Japanese Beef Curry with Breaded Chicken

Need to whip up dinner in half an hour? Here's a quick meal you can make. Japanese curry with rice and breaded chicken, well, sort of.

Start off by making a pot of rice. Then take some frozen chicken burgers, which you might have in the freezer, and pop them into the oven. Now, peel and cut up some onions, carrots, and potatoes. Thought you had carrots and potatoes but can't find any? That's fine, just chop those onions. Great, now grab the Japanese curry roux cubes in your cupboard and open up half of it. Cool. Dissolve the curry roux into hot water and set aside. Your mise en place is done.

You can make your Japanese curry with just vegetables or you can add either cubed meat or ground meat. If you feel like adding meat, brown your meat in a pot with a bit of unflavoured oil. Add in your onions (and potatoes if you found some) into the pot before the meat is fully browned. Pour in the dissolved roux and bring to a simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Tidy up the mess you've made in the kitchen. Fluff the cooked rice. If you have carrots, add them into the pot of curry and cook until desired tenderness. The chicken burgers should be done. Take out the chicken burgers and slice. Now assemble and enjoy. That all made sense, right?

Badaboom, badabing!

Tonkatsu Kare Raisu

We didn't have a few ingredients to make kare raisu aka Japanese curry with rice. We didn't have any Japanese curry cubes, nor did we have enough of the right ingredients to make the Japanese curry roux. But we've made it before (here and here).

Andrew ended up grabbing some of the ingredients the next day and then made the curry. Then Andrew used the rest of the pork chops to make pork cutlets (tonkatsu) with panko bread crumbs.

Once I got home from work, he was just frying the last two breaded cutlets. The rice and curry was ready too. I have to admit, it was quite an impressive effort by our youngest brother.


He got high marks. The tonkatsu wasn't over-fried and was still juicy.

Despite not being that hungry, we both devoured a bowl of tonkatsu kare raisu. And because we didn't eat very much that day, we had plenty of leftovers for the next day. Win!

Toronto Weekend July 2013: Part II

Our family went to Toronto one weekend for my cousin's wedding. This is the second, and final, part. The previous day can be found here [link].


We had breakfast at the hotel's breakfast buffet. It wasn't just a sad cereal and fruit selection with juice, coffee, and hot water. No, no. They had stuff like scrambled eggs, bagels, sliced bread, cubed fruits, and a waffle machine.

I didn't mean to have a carb-heavy breakfast. Lucy shared half of her waffle. I suspected that she couldn't finish it all. The breakfast sausages were very lean. They were close to being dry.

Lucy's comments:
Being the first one in the family at breakfast, I excitedly texted everyone to let them know that there was a waffle machine available.  It was an impressive feature for a complimentary breakfast.

After breakfast, we packed up and checked out of the hotel. We headed to Pacific Mall to walk around a bit and get some bubble tea. We had already been drinking our bubble teas when we walked by a bubble tea shop that had winter melon tea available! Holy! Even though I barely had any of my drink, I was so tempted to buy a winter melon-flavoured drink. I think it must be a Taiwanese thing, because I can't really find it anywhere else. I found some expensive cans of winter melon tea at T&T. Not worth it. Next time... bubble tea shop... next time.

I have to admit that while walking around Pacific Mall, I was trying to buy time so that we could go for dim sum in the GTA before we head back home. But then I realized that we all had a late breakfast. No go. I gave up and we to Kingston for a late lunch.

Semi-Homemade Ramen & Brick Toast

I think it was Richard's idea to make tsukemen, a style of ramen where you dip the noodles into a flavour-packed soup. It ended up being ramen. We've been thinking about tsukemen ever since watching David Chang in The Mind of a Chef.

Richard made two soups: one with roasted chicken thighs and pork neck bones, and the other was made by mixing hon-dashi powder and soy sauce. They were made separately and mixed together in the end.


Toppings included menma (simmered bamboo shoots), soft boiled eggs, shiitake mushrooms, roasted seaweed sheets, pickled ginger, and green onions.


Despite being time-consuming, I'd like to try and actually make tsukemen with a side of Japanese-style chashu.


This was our lazy -- but awesome -- version of brick toast. Our dessert consisted of two slices of toasted T&T milk bread slathered with condensed milk.


