Sukiyaki

Lately, I have been in a Christmas-y kind of mood, even though it is July. And today I went and saw Departures (too amazing to explain) with my mom and my sister, and in the movie, the adorable, J.Crew-model-material husband comes home from work one day, and brings his tiny, super-kawaii, super-Japanese wife really nice beef so that she can make sukiyaki for dinner! That, in combination with the adorable, thick-knit sweaters they wear, is basically why I wish I had been able to get into the Japanese language class at my high school, so that I could go live there and have the most adorable life ever.

But! The point is, when they mentioned sukiyaki, my mom and my sister and I basically freaked out because sukiyaki is so delicious and happy and wonderful! Plus, we made sushi at my house yesterday (obviously that is the best way to celebrate the 4th of July), so I have been craving Japanese food.


I love sukiyaki because every year on Christmas, our family friends that we've known since I was three years old come over and we put two, giant, electric frying pans on the table (we always have one vegetarian pan) and eat sukiyaki! Every region of Japan makes it differently, but when we have it, we have really thinly sliced beef, spinach, bamboo shoots, tofu, mushrooms, shirataki (yam noodles), and scallions, and it all cooks in this soy-sauce-and-sake-and-something mixture, and everything absorbs the sauce. Everybody has their own bowl of rice (we don't do the raw-egg thing), and you just pick whatever you want from the pan with your chopsticks, and whenever you start to run out of something, you just put more in! Everyone drinks Japanese beer, and it is basically the best Christmas dinner ever.

We've tried making it in the summer before, but it's just not the same. Sukiyaki is pretty magical all the time, but it's insanely good when it's cold outside. When I have my own house full of thick-knit sweaters and cooking appliances and a J.Crew husband, I will make sukiyaki all the time in the winter when it is snowing and cold outside!

Love, Jillian