Origami Mommy

Japanese Sweet Potato Cakes

It's fall harvest season in Japan.

We've been eating persimmons, chestnuts, apples, and of course, sweet potatoes.

We could eat these all day long. Field trips in the fall to harvest sweet potatoes (oimo hori) are a common activity in kindergarten, and I still remember our children getting on a bus, and coming back hours later, covered in dirt and proudly carrying their bags full of sweet potatoes fresh from the earth. I miss apple picking back home in New England terribly - it's something we did every fall with the boys before we moved here - but I am so glad they get to have this sort of experience while living here.

One spring, they even got to plant sweet potatoes at our homestay family in Gifu-ken, and they have also planted them on the garden in their kindergarten, along with many other vegetables.

The other day our homestay family sent us a wonderful package of freshly harvested sweet potatoes and chestnuts and lotus root. Plain, roasted sweet potato, or yaki imo, is the best. It is less sweet than the sweet potatoes, or yams, I grew up with. It's a beautiful golden color (you can also get purple ones these days) and the taste is reminiscent of chestnut. You can roast it at home in an oven at 400 degrees for a wonderful plain after-school snack, or, if you live here, you can purchase it from the "yaki imo" vendor who makes his rounds in the neighborhood in the fall.  I will never forget lying with my newborn daughter the day she was born and hearing the distinctive sound of the potato man in our neighborhood. Such a Japanese fall sound for me, forever linked now with the lovely memory of a peaceful birth.

In addition to plain roasted sweet potato, I like to cook it in a vegetable braise, dice it and roast it with olive oil and herbs, make caramelized sweet potato (daigaku imo), and bake sweet potato cakes. Sweet potato cakes are a wonderful way to enhance the sweetness without going overboard. Here's a photo. A recipe follows, and I'll try to post a recipe for daigaku imo too sometime in the next few days.

Japanese Sweet Potato Cakes

Sweet potatoes, about 2 medium or 400 grams 

40 grams butter (about 2-3 tablespoons), softened

70 grams sugar (about 1/3 of a cup)

One egg yolk

2 T cream

Flour

For flavoring - a splash of rum, or a generous teaspoon of vanilla essence, or cinnamon. We love vanilla.

One more egg yolk for brushing on top of the cakes before baking.

*Note: All measurements are approximate and leave much room for flexibility! I'm not much of a measurer. A few potatoes, a dollop of butter, a splash of cream - this is how I bake these and it turns out fine. These are more forgiving than other baked goods. So don't worry about this part too much and definitely don't feel you need to race out to buy a cooking scale! I happen to own one because Japanese recipes call for them. 

Directions:

Roast your sweet potatoes in the oven until they are soft, then cut in half and scoop out the insides into a bowl. If you mix in the butter right away there is no need to wait for it to soften, as the heat of the potatoes will do it for you. Mix in the egg yolk, cream, sugar, and flavoring of your choice, and mash all together with a wooden spoon until creamy. Kids love doing this part! Now add enough flour to bind it all together so that you can mold it without it losing its shape. Add flour only a little at a time, because you want the dough to remain creamy and soft. Some recipes don't even call for any flour at all but I think it is helpful. I probably added about 1/2 a cup in the end altogether.

Put your cakes on a greased cookie sheet (I usually use parchment paper instead of grease) and then brush the tops with egg yolk. Pop them in the oven at 350 for about 15-20 minutes, and enjoy! 

If you can't get Japanese sweet potato where you live, perhaps this would be good with butternut squash, pumpkin, or yams. 

What are your favorite ways to cook with fall harvest vegetables and fruits? I'd love to hear. 

Bento lunches and a giveaway

I read an article in the New York Times recently about the growing popularity of bento boxes for packing lunch. My boys had bento lunches for 3 years while they attended Japanese kindergarten. I was daunted at first but started to enjoy the process after awhile. A few rice balls (onigiri), some vegetables (sometimes frozen edamame just tucked into the lunch box and perfectly thawed by lunchtime), a small portion of fish, meat, egg or tofu (sometimes using leftovers from dinner the night before, sometimes using frozen food sold for this purpose), and then a bit of fruit for dessert. Once I got into a rhythm it wasn't all that overwhelming. Japanese mothers sometimes put a lot of effort into making bento lunches attractive for their children, but I don't think that it really involves that much more time than making a sandwich.

There are a lot of quick and easy ways to make food appealing-looking to children. Keeping portions small and having some variety and balance is important. One trick is to have small cookie cutters on hand. I have tiny flower-shaped cutters which can cut carrots into flowery shapes, and I also have these contraptions that are like paper punches, which cut nori (seaweed) into shapes to sprinkle on top of rice. However, most days call for simple and fast preparation.

