I Enjoy Being a Girl

This past Thursday in Japan was Hina Matsuri or the Doll Festival (originally known as Girls' Day). Every home with a little girl displayed the traditional Emperor and Empress doll set and the appropriate food was made for the festivities. How lovely to celebrate being a girl! (And if you are a tomboy and turn your nose up at the old-fashioned notion that dolls and girls always going hand-in-hand, I would recommend a lovely book by Barbara McClintock called Dahlia).

mailed all the way from Japan!

To carry on the tradition in our home, we relished the idea of celebrating our girliness. We don't have the fortune (or the room) to have our own heirloom decorative doll display, so I decided to experiment with making some from this tutorial.

If you'd rather go the good ol' origami route try these:

But perhaps my favorite is this edible couple:

photo courtesy of Hinamatsuri-Kodomonohi.

Along with having our own set of dolls for display, we also celebrated with food! Traditionally, families will eat chirashizushi, a delightful dish that consists of sushi rice topped with an array of colorful toppings, displayed like jewels. But in our family we are die-hard fans of temakizushi and it really is the same thing, just presented a bit differently, we went with that.

In addition I tried making mochi for the first time ever.

My recipe:
Hinamatsuri Mochi
3 cups mochiko flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups water
1/2 cup coconut milk
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Lightly oil 9x13" pan.
In a small bowl mix wet ingredients together. In a separate bowl mix together the dry ingredients and then create a well in the center. Add wet mixture slowly to dry ingredients and stir together. Pour mochi batter into prepared pan and seal with foil.
Bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes. Remove from oven and take foil off and cool overnight. Cut into squares (or preferred shapes) and use a paper towel to absorb any excess oil before dusting with cornstarch (or powdered sugar!).

We had a tea party for Mayumi and a few of her girlfriends yesterday, which was great fun. Everyone seemed to love the idea of celebrating being a girl and I think this will be a tradition we continue through the years!

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