Food Education with Nerikiri? A Lazy Mom's Attempt at the Joy of Making It with Her First-Grade Daughter

Don't you have the impression that nerikiri is difficult?

It feels like a craftsman's skill, so I thought it would be
completely impossible for an amateur like me
.

But when I tried making nerikiri for the first time the other day...

It was super fun!
.

Of course, craftsman-level skill is impossible.

But I decided to change my perspective completely.

Instead of making it to admire,
I thought, why not use nerikiri to enjoy the fun of making it?
I wondered if that would work.

Japanese sweets are profound, but
the basics are very simple.

For example, the ingredients for nerikiri are just

white bean paste, shiratamako (glutinous rice flour), and water

that's it.

If you try to make Western sweets,
you have to prepare so many ingredients like
fresh cream, butter, eggs, almond powder, and vanilla essence.

And many of them are perishable.

Compared to that, if you buy the ingredients for Japanese sweets,
you can make them whenever you feel like it.

It's perfect for a lazy person.

Furthermore, the preparation method is also simple.

I made this by referring to this ↓

As long as you are careful when kneading,
you won't really fail.

You can color them freely, and the possibilities are endless.

I heated it in a pot this time, but I heard you can also do it in the microwave.

I think the charm of Japanese sweets is that the hurdle for "just trying it out" is low,
making it easy to take on the challenge.

And so, this is what I made the other day.

Title: Seal

For this design, I used
Okashitsukasa Beniya Miyake's
"Happy Seal" as a reference.

It's not as cute as the original,
but I still ended up liking how it turned out quite a bit.

Title: Bear and Dog (on the right)

I colored the brown parts with cocoa powder.

I don't have much of a knack for it, but it has a handmade feel that I find endearing.
...Let's just go with that.

Title: The Scream

This was an ambitious piece by my first-grade daughter.

That indescribable expression is just irresistible, isn't it?

I couldn't find the food coloring I thought I had bought,
so I only had white and brown.

The most understated Nerikiri ever is complete.

By the way, the squashed thing at the bottom is apparently a pizza.

...These creations are really just at an elementary school play level, aren't they? (;^_^A

I'm sure many of you
"I could do better than this"
thought exactly that.

If you thought that, then I've succeeded.

I shared these examples because I thought it would be perfect
for lowering the hurdle of trying it out to the absolute minimum.

If you think it looks too difficult or
impossible, you'll never end up doing it.

You never know until you try.

Let's lower the bar!

The choice to play with Nerikiri

For my daughter, Nerikiri is like playing with clay,
so we were able to have fun doing it together as parent and child.

Of course, after the fun of making it,
there is also the joy of eating it deliciously.

We might live in an era where you can buy anything if you go to the supermarket.

However, I am thinking that I would like to use the experience of making things by hand
as an opportunity to pass something on to my children.

In our house, there are many times when I ask for help with cooking
and get turned down (;^_^A,

so I am planning to foster the "joy of making"
by having them get involved with food little by little
through things like making snacks like this.

I also have an ulterior motive of wanting them to become interested in Japanese traditions
through Japanese sweets.

When you are busy, daily cooking tends to become just a chore.

Even so, I recommend trying to make something new
from time to time.

I hope Nerikiri can become one of those options.

Updating on Tuesdays and Fridays
This was Kireido

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