Day 3 of Ghibli feast
Ghibli feast #7: Spirited Away
Spirited Away was the second Miyazaki film that was theatrically released in the U.S., so I’m sure a lot of people know and saw this film in the theater. I’m not going into details of this film since I’m not good at summarizing… so let’s just get to the feast.
I’m sure the people who missed my “preview of Ghibli feast” post are wondering what I’d make for Spirited Away. There is soooo much food in the film. So much that I could probably have a feast just with Spirited Away. I hate to disappoint you but I’ll save that for some other time. Sorry!! But I will do it someday, maybe soon… I have to do a lot of research first. But for this time I decided to do the simplest food from the film.
Dish 1
[Rice balls]
After Chihiro started working at the bathhouse, Haku tells Chihiro to meet him outside. He gives her back her clothes and a card from her friends with her name, Chihiro, on it and tells her not to forget her name. He assures her that she’ll see her parents again, and gives her rice balls. The rice balls Haku gives her has no seaweed and it doesn’t look like anythingis inside either, but it looks soooo good when Chihiro eats them. Chihiro, who’s confused and worried about her parents starts crying as she eats the rice balls.
Growing up, eating rice myself, I can understand her feeling so well. Nothing makes me feel more at home than eating rice. I used to go to conventions a lot, and for a couple of days I’d have to eat hotel food, convention food, take-out, fast food, etc… And usually by the end of the trip, I just can’t wait to get home and eat rice. Chihiro is feeling so lost and alone in a strange world, and biting into plain rice balls relaxes her, making her burst into tears.
My boyfriend and I make rice balls every Sunday morning, but we usually have seaweed on them. I should’ve had him make them though. His rice balls are usually perfect triangular like the ones Haku gives her.
My rice balls always end up big and round.
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My grandma used to tell me farmers go through 88 stages to grow rice (thus splitting the Kanji for rice becomes 88), so I had to chew one mouth full of rice 88 times to pay respect. I've tried, and it's not an easy thing to do... but it's a nice story nonetheless.
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Dish 2
[Steamed red bean bun]
After a busy day at the bathhouse, Chihiro stares at the train running outside the bathhouse. Rin who also works at the bathhouse tells Chihiro that the train only leaves, but never comes back, and gives her a steamed bun with sweet red bean inside.
I didn’t want to wait for yeast to rise, so I used cake flour to make steam buns. (check out “how to make steamed bun with cake flour without yeast”) I was going to make sweet red beans from scratch, but I had bought sweet red beans a long time ago to make Oshiruko, so I decided to use it. (Oshiruko is rice cake in sweet red bean soup) I’ve never made seamed bun with sweet red bean but it came out pretty nice!
I like using a bamboo steamer. No need for cheese cloth, and no worries about water dripping on the buns!
I tried to make them as big as possible, but my steamed buns were not even close to the size of the bun Chihiro had. I think Miyazaki wanted to make her look like a very skinny city kid, and that’s why her hands are tiny and her arms and legs are almost stick-like. But look how HUGE the steamed bun is compared to her hand!!
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Chihiro's bun is as big as my steamer. I'm not sure if she should be eating something so big as a night snack.
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Dish? 3
[Konpeito]
This one was a last minute extra food we threw in. When we decided to do this, we realized that we had the “konpeitou candy” which Kamajii feeds to the hard working Makkurokurosuke. I bought the candy for my boyfriend a long time ago because he didn’t know what it was and was surprised when I told him that you could buy them.
“To make Konpeitou, the rice kernels are put in a turnable pot, and slowly covered with syrup over a period of 10 to 30 days, allowing layer after layer of syrup to build up, about 1 mm a day. Spikes will start appearing about the 5th day.” (Copyright 2010 Practically Edible. All rights reserved and enforced.) Read more of this snippet here.
That’s right, those tiny spikes are not artificially created or from a mold! It’s pretty much pure sugar, so it’s very very sweet. The ones I got were plain flavor, but for some reason, he had eaten more colored ones than white ones. The colored ones do look tastier.
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Okay, so it wasn’t much of a feast… But we had one last feast planned to finish the Ghibli feast! It was the Castle of Cagliostro.
You can also see these pictures in Ghibi feast set on my flickr page!
I was born in Japan, lived in New York for a while and now living in San Diego, California. I love creating things with my hands in my free time whether it’s making character bento or stuffing stuff! And now I'm working for 
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
when i think ghibli and food the first thing i think of is all the food chihiro’s parents eat when they turn into pigs. it looks so delicious!
anna, i’ve just discovered your blog, searching for obento ideas. and i love hayao miyazaki’s work, too! your bento factory is amazing, thanks for sharing your ideas =^ . ^=
I’ve had steam buns here in Melbourne that were filled with shredded BBQ pork and they were lovely. It’s roughly the same colour as the red bean. I was a bit put off by the sweet bun and savoury filling, but got used to it quickly. I’ll try these. I have a tiny steamer too (that’s a bit singed from my neglect the last time I made gyoza).
I want to try the candies the most… since I love sweets LOL. The Makkurokurosuke doll is soo cute
Hey, the Konpeitos could also pass as Star Bits from Mario Galaxy =D
I love red bean steam buns. Oh, I love them so much. I also love this project of yours. I’m going to have to search out the animation itself. <3 H.
I. Think. You. Are. AMAZING. And I worship you. I really enjoyed reading all of the Ghibli feast posts~! <3
Do you know what food her parents eat in the beginning? I’d love to know!
Aaah! Just stumbled across your photos on Flickr while doing a search for Spirited Away. The part where she eats the rice balls is one of my favorite parts of the movie! Great job on everything, your blog is wonderful!!! <3 <3 <3
Thank you so much for these recipes! I’ve always wondered what the bean buns from Spirited Away and the pumpkin herring pie from Kiki’s Delivery Service tasted like… Anyway, I’ll definitely try these recipes out soon!
I found little Hello Kitty packets of those candies at a local “Japan” shop in the mall and had to laugh. We had tried to find out what these were after seeing them in an episode of Hamtaro, where they were called “diamonds of sugar”. The name turned out to be utterly useless as a lead.
I’ve made the red-orange poultry that Chihiro’s parents eat at the beginning of the film (but I had actually made it before I’d even seen Spirited Away, so it’s probably not the same thing) The bird they eat looks like a cornish game hen. Cornish game hen tends to be really bony, but it tastes pretty good. When I made it, I glazed it with orange mustard, and it looked exactly the same as the bird at the buffet. Not that you care, but if you ever decide to make a completely Spirited Away themed feast, there’s an idea for how to make the poultry.