Kabocha - Pumpkin

A lot of my favorite bloggers swear by pumpkin oatmeal. :) I've never tried it...yet, but the photos they told are amazing. I've my own version of oatmeal as well, which I'll share of course! But for this post, I want to praise pumpkin...not just any pumpkin, but the Japanese kind called kabocha. I first experienced this delicious vegetable when I taught English in Japan. My Japanese friend let me try her grandmother's boiled kabocha and I felt in love. Because kabocha is very hard, the Japanese like to boil it in mirin, some soy sauce, and a little sugar. The kabocha then comes out so tender and moist. But I'm lazy. Don't have time to go through that process, so I buy the frozen kabocha from a Japanese market. It is quite expensive (like all Japanese things, right?), but a little goes a long way. Here's a picture of the frozen kabocha.

There are lots of way to use kabocha. Here's a website as a starter http://japanesefood.about.com/od/vegetable/p/japanesekabocha.htm