Do I really need to say any more?

Koreana in Chinatown and a Rant

Nobody felt like cooking on a Friday night late last month, so we (Mom, Richard, Andrew, and myself) had dinner at Koreana in Chinatown. I had previously heard of good things from the family.

The first time I ate there was on Canada Day, where VN and I had the stir-fried kimchi with tofu and jja jang myun (Korean version of the Chinese black bean noodles), along with the banchan. I was surprised at how large the serving of jja jang myun was. The flavour of the black bean sauce was too plain for my tastes. Everything tasted the same to me after two bites. If it weren’t for the slivers of cucumbers, I wouldn’t have been able to stomach more than a few bites. I’m not sure how legit their version is, but I do know that I’m not a fan. VN’s stir-fry was better, though I found there to be too much sesame oil.

When our family arrived for dinner on the Friday night, a table had just left so we didn’t have to wait very long at all. We spent quite a bit of time deciding what to get. Mom doesn’t like Korean food much, but came because she told Andrew to pick where to go for dinner. Lesson learned? lol

After we gave the waitress our order, she brought us some complimentary bowls of miso soup. Once we were finished, she set down the banchan of pickled bean sprouts, daikon radish, potatoes in a sweet gloopy sauce, kimchi, and seasoned seaweed. I typically love the sweet potatoes at Korean restaurants but the sweet gloopy sauce ruined it for me. It didn’t taste homemade.

To start off the meal, we got an order of haemul paejon aka seafood pancake. Mom was disappointed because the pancake wasn’t crunchy and crisp. I had to remind her that Korean pancakes are chewy like this and not flaky like the Chinese version. Unlike the loaded seafood pancake at Nak Won (in Toronto), there wasn’t a lot of seafood in the pancakes we received.

Our main dishes began arriving not long after we began with the seafood pancakes. The mul naeng myun (aka cold noodle soup) arrived in the familiar stainless steel bowl as the jja jang myun I had previously. I knew that the soup was supposed to be seasoned with vinegar and mustard, but the cold soup just tasted like the pickling liquid of the daikon and carrots. I thought the soup was supposed to be a cold beef broth with just a bit of vinegar. I didn’t get any mustard, though I could’ve just asked for some. Mustard wouldn’t have made it anymore tasty.

Richard wanted to order the sukiyaki, but since Mom wanted that, he went with the unagidon aka BBQ eel over rice. He looked like he enjoyed it since he ate it quietly.

Andrew was craving the stir-fried kimchi with tofu. I’m pretty sure it was the same dish as VN’s, but the flavours were well balanced this time. There were pieces of pork, kimchi, green onions and tofu. This was a favourite at our table.

The other favourite was the sukiyaki that Mom got. The beefy soup was sugary. I’m not sure if it’s supposed to be like that, but it was strangely addictive. We all kept taking bites of Andrew’s stir-fry and then sips of the sukiyaki.

Though Koreana isn’t the best Korean restaurant in Ottawa, we’ll still come back for their stir-fry of kimchi, tofu, and pork.

On a somewhat related note, I need to vent about the people who review restaurants (small restaurants specifically) and complain about horrible service. I usually check sites like Urbanspoon to see what other people think about restaurants, but I mostly read up on what certain food bloggers think. There are always people who comment more about the service than the food. I want to know how good the food is, not the service. My blood pressure slowly rises whenever I see those comments.

Homemade Okonomiyaki: Take Two

Just like the first time Lucy and I made okonomiyaki, the base of our Japanese pancakes consisted of shredded cabbage, cheddar cheese, bacon and green onions. This time we cooked them for the family.



Everything was mixed together in a bowl, depending on the person's preferences; more cabbage, more batter, etc.



The pancakes cooked on our griddle. Then came the fun part – dressing the okonomiyaki!







A squeeze of kewpie mayo, a few shakes of furikake (which was made from seaweed, powdered soy sauce, toasted sesame seeds and dried egg), a squeeze of okonomiyaki sauce, and a handful of bonito flakes. The bonito flakes were dancing with excitement -- that is until we gobbled them up.

