Chef’s Kiss! 3 Easy Recipes for You to Make in Japan 🙂

❤Food❤

I love food. Everyone should know that about me. Food is the way to the heart, right? So let’s make your heart happy! I’ve had to really figure out what I can and can’t eat over the last year and I find that these recipes work well for me. I hope they work well for you as well. These are recipes I make at home myself. I typically just mix stuff together depending on the taste I want,  but for these recipes, I’ll share with you, I did my own take on Japanese recipes that I learned here.

Check out my article on a restrictive diet here!

And if you’re not good at cooking. Don’t worry!

I made these, so I KNOW you can!

(Also, don’t worry if you don’t have some of the seasonings like basil or oregano. The meal will still taste good even without it. I recommend using the extra seasonings I speak of though.)

 

A Side of that Please!

Some (healthy) Sides You Can Eat with Your Meals!

• Salad with dressing or just salt/pepper/oil (super easy and yummy
• Homemade wedge potatoes with salt and pepper
• Potato salad (store-bought)
• Miso soup
• Cherry tomatoes cut in half
• Spinach
• Literally any veggie 😉
• Cut cucumbers with sweet miso paste

 

Yummy Recipes for Your Tummy

1)Breaded Lemon Chicken with Pasta

 

My friends always ask me to make this when they come over or when we have events. I have no doubt that this will become a favorite of yours.

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 1 bag of panko flakes
• pack of chicken breast
• flour
• oil
• 2 tbs each of salt/pepper
• 1 tbs parsley
• 2 tbs basil

Additional Things You Need:

• lemon juice in a bottle
• plexiglass dish or something that can go in an oven

On the Side:

• pasta
• lettuce

Recipe:

Preparing the Chicken

*Prepare the oven at 180 degrees

**Separate the egg, flour, panko flakes into three bowls

***In the panko flakes mix salt, pepper, and basil  (half of the seasonings mentioned above).

****In the plexiglass, spread around the oil, sprinkle salt, sprinkle pepper, and then squeeze lemon juice in it. (It all depends on how strong you want the flavor. If you want a little bit of flavor, use just a little. If you want a lot of flavor, make sure to cover the surface of the glass in lemon juice. Of course, you can add more when it’s actually on your plate haha )

The Procedure

1) Clean your chicken in the sink with water and salt. (I know some people don’t clean their chicken before they cook it but think about all of the things that chicken that you’re about to eat has been through before it lands on your plate. The slaughterhouse is a VERY dirty place~)

2) Take the chicken and dip it in this order:

Flour—>egg—>panko flakes <make sure to coat all sides of the chicken>

3) Place each chicken breast in the plexiglass

4)Now that each piece is inside, sprinkle the top with the rest of the salt, pepper, and lemon juice (I really love the sour taste, so I’m a little more than generous with the lemon juice)

5) Cook in the oven for about 20-25 minutes, but make sure to keep going back and checking on it.

6) After the chicken is cooked all the way through, enjoy! 🙂

7) I typically eat mine with pasta that I also add salt and squeeze lemon juice on along with bits of lettuce. It’s the perfect combo as the lettuce balances out the zesty lemon taste!

 

2)Pumpkin Soup with Bread

I eat this all throughout the year. It’s so easy to make and it makes me happy because I started making it after my Tanabe mama made some. It took me 28 years to realize I love pumpkins haha. It’s also fun to share with friends because it’s a huge batch that is made. Share the love! This one may be a little bit hard to describe because I eyeball it, but I’ll do my best.

Ingredients:

• 1 half of a pumpkin
• 1 pack of ground meat
• 1 can of chopped tomatoes
• 150 ml almond milk (for us lactose intolerant babes out there haha) regular milk is fine too
• 50 ml water

• 3 tbs of salt
• 3 tbs of pepper
• basil
• garlic flakes in a bottle
• parsley
• oregano

On the Side

• baguette or toasted bread
• cheese

Recipe:

1) Either boil the pumpkin until it becomes soft or stick it in the microwave after wetting it for a few minutes to soften it. <You can season the pumpkin like I do too 😉

2) At the same time, take out the ground meat and cook it in oil on the stove on medium and add half of the salt and pepper.

3) As the meat is cooking, cut the pumpkin into digestible chunks that you can add to the meat and then add it in.

4) Add 150ml-250ml of milk (eyeball it!), 50 ml of water, and the canned tomato chunks, and then bring the soup to a boil.

5)Add in all seasoning. Here is where I eyeball it and do mini-taste tests to see if I need more of anything. I’m not going to lie, I typically add more salt and seasonings than what I listed above, but it really depends on your preference.

6) Depending on the consistency you want, you can add more water or milk to make it more watery. I like mine thicker, so I don’t add too much~~~

7) Let that simmer for about 10-15 minutes.

8)Then turn off the stove. Put it in a bow, add cheese < I use tofu cheese>, and enjoy!

9) You can also heat up the baguette or bread, cut it up, and dip it into the soup for a savory flavor!

 

3)Burger Cheese Melty Cheese Inside

I made this for the first time for my Tanabe family this month. I was so nervous to try it, but the results were actually really good and they kept hitting me with the “すごい！” “めっちゃ美味しい” “素晴らしい” comments! You really can’t go wrong with this recipe.

Ingredients:

Meat Patty

• 1 pack of ground meat
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp pepper
• 2 tsp consume
• 2 tsp nutmeg
• half an onion
• 1 slice of bread
• 1 egg
• 3 tbs milk

• oil
• slice of cheese

Sauce to pour on top

• 1 can of chopped tomatoes
• 50ml water
• 3 tsp sugar
• 2 tsp consume

On the Side

• salad lettuce
• salt/pepper/oil for your salad
• rice

Right from the start you can see that I deviate from this recipe because I don’t have a food processor lol.

Recipe:

*chop onions into tiny pieces

** Whenever I cook I usually season the onions with salt and pepper just so that everything has a lot of flavor.

1) In a bowl, mix together the meat and onions

2)Pour in all of the seasonings above in the ‘meat patty’ section

3)Mix in milk

4)Rip up the bread into tiny pieces and toss it in! Make sure it mixes in well and is super squishy~

5)Oil your hands and take your slice of cheese and fold it 2 times so that it’s a square

6)Use a spoon, place the meat in the center of your hand, and mold it into an oval.

7)Put the cheese in the center of your oval and place the meat on top to completely cover the cheese so that you can’t see any of it. Like you’re making an oval snowball!

8) With clean hands, pour oil onto the frying pan, place the cheese meat patty in it and cook it!

9)Cook until completely brown.

Sauce

1)In a pot, pour in all of the sauce ingredients mentioned above and heat it up~

2)Add more water if you want it to be watery (I don’t recommend though).

3)Let it simmer for 5 minutes.

4)Get a plate and put the rice and salad on it, then put the cheese meat patty on top of the rice.

5)Pour the sauce onto your yummy meat burger and enjoy!

Dessert

Fruits, fruits, fruits!

Ice cream

Banana bread. You can find the recipe I use in this article about a picnic I had with my friend!

End

 

Not too difficult, right? Now go and enjoy your meal and be sure to share it with others! Happy cooking!