New Japanese Plates Part 1

Wine: Marina Cvetic Montepulciano S. Martino Rosso – 2003

When in Japan we went to a region near Kyoto called Shiaraki where there are lots of potters. They make a special kind of pottery also called: Shigaraki. We went to the studio of Otani Shiro. We saw a climbing kiln, which is made of several kilns that are connected running up a hill. Thus the heat from one is transferred to the next. A potter named Satoshi Arakawa showed us some plates that we liked and we decided to order them. They arrived and this was our first dinner we made using them. For this dinner we only used the salad plates, dinner plates will be used for the next dinner we cook. We really like the look and feel of the plates. It makes it very special to have met the artist and visited the kiln where they were made.

For a first course we made Zuni Caesar Salad from The Zuni Café Cookbook. It is a great Caesar. One of the nice aspects of the Zuni salad is that you get to eat the salad with your fingers. Yum.

For the main course we make Expatriate Roast Chicken with Lemon and Olives from The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen by Paula Wolfert. We love the taste of Moroccan Food, especially the olives and preserved lemons. The chicken was delicious.

We made Moroccan Rice with Bell Peppers from the same South African company that we used in the last couple of dinners. This is the first time we tried this Rice. We didn’t like the consistency of the rice and won’t be using it again.