Shoya Maruhachi is located at Shinden, Hakuba Iwatake. An old farmers house which was built in Edo era. Took the American high school students there when we accepted them as a host family last month after experiencing EX adventure. When we entered, the front area was renovated but still thick old pillars and structures were also there. You can order some drinks and cafe there.
Also you can have some dinner at night. Shoya Maruhachi English website
Tried to make some peach puddings and done :-) Expected a lot more beautiful in color, but tastes good because enough much cream were used. Also tried some cups for it. Small ones for individual demands and large ones for party size. The one in the pic here is served from a large one by adding a couple of mints.
It was snowing outside today but no need to remove snow. I concentrated on cooking some apple pies and lasagna. The rum I bought the other day got chance to be used.
Making some apple fillings.
Wrap the apple fillings by a couple of pie sheets which are unfrozen in a confy room temperture.
alt="P1120008.JPG" />Grill them in an oven.
Done! Put some ice cream on top of an apple pie which is just done. What an amazing combination but I cant take it coz of my diet!
Making some lasagna sauce.
I use this lasagna. Wave shape at the longer edge. The waves bothers the lasagna to get connected when they are boiled.
Anyway, they connect easily in hot water, so I use this kind of "secret weapon" to make it easier to cook!
Put some boiled lasagna then sause, repeat it some time and put some white sauce and cheese on top. Put them in an oven to grill. A bit of fresh rosemarry makes it richer. 
Bought a bottle of Rum today as our stock went less and less. I don't drink alcohol in regular bases, just an occasional drinker. But I use some for cooking. Rum is a must to cook apple pie.
It seems that some pumpkins are now growing in our tiny farm, I thought it's just one or two, so I asked my mom to harvest them. But...actually it seems there are more... :o
I made these puddings in some small souffles. I do cook, it changes that the way how to cook something depends on the time. For example something must be sweeter before than now but nowadays less sweet things might be preferred because of the diet boom. It seems that there are many ways to cook puddings, I have my way to do as well as others. So i always try to find the best way for it by repeating some failures and success.
This one is in a bigger vessel originally for baking some cakes. 30 minutes needed in an oven. 20 minutes for souffles but this is bigger, so needed more time.
Biggest of the three!Very big but shorter then the previous vessel, so it just needed 40 minutes being in an oven.
Picked some mulberries and made its jam. Mulberries are sweet but look like almost black rather than red. So if you don't brush your teeth after having some, your teeth look like almost black which is like Ohaguro that married women had in old Edo era here in Japan:-) Maybe good for women to avoid sukebe guys around lol....
Time for harvesting strawberries! We grow some strawberries but it seems that it might be a bit cold for them to grow here in Hakuba. Never seen any bit ones sold in markets. Strawberries are red but the flowers are white like you see.
Strawberries attract birds with their red fruits, so we put some nets to protect fruits. But the nets are not very small, just need to protect them from birds. Bugs can go through the nets because they are to work for pollination :-)
Making some strawberry jam. Add some sugar and leave them for an hour or so. Water comes out from the strawberries then simmer the pan. Add some lemon juice. That's all, easy isn't it!? Wish the jam itself also looks this beautiful but actually it looks a little bit darker in color.
Plain Kanten with sweet black beans. If you don't add any sugar when you boil kanten, it does not taste at all which is a bit tough to eat lol... So usually we add something sweet. When you add some fruit in this plain kanten with sweet black beans, that is what we call "Mitsumame" here in Japan. Actually this plain kanten with some sweet black beans is my diet menu!!! I eat some of it ( usually 150 grams ) BEFORE I have dinner to avoid eating too much yummy stuff :(
Fruits terrine Gyunyu(milk) kan ( abbreviation for kanten ). We can try any fruits. I've noticed that we have many kinds of fruits which are like yellow in color but not so many in other colors. Peach, pineapple, banana, apple, orange etc are all like yellow but if it's red - maybe strawberry, rasberry etc and if it's green- kiwi? Bananas feel great when they come into my mouth, as grapefruits are a bit sour , it would be outstanding in the gyunyukan, so I think some love it love it very much but others don't love it don't love it very much.
Fruit terrine I made last year. I guess this could be one of bad example in the meaning of combination. Too much fruit in it. If it's too much, it easily gets out of shape when you get it out of a form. I guess maybe that's a good idea to put as much fruits as it does not get out of shape :-)
Mizu Yokan. Made from vegitable geratine, anko ( sweet bean paste ), some water and sugar. Now trying some combinations : how much water , anko , sugar for some vegitable geratines. Mizu Yokan is one of popular sweet thing especially in summer I think because usually we eat them after we cool it very good.
I was getting a bit nervous because in proportion to get the powder, it was getting much harder and harder than expected. Finally I decided to adjust some - I added some milk to soften it.
Green soybeans. We Japanese often boil them and spread salt and call them "Edamame". Edamame is good with beer. When you get in a beer house or a beer hall whatever in Japan, you often find people order this edamame thing a lot.
But a lot of people don't know the fact that this is soybean! Because we use different words for "green" soybean and "dried" soybean. Edamame is a word for "green" soybean but we call "dried" soybean Daizu. No relational sounds at all. So if they don't see the process how green soybeans are dried to be "dried" soybeans ( Daizu ), they usually don't know the green soybeans and dried soybeans are same stuff. Maybe this misunderstandings does not happen among English speaking people because they use "soybean" for both.
I put some macaronis at one side of the plate, didn't put any at the other side to check the difference. Some prefer this plate with macaroni, some do without macaroni. It seems it depends on who has it.
