Cucumber and Chicken Marinated in Chili Oil 鶏肉ときゅうりのラー油漬け

Today March 11th in Japan marks the 2nd anniversary of the devastating 2011 Tohoku earthquake, also known as the Great East Japan Earthquake. A 9.0-magnitude earthquake followed by a devastating tsunami wave cost the lives of over 16,000 people with almost 3,000 still reported as missing. Recovery will take time and many people are still working hard to repair and rebuild in affected areas. To me, it is important that we never forget and keep supporting those who need us.

Remembering this tragic event today, I want to talk about this amazing Japanese lady and her book that was recently released, and share one of her recipes at the end of this post.

Her name is Nobuko Hashimoto, known dearly as “Hashimoto mama” among the earthquake volunteers from all over the world. She was a victim of the devastation herself in Ishinomaki (石巻), where the city was among the most seriously affected by the earthquake and tsunami.

In addition to her own hardship of getting her life back aside, she generously opened her house for volunteers and has been preparing food for over 5000 volunteers with her and husband’s own money that they saved in case of emergency before the tragedy happened.

Hashimoto mama’s new book, Hashimoto’s Tohoku Recipes (「石巻ボランティアハウスの橋本ごはん」), tells the story of how she ended up preparing thousands of meals for people and how this has impacted to her life as well as volunteers’. In her book, she also shares the popular Tohoku regional recipes that she has been cooking for volunteers.

My Pantry page was also mentioned in this book thanks to Joseph, a California Just One Cookbook reader. He spent a lot of time volunteering in Ishinomaki and fell in love with Hashimoto mama’s cooking which led him to conceive the idea for this book. I want to thank Joseph for letting me be a part of this beautiful book.

I received this book a couple of days ago from the publisher and I started reading this book. I was deeply moved by Hashimoto mama’s kind and giving heart as well as her positive and cheering personality despite the hard situation she is in and I cooked one of her most popular recipes from the book.

The book is written in both Japanese and English.

For those living in Japan, you can order the book from Amazon. Each copy is 1680 yen with free domestic shipping! For those living in the U.S, you can order the book at Kinokuniya.com.

Wish to learn more about Japanese cooking? Sign up for our free newsletter to receive cooking tips & recipe updates! And stay in touch with me on Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, and Instagram.