Getting Down to Business

rice-pounding in process

Unfortunately, I don't have an usu and a kine.  I do, however, have a smallish-to-medium-sized granite mortar and pestle, so I decided I would use that to make a small batch of hand-pounded mochi from whole rice.  At least one blogger, at justhungry.com, advises that pretty good mochi can also be made from whole rice using a KitchenAid stand mixer fitted with a dough hook, both of which I have.  The result isn't any smoother than hand-pounded mochi, though, and I wanted the experience of making it with my own muscle power, so I opted not to try that method just yet.

I did rely on that blog as a resource, though, drawing in particular on its posts about selecting and preparing rice.  Since I don't have a rice cooker, I also drew from a recipe on seriouseats.com, which outlined how to cook the rice in a steamer basket lined with cheesecloth or muslin.  (Cheesecloth I do have.)

"box" mochi boiler/steamer

                                                                                                In these modern times, mochi is also often made from rice flour (usually Mochiko), which is mixed with sugar and water and then cooked either in a sort of combination steamer/doubleboiler rig or in the microwave.  I decided to try at least one method for making mochi with Mochiko so that I could compare the results to my whole rice mochi.  I selected a recipe I found on YouTube that used the boiling/steaming method.  In the picture at the left, my batch of "box" mochi is merrily clanging around in a stainless steel bowl inside this pot, which also holds just a few inches of boiling water. I put a paper towel in the water underneath the bouncing bowl (propelled by the boil bubbles) to quiet it down a bit.