Japanese cooking – yum!
I was thrilled to be invited to join the Istanbul Women’s Institute at a Japanese Cooking Demonstration today. We were hosted by the wonderful Ayse, whom I have heard about and yep, she is as warm and friendly as her reputation suggested. She lives in Yenikoy which is a suburb further up the Bosphorus and has the most amazing enormous kitchen, just perfect for cooking demonstrations. Apparently, it is often Ayse doing the demos as she loves to cook, and is the Institute’s Turkish food expert.
But today, it was Kyoko Numan cooking. Kyoko has lived in Istanbul for several years, and before that the US, and as well as Japanese food and cooking, Kyoko teaches origami. We had the pleasure of admiring her origami when we eventually got to sit down and tuck into all the wonderful dishes, as the tables were decorated with fans, and birds and flowers….
As well as learning to cook some delicious Japanese dishes, the fascinating part for me, was meeting all the women there – 17 in all. Our nationalities spanned Mexico, Portugal, Brazil, Canada, Sweden, Singapore, Malaysia, Germany, USA, and of course Turkey and the UK. It was wonderful to hear everybody’s stories and what brought them to live in Istanbul. And of course we all shared a love of food.
So, to the food – Kyoko cooked for us:
Teriyaki chicken made with boneless chicken thighs – she demonstrated this two ways, both in the pan on the stove top, and in the oven. It was succulent and juicy and had a wonderful flavour, and one that I plan to make very soon.
Vegetable tempura – aubergine, peppers and courgettes with a wonderfully simple teriyaki sauce. I have never made a batter before and so was interested to see that you use carbonated water for it. (or beer!)
Miso – delicious flavour of miso with spring onions, egg and wakame (seaweed)
Chirasi sushi – a new dish for me as I have never seen sushi like this. The sushi rice is spread out on a bamboo platter, with the shredded nori seaweed sprinkled over the top. Next some fake(!) crab, smoked salmon and egg pancakes were all scattered over, and it was finished with some sesame seeds. Again, delicious but refreshingly different – actually it made me think of a sushi cake!
We also learnt to make homemade gari, which is pickled ginger, a complete revelation, as it is easy to do, but wonderfully harmonious in its flavours, and of course finished the meal with Japanese green tea, which we were told should always be made with hot water at 90C, in effect, allowing it to slightly cool after it has boiled.
All in all a wonderful day with wonderful food and wonderful ladies.
