Fresh Strawberry Daifuku Mochi

Strawberries, Sweetened Red Beans, and Mochi = YUMMY

Hello! I've always wanted to make Fresh Strawberry Daifuku Mochi and finally made it! When I posted photos to Instagram, several people asked for the recipe. I felt I couldn't just give you the recipe because there's some technique involved. So, here is a video of me making Strawberry Daifuku Mochi. It's a fresh strawberry covered with anko (sweetened red Azuki beans, smooth texture), covered with mochi made with Koda Farms Mochiko sweet rice flour.

This video uses the microwave method. You can search the interwebs for a steamed method. I adapted recipes and techniques from Just One Cookbook, Bon Appetit, and my 40+ years of mochi making experience with my family. Also, I worked in a mochi & manju shop while in high school (Sakura-ya in Gardena, CA - um, seriously the best mochi in Southern California), and I helped make mochi during their busy New Year's holiday season.

Hints for success:

• Work fast - mochi needs to be hot/very warm when you form it. That's why this is a small batch. 
• Make sure your hands have potato starch on them to prevent sticking when working with hot mochi. You know what sucks and could hurt you? Having sticky HOT mochi stuck to your hands. It's a pain. Thus, if children are helping, you need to be careful. 
• If you screw up microwaving the mochi, just make another batch. You are using a small amount of ingredients and your box of Mochiko will give you several batches. (I overcooked it once and had to start over).
• Some of the video is sped up so I'm not working that fast. Please know that I've been making mochi and baking for a long time. I can hold hot mochi in my hands pretty easily. I think forming mochi might be one of those "harder than it looks on the video" techniques. But keep practicing and you'll get it! And no matter what it looks like, it's delicious! 
• I've only ever used Koda Farms Mochiko sweet rice flour made with short-grain glutinous rice. This California family business has been making Mochiko for the Japanese American community forever. Support them and follow them on IG. Also, "sweet" rice doesn't mean any sweetener is added, it refers to the type of rice. (You can't use Bob's rice flour because that is made with medium and long grain rice. You need the short-grain rice flour... just get Koda Farms and you'll be good.)
• This isn't the only way to make mochi. The interwebs has lots of videos and recipes. The ratio of mochi, anko, and strawberry varies. 
• FYI - I can't make this low-carb and have never substituted real, granulated sugar for other sugars. Koda Farms Mochiko is rice flour and gluten-free. Anko (sweetened Azuki beans) is usually gluten-free but read labels carefully.
• I have seen people substitute corn starch for potato starch and I think that'll work. You brush off most of the powder.

Ingredients:
3/4 cup Koda Farms Mochiko rice flour (link on Amazon) (Hey, I noticed that I have the wrong amount on the video. The correct amount is 3/4 cup Mochiko).
3 Tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 cup cold water
Anko (sweetened azuki red beans), smooth (comes in smooth and rough texture. I prefer smooth for mochi) (link on Amazon)
6-8 small or medium fresh strawberries

Preparation (see video for details):

1. Cover strawberries with a thin layer of anko. Refrigerate until ready to use.
2. In a microwave safe bowl, mix mochiko and sugar. Add water and stir until smooth and well combined.
3. Cover with plastic wrap and microwave 1 minute. Remove and stir with spatula.
4. Return covered dish to the microwave for 30 seconds. Remove and stir.
5. Microwave another 30 seconds and stir.
6. Finally, microwave another 30 seconds and stir. Mochi needs to be smooth and sticky.
7. Microwave times may vary because all microwaves are different.
8. Spread potato starch on work space, and plop mochi on the potato starch.
9. Cut small pieces of mochi and form into a circle.
10. Wrap anko covered strawberries with mochi, placing seal at the bottom.

* I am part of Amazon Affiliates program so I can earn a few pennies if you purchase something - at no cost to you.

Music in video by Ben Sound. Thank you!