Noodles Galore! June 24-26, 2011

Jimmy and I attended a wedding last month in St. Catharines. Since it’s a 7-hour drive from Ottawa, we decided to stop in Toronto on Friday night, and then continue towards St. Catharines on the following day. Lately, we’ve had a tradition of stopping for noodles whenever we’re in Toronto, and this weekend was no exception. We searched for ramen places on Urbanspoon and came up with two winners: Kenzo (visited here and here) and Ajisen. We chose Ajisen for the abundance of free parking on Friday night, and then checked out Moo Beef Noodle House on our way home on Sunday.

First stop: Ajisen Ramen in Markham!



Jimmy ordered pork ramen. It had green onions, sliced pork, soy eggs, and a generous amount of the house specialty, fried garlic oil. The soup was a thick, tonkotsu broth and had straight, very QQ (i.e. chewy, bouncy, and al dente) noodles.



I ordered the BBQ pork and corn ramen, but the waitress didn’t catch the “corn” bit. I was too tired to complain (it was nearly 11:30 PM by the time we arrived in Toronto). The noodles and broth were identical to Jimmy’s, but mine was accompanied by tender slices of chashu (rolled BBQ pork), a heaping pile of blanched bean sprouts, and shreds of wood ear mushrooms.

Although I prefer curly ramen noodles, I appreciated the fact that the noodles were not overcooked. The broth was perfumed by the intensely aromatic fried garlic oil, and I noticed that the restaurant provided a jar of the magical stuff on each table. The soup was well-seasoned, and it wasn’t too rich. I’ve had tonkotsu ramen at other places where it’s a struggle to get through the bowl because of the thickness of the soup.



The real star of the night was the chashu. As you can see, you could practically see through the fatty bits. Each perfectly seasoned slice melted in my mouth. The charred outer layer added a smoky flavour to the rest of the pork. Jimmy declared this ramen as his order for our next visit to Ajisen.

We were in and out of Ajisen in 20 minutes, much like our previous visits to Kenzo. We drove to our hotel in Mississauga and crashed after a long day of driving.

In the morning, we grabbed some continental breakfast at the hotel, and left for St. Catharines. The wedding was very sweet and unique. I didn’t end up taking pictures of the reception because I was too busy trying not to cry and stuffing my face – sorry!



We stopped in Toronto for lunch on our way back to Ottawa. Christine texted us with the name and address of a beef noodle restaurant – Moo Beef Noodle House. Again, we were in the Scarborough/Markham area. This restaurant was located in a small strip mall off of Highway 7. It was about half full when we arrived.





We both ordered beef noodle soup, with a couple of sides.



Marinated duck wings. My childhood favourite snack. I was devastated when I realized I failed to eat any in Taiwan (series of posts to come), so I took advantage of this opportunity to eat them. The marinade and drizzled sauce were strangely sweet, and something had hints of sesame oil. It threw me off guard because it didn’t taste much like the wings I grew up eating. In comparison to Cantonese style duck wings, I was very disappointed in these. It didn’t stop me from eating the entire plate, though.



We spotted signs for stinky tofu in the windows, so we thought we’d try them out. Clearly, our expectations were set far too high (again, blame it on the recent trip to Taiwan), so we barely at any of these. The tofu itself had a dry spongy texture. It was very unappetizing because I had to chew so long to break it down. It also wasn’t the right type of stinkiness. Generally, the stinky smell doesn’t translate to the taste, as it tends to mellow out once you bite into it and the garlic flavour takes over. This tofu was stinky from start to finish, without being tasty. It was rather bland for stinky tofu.



They also used the same sweet drizzle from the duck wings on the tofu, which I didn’t enjoy. You can see the pools of sauce in the indents and wrinkles of the tofu. Not great.



The appetizers being duds, we turned our attention to the beef noodles. Unfortunately, they turned out to be let-downs as well. At Moo’s, you have a choice of three types of noodles: thin, medium, and thick. We both chose thick, assuming that they were handmade noodles. Instead, we got store-bought udon noodles. It was very disappointing. The noodles were not boiled long enough, so they were practically doughy when we bit into them.



The soup was decent, but it tasted as if someone took a regular bowl of the broth and then watered it down for two bowls. The flavour wasn’t as intense as we’d hoped. It certainly did not measure up the now-closed Mr. Sun’s beef broth.



We had to punch up the flavour by liberally adding more chilli oil. Not a good sign. Overall, we ate very little at this restaurant. Lunch cost around $36 for two, which we found crazy expensive for sub-par food.

