9/27 Teacher

I learned much from watching my father cook as a little girl, because he did most of the cooking up until my parent's divorce. However, it was my sister, Danielle, that taught me the most. She was the one handling the cooking during those years post-divorce when I was actually engaged in learning to cook, instead of being a passive by stander. My sister loved to watch Food Network, and get new recipes anywhere she could. She was a subscriber to the Campbell's Kitchen recipe collection, that would send a new recipe to her email daily, and often sorted through cookbooks at Boarders (may the book chain rest in peace). It was my sister who would check over my shoulder during my first tentative steps into cooking and point out when meat was done thoroughly and how to tell if my pans were too hot.

Many of the recipes I learned from Danielle were simple, but they have served me well over the years. One of them - from that Campbell's email list I mentioned - is very literally just cut up chicken cooked in a skillet with cream of chicken soup and minute rice. It's a really simple dish, but when I left for college, I found that many of my friends loved it and asked for me to make it. One of my good friends moved to Maine and she said that she would miss the chicken and rice dish I made. I told her how to make it, how simple it was and she just smiled at me and said, "It still wouldn't be the same."

For that friend, that dinner made her think about cool winter nights, eating dinner with all of her friends (because I was living in the dorms at the time, I often went over to her house with a bunch of friends to cook and have good, homemade meals). For me, that meal always makes me think of my sister, and how she helped teach me to be an adult. How much of an impact on my life she has always been. She still teaches me things. Just a month ago, I went up to visit her and my mother, and Danielle taught me how to make homemade ice cream. I consider her one of the most influential people to my interest in food.

9/20 Historical Food of Japan

If food is a critical view of culture, then traditional recipes and foods can be an exciting glimpse into a lifestyle that's past. Now, most of the time when someone says "historical food", I know the first thing that comes to my mind is large legs of mutton being ripped in to without any silverware, and hard, crusty breads. While it certainly is true that some places did eat meals like this, the traditional and historical foods are much more varied than my limited imagination realized.

I did some research a while back into the lifestyle of feudal Japan, and a lot of what I found revolved around the traditional foods of Japan. Traditional Japanese food revolved around rice in many different forms, and the consumption of most kinds of meat , aside from fish, was really slim. One of the fun things that rose out of Japanese cooking is what is called wagashi. Wagashi is a kind of traditional sweet that was often paired with green tea, and it could take many forms. The earliest wagashi were fruits and nuts, although there have been the remains of cookies made from ground chestnuts found in some burials. Dumplings called dango were also invented early on. They were made of rice flour and often filled with sweet fruits or beans. Dango in many forms remain popular today.

During the Asuka period (538 to 710) trade to China brought back confections made of fried dough. Sugar also came from China around this time. Since the Japanese could not yet refine sugar, they prized it like a treasure. Until that time, they had used naturally sweet things like honey and fruits.

While the staple of Japanese cuisine evolved, many big changes came after more ingredients became available when European traders came in the early 16th century. Traditional wagashi is considered to be the confections that were created and perfected before that time.

9/13 Food from home

Food is such an intrinsic thing to being who we are. Everyone has their own favorites, and everyone has something that reminds them of growing up. When I was a child, my mother ran a bakery out of our house. She closed down when I was five, but I can still remember sitting at the kitchen doorway, watching her make butter cream icing while a cake was cooling on the stove. We always had exciting birthday cakes, even after my mother closed the bakery down, and my mother even baked my sister's wedding cake. She's promised to do mine one day, too.

One of my favorite things about the cakes to this day was the cake tops. When my mother would bake a cake, there always is this little poof in the center, where the cake rose more than at the edges. This poof had to be trimmed off so that the cake would sit flat on a cake board. My mother would take a long, serrated knife and carefully trim off the cake poof. Since the poof was extra that was not needed for the cake, Mom would put it on a plate and offer it to my sister and I when it was cool.

I don't often make cakes, and when I do, I rarely trim off the poof, since I don't decorate like my mother does. So, the last time I had a cake top was when Mom was baking the cake for my sister's wedding. I came into the kitchen and there, on the counter, was a plate piled high with tasty chocolate chai cake tops. I picked up a piece and nibbled on it, then another, and another.

The cake pieces reminded me of being a little girl, sneaking into the kitchen to take more cake tops while my mom decorated the cake it came from. There are few things to me that are better than the smell of a baking cake, and I think that cake poofs will always remind me of my childhood.