  

Chocolate Mochi Brownie Squares

Chocolate Mochi Brownie Squares

Recently, I transferred to a new position at work. Still working for the same library system, but a new position at our headquarters. I'm tardy in posting photos of my going away party at my former library - they hosted a lovely dessert buffet...it was so sweet. Those are coming soon!

At my new workplace, one of my co-workers is on a gluten-free diet (darn you Celiac). I keep bringing in desserts she can't eat so I wanted to make something gluten-free. I love, love, love all things mochi (my family's history with mochi is well documented in my New Year's Mochi Making posts) so this recipe on my friend's blog JustJenn Recipes was a perfect fit.

Since these brownies are made with rice flour (I only use Koda Farms Mochiko rice flour), they have a distinctive "mochi" chew. They aren't too sweet and are a nice morning or afternoon treat.

I cut all my work treats "petite" size...I usually cut a 8 x8 pan into 16 or 25 pieces.

This is a great gluten-free recipe...and enjoyed by all! It's super easy to make...no electric mixer needed. I hope you make a pan full of yum soon!

P.S. Thanks for all the comments about my last post mourning the loss of Picnik. Picnik certainly had many fans!!! I used PicMonkey to add the text to the first photo. It is easy to use and the fonts are stylin' - I jumped for joy seeing Lobster Two! They say collages are coming soon! Some Picnik folks went to PicMonkey and you can see it. It is web based, but you need to pull your photos in from your computer, and can edit one photo at a time.  I hope they are able to add direct integration with Flickr at some point and make the whole process online, but it a great start!

Recipe:
Find the recipe on my friend's justJENN Recipes blog for Chocolate Mochi Brownies

My changes and notes:
- 1 cup mochiko (Koda Farms brand) was 4 7/8 ounces by weight
- I used 1/2 cup Nestle semi-sweet morsels for the melting
- I mixed 1/4 cup of mini chocolate chips into the batter then put the pan into the oven. After 15 minutes of baking, I sprinkled the remaining 1/4 cup of mini chocolate chips on top. I think this helped prevent the chips from falling to the bottom of the pan.
- I used an 8 x 8 pan and baked it for 52 minutes.

Matcha Mochi Cupcakes - Happy St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day from The Food O'Librarian

Today, I'm celebrating my Japanese and Irish roots.
What?
Yes, I may be 100% Okinawan, but somehow, my grandparents named my father Patrick!

My grandfather traveled from Okinawa, Japan to Hawaii in the early 1900's to work on the sugar plantations...as did many Issei (first generation Japanese Americans). Later, he went back to the little island of Okinawa and met my grandmother. They settled in California as farmers and began to raise their family of six kids. When son #3 came along, they named him Patrick. They were Christian (named the first two sons John and David), but not Catholic so I'm not quite sure where the name came from. However, I attribute this bit of Irish to my craving for some corned beef and cabbage every March 17th. And the McDonald's Shamrock Shake. :)

So, to combine the Irish and Japanese (hee hee), I whipped up some Matcha Mochi Cupcakes. Using matcha (green tea powder) and mochiko flour (sweet rice flour), these cupcakes are chewy and a bit dense. And they are such a pretty color of green! It is similar to my Blueberry Mochi Cake, Cherry Mochi Cake, and Matcha Mochi Bundt but it uses whole milk and oil instead of butter and evaporated milk. It is less buttery than the other cakes, and I enjoyed it a lot!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Recipe:
Find the recipe here on my friend Azusa's blog, Humblebean. Check out all her beautiful photos and food! This recipe is gluten-free too!

Cherry Mochi Cakes - Cute and Gluten-free

fresh california cherry mochi mini-cupcakes

Remember the Blueberry Mochi Cake I made recently? It has been well received by my co-workers, friends and family...and it is such a thrill when I get comments from people who made it for their family (and they liked it!)

Now that it is Summer Fruit time (whoo hoo!), my thoughts are all about the cherry. Two years ago, my friend Charlotte forwarded me the Martha Stewart Tiny Cherry and Almond Tea Cakes recipe. It is just so pretty!

