Kaiseki cooking class
Yesterday I took a cooking class at Kei's Kitchen, where we learned to cook a traditional seven-course kaiseki meal. There were nine of us in the class, including me. We arrived just before 10:00 and were greeted with hot cups of green tea, which we drank while getting acquainted with each other around Kei's dining room table. We then spent the first 15 minutes going over the "early winter" menu that we'd be cooking, with Kei and her daughter Masako drawing our attention to any special cooking techniques or unusual ingredients we'd be using.

This is what we made:

• Sakizuke ("The Appetiser") - deep fried mochi sandwiches with dried mullet roe and asparagus with green tea salt


• Wanmono ("The Seasonal Broth") - quail balls in broth with chrysanthemum greens, carrot flowers, and a hint of yuzu


• Mukozuke ("The Cold Dish/Sashimi") - hiramasa kingfish sashimi served with grated daikon and wasabi


• Yakimono ("The Grilled Dish") - grilled prawn with hot miso sauce and a side dish of spicy daikon and mandarin pickles


• Takiawase ("The Simmered Dish") - steamed ocean perch with seasonal mushroom sauce


• Aemono ("The Vinegared Dish/Salad") - konnyaku, shiitake, and carrot in sesame and tofu dressing


• Gohan ("The Final Rice") - inari-zushi - fried tofu pockets filled with sesame and shiitake sushi rice

Controlled chaos followed for the next hour and a half, as we were all assigned something to chop, slice, mix, roll, or otherwise assemble. One of the other class participants, who'd taken the class before, told me to keep an eye on as many people as possible, otherwise I'd miss entire dishes - and he wasn't wrong! Still, we all got to work on at least part of each dish, and we were especially encouraged to try things we'd always wanted to learn or didn't already know how to do. Here are a couple of photos of Kei's amazing kitchen:





By 12:30 the dishes were cooked, the table had been set, and we were ready to eat! Here's a picture of Kei next to the dining room table (on the left; another student is on the right)...



...and a closeup of the finished meal.



I don't think I need to tell you that the food was amazing ;-) We all sat around and ate and talked for about an hour (the conversation centered exclusively around food, surprise surprise!), and I was home by 1:45. I can't think of a better way to spend a rainy June morning, and I can't wait to take another class later this year!