Some Blobby Boys To Start The Afternoon!

Ohagi (Traditional) From My Neighbour Totoro

Happy #GhibliGourmet month! Today’s recipe is an obscure item from My Neighbour Totoro - the gift that Kanta brings to the Kusakabes when they first move in.

I posted a quick-fix ohagi from Sousei no Onmyoji before, but was tempted to make a real ohagi from scratch. Usually, I do not have not much affinity with western desserts, so I wanted to try an asian one, to only find out that I have not much affinity with wagashi as well.

I tried following the recipe for anko from just one cookbook, but somehow it didn’t work for me. I even soaked the beans for 24 hours! It was a lot of work for not much anko. See whether her recipe above (click the link above) works for you, if not, I have reflected the cooking times it took me below as well. I decided to only make the non-strained tsubuan version.

Also, check out what the rest of the Fandom Foodies have made for #GhibliGourmet in the linkup post here!

Recipe is below the cut! (Dashboard Users)

Ingredients

For Anko

1 cup (250ml)  azuki beans

1 cup (250ml) sugar (or to taste)

Pinch of salt

For Rice

360ml mochi rice

390ml water

Pinch of salt

Others

Kinako powder (for topping, optional)

+ Plastic Gloves/Clingwrap

Method

For Anko

1. Soak the beans in water overnight. (I soaked them for a day)

2. The next day, pour the old water away, and put in new water about 1-2 inches above the beans.

3. Set beans to boil on high heat.

4. Reduce to a simmer after it starts to boil. Keep some water handy to add whenever it boils down. (Note: this somehow took me 5 hours? Even though other recipes say 1-2 hours.)

5. When the beans are soft and you can smush one between your fingers, add the sugar in gradually, stirring with a ladle/slotted spoon.

6. When you can draw a line at the bottom of the pot with the ladle that lasts for two seconds, it means it’s viscous enough and then you can add in the salt, stir, and let it cool.

For the rice

1. Set the mochi rice to cook in your rice cooker. (Use the sushi rice function if it has one.) I was going to make it in a clay pot and everything, but the long anko-making process made me tired, so I used a rice cooker.

2. Sprinkle salt over and then mash it into rough chunks with a wet wooden pestle.

Assembly

I made 2 kinds of ohagi - the anko-covered one, and the kinako covered one.

For the anko covered one:

1. Wet a plastic glove/ clingwrap, and spread about 2 tbsp anko on it.

2. Make a rice ball about 1-1.5 inch in diameter, and place it in the centre of the anko.

3. Cover all the rice with anko. Add more anko if necessary.

For the Kinako-covered one

1. Spread and flatten the rice on your palm, with a layer of damp plastic in between your hand and the rice. Make it as flat and wide as you can.

2. Place a dollop of anko in the centre, and work the rice to cover the anko. Add more rice if necessary. (And this was why my kinako ones were bigger than my anko-covered ones)

3. Pour the kinako (soybean flour) on a plate, and roll the rice-covered ohagi in it!

Finally, decide to just have your neighbours give you ohagi everytime instead of making it yourself.

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I still remember the ace discourse.

When people were making fun of ace people just for existing, how ace blogs were harassed non stop, how ace tags on Tumblr were spammed with gore and porn (and even the pics of the corpse of an ace girl that killed herself) how ace people were homophobic just for existing, how pro ace internet celebrities were smeared and accused to be pedophiles for supporting ace people, how this "discourse" was used by terfs as a gateway to radical feminism for anti ace folks, how TO THIS DAY what happened is downplayed and justified, because we deserved to be harassed for years for being "cringe"

I am also seeing you, making fun of trans men for daring to call out bigotry targeted at them, how apparently talking about their own oppression is transmisogynist somehow, how the term "transandrophobia" is ridiculed and people who use said term are getting death threats and are being harassed.

It's always the same ,the only thing that changes is what identity is the current "acceptable target"

the gifs i find on this website... you guys are art curators

I love you! I missed you!

Favourite ship dynamic

(btw he's happy ABT not being in a relationship)

(thank you to @otterpenguiny for the image id in the alt text)

actually i think everyone should listen to the oh hellos' entire discography. you all should hear boreas and eat you alive and lay me down and second child restless child and theseus and zephyrus and rose and a kindling of sorts and passerine and hierogylphs and notos and on the mountain tall and torches and eurus and bitter water and caesar and exeunt and dear wormwood and like the dawn and the valley and the valley reprise and in memoriam and thus always to tyrants and planetarium stickers on a bedroom ceiling and o sleeper rio grande and lapis lazuli

Ladies and gentlemen… moth-them

I'm at a :.|:; for words.

For around six months now I've been living next to an actual real life archive, and it's unnervingly similar to TMA! Here's a few notable things from these past months:

-i watched a balding man in a very posh suit carry a massive antique briefcase out of the building and out it into his car at 4am

-at 12:30am i made direct eye contact with someone working at a computer on a floor I'd never seen anyone go before. (there's a section of car park and pavement between my building and the archive so this was pretty impressive! )

-The smoking area is always full at weirdly specific hours of day and night (presumably breaks), and completely empty the rest of the time. Clearly archiving really does encourage a smoking habit!

-one of the floors has really bright LED lights which were left on day and night for a week, then off for four days, and now are on with every single blind closed.

-for the first few months I only ever saw three people go in or out of the building- a generic looking security guard who yells at people that park in front of the entrance; and a dishevelled looking man, pursued by another man from the smoking area.

-from my window I can see directly into a room that's filled with mannequins! I couldn't tell what they were at first due to the sheer amount, but they range from cpr dummies to full body mannequins.

-despite being able to see many desks I've only consistently seen two people working at them.

-the fire alarm once went off for hours and nobody evacuated.

-recently at 3am I watched a security guard from the building come out to feed bagels to the fox in the car park (not really that relevant but I thought it was quite nice)

-two of the windows have humanlike figures in them at all times, but they're impossible to focus on so I have no idea what they are.