obskure abstrusitäten

i've been a bit obsessed with japanese food lately which actually started quite randomly with a dinner invitation for okonomiyaki. the day after i only had potatoes, carrots and onions at home, so i wanted to make a dish out of those. i just started cooking, without deciding if it should be a chinese style dish or an indian curry. when the pan got hot it suddenly came to my mind "why not kare raisu (japanese curry rice)?", so i just started with the spices i would put in a regular curry (ginger, cumin, mustard seeds, coriander seeds, curry leaves, bay leaf, chilli) and while the whole thing was simmering i tried to look up the ingredients of instant kare raisu. however, wherever i looked it just said "curry powder", duh?! ok, so i just tried to figure it by myself. started with a little bit of cinnamon, a dash of nutmeg and some soy sauce. then i mashed the potatoes a bit for a thicker texture and seasoned in the end with a teaspoon of honey.
i was really surprised, it tasted indeed just like the instant versions! mmhh... : )
on the next day, i actually wanted to make an okra/tomato stew, but ended up making kombu dashi for miso soup... and now i can't stop eating nori and instead of using up the okras, all i can think of is making onigiri and tsukemono!
while looking for tsukemono recipes i stumbled across this great japanese food blog. it has tons of recipes and all the basics you need to know about japanese food.
unfortunately i was more in a hungry mood the last couple of days, so no pics of all the yumminess. only this totally unrelated, however incredibly cute pic of tavi that i just discovered on her blog.