Shiratama Cream Zenzai from Menkui-Tei 06-16-2009

Location: 63 Cooper Sq.
Time: 7pm
People: RB and myself

Feelings: Although the weather has been quite gloomy in the city these days, my stomach is more than ready for the summer. There is no better way to welcome the summer than a dish of shiratama cream zenzai. Shiratama is a kind of sweet mochi that is made with shiratama flour. They may look like cotton balls, but they are heavenly soft and chewy are subtly sweet. As soon as I saw the shiratama dish on the wall menu at Menkui-Tei, I had to order. Nothing was stopping me, not even the non stop cold rainy weather.

The traditional shiratama cream zenzai usually comes with vanilla soft serve, azuki beans and shiratama. When the soft serve starts to melt a little, you would gently mix it with azuki, which gives the greatest texture and flavor you could imagine. It is sweet, nutty, and creamy, and the chunks of azuki beans gives a nice, interesting texture. My love for ice cream with chunks started from here. Whoever thought of mixing vanilla and azuki is a genius.

Since Menkui -Tei did not serve the shiratama dish with vanilla soft serve, we decided to order it with green tea ice cream instead. Shiratama was sweet and chewy and complimented the bitter-sweet green tea ice cream very well. But it was not as good as the kind I am used to. I could not do the "azuki mixing" move with the green tea ice cream. Not only the taste would be different but the color would not be pretty either.

I hope to find my favorite shiratama dish with vanilla soft serve somewhere in the city (perhaps at Cha-An?) and welcome the summer properly soon.