But I tend to shy away from nut recipes (because a co-worker can't have nuts or seeds), so I thought...what if I make it with mochi cake!? The result, if I do say so myself, is YUM!

Cherry Pitting with a chopstick! I tried my best to keep the stem attached.

Since I wasn’t sure how this would all work out (read: it could be another baking disaster of mine), I didn’t want to risk wasting my very first batch of beautiful California sweet cherries! So, I made 16 mini cupcakes with fresh cherries, and poured the rest of the batter into a 9 x 13 pan and added frozen Trader Joe’s Sweet Cherries (about ¾ of the bag)

Make this easy-to-make, gluten-free recipe! Since it is made with mochiko flour (sweet rice flour), the texture is slightly chewy!

Cherry or Blueberry Mochi Cake
Adapted from JustJenn who adapted it from Hawaii's Best Mochi Recipes by Jean Watanabe Hee

Mix together: 2 sticks melted butter and 2 cups sugar. Mix in 1 can evaporated milk (NOT sweetened condensed milk).

Whisk in 4 eggs. Add 1 box of Mochiko (Sweet rice flour. You can get Koda Farms Mochiko at an Asian grocery store, Surfas in Los Angeles, or health food stores because it is gluten-free. I buy it at Japanese grocery stores for $1.28 - $1.50 a box). Add 2 tsp. baking powder and 2 tsp. vanilla and mix until smooth. Done! How easy is that?!?

You can add frozen blueberries to the mix or layer them into the batter. Or, as I did for this one, add fresh and/or frozen cherries. I covered some and just popped the cherry in other...both ended up the same; I would do the easy method!

I made 16 mini cupcakes and baked them for 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees…until they were a bit golden on top. The remaining batter went into a 9 x 13 pyrex glass pan for 60 minutes (check at 50 minutes).

For the mini cupcakes, I sprayed the tray with Baker’s Joy. However, if you were going for totally gluten-free, please just brush with melted butter.

Cherry Mochi Cake - Give it a try!

Monkey Munch or Chex's Muddy Buddies

Monkey Munch or Chex's Muddy Buddies
One Delicious Bowl of Goodness

For my last three baking endeavors, my oven has been either (1) giving me attitude or (2) crying out for help. I turn it on, it doesn't heat up for a long time or gets stuck at 250-275 F until I put it on broil to "wake it up." Once, it got up to 350 right away and then fell back to 250 within 20 minutes. Perhaps this is why my little 4" Devil's Food cakes took 45 minutes to cook! Sigh.

So, until the Southern California Gas comes out to calibrate the oven and check it out (such a great free service...and I just hope I don't need a new oven like Madam Chow), I'm going to try to make "short bake" items such as cookies and no-bake items such as this crazy yummy Monkey Munch or Muddy Buddies.

I doled them out in 3 dozen nut & party cups to bring to work.
(By the way, you can get a boatload of these sooo cheap at Smart & Final (sorry, S&F are only in CA, Arizona, Nevada and Mexico)

Jon and Kate Plus 8 make this on their show and "I'm-getting-really-tired-of-you-but-your-kids-are-so-damn-cute-I-keep-watching-the-show-with-you-on-MUTE" Kate calls it Monkey Munch.

Here is the easy, simple Muddy Buddies recipe from the Chex's website.

So easy! Melt 1 cup chips, 1/2 c peanut butter, 1/2 stick butter in the microwave. Stir til smooth then add 1 t vanilla.

9 cups Chex Mix (I used Rice Chex). Mix the melted mixture with the cereal then pop it into large ziploc bags with powdered sugar. Shake and spread out on a cookie sheet. And that's it! It would be a lot of fun to make with kids as they get to shake, shake, shake and then eat, eat, eat! I'm going to make this with my niece and nephews real soon.

Monkey Munch. Muddy Buddies. Or even Monkey Buddies. Whatever the name, I could eat a gallon of this stuff. Make it in a quick minute! Here's the recipe!