Restaurant Review: Shou Sumiyaki

Hi Everyone! It appears we meet again! :) I gotta say, I am about to talk about something that happened literally weeks ago :O I am so far behind in finishing my post drafts, it's not even a joke! Well it actually is a joke, a disgrace if you will. Life has me in a wrestling move, maybe something called a... choke-hold? That analogy has lead me to realise I'm not well-versed in wrestling terminology, so let's do a restaurant review instead!

Shou Sumiyaki

160 Little Bourke Street

Melbourne VIC 3000

Shou Sumiyaki, nestled just inside the big colourful gateway of Chinatown, is this cool little Japanese Restaurant I visited a few weeks ago. Or do I mean... Koren BBQ Restaurant? No no, I mean Japanese. I think. It certainly had a Korean BBQ vibe to it, as the food comes delivered to your table on dainty little plates which you can cook yourself on the table-top grill. Luckily I'm not as arrogant as the Japanese food purist on the next table, and can just shut up and enjoy the good food.

We ordered a special combo so that we might try a bit of everything, and were given a good amount of food in my opinion- which some may say is a little too much. The starters included fresh cucumber salad in a sesame/white miso dressing, a crab dish, miso soup and lovely steamed rice. My memory is a tad hazy on the details as it was so long ago and I didn't make many notes. Bad Jade, BAD Jade!

The friendly staff removed their shoes to walk into our sacred dining zone and fired up our grills. Thus commenced the meat procession, in which they carried little plates of meat out to the table and explained what each plate was in case we didn't know. Scotch... Oyster blade... Ribs... Wagyu... the words were flying around as we discussed our favourites and their prefered cooking times.

I discovered something about myself during this dinner - I. Love. Ribs. I'm not just talking about the visible rib cage of my svelte boyfriend, I'm really talking about the edible type. Ever had chicken ribs? You should. My friend's dad is a butcher and he does some amazing marinated chicken ribs. It's cut up into little individual rib bones with a bit of tender and delicious meat attached! I'm also partial to pork ribs, and am working on my goal of one day having the Flinstones style giant ribs attached to the side of my car. A girl can dream. There is something about the meat in that area of an animal's body that I really enjoy... the taste, texture and fat:meat ratio - it's has it all.

I'm sure my eyes glazed over mid-meal as I was transported back to my Osaka home-stay in 2003. We stayed in a little traditional hut in the mountains and in between riding uni-cycles and playing with a three-legged stray dog we cooked our own meals from scratch. One night we made a dish named "Niku yaki" meaning 'grilled meat'. Basically we had a bucket full of hot coals with a mesh grill lid and we grilled vegetables and meat on it while sitting cross legged in a circle around the cooking pit. I have to say, Shou Sumiyaki was a little more up-scale than that and we even used Wagyu beef as a matter of course.

I spent my dinner blathering on about this or that, and warning my friends passively about one of my pet hates: People who can't pronounce Wagyu Beef and incorrectly say 'Way-goo'. It makes me die inside.

We each got $10 beers and the whole thing worked out to $50 each. For some fresh, good quality food and a big old Japanese beer... I was very impressed! Next time I feel like grilling my food I will think of this place before any other :)

Katsu Katsu Katsu-don!

AHOY MATEYS!!! Well, lookie here. Dish numero thirty five-o COOKED! This little old dish is a Japanese dish involving meat schnitzel over rice. Anything suffixed with "-don" just means it's a rice dish! So this is a cutlet (katsu) rice dish (don). Ever literal hey? I found the recipe online of course at J-simple recipes. They have some cool things on there! I got myself some Pork steak from the vic market... possibly not the right meat to use?? Dunno. Maybe i should have just tenderised it, it was uber tough.

Ingredients: (serves 4)

4 eggs

1 onion

4 deep–fried breaded pork cutlets

4 servings steamed rice
150 ml bonito soup stock

5 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons sugar (the original recipe used double this but i found it too sweet)

The recipe used pre-cooked cutlets, so i had to crumb and cook them my own way. I used panko crumbs - the japanese breadcrumb. Ultra crunchy! So yeah, cook them in oil....

Then chop them up into slices on a board but try to maintain the structural integrity of the whole piece if that is possible. Meanwhile, boil the bonito soup stock, sugar, soy sauce and onion for 3 minutes on medium heat. When it is ready, add some of the liquidy onion stuff to the frypan and lay 2 of your schnitzles in the liquid and let it go for a few minutes...

Then crack your eggs into a cup and beat gently, then try to pour 1 per schnitzel:

Then serve over rice, and garnish if you wish, then crack a japanese beer and relax.

