cook steak for us.  When I told her “I’m cooking steak with ponz sauce” she dug her rice cooker out from the kitchen cabinet.  Yes, we sometimes eat steak with rice in Japan:)  

We thought “umm we should make miso soup too”.  So here is our dinner:)

Diced steak teishoku  We diced the meat so that we can eat with chopsticks.  The meat was nicely cooked to “medium” and the ponz sauce was delish.  We grated daikon radish and place on top of the steak, then pour the ponz sauce over.  Goes very well with rice, really.

Oh, by the way the rice was very very delicious!(>v<)  Thanks to her (my friend) I enjoyed juicy, sweet Japanese rice.  I can’t believe this cooker was just 990 yen.  It’s on my shopping list now:)

This Fried Squid is the item I ALWAYS eat at Dim Sam.  I think this is everybody’s favorite:)

From top right to clockwise:  Steamed Prawn Dumpling, Fried Squid, Ginger tripes (I love them too!), Steamed Sweet Corn and Prawn Dumpling.

I love steamed prawn dumplings:)  So juicy … ☆☆☆

Ginger Tripes.  As I wrote on my earlier post I love weird parts of meat and this is my favorite Dim Sum food along with Spear Ribs and Chcken Feet.

Finish the meal with Sesame Ball:)

Hey there is Japanese word “おいしい” (=delicious) on the plate