Jpanese March 3, 2006: Cooking class "Girls' festival dish"
	Today isthe Girls' Festival. We had a cooking class titled as "Japanese cuisine" at Oita GOF house.
We decorated dolls and peach flowers here and there of the house. In the kitchen were many GOF members wearing white cooking smock apron. We had 30 guests today. They took cooking memo enthusiastically during the class.
	The first step of Japanese cuisine was to make good stocks of three kinds, kelp,bonito, and small dried sardines. We took clear soup using the first extract of bonito thin stock. The teacher was Ms. Nishinaka and the helper was Ms. Araki.
As it was the Girls' Festival day, we prepared "Chirashi-Sushi", or "Scattered Sushi." In the beginning, the ingredients were prepared to be mixed up with vinegar boiled rice. Dried horse radish and Shiitake mushroom were boiled together. Vinegar lotus root and sweet-vinegar carrot were cooked as well. Sliced cod was flaked to make good "Denbu." Boiled cod was watered well after removing skin and bone.
"Golden thread egg" was then prepared. The raw egg was beaten well and then filtered carefully to make omelet
	Now, all the ingredients were beautifully prepared.Then they were mixed up with vinegar boiled rice.
They were dished up beautifully to make "Gomoku-Chirashi."
	The next step was to make boiled down vegetables using burdock,carrot,taro,dried Shiitake mushroom,Kyou-Ganmo, and kelp. The kelp was tied up like this. The teacher was Ms. Kajikawa.
Small dried sardines were first added and pre-cooked vegetables were piled up in flat before the boiling. It was then boiled up with a floating lid for 15 minutes and then Kyou-Ganmo was added before final boil down.
	Marinated rape blossoms with mustard. The rape blossoms petals were cut apart from the stems. The stems were first boiled up. They were drained and lightly salted on the bamboo sieve and cooled down quickly.
The sliced salmon was grilled in the oven after dressing with mayonnaise. The thickness of the slice was about 1 centimeter. The slices were slightly salted and put side by side on the plate. The mixture of cod roe and raw egg was dressed on it before grilling in the oven for 5-6 minutes. After taking off it from the oven they were decorated with chopped parsley. Now, simple but beautiful dish was completed.
	In the end "Sakura-mochi", or "Cherry rice dumpling" was made. The rice was boiled up together with pink colored water.
The leaves of cherry were salted in advance. The bean jam was rolled up into 20 balls with 15 grams each. The boiled up pink rice was then added with sugar and piled up together with the bean jam ball to make 30 grams product wrapped with cherry leaf each.
	Finally, the Girl's Festival dish was ended up beautifully.
The food tasting preparation was ready now.
	Kids daycare report. Two carers took care of three kids.
The cooking class was over. Some asked questions, some looked around the exhibition, some enjoyed tasting. We have had a good time today.
	Carefully cooked dishes were very good. We all enjoyed them.
Recipe: Clear soup 　　　　Gomoku Chirashi Sushi 　　　　Marinated rape flower 　　　　Salmon grilled with mayonnaise dressing 　　　　Boiled vegetables 　　　　Cherry rice cake
	reported by Nagano