The last integral step is to eat so much that you feel actually SICK and wish you had made a salad... voila! So, it's about time I start cooking some HEALTHY dinners right? What kind of example am I setting for the children of the world?! But seriously, It can't be great. My dad actually patted my belly after i finished lunch yesterday at my brother's birthday celebration... I know how to non-verbally communicate dad, I know what you were saying. That is not good. If anyone actually says anything though, I would literally eat their head off. Not even joking, I may be hungry..

purezentoooooooo

My Japanese friend Shiho has gone back to Japan for good :( Before she left though, she gave me a bunch of presents!! So nice!!! Below are 12 cans of Japanese alcohol i remember fondly....

She also gave me heaps of beer snacks which Josh and I will sample tonight!! Japanese night!! :D

 She gave me a lovely cup to replace the one i broke!!

Some cute chopsticks to add to my collection....

 A wind chime for under my pergola...

AND THE BEST!!! OKONOMIYAKI BANNER declaring that i make/sell okonomiyakiiiiiiiiii!!!!!!!!

WOOHOO! So i am working on an amazing package to send her to say thanks :) we'll see how the beer snacks go!!!!

ZOMG OKONOMIYAKI

Why hello everyone!! I am very excited to show you these pictures of my new recipe off the list! Okonomiyaki is one of my favourite Japanese dishes EVAAAAAA! Okonomi means 'whatever you like' and yaki is 'grill or cook'. Shiho came over on Sunday to offer her Japanese cuisine expertise, and here is a picture-heavy post detailing almost every step of the way :P 



cabbage (i used wombok)



spring onion

 

Shiho mixing the batter. We made it with 1 cup flour, about 1 cup Dashi (or you could use water), and 1 egg. You can also buy a batter mix at an Asian Grocer but we couldn't find it *frown*

 

heating up the teppan. Josh bought me this - what a sick dude :D

Cooking the yakisoba noodles. We found a $2.16 packet of yakisoba complete with yakisoba sauce at Safeway - enough to make 2 hiroshimayaki! crafty consumers!

the batter was a little thick the first time - needed more dashi!!

amazing photos by Corey - you can see the steam!!

On goes the cabbage!

In Japan they have super super thinly sliced bacon and pork but we couldn't find any so we chopped up some normal bacon cuts :S I jokingly called this Australia-yaki because of how improv it is.

bacon goes on too! i was looking for kim chi but the asian grocer was SOLD OUT!!! wtf

crack the egg

scramble it

now comes the tricky part. Watch me fuck this up....

scooping the filling back in. God i hope no okonomiyaki chefs are seeing this... how embarrassing...

on goes the infamous brown sauce. Okonomi sauce

then the kewpie mayo

then the spring onions or "negi"

then the fishy flakes. I call them bonito flakes but Shiho calls them Katsuobushi. We are both right in a way because bonito is the name of the fish (Skipjack tuna) which is dried and smoked and then turned into flakes called katsuobushi :) 

oh... yes... then we taught shiho some swears. She spelt this out on the fridge - cho kawaii!! I then corrected her and she won't stop saying it.. haha! Also she found out a worse one.. starts with 'c'... oh dear!

With the left over batter we made an osaka style one because we had no more noodles. This only has cabbage and spring onions in it but you can put anything!

oh yeah, then we went on the roof!

What a fun day :) Next I want to make sukiyaki - another of my favourite Japanese dishes :D mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Dish 20) Japanese Curry!!

Howdy Pardners! So I didn't cook much last week because I was super social and busy and ate at restaurants about 4 nights of the week... so i started slacking off a little. Remember how I said that on Thursday at work, I had an exciting food day?? Well it was because the work experience girl Shiho cooked some Japanese food for us for lunch!! Here she is: 

She made Kare (curry) Katsudon! The name means Curry, cutlet and rice. It is one of those easy modern home style Japanese dishes.

My first experience with Japanese curry was in 2003 on my Year 11 school camp. We arrived in Osaka and made our way to our host school in the searing heat on little to no sleep. We arrived during 'Culture festival' (Bunkasai), so the school resembled more of a circus than a school. Culture festival is basically an annual event where students at most schools display their talents. Because most Japanese schools encourage students to join multiple sports and culture clubs, this festival offers them an opportunity to show off their skills to peers, family members, and in my experience - Australian exchange students. Classrooms are re-decorated to resemble shops, gameshows, kitchens, dance halls etc. I remember a verrrrry messy game show involving water and flour.. the place was crazy! But fun! One of the classrooms was transformed into a Curry hut, and I had my first Japanese curry with steamed rice amidst the culture madness. Good times.

My second memorable Japanese curry memory is when I went to Japan in 2008 and kept eating it at cheap 24/7 places like Sukiya. Oh I remember a cool place called Yoshinoya too, mmmm. Cheap and filling. I hear that there is a Yoshinoya in Sydney now... for those who are interested!! Anyway, I recently found out what makes the Japanese curry flavour so distinct. The answer, my friends, is Curry blocks. This is what they look like in packet form:

I bought this after trying Shiho's curry and decided to try my hand at the dish I love ever so much (^_^) It was about $3 or $4 or something from any random Asian grocer, and it makes about 5 serves. You can get bigger packets, mild or spicy and there are multiple brands! Directions were in English with this brand, and it was super easy to follow and make! Here is mine:

Here's what I did...