We usually have rice every day for dinner, so there is often quite a bit leftover for lunch. Fried rice is really easy to make - best made with cold leftover rice - and you can throw just about anything in there that you like. In Japan it's common to flavor fried rice with ketchup, but I usually use garlic and a bit of soy sauce and sesame oil for something that tastes more Korean.

My children's kindergarten asked parents to provide a little lunch mat (preferably handmade), and then the children stacked their utensil sets and their little bento boxes on top. They also brought their own little cups to school.

Our babysitter and my dear friend often helped me out by making bento lunch for my sons, especially when Mia was a baby and mornings were hectic. Here's an adorable one she made, much to my son's delight.

Another thing that is really useful are these little picks:

We still use them all the time when serving cut fruit, etc. One or two can be easily tucked into a bento box and make lunchtime a little more fun for your little one.

One more thing that is pretty neat are rice ball molds. These help you form rice into cute little shapes that you can then decorate (if so inclined) to make little faces. I confess I didn't do this that often, but when I did have the time the kids were delighted.

The molds come in two parts. Take it apart, fill the canister with rice about halfway up:

and fit the two parts back together again to smush the rice down into the canister.

Then, take it apart again and turn the canister over. On the bottom there's a little flap you can press on to gently nudge the rice out. It should be formed in the shape of a little bear's face.

So.....big moment for me, I am going to do a giveaway of these picks and molds! I am so appreciative of all of you who come by and visit, read, subscribe, and comment, and I'd love the chance to send these out to one of you. 

All you have to do to enter this giveaway is comment on this post down below and mention what is your child's (or your) favorite thing to pack for lunch. The giveaway will last 2 weeks and end on October 11th at midnight EST, and then I will send these items to the lucky winner.  The one caveat is, that is so close to my due date, that there may be a delay in sending - but I won't forget. :-)  Good luck.

The clearest river

We're back now from our trip to the countryside. We were in a village called Gujo-Hachiman, which is where DH and I first met years ago. It's famous for clear rivers, fishing, and rock jumping.

Afternoons were spent at the river, where soothing water sounds and glistening rocks were the best therapy for our city-weary selves.

I was amazed by the simple beauty of rocks under cold river water. I gazed at them all afternoon and the children gathered them for their little games and pretend play or just skipped rocks in the river.

We stayed in an inn where my husband did his homestay when we first lived in this village. We always stay in the same beautiful room facing the mountains.

I lugged along some of my handcrafting (of course!) and completed a few little "sarubobo" (courtesy of Mairuru), which I've since found originate right near this village, in a city just north of here called Takayama. Such an apt coincidence.

The boys had their summer Japanese homework to do, and Mia always drags out her "work" when they are studying or drawing. It's really adorable to see 3 little heads bent down in concentration like this.

Now we are back, and getting ready for end-of-summer guests and the start of school. Hopefully that means I'll have finally have time again for a new origami or recyclable tutorial for you soon!

Tutorial: A bouquet of paper hyacinths

Daniel came home from school a few weeks ago clutching a little bouquet of flowers he proudly presented to me. They were super-easy to make, as he showed me, and you can make a lot of creative decisions to make this project your own - size, color, type of paper, etc. I tried lengthening the flowery part and they came out looking like hyacinths (or some other similar type flower - I'm not really good with flower names, so if you can help me out here please do!)

I love the possibilities here - made with construction paper, they have more structure and shape; made with tissue paper, they are airier and lighter. You can see examples of both in the first photo of this post. I'll demonstrate below with origami paper, but I love the look of tissue paper flowers too.

Begin with two pieces of paper, one for your flower and one for the stem. Any size, as long as it's roughly square.

Start rolling up the stem paper as tightly as you can into a little paper roll. Secure with tape. I cut my stems in half to get two stems out of one piece of paper, but you can leave it as is, of course.

Take your piece for the flower and fold it in half, then fold in half again, or else fold into thirds. Really, you can fold any way you like, as long as you have some closed-fold sides to cut into later.

Daniel folded his like the picture above, but to get the hyacinth look, I found it was helpful to fold like the picture below - into thirds, slightly uneven, with two closed folded edges on the same side. 

Begin cutting through those closed folds at intervals, but not all the way to the other side, just like the photo below. Keep on cutting till you reach the end.

Now, attach one end to your stem with some tape, and then begin rolling, moving ever so slightly down the stem as you do so. Secure the end with tape.

If you use tissue paper the petals will fall gracefully; depending on the thickness of the construction paper you use you might want to tease out some of the petal layers. Other than that, you're done. Make a whole bunch and put them together in a small vase by a window - so pretty!

This last photo is of the bouquet Daniel brought to me - I love how child-friendly and quick this project is.

