RUID志木料理 - Cooking in Shiki #2

It's been far too long since I updated this blog. So much has happened since I last wrote here. So, here's a yakisoba recipe to make up for it.

image by NoRecipes.com.

Yakisoba is one of Japan's most well-known foods; it's grilled soba noodles with various meat and vegetables. Since I don't have a grill in Shiki, this is a fried soba recipe with a few changes to the traditional recipe (i was too lazy to go and buy the correct ingredients gomen)

So here's what you need for my half-traditional, half-whatever I had in the fridge recipe:

• 100g dried soba noodles
• Canola oil
• Chicken/beef/pork (I used chicken)
• 1 large onion
• 1 clove of garlic
• Half a tin of sweetcorn
• Sriracha sauce (real yakisoba uses sōsu but I didn't have any so I used this hot chilli sauce instead. A good alternative to sōsu is worcestershire sauce with some ketchup, apparently.)

First you need to boil the soba, so boil it in a pot of water. As soon as the noodles are fully cooked, drain them and transfer them to a wok and start frying them in canola oil. Chop up your veg and meat to whatever size you like (I like them chunky but traditional yakisoba tends to have very thinly sliced toppings) and add them. If you're using sōsu or some other more traditional sauce, you can add it as you fry the noodles, but because sriracha is rather hot, I drizzled it on after I fried them. Once your meat is cooked through and the noodles start to brown, serve them. You can add nori or katsuobushi as garnish if you're making more of a traditional yakisoba.

here is how mine looked in the end. it tastes good cold as well as hot so it's a handy dish to make lunches with. as you can see I drizzled the sauce rather than cooking with it so it would actually have a flavour other than hot~

I will try to get back into blogging regularly so until then please cook yakisoba and tell me what you put in it so I can try it too.

xoxo Benji

RUID志木料理 - Cooking in Shiki #1

So cooking in RUID Shiki (my dorm) is a little difficult because we only have a hot plate, no oven. But I love cooking, so it's just giving me more room to experiment really. Today, I made chicken fried in crisps with cashew nuts and here is a recipe.

disclaimer: this is in no way healthy so don't blame me if you get a heart attack from it.

WHATCHE NEED

you can buy all the ingredients in Big A, the discount supermarket next to the dorm.

• Chicken breast(s)
• Eggs (1-3 depending on how much chicken you're frying)
• Cooking oil (I use canola because it has lower saturated fat than most other oils)
• Crisps (I used hot chilli ones but any flavour will do)
• Cashew nuts
• Sesame seeds (not pictured)
• (optional) onions or any veg you want to add flavour and crunch

First, beat your egg(s) in a bowl with a little bit of water.
In a separate bowl, crush your crisps until they're tiny and powdery.

Slice your chicken up and dip them in the egg a couple of times, then coat them in your crisp batter as much as you can.
Fry the battered chicken in hot oil for 8-10 minutes with the cashew nuts, until the chicken is cooked through.
(I fried some onion bits as well at this point.)
Sprinkle some seeds on top for presentation and flavour.

Serve & enjoy~

ENJOY FRIENDS XOXO

上野公園 - Ueno Park

yo~

first post since arriving in Japan/getting over my jetlag. woo.
for now I'm just gonna blog about things that happen day to day until I come up with a certain theme or someone asks for a specific post!

Yesterday began at the lovely hour of 5.51a.m. when I was awoken by a 5.4 magnitude earthquake, which was a new experience. I 100% thought I was dying. The whole room was shaking and the pictures and various trinkets on my shelves were rattling, which is probably what woke me up in the first place as I remember hearing that in my half-asleep state before I registered the shaking. Then after a couple of minutes, it stopped, and I was pretty sure I had dreamt the whole thing.

Anywhooo, after that, I got up and made breakfast and showered and stuff because I ventured into Tokyo city for the first time that morning; a group of exchange students all went to Ueno Park!

i refuse to be shamed for my selfie stick.

First, we went to a temple in Ueno Park, wherein I was in my element, as during my last trip to Japan I had visited many shrines and temples.

washing my hands before i entered the temple.

We prayed at the temple and received おみくじ, which are fortunes, and then we sat and watched an old man feed the birds outside the temple.

After we stopped to eat our 弁当 (takeaway lunch) we made our way to the Tokyo National Museum in the park, but to get there we had to pass through a pet festival.

for some reason we could play with turtles, i'm sure the turtles weren't pleased.

So after we took many photos with the mascots and played with small animals, we made it to the museum, which was full of ancient Japanese items such as swords, suits of armour, statues and folding screens. We learned a lot about Japanese history and at the end we all went full tourist and raided the gift shop (Wave off Kanagawa t-shirt, holla.)

The next part of our day was my favourite - we went to Ueno Park Zoo! I got to see giant pandas for the first time ever, as well as baby Japanese Macaques and pygmy hippos. The sun was beating down on us all day but it was worth it.

It was dark by the time we got home, but it was a wonderful day, and a perfect introduction to Tokyo. Today I'm going to explore Shiki, the city I live in, and do some shopping.

じゃあね!
Benji
xoxo gossip goat

自己紹介 Self Introduction

mmm, that new blog smell.

hello and konnichiwa! my name is Benji and I look like this.

real cute.

I'm 20 years old and I study Japanese & German at Dublin City University in Ireland. You may remember me from my adventures at irishkidinkamakura when I went to Minato Sohgoh High School in Yokohama. Since then, I've come out as transgender, so please call me he/him/his!
This time, I'm heading to Rikkyo University in Tokyo for a whole year. I'm super nervous and super excited at the same time. Like before, I'm going to blog about my adventures in Japan! If you have any questions, suggestions, etc etc, throw em my way.

See you in September~

ベンジー
Benji