1) Cook diced chicken in a glug of olive oil until almost cooked, then add chopped onion, potato and carrot and stir for a few minutes,

2) Cover with water and bring to the boil.

3) Turn the heat down and simmer until everything is soft. The packet recommends 10 minutes but i did almost 30 minutes!

4) Turn the heat off, and crumble in the curry block. Stir through until dissolved and return to simmer for 5 minutes until the sauce is thick and fragrant.

5) Serve over rice and bury your face in the bowl until all eaten.

Josh and Maki were around when I made this dish and they absolutely loved it! I think they both were impressed by how simple yet tasty it was.

So now you've met my new friend Shiho ^_^ we have been emailing eachother and practicing our languages! She is studying English here until February so hopefully she can learn some stuff from me - and hopefully not the WRONG stuff. She already asked me what "yo yo yo" means, as she saw it on subarashiiblog's last post. Uh-oh now i'm teaching her gangster slang haha! Anyway, next week we are going out for dinner to eat some Japanese food, hoorayyyy! I told her how I like to call Takoyaki "TakoYUMMY" because I love them so much... and she thinks it is the funniest thing she has ever heard!! She also gave me lots of compliments and my head grew so big that I almost couldn't get on the train after work. But she is right... I AM cute, and funny and smart and my Japanese IS perfect, and i do know EVERYTHING about Japanese food... her words, people. Her words. Hahaha! (^_^)'

October Poem + various things from my weekend

October is over and I was quite slack

All week I cooked nothing, I need my groove back.

This poem's a day late, I was too busy eating

and having strange dreams - my weekend was fleeting!
I dreamt of the death of Josh's friend Jim
He was at our house at the time, so we had to bury him.
We were crying our eyes out, and trying to find room
in my front yard for his eternal tomb.
There were too many graves, and because he was tall
We couldn't find space in the front yard at all.
When Josh told Jim last night on the phone
He said his mum does not condone
He's not allowed over to our place anymore
Looks like we no longer have a good rapport

*frown*

I imagine that this strange dream was triggered by the fact that Jim let me borrow his Dutch cook book and I was reading it in bed. I spent Saturday morning painting my nails, drinking tea and reading this book:

 It has everything you want in a specific cuisine cookbook... recipes from OTHER cuisines:

Pictures of people in the midst of PDA's...

 and some cool notes and flags for the best recipes!

Cannot WAIT to start cooking some of these dishes! Thanks again Jim, expect some facebook comments asking for advice :D

So not only did I think about food on the weekend, I also ATE lots of food! Thursday night i got dumplings and beers with Josh and my friend corey, but didn't have my camera to take photos of his cool house and Indian game Carrom!! CRY! His housemate Kristian gets free cheese through a culinary connection his dad has, so Corey made us cups of tea and put out these 3 amazing cheeses: Brie, Triple Cream, and Blue. The Blue, surprisingly, was my favourite. There is a first time for everything! Kristian also had the same model car that I used to have before it was cruelly stolen from me, so I may have sat in the drivers seat for a minute or 2 and had a moment when Corey left to get biscuits. I didn't tell Kristian this when he arrived there later of course, it was the first time we met so I didn't want him to think i'm weird. That's the fun of life - finding out on your own what people are really like haha. Although, after publishing this info on my blog, it's tempting fate for him to find out. meh. Anyway Thursday was an awesome food day at work too for reasons I cannot explain just yet! And I had to borrow another girl's camera to take some pics which will hopefully appear on here on Wednesday...?

Friday night I ended up going out after work with Corey again! Again there was no plan, and we were just wandering around and ended up here in Chinatown:

YAMATOOOOOO! I realised as I walked past that I have always wanted to try this place! So we did. I got Nabeyaki Udon:

I also bought some tea from T2:

And thought about eating the chocolate Claudia bought me back from Belgium. Look how pretty it is:

Saturday I stuffed my face at a BBQ at my friend Trav's place. It was all cold and rainy, so a pile of Raybans formed on the bench..

And Stevenz jumped in the pool fully clothed for a dare. He gained $30 and probably pneumonia too. That below is Trav making Stevenz earn his money...

Oh and then I went out for Indian food with my family for dinner!! Yikes! OMG this morning when I was walking from Josh's place to the station, I saw this and had a slight freak-out...

It took me a while to notice the fake cobwebs - all i saw were bloody handprints and tape. I think I actually stopped dead in my tracks!

Well there you have it folks! A whole bucket load of information to digest. Hope it's tasty!! I'll be back on Wednesday with some more good posts WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE :D