21
RAIN
Farmers in the city of Tamura, Fukushima Prefecture, have begun planting rice in a district once designated a no-go zone because of radioactive fallout ejected by the disaster-hit Fukushima No. 1 power plant.
Recently I was asked to write a blurb for a new liquid plant-nutrient. As soon as I saw the name of the product, 早根早起 （Hayane Hayaoki), I smiled at this example of linguistic creativity.
Life in Japan just seems tailor-made for certain foreign residents, who slip into the fabric of this society as smoothly as a hand slides into a glove. American Curtis Patterson, a professional koto player and music teacher, is a case in point. Not only ...
Denmark’s Emmelie de Forest won this year’s Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday night with her ethno-inspired flute and drum tune “Only Teardrops,” despite tough competition from spectacular stage shows by performers from Azerbaijan and Ukraine. Juries and television viewers across Europe awarded the barefoot, ...
One team’s quest for a first title has ended. The other team’s fight will continue next season. The Yokohama B-Corsairs outplayed the Rizing Fukuoka in Sunday’s bj-league championship game, controlling the tempo for larger stretches and making enough timely baskets to fill an instructional ...
Makiko Itoh writes the Japanese Kitchen column and is the owner of two popular blogs about Japanese cooking: JustHungry.com and JustBento.com. She’s the author of “The Just Bento Cookbook,” now in its 6th printing.
For Makiko Itoh's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
In the world of sushi and sashimi, maguro (tuna, especially bluefin tuna) currently reigns supreme. It's so popular that large specimens of the fish fetch ridiculous, headline-grabbing prices at the Tsukiji wholesale market in Tokyo, and the species is in danger of extinction due ...
Newcomers to Japan are often a little taken aback by the many decidedly non-Japanese condiments, such as ketchup and Worcestershire sauce, that are used in everyday cooking. And in particular mayonnaise: Usually reserved for sandwiches, salad dressing and dipping sauces for chilled seafood in ...
After an unusually cold winter, the sight of spring produce is particularly welcome, especially the bright yellow-green of nanohana.
Before refrigeration became widespread in the late 1950s, fresh, unprocessed fish was only available to the well-to-do or people living on the coasts.
New Year’s is the most important holiday on the Japanese calendar. And as befitting such an important festival, the food traditionally served is lavish and elaborate. At the centerpiece of the New Year’s feast, which traditionally went on for as long as seven days, ...
The obsession with fresh, seasonal food in Japan extends to things that you may not even think of as having seasons, such as dried flour. Shin-soba-ko (new fall-harvest buckwheat flour, used in soba noodles) is eagerly anticipated every year by Japanese gourmets. While soba ...
Traditional Japanese confections, or wagashi, can take a little getting used to for Western palates: The sticky-gooey texture of mochi (pounded rice) and the sweet an (bean paste) filling that are often used are quite different from most European-style cakes and cookies. But one ...
Fall is in the air! With the return of cooler weather, your appetite may be making a comeback too. Luckily, fall is a great time for gourmets to indulge in Japan. There’s an abundance of fresh produce in season, and some of the tastiest ...
A little while ago a friend of mine who’s been living in Japan for few weeks texted me in a bit of a dither, saying, “This guy I barely know said I was sweet! Is he coming on to me?” It turns out the ...
When temperatures are in the high 30s Celsius you may not feeling like eating much of anything. But even on the hottest, stickiest day a cool, refreshing dish of tokoroten — a kind of noodles made from seaweed — can help revitalize even the ...
When the weather is swelteringly hot, there’s nothing more appealing than an ice-cold drink or snack. One of these is kakigōri, a mound of shaved ice that is topped with a sweet, sticky syrup. What makes it different from a snow cone is that ...
There are two basic skills you should master if you want to make authentic Japanese dishes at home. One is how to properly prepare and cook plain steamed rice — a task made easy these days with sophisticated electronic rice cookers. The other is ...