Sewing on Mt. Fuji

We escaped Tokyo over the weekend for a little weekend trip with friends to Mt. Fuji and a lake called Yamanaka-ko. While the rest of the group went into a hot spring and went swimming, I dug into a bag of felt and fabric scraps I'd brought along for some handsewing projects because it was so wrenching to be torn away from my sewing machine just when I'd started falling in love with it so.

Before I left, I made a new skirt and a dress for Mia. The dress was made of Japanese double-gauze fabric (which I adore - two more double-gauze fabric dresses are in the works right now), and was loosely based on the pillowcase dresses that you see tutorials for everywhere. I sewed elastic in the front and back and then made bias tape out of the material that I used in the armholes and for shoulder straps because I had no ribbon. I realize I am much happier winging it when making a dress rather than sticking to a precise pattern. I made a matching scarf out of the same double-gauze fabric with a pale pink striped cotton backing on the other side.

I also made a skirt out of a small piece of Heather Ross's Far Far Away fabric by Kokka, combined with a tiny ruffle made of Rowan fabric.

This, too, I made without a pattern. I just made each tier a bit bigger than the one on top and then used my newly-learned ruffling techniques (making a loose running stitch along the top and then pulling gently on the bobbin threads to gather) to experiment. I learn something new with each sewing project. This time I learned that I have to pay close attention while cutting fabric so I don't ruin the design - there are no whole unicorns on this skirt anywhere, which was a great disappointment!

I also made some bags - a tiny treasure pouch for Mia to carry small toys in and a larger tote bag for me out of canvas. I especially like the button detail on the bottom.

We went to a few really nice places on this trip. It was balm to my soul to be away from people and buildings. I was raised in the countryside so living in cities all these years and raising my children in urban areas has been hard for me. 

Mountains and water were everywhere and the weather was cool, although foggy. The fogginess made it challenging to take good photos, and in the end we never did get any good photos of Mount Fuji, although we drove up partway by car and then hiked a little bit up the mountain.....just a bit.

We also went to a children's nature park where they could play around in the water....

make things out of wood....that woodpile, heaven for my little boys! and saws and chisels and hammers and nails everywhere....

My brave friend allowed her foot to be used as leverage while the kids were wielding their saws...!

While the others were busy with their activities, I hand-sewed a bunch of little felt things and also got started on some embroidery at last. I don't think I was too successful with my first batch of felt mascots at all, but my children loved them and loved being able be involved in choosing colors and that's all that matters. 

As evening approached we got settled into an inn...

and then ate a lovely dinner

Sparklers afterwards....so much fun on a summer evening!

Sushi play food tutorial

One of my favorite memories from my boys' kindergarten years in Japan was an event held every year. The oldest children in the school would work for weeks preparing all sorts of items for a huge play store. They'd make toys, fruit and vegetables, sushi, sweets and ice cream, jewelry and bags, all from recyclables. Some of the materials they used included newspaper, milk cartons, water bottles, straws, shopping bags, gift wrap, plastic wrap, cardboard, toilet paper rolls, etc. Meanwhile, the younger children in the school would make their own little shopping bags, wallets, and money, and then the store would open, the young ones would troop in, and the older ones would proudly "sell" their gorgeous little creations. This always led to weeks of exciting follow-up play in our own home. 

Making handmade items for house play or store play seems to be really popular here.  Adult make things like felt sweets.  Children make their own versions from paper and recyclables. The sushi shown here is quite easy for children to do.

First of all you will need a few of these or some other similar styrofoam packing. Here,  this is used to wrap fruit in in the grocery store. To be honest, I'm not sure if they even use this back home - if not, you can easily substitute with styrofoam peanuts, shredded paper, or even small amounts of wadded up paper towels or tissue.

Make a small cylinder using the stuffing of your choice, then wrap it with black construction paper and tape. Cut to the length you want your sushi to be. That's all there is to it! Add on bits of red maguro (tuna), green cucumber, or yellow pickles with glue and then line them up in a little container (such as take-out sushi containers). You can cut the green "grass" that comes inside take-out sushi, and then use a wadded up small piece of green construction paper as wasabi and pink paper as pickled ginger.

Children get a real kick out of play food, especially if they make it themselves. I'll be posting more tutorials for other play store items in the next few weeks.

Felt shapes and an exciting shopping trip

(Hi all and welcome - I'm so glad you're here. if you're visiting from the Crafty Crow be sure to check out this post for a little, bento-related giveaway)

I love working with felt -  it is so easy for the novice sewer like me and it's suitable for handsewing, which is easier to do in a house with constant distractions. I have a few Japanese craft books about making homemade toys for children and I fell in love with this project - an utterly adorable little geometric shape set made of felt. 

My boys loved this sort of thing when they were little - all the pieces (usually wood or plastic in commercial sets) come in triangles, squares, and circles, and you can make endless patterns and pictures with them.

