One week into my new year's resolution of learning to cook a Japanese meal a week and I failed! I had a legitimate reason though: I was flat-out broke. After our wedding and Christmas, we were just too strapped for cash to justify going to SeeWoo, filling our trolley, and making it rain like Drake at a peeler joint.

See the thing is, when starting to cook an entire culinary repertoire from scratch, you have to fill your cupboard with the essentials. And when it comes to Japanese food, there are quite a lot of basic ingredients you need: rice wine vinegar, mirin, soy sauce, katsuobushi and such. However, don't let that put you off - it's really not that expensive and you can get decent priced stuff in larger Asian grocery stores. Even grocery stores like Tesco are getting in on the act because I've seen Japanese products in some stores. Anyway, aye, the way I have ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise in my fridge likewise, Japanese people have soy sauce, rice vinegar and such almost always on the go.

Armed with my "store cupboard essentials" list from Everyday Harumi, we headed out and loaded our trolley with everything from oyster sauce to tofu to gyoza wrappers to soy sauce.

It felt quite overwhelming, to be honest, staggering through the aisles trying to find foreign (well, to me anyway) ingredients. And when I did I starting questioning myself -"is this ok? Would Harumi-san approve of my choice of rice vinegar!? OHMIGAWD, I CANNOT LET HER DOWN". Overreacting? Maybe. Probably. It just brought back moments of when I first met my boyfriend/ now-husband's family, whom are all well-accomplished home bakers and chefs. More specifically, I was anxious about meeting his Japanese Mom. Man, can she cook and bake! I haven't always had the best of luck with my ex-boyfriend's Mom's either so I just wanted to make a good impression (hide the crazy!)

Anyway, here we go. I decided to just go for it and started off with a labour-intensive delicious pain in the arse classic: goyza!

I went with Maori Murota's Prawn/Shrimp, Fennel and Tofu gyoza recipe from her book, Tokyo Cult Recipes.The only real issue I had - apart from it being awkward, fiddly, and a "bit of a faff" - was that the instructions on how to prepare the gyoza's and pinch them together was a bit difficult to follow (and achieve). Nevermind! It all tasted amazing in the end, didn't it?

I had left over tofu from the recipe so made a simple tofu steak with soy/sesame sauce. This time loosely following a recipe from Harumi Kurihara's Everyday Harumi.

Look, I know some people in the UK are freaked out/ grossed out by tofu but y'all need to get over it. What's the big deal?! Freshly-made tofu (which the above is *not* - straight out of a tetra pak, it is) is absolutely delicious. Even in Harumi's book, which was translated into English for a British audience, she exclaim's her disbelief at how unpopular tofu is outside Japan. 

Anyway, tofu is good, ok? BYE!

MATCHA GREEN TEA AND WHITE CHOCOLATE CAKE / BEGINNINGS

Since it is still officially the Christmas holidays (read: before the inevitable renewed health regime kicks in) so I opted to start with an easy (and fatty) loaf cake: matcha green tea and white chocolate.

Matcha is a finely ground powered green tea - often used in traditional Japanese tea ceremonies. In the last few years there have been all kinds of articles exposing the alleged health benefits of matcha tea so you may have heard about it. I'm not usually one to drink it on a daily basis, to be honest, but I did have a small container of some in my pantry. Probably from last year's renewed health regime. On it's own, it's very bitter. In baking, however, the bitterness levels out and is balanced quite nicely by sweetness so don't be afraid to use heaping tablespoons of it. It's a somewhat odd/ bitter taste for tea but you do get used to it. I can't remember the first time I tried it in baking but I do remember thinking it was strange to put tea into something delicious and sweet like a cake. Now, however, it's all the rage. Matcha this, matcha-that. Anyway, do give it a try and I promise, it's actually super tasty and lovely.

I happened to have the Aiya ceremonial tea so opted to use that in the following recipes. You can get cheaper culinary-grades for baking - as opposed to the more expensive ceremonial grades.

The recipe I used was from Maori Murota's beautiful book that I received for Christmas, Tokyo Cult Recipes

Apparently this loaf/ cake is known as おやつ ("oyatsu") or snack food. To me, it feels somewhat dense so I would have it for dessert / with afternoon tea.

MAKES 1 LOAF CAKE
15 MINS PREPARATION TIME 40 MINS COOKING TIME

3 eggs
softened butter – the same weight as the eggs
caster (superfine) sugar – the same weight as the eggs plain (all-purpose) flour – the same weight as the eggs 1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon matcha (green tea powder)
70 g (21⁄2 oz) white chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 170°C (325°F), and butter and flour a 19 x 19 x 8 cm (71⁄2 x 71⁄2 x 31⁄4 in) loaf tin.
Weigh the eggs, then weigh out the same amount of butter, sugar and flour.
Using an electric mixer, beat the sugar and butter together for 5 minutes, or until light and creamy.
Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing each one in well before adding the next. Sift in the flour, baking powder and matcha.
Combine using a spatula. Stir through the white chocolate chips, then pour the mixture into the prepared tin and bake for 40 minutes.
The cake is cooked when a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean.

RECIPE: Tokyo Cult Recipes by Maori Murota, 2015 

**I weighed my eggs whilst still in the shell and then weighed out the equal amount (170grams) in butter, sugar and flour.**

EARLY RESOLUTIONS / A LITTLE BIT OF JAPAN IN SCOTLAND / ABOUT

I'm neither Japanese or Scottish. I'm actually Canadian - born and raised around Kingston, Ontario. However, I currently live in Glasgow, Scotland with my half-Japanese half-Scottish husband. We married in November 2015 and since both of us love food, our wedding was a celebration of good food and good eatin'.

And so now as the new year approaches, I started thinking about how over the course of many years, I've taught myself how to bake as well as the odd pasta/curry/generic mainstay but I've never *actually* mastered anything - let alone an entire culinary repertoire. Although I'm not promising I will master anything. I mean, I grew up in Canada, eating "Canadian" food and yet, I couldn't even tell you the first staple of the Canadian diet. Besides the all important nanaimo bar obviously.

Japanese food though? I mean, I love it and I'll happily eat almost anything put before me (well, apart from beef, chicken or pork...). Raw fish? You got it. Tofu? Even better. Pickled plums? er, ok. But actually making it? I haven't got a clue. So, with the new year just around the corner and my husband's mouth salivating at the thought of okonomiyaki and ohagi, I'm going to challenge myself to make one Japanese dish per week. The only issue being, where do I even start!?