Mitsuwa Foodcourt

Mitsuwa Food Court
4240 Kearny Mesa Rd
San Diego, CA 92111
Neighborhood: Kearny Mesa
(858) 974-1101

Despite shopping regularly at Mitsuwa, I've never actually eaten in its small food court. It''s always been one of those things where I say I'll try it out sometime.  This weekend, I finally made it a point to eat there for lunch. Mitsuwa has two restaurants in its food court: Kayaba and Santouka.

Kayaba offers udon, curry and katsu.  Santouka offers ramen. Boyfriend opted to eat at Kayaba. I chose to try the ramen at Santouka.

I chose a bowl of regular miso ramen.  I don't know a lot about japanese ramen. It's not something I've eaten much of and only have recently started exploring. It's my understanding that Santouka offers Tonkotsu style ramen.  This means they make the broth with pork bones, creating a cloudy broth.

I liked how there were bamboo shoots in the ramen. I found the chasu (pork slices) to be a bit dry and too fatty for my taste.  Overall, I enjoyed my bowl of ramen a lot.  Boyfriend liked it too. I did find that it was a bit too salty though. In the beginning it was fine, but near the end I was feeling the salt, and I couldn't drink any broth after I finished my noodles.

Boyfriend ordered the fried pork chop with curry. I thought the fried pork cutlet was pretty good.  The batter was a bit too thick for me, but I liked that the meat was thick as well.  I often find the pork cutlets to be too thin. I really liked the red pickled vegetables. A lot of the other offerings at Kabaya come with some soup, potato salad. I wish this curry pork combo came with it.

We're definitely going to have to come back and try some more of the food court items next time we go shopping at Mitsuwa.

Also while I was at Mitsuwa, I discovered that they carry mochi from Mikawaya! I'm not sure how long they have been carrying it. Perhaps a very long time, but I just never knew. I didn't even know about Mikawaya mochi until a few months ago. I had found Mikawaya mochi at the Mitsuwa in Costa Mesa, but I'm ecstatic that they have it in SD. They had all the offerings they have at Mikawaya in LA.  It's located in an odd spot. Its' not near the other mochi offered at Mitsuwa.  Instead, they are on a rack nearby the freezer.

Chocolate Seashell Cakelets

I really loved the vanilla cakelets I made with my Nordic Ware Sea Shell Pan
a few weeks ago. I've been trying to decide what else to make with my seashell pan. I decided to try making some chocolate yogurt cakelets.  The cakes didn't come out as pretty as the vanilla batter, but they still looked nice and have a glossy-like exterior.

These cakes are light, not too sweet. I love how they are small and bite-sized.  They make a nice gift too.

Chocolate Yogurt Cakelets (recipe base adapted from Little Corner of Mine)

Ingredients

1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup white sugar
3/4 cup plain yogurt
3 large eggs, lightly whisk
1 Tbsp. strong brew coffee
1/2 cup canola oil

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350'F.

2. In a large bowl, sift in flour, cocoa powder and baking powder. Add in salt, sugar. Stir to mix well.

3. Then, add in all the wet ingredients: yogurt, eggs, coffee and oil.
Use a whisk and whisk everything together until blended.

4. Fill cakelet pan 2/3 full with batter and bake for approximately 20 minutes.

Kiwi coconut cupcakes

I'm not a big fan of kiwi because of its tart and acidic aftertaste. But I love how pretty they look when they are sliced up. When I saw this recipe from Cheeky Kitchen for kiwi and coconut cupcakes, I really wanted to make them because they were so darn cute.

Cheeky Kitchen's cupcakes were lined with slices of kiwi.  Since I'm not a huge kiwi fan, I decided to make the cupcakes without any kiwi, and just line the edges of the bottom of the cupcakes with kiwi. It was a bit hard to deal with the kiwi slices because you have to line the edges of cupcake/muffin pan with kiwi slices and then pour the batter in and the kiwi slices don't always stay upright.

However, the cupcakes came out beautifully.  Even better, they tasted great. I absolutely loved the cake batter. Though the cake batter has some coconut milk, I didn't really taste it. It tasted like a creamy vanilla batter to me. I'm going to use this cake batter again for other cupcakes and cakes I make.

Since I modified the recipe a bit to suit my tastes, the modified recipe is below:

Kiwi coconut cupcakes

Yields: 12 cupcakes

Ingredients

1 stick butter
2 eggs
1 c. sugar
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. white vinegar
1 1/2 c. flour
1/3 c. coconut milk
4 kiwi's for edging

DirectionsI
1. In
a large bowl, use an electric beater to cream butter, eggs and sugar.
Add remaining ingredients. Beat just until combined.

2. Slice kiwis into thin slices.  Take the slices and line them along the edge of cupcake/muffin pan.

3. Grease cupcake pan.  Spoon batter into pan, about 2/3 full.  If kiwi slices fall down, make sure to move them back to the edge of each cupcake ring.

4. Bake cupcakes at 350 degrees for 18-21 minutes.