Japanese Sausage

Finally…..  I’m eating Japanese sausage!  I was having craving for Japanese sausages since I was pregnant.  Japanese sausage is processed food (smoked), and has crispy skin.

Normall sausages outside Japan are usually raw meat.  I was surprised to see them in Perth the first time, because the sausages I knew was like the photo above.

Because they are processed, you can eat Japanese sausages as they are.  But people usually grill them to add flavour and texture.  I, on the other had, love boiling them.  It’s healthier, and makes the skin crispy.

When I broke the sausage, you can almost hear the sound of breaking the skin.  Although I boiled them for 3 minutes or more, the meat inside was still juicy thanks to the skin.

Sometimes I just boil sausages and eat with seed mustard. Ummmm… yum yum.  Goes with beer, chu-hi, and even hot Japanese tea! ♨

Japanese Pickles

Few days ago my dad bought few kinds of pickles from a pickles shop.   He knows I like pickles.  I remember eating whole takuwan (yellow, pickled daikon radish) by myself when I was a teenager. The combination of takuwan and hot Japanese tea was addictive, and I couldn’t stop eating takuwan once I started.  Pickles got lots of salt (sodium), and it’s not a good diet….  besides, one whole takuwan is about 30cm.  I don’t know how my body survived….

People make pickles so that they can keep the food edible longer.  The salty pickles goes with steamed rice, and Japanese people (in old era) used to eat just rice, pickles and miso soup.  To think about it, Japanese food contains lots of salt.  Miso is also salty, and so is soy sauce.

Back to the subject….  Here is pickled cucumber.  You can also buy it in Perth.

Rakkyo – pickled onions.  People eat it with Japanese curry rice.

Takuwan – pickled daikon.  You see it often in a bento box from Japanese restaurants in Perth, too.

Nasu-no-asazuke (lightly pickled egg plant).  Looks bit weird, but I love this.  One of popular item at  izakaya.

Gobo (burdock roots) and aka-kabu (red radish).  I never seen pickled gobo before!  It’s new….

It has vinegar-like taste, and not salty.  I love the texture.

There’re many more kinds of pickles in Japan, including cabbage, Chinese cabbage, mushroom, etc etc ……  Kyoto and Nara are famous for pickles.  If you love Japanese pickles and enjoy soshoku, try some unique one there

Chicken Tazta Burger

As I mentioned on the earlier posts (here & here), I had an opportunity to eat McDonald’s chicken tazta burger while I’m in Japan!!!

Chicken tazta burger is one of my favourite  I love the combination of tazta-age, cabbage and the sweet sauce.  They took it off their menu few years ago, but this burger is back on menu for a limited time.

This time, there’re two types of chicken tazta burgers – normal one, and wafu oroshi (with grated daikon radish & ponzu sauce).  I had to eat both of them!

The new flavour, tazta oroshi had tansy kick of yuzu.  I loved it.  The daikon oroshi (grated daikon) and ponzu went very well with tazta-age.  The only one thing I noticed was that the bottom bun was bit soggy and soft because of the ponzu.  Maybe they put too much ponzu sauce?  It was bit difficult to eat, but I enjoyed the flavour.  Japanese mayonnaise is so good on burgers

Teriyaki at McDonald’s

We went to McDonald’s the other day to have lunch.  Right now they are doing this campaign “buy value meal LL size and get a coke glass”.  Coke glass looks just like can of coke.

We were both hungry, and bought 2 teriyaki burger sets LL size.

Coke glass…

Ummm, yap, LL size is very big….  I couldn’t finish the potato and drink.

There’s power point for Nintendo DS.  (McD de DS)

Hmmmm  I haven’t had teriyaki burger for awhile!!  The combination of sweet teriyaki sauce and Japanese mayonaise is the vest match.

The new “Chicken Tazta Burger” starts selling from tomorrow! (related post)  I must try it…

Happy 30th Birthday!

Today is D’s birthday…. entering his 30th!

We are going out for big lunch today, but I will write about it later.  I bought him birthday cake from this cute cake shop.

The shop’s decoration is all Christmas!  So cute…  This shop has been popular around this area ever since I can remember.

I picked individually cut cake, not a whole cake.  I thought it’s easier to eat as there is no need to cut by ourselves.  I could pick few different flavours too.

I chose sponge and cream cake with fruits (everyone’s favorite!), monburan (cake of marrons – chestnuts-), chocolate cake, fruits tart, and cheese cake.  They all look yummy!!!  Pumpkin tart looked nice too, but maybe next time…

Hmmmmm… a whole decorated cake looks also nice and delicious…  Japanese cakes are so cute.  And, the decoration is amazingly beautiful.

We probably get a whole cake on Christmas, maybe!