Kirimochi

I've realized that because I don't want to post recipes unless I know they're perfect, I don't post basic things like "what I ate today" or "here is a Japanese food I eat all the time". So, to begin to remedy that, here's a post about kirimochi, which is something I eat several times a week.




You can buy kirimochi (切り餅) dried at any grocery store in Japan. They are absurdly overpackaged small white blocks. Once you open the large bag (complete with silica packet), your mochi is individually wrapped, and it looks like this:

To eat them, you'll have to cook them, but beyond that it's pretty flexible. They're great in soup - the mochi melts a little, but stays block-shaped, and becomes very chewy and stretchy. I like to put them in miso soup. You can also fry them, or bake them in a toaster oven.




When you bake them in a toaster oven, they puff up enormously (or explode). The outside becomes crispy, but the inside melts and gets chewy and delicious. (Also, really really hot.) This is what they look like after a few minutes in the toaster oven:

They make a great snack just like this. Japanese toaster ovens even have a mochi icon on the bottom that tells you for how long and at what temperature to bake them.


You can also buy fresh kirimochi, but it's not as ubiquitous as the dried kind. Fresh kirimochi tends to be more interesting, though - you can get matcha, azuki, or black bean flavours. I get mine from the local temple fair. The same rules for cooking apply - gnawing on them raw isn't a great idea.