After this trip, we decided that we would wait for a trip to Taiwan if we craved Taiwanese beef noodle soup in the future. In the meantime, we’re going to return to the reliable ramen places in Toronto to get our fix of a well-balanced noodle soup.

~ * ~

Addresses:

Roadie to Kingston: Sima Sushi and Arisu

A few days ago, Jimmy, Richard and I went to Kingston for Henry’s convocation. Since the convocation didn’t begin until the afternoon, we had lunch at Sima Sushi. This is Lucy and Jimmy's favourite sushi place in Kingston. You can read about their fondness of the restaurant here.

Each set included some salad and a bowl of miso soup. It wasn’t spectacular, but it wasn’t meant to be.

I got the sashimi and maki lunch set. It came with yellowtail, tuna, salmon, and butterfish sashimi.

And also included some California rolls. Henry ordered the 1A Sushi lunch set which replaced the sashimi with sushi rolls (not pictured).

Richard got the unagi don. The eel was a bit fishy to me, though it’s normally like that, but it tasted fine with the rice and sauce.

Jimmy got a sashimi dinner set (salmon, tuna, yellowtail, and butterfish sashimi).

Lucy and Jimmy love Sima Sushi – oh, Andrew too! They always talk about the dreamy butterfish. I didn’t think it was that great.

It does look like Sima Sushi has been consistent over the years. Take a look at their two trips here and here about two years ago. Reading the two entries written by Lucy is a breath of fresh air. I know I'm not a great writer. Anyway...

We headed back to Henry’s place to chill after the ceremonies wrapped up. The plan was to go to Grecos for some Greek food, but we weren’t able to grab a table since everyone came in to town for the convocations. Henry suggested that we go to Wooden Head’s, while I suggested that we just grab some burgers from Five Guys (which happened to be a few steps away from Grecos).

We went to Arisu in the end. I really wanted to try Smoke’s Poutinerie, but we went to have Korean instead. You can read about the last time Lucy wrote about Arisu here.

I was surprised that the restaurant wasn’t packed, but I was glad at the same time. We ordered a plate of dukkboki (rice cakes) to share. As soon as I saw the dukkboki, I had a feeling that it the sauce would be a sweet and spicy sauce. You know, it's like the really sweet sauce buffets use for general tsao chicken. Anyway, it tasted exactly like I imagined. I'm sure this wasn't what it's supposed to taste like. Where are the fish cakes and large pieces of green onions? There was a weird (thin) crispy layer on the outside of each rice cake. It was probably from all the sugar.

There was only one waiter for the restaurant. The poor guy was definitely overwhelmed. We didn’t even get the banchan until after the dukkboki.

Anyway, the waiter brought the three small side dishes. The first one was a salad of bean sprouts, cucumbers, carrots, green onions, and daikon with a bit of sesame oil and other seasonings.

This was a plate of a potato salad. Richard and I much rather prefer the sticky potatoes that is usually served.

With just one look, I knew the kimchi wouldn’t be good. I was right. It wasn't very garlicky or stinky (fermented).

Richard and I split had got a plate of chap chae to share with the table. We barely touched it. It tasted fine but nothing that great – plus, it was easier to pack the chap chae up and eat it later.

Richard ordered the kimchi jigae (kimchi soup). Jimmy got the tofu soup (not pictured). I didn’t try Jimmy’s soup, but Richard’s soup was okay. I preferred mine over his.

I got the yuk kae jang (spicy beef with vegetables in soup).

Henry ordered the gamjatang (pork bone soup). We all tried Henry’s soup and immediately wished we ordered the gamjatang instead. The soup was sweeter than mine was. The sweet taste of the pork bones and meat was so good! Oh man, my mouth is watering now. Richard ranked the soups from crappiest to the best: Jimmy’s tofu soup, his own kimchi jigae, my yuk kae jang, and then the gamjatang.

After we paid the bill and left the restaurant with full bellies. We dropped Henry back at his place and then headed back to Ottawa. I sure do miss roadies!

~*~*~

Addresses:

Sima Sushi
66 Princess St.
Kingston, ON
613-542-8040


Arisu
185 Division St.
Kingston, ON
613-531-9265