豆乳 shabu shabu

After having this delicious 豆乳 shabu shabu in Japan, we decided to try it out at home tonight.


It's pretty simple, you just need (1) unsweetened soya milk; (2) meat of your choice (get those thinly sliced beef, pork or chicken from Chinese / Korean / Japanese grocery shop); vegies (tonight we had 金菇菜, cabbage is another nice choice); and (4) udon or japanese ramen.

  

The soup base- just pour in the soya milk, and add some meat of your choice- tonight we put in some left over chicken and pork balls. We also added some tofu. Let it boil (on low heat) for a little while to get the flavour of the meat into the soup.

Once that's done, you are ready to shabu shabu. Pour some sesame sauce (which you can easily get from Japanese grocery shop) into your bowl, and use that as a dip for the meat and vegies that have been cooked in the soya milk.

At the end of the meal, save some room to have a bit of the soup- it's smooth and super rich in flavour. Awesome stuff!


Ideally we should have a hotpot stove so we can eat at our table... but until we get one, the stove will need to be it for the time being.

Photos from our Japan trip - October 2009

Finally  got around to collecting my favourites from the trip. Overall, we enjoyed our time at Hokkaido the most, because there were just tonnes of fresh and delicious sashimi.

Osaka- we think it was OK, but probably once is enough. The city is a bit too busy to our liking, and shopping wise- I still prefer Hong Kong's... particularly given my lack of knowledge of the Japanese language...

Kyoto was great... fascinating to see the different shrines... but again (for hubby and I), once we've seen 1 or 2, the rest are pretty much the same.

Our best memory of Kyoto is probably our stay at the Westin Hotel... Ooo.... we luvv their Heavenly Bed, they are SUPER COMFIE and totally live up to its name. The hotel do sell the mattress, ensemble and manchester etc... from the Australian price list, just the ensemble will cost you $3,500.... and if you get matching pillow, sheets, doona etc, add another $1,000 to that. I personally think it's worth the bucks, cos the mattress is just divine (and once you get the mattress, you might as well go the full length with the matching accessories)...

Too bad our mattress is brand new, and will have at least another 10 years of life, if not more.....

The "Marriage Contract"...

Came across this article on SMH today...

Magwatch|Emily Dunn

I can understand having a pre-nuptial agreement to set out what happens when a marriage breaks down (especially for the rich and famous, where there are a lot at stake)... but to have it drawn up to stipulate the commercial / financial consequences for things that happen during a marriage... this is just outrageously ridiculous.

Seems sad that for some people, marriage is just another commercial transaction...