Bread from the Fish-Pan

The Basic Recipe

Did you know that most Japanese "kitchens" have a Coleman campstove instead of an oven? You have to buy your own convection oven appliance to bake bread, or get the bread making appliance. What if you can't afford one at the moment, or don't have space for one or both even if you could? If you have the Coleman stove, standard with natural gas except in my kitchen, you can enjoy The Basic Recipe is from Theodore White, the resourceful leader of the now defunct "Tokyo Hikers." Thanks Ted, wherever you are now!

Originated from Theodore White.
Combine in a bowl:

• 1 cup flour

• 1.5 tsp baking powder

• 2 pinches salt
  Mix and then add:

• 1/6 cup oil

• 1.3 cup milk

After mixing, flour a board and your hands. Knead the dough until springy and even in texture. Once it no longer sticks to your hands, roll it out on the floured board until about the shape of the fish fry pan in your "range".

Cook for 3 minutes. Flip over. Cook for 3 minutes. Take out and cool.

Variations

• small fish like a sardine, wrapped up like a croissant. The true "fish in a blanket" concept. Lunch on cold mountain hikes. With ocha green tea.

• black olives and walnuts

• figs and dried cranberries

• flour is 1/2 white, 1/4 rye, 1/4 corn

• olive oil for the oil

• add an egg, yogurt for more body

• line pan with aluminum foil and sprinkly corn flour on it.

It's News in Japan

Feminine Passivity

"Japan supplied the world with yet another astounding example of feminine passivity when a 19-yr-old girl thought to be have been murdered turned up after spending the last NINE years as the plaything of mentally-disturbed and unemployed man. Forced into a car in 1991, Fusako Sano was kept on the second floor of a house in Niigata. She never went out or tried to escape, spending most of her time watching TV.

Incredibly, the man's mother, who lived downstairs, remained oblivious to her son's guest. The girl was discovered when the man took her to the hospital suffering from exhaustion, and started to cause a disturbance." --from Tokyo Notice Board, Feb. 4, 2000."

© 2008. Comments to Patricia Yarrow
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