Yaki-niku!!!

I had a coffee gelatin for breakfast, but I didn't photograph it. Before lunch (gyoza), I had a matcha jelly topped with kinako and ground black sesame seeds. Matcha is easily one of my favorite flavors in the world. I will eat anything matcha--ice cream, cookies, tea, salt, anything. I love it.
This was pretty good, but I actually used a bit too much matcha powder and the texture was a bit off.


Tonight for dinner? Yaki-niku. We eat beef about once a month, and we usually have either yaki-niku or nabe. Yaki-niku is kind of a production--we have tongue, rib meat, calbi, brisket, everything. We cover the kitchen with newspaper to avoid grease splatters. For the longest time, I would get down on my hands and knees and scrub everything after yaki-niku, but we realized it was easier just to spread newspaper everywhere.
Here we are getting ready to get started. My husband also bought some Korean nigori-zake to compliment the meal. It was sweet and delicious. My parents are visiting next Wednesday, so we have another bottle for their visit. We're having yaki-niku with them, as well, mainly because I figure it's a safe bet... I'm still working on getting them to appreciate sushi. I didn't really love Japanese food until I married, so I may be urging its deliciousness in vain.
The marbled meat is the calbi... mmm. More meat. No, we didn't eat it all. I'll be making niku-jaga or something similar later this week.
We started with cooking the gyutan (tongue). We ate it with salt and lemon juice, and it was very nice.
And cooking the calbi! Calbi's my favorite cut of meat we can get in America.
Turning the calbi.
Daikon and ponzu dipping sauce for the meat.
A second dipping sauce, garlic and ginger with a hint of red pepper. A favorite yaki-niku sauce. Also with daikon.
Short ribs!