What I saw in the book was made with primary colors, which I think looked fantastic. In the colorway I chose here, organic, natural shapes might work better than severe geometric lines - I can even envision basic shapes like trees (with little apples to put on them), simple houses, cars, animals, people. 

Now, this wasn't handsewn and it was incredibly tedious to keep changing thread on my sewing machine (and to sew those tight little circles), but I think the end result is a lot of fun. It goes in a little cloth bag and makes an ideal travel toy. Here's my quick tutorial - all the pieces are made of double pieces of felt sewn together. Trace squares, triangles, and circles onto paper first and then cut two layers of felt for each piece. For variety some of them can be different colors on each side - just choose a thread which looks good with both. After sewing, do a final trim with scissors.

On another note, I had so much fun the other day. I went to a huge Japanese craft store called Yuzawaya. It's quite far from me, so I rarely get to go these days - no more than once or twice a year. It was such an exciting day for me.  

I've been wanting to build up a fabric stash for so long. I have so many projects burning away in my head and I can't even begin until I have a few more scraps and pieces here. Plus the boys are always coming home from school telling me they need an extra handkerchief (required), lunch mat (also required), little bag, etc. I'm still not happy with my stash - I love Japanese fabric and feel lucky to have such sheer variety here but I am longing for more vibrant patterns by my favorite designers who are hard to find here. But the longing is eased somewhat. One thing which helped was that I was able to pick up a bunch of fat quarters as well as a bias tape maker. As soon as I got home I started experimenting: 

I'm really looking forward to being able to trim things now! One of the first things I tried doing was making a skirt for Mia out of linen and putting on a newly trimmed pocket pocket, but she wouldn't try it on so I could hem it. I'm afraid she might not be a linen girl....Or it may be that she was disappointed that it wasn't pink.

I'm hoping it will help if I add some of these 

but I think she would really prefer a riot of color, the brighter and pinker, the better.

I don't know if she's going to be happy with the material I picked in this pile below to make her a little dress. It's a very light fabric but definitely lacks the vibrant punch she seems to love - it's a dark navy with teal colored flowers. The purple floral and solid fabrics are also for a dress for her, and the brown mushroom and blue dotted quilted materials will become book bags for each of the children.

I also picked up a bunch of plain linen and linen-cotton blend fabric. I love the soft colors. I have a few secret projects planned with this, mostly gifts so I can't say more right now!

Then, I found myself on another floor which I had totally forgotten about. The seventh floor of Yuzawaya in Kichijoji is chock full of beads as well as zakka kits. Amazing! I got so excited. There were a bunch of zakka kits on sale and I picked up a few, including this little kit for a water bottle holder

There were many other kits there too - for placemats, coasters, even fabric slippers. I already started one kit, though the embroidery and button and strap are not on there yet. This is for a cup bag which is, again, another required item at Japanese school (preschool, not elementary). You bring your own little cup to school for lunch. 

and then I picked up a bunch of little bits of trim. 

This is also the kind of place where you can pick up small bits of cotton fabric bundles like this, which is so fun to dream about.

There were so many other goodies- I picked up an embroidery hoop as well as some beading tools I'd been needing and some packs of beads, like the ones below. No matter what craft you do, there's something there - for needle felting, basket making, flower making, metalwork or leathercraft,  mizuhiki, lots and lots of washi (Japanese paper), knitting and crocheting, etc.

There! Now don't you feel like you went to Yuzawaya with me? minus the sore arms (no shopping carts!) and legs...

Slices of life

I felt well enough to take Mia to the park yesterday. (Pregnant with number four and had been on bedrest for an interminably long spring). A welcome opportunity to take photos of my girl. It's tsuyu here, rainy season, though yesterday was just cloudy. These photos were taken at Arisugawa Park, a small park which boasts a lovely bridge and two waterfalls, lots of ducks and turtles, crayfish and tadpoles. A small, welcome oasis for city-dwellers like ourselves.

I also got to walk my younger son to school. Children typically commute to elementary school on their own in Japan, but I like to walk along when I can, especially with the younger one.

First graders wear these yellow hats so they'll be more visible. My older son wears a blue hat in winter and a white hat in summer. Children also all use this special kind of backpack called a randoseru. Other than this and the gym uniforms they have, they don't have any uniforms or required clothing in public elementary school. They do have lots of required bags though. The little bag hanging down from his backpack contains his lunch mat, his toothbrush, and a cup. They also need bags for swim wear, gym wear, art supplies, and other such things. My next sewing project is to make some handmade bags for school.

First graders at my sons' school also cover their backpacks with this neon yellow cover, again to make them more visible when walking to school. There's nothing like the sight of new first graders in the spring, which is when the school year begins here. They are referred to as pika pika no ichinensei, or bright and shiny first graders.