Daigaku Imo

On Kototoi dori in Asakusa, there is a charming little daigaku imo shop selling, naturally enough, daigaku imo, a  Japanese sweet potato treat, covered in a light syrup and a  staple food of festivals. This daigaku imo shop has thin sliced sweet potato chips, as well as the more conventional wedges.  It also avoids selling distractions like sweet potato puddings and cakes, and is committed to excellence in daigaku imo :)

Daigaku means university.  Imo means of the broad potato family.  University sweet potatoes?  The name apparently comes from the fact that they are common food at university festivals; sweet potatoes are  most plentiful around October the traditional festival time for  schools and universities.   I am not sure about it's history, but I assume it's food culture that originated in Manchuria as I often ate it in the North East Dumpling Restaurant in Ashfield (Sydney's Mainland Chinese Chinatown - or one of them anyway).  

We bought some and took them to a nearby park to eat them.

 There is a recipe below.

Recipe

2 small sweet potatoes 

a little salt

Oil for frying
2 teaspoons black sesame

Syrup
6 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons mirin
1 teaspoon soy sauce
1.5 tbsp water
1. Cut sweet potato into bitesize pieces & Soak in salt water for 1o mins.
2. Put oil into a deep fry pan, add potato to room temperature oil and cook.
3. At the same time add the sugar, mirin, soy and water in a small  saucepan, heat until they thicken a bit.
4. When the sweet potato is cooked through (check with a bamboo skewer)  and has a slight brown tinge on the outside, put into a new pot.
5. Pour the syrup over the top and sprinkle black sesame seeds.


http://recipe.gourmet.yahoo.co.jp/E100204/   The recipe comes from here, it's in Japanese, but it has some pictures :)


UPDATE:
This recipe is much better.
http://www.justonecookbook.com/candied-sweet-potatoes/

Pork and Veg stirfry

A very quick and easy dinner

thinly sliced pork  (we are on a pork eating campaign since the Japanese govt. has intervened with extra subsidies to keep pork farmers afloat - for the non pork eaters that read this, chicken would work reasonably well, beef may be ok too.)

veges
1 carrot - I cut it into kind of rectangular thin slices rather than circles or julienne, but whatever is ok
1 negi (the green onion between a leek and shallot ) regular onion would work so would half a leek
1 bunch of nira - garlic chives I think - flat leaved grassy green vege

seasoning
3 Tbsp soy
2 Tbspn mirin
1 sake
3 Tbsp white sesame seeds
grated ginger
garlic

Marinate meat in seasoning
Chop veges
stirfry veges in sesame (or vege) oil  - add carrots first, then negi and nira till half cooked.
push to the side
cook meat
mix together with veges,
pour remaining seasoning on top,
cook till done.


the picture is in the food challenge section.

Yaki udon, an easy dinner

Yaki Udon

Yaki Udon is a stirfry noodle and vegetable dish (udon being a  type of wheat noodle - nowdays most commonly made with Australian wheat ).
Just as an aside, there is an interesting article on the decline of Japanese wheat production here.
http://www.tokyofoundation.org/en/series/japanese-traditional-foods/vol.-20-domestic-flour

Recipe
A handful of thinly sliced meat - typically pork but can be anything including mince.
Veges
1 onion
1/4 cabbage
1 carrot
garlic
ginger
black pepper (most recipes don't include this)

2 packets of precooked udon noodles
2 tablespoons of sesame oil (vege oil is ok)

Sauce
2 tablespoons of soy
1 tablespoons of mirin (you could possibly get away with using sugar)
1 tablespoon rice vinegar (probably cider or white or malt would be fine - probably not balsamic)
Method

1. Put noodles into a saucepan of boiling water until the water reboils.  Take noodles out, set aside. (Most recipes don't recommend this but I think it works better.)
2. Chop veges 
3. Put oil in a frypan   Lightly fry veges including garlic.  Push veges to the side of the fry pan
4. Fry the meat.   Mix meat and veges in the pan.
5. Grate ginger and black pepper over the top.  Add the noodles, mix,
6. Add the sauce.  Mix together.
7. Serve   with white sesame seeds or katsuo bushi, or chopped shallots

Next time I make it I will take a photo.