Japanese

Saitaku Sushi Kit

One of my favourite types of food is Japanese. It is one of those delights I will randomly crave, whether it is sushi or chicken teriyaki, you can never go wrong with a good Japanese meal. At The Amazing Blog, we love trying new foods, especially new brands that allow you to easily cook international food in our own homes! We recently stumbled upon Saitaku, a global brand of authentic Japanese ingredients, which recently launched a line of “cook-from-scratch” products.

Our favourites are their Sushi Kit, the Tempura Batter Mix, and Teriyaki Sauce. The Sushi Kit contains everything you need to make sushi at home. For beginners this is a great kit to ‘wet your feet’ and learn how to make the perfect sushi rolls in several easy steps. The kit includes sushi rice, sushi vinegar, soy sauce, sushi nori, sushi ginger, wasabi paste, a rolling mat, chopsticks, and most importantly your very own leaflet with step-by-step instructions along with images to wrap your first ever sushi. The Sushi Kit is by far my favourite one of their products! Along with create-your-own kits they also sell an array of sauces and noodles. My favourite sauce, Teriyaki, is delicious on meats and vegetables. It is a mixture of naturally brewed soy sauce, sake, mirin, and sugar. The Tempura Batter Mix includes all of the ingredients to make the perfect batter to put over chicken and even shrimp. Saitaku’s Tempura is absolutely delicious. All of Saitaku’s products are made with high quality ingredients to authentic Japanese recipes, and all products are wrapped up in a distinctive and eye catching Japanese packaging.

These products can be purchased on numerous online retailers, a list of which can be found here which currently has discounts on all of Saitaku’s products. The Sushi Kit retails for £6.99 and a 150ml bottle of the Teriyaki sauce retails for £1.29. For more information on the brand and other products visit their website here. We at The Amazing Blog thing Saitaku’s Japanese food products are great and definitely worth a try!

A Bit of Rough

There is nothing as satisfying after a week of hard work than a good pampering session - something that I always look forward to every Sunday. I prepare my bath with the best smelling essential oils, apply a purifying face mask, use a clarifying shampoo and a deep repairing mask, exfoliate my skin, do my nails... the usual. However, I've recently added a new product to my routine which has replaced my beloved salt and sugar body scrub - A Bit of Rough exfoliating wash cloths have helped me achieving perfectly polished skin, saving a few pennies as no exfoliating creams are needed at all. At The Amazing Blog we think these cloths should be part of every pampering session lover's routine. A Bit of Rough cloths are made of a mix of fibres that are gentle enough to use on our face and effective enough to exfoliate our whole body. These exfoliating cloths get rid of dead skin cells leaving your skin appearing brighter and feeling so much softer - just use your favourite shower cream or face cleanser of choice, and after lathering it, remove the excess product and polish the skin with A Bit of Rough.

These cloths have many uses too; if you're on holiday, use them to get rid of dry skin patches to get a perfect and even tan. And if you see that your fake tan is fading or getting patchy and want to clear it completely, pop some baby oil on the cloth and give your skin a good scrub lathering up afterwards some shower cream, and you'll be good to go. A Bit of Rough exfoliating cloths are machine washable, so pop them into the washing machine with the rest of your laundry after every use. At The Amazing Blog, we can't believe how easy these cloths are to use and to clean!

A Bit of Rough can be purchased from their website - each exfoliating wash cloth is £8.00 and will be posted first class. Postage charge is £2.00 per oder for all UK orders. Buy 3 cloths and only pay for 2, £16.00. For delivery charges outside the UK email A Bit of Rough.

 

Sakata

Having started the New Year with the best possible intentions, I’m embarrassed to admit that the inevitable has happened and as predicted, the cold weather and January blues have completely overridden all my saintly resolutions. After boasting to the girls at the Amazing PR office that I would be hitting the gym religiously, eating healthily with no snacking in between my well-balanced meals, minimising my alcohol consumption and drinking gallons of water I am feeling incredibly discouraged at my failure to keep to any of these promises past the three week mark.

Knowing that my habit of snacking in between meals would be the hardest to tackle (as demonstrated by the chocolate wrappers and crisp packets routinely cluttering up my desk) I was not surprised that this was my first failure, however thanks to some recommendations on healthier alternatives from the girls in the office I am feeling decidedly less guilty about my lack of will-power.

Already a huge hit in health conscious Australia, Sakata Japanese rice crackers are the first flavoured crackers to launch in the UK. Available in four flavours: Original, Classic Cheddar, Sizzling Barbecue and Sour Cream & Chive they are perfect for satisfying my craving for crisps and at only 9 calories or less per cracker and gluten-free they have quickly become my guilt-free snack of choice. Now all I need to do is find a guilt-free cocktail…suggestions are welcome!

Sakata rice crackers are available from Waitrose and Ocado.