Let's Cook Japanese Food!

I have an embarrassing number of cookbooks. Really, I do. Probably close to 100. What's worse is that more often than not I go online to search for recipes rather than go to my cookbooks to find a recipe. When there is a book I find myself going to again and again, then that's a great cookbook. Let's Cook Japanese Food is that kind of cookbook for me.

Having lived in Japan for eight years I found myself missing some of the more comforty foods I used to have there. Chicken Kara-age, Fried Rice, Croquettes, Okonomiyaki, Doria - the list goes on and on. These are not foods you find readily in Japanese restaurants. These are really home foods or foods you would eat in a tiny little restaurant on your way home from the train station. When I did find them, quite frankly, they were horrible. Even in Japantown. Actually, especially in Japantown.

One day when I was particularly obsessed with finding a seafood doria recipe online I came across this book. I was skeptical, but being the online shopper that I am I naturally bought it. When I received it I was happily surprised to see what it had in store for me. All the foods I have been missing for years all wrapped up in one little cookbook!

Amy Kaneko knows what she's doing with Let's Cook Japanese Food and was obviously well tutored by her Japanese mother-in-law. This book is chock full of Japanese comfort foods. All the foods I love, but couldn't find here in San Francisco.

The book is divided into four sections:

• Tofu and Eggs
• Vegetables
• Fish and Shellfish
• Meat and Poultry
• Rice, Noodles, and Dumplings

Within each section is a great introduction and each recipe also has a nice history of explanation of the dish. The instructions are easy to follow and the ingredients are very easy to find. More importantly they taste just like "mamasan" used to make! Recipes I could never find online. I have made so many of these dishes and have been pleased with the outcome each and every time.

If you lived in Japan, have a Japanese mom and want to cook like her, or are just curious about Japanese food, this is the ideal book for you. You will be going back to this cookbook again and again.