During the depths of despair of COVID lockdowns circa 2020-2021 in the hospitality industry – anyone still standing was forced to reassess their products. One of the many kits and takeaway dishes we made was the Curry Rice Kit. All this time we feel we hacked our way through working in restaurants so even though […]
No joke but, I always joke that this dish was invented by drunk or stoned people. And I’m probably right. The word comes from ‘Okonomi’ meaning ‘what you like’ or ‘how you like’ & yaki meaning ‘cooked’. So, ‘cook what you like’. Tell that to a stoned teenager & you’d probably get a cabbage pancake […]
A throw-it-together salad that suits everyone, anytime anywhere. Make whatever size you need & use as much sesame dressing as you like.Taste it & add more (like we did).
Good rice to Japanese people is like good bread to us western folk & as you may or may not know, there is a kind of artisan craft to making ‘good bread’. There are techniques one learns over many years, patience is one, handling gently is another, and generally give a crap is a huge […]
Every morning when I walk up in Japan, I almost always have miso soup as part of breakfast. If I’m out somewhere late afternoon & we’re having teishoku (a set meal) there’ll be another kind of miso soup with that. Every prefecture & every house in fact has its own style of miso soup. Some […]
The best Home-style Japanese food… FYI donburi means ‘on rice’ & usually this comes by itself but this is Ajitoya style. Like our other dishes, it’s not difficult, just get prepped & the rest will fall into place. Even my Aussie family who can be fussy eaters, all loved this dish. Gingered pork on rice
The few warm days left before the coldness sets in gets us craving a bowl of buck-wheat soba noodles. Like me, they might not be super attractive but with their wabi-sabi colour, al-dente bite & earthy flavour they’ve secured a place in our stomachs forever. This is a soba noodle salad dish we make all […]
Japanese food holds so many great vegetarian options & Agedashi Tofu might be an Olympic gold medal (yeah I know, not the right timing). How this was even invented is beyond me… two blocks of dusty tofu deep fried resting in a sweet dashi broth balanced so well… it’s easy to make & a bit […]
An absolute favorite at Ajitoya, probably because it pleases 3 things; your eyes, your empty stomach & your vegetarian craving. In Japan, this dish is called Kitsune Udon. Kitsune means ‘fox’ in Japanese and is the foxy coloured brown flat tofu that lays on top (called ‘abura age’). Some say, tofu is the foxes fav […]
Every country has its version of fried chicken, and that’s just great. But the Japanese do fried chicken super extremely awesomely well – Karaage. Marinated > coated in potato starch > lightly fried in light vegetable oil. It’s the best bad food out there. Not overly difficult but we’ve messed this up before by adding […]