Shigezo "Rare" Soy Milk Cheesecake

As I approach the end of my time living in Japan, my readers may find that I will be turning more to fresh food instead of packaged snacks. That's because I view the coming weeks as my last opportunity to easily purchase such things. Once I go back to the U.S., I will probably have opportunities to buy shelf stable items like Pocky, sembei (rice crackers), and Tirol chocolates, but not refrigerated items. It's a dimension of experiencing Japan that I'm certain I will sorely miss when I'm gone. So, I hope my readers will be tolerant of and patient with seeing a few more reviews than usual of the types of things they may not find unless they're walking the same streets as I currently am.

Of course, whether my readers like it or not, it's highly unlikely that I'd resist trying cheesecake. There are a great many things which I find hard to resist, and the prospect of anything made with cream cheese and cheesecake in particular is going to get my motor revving. On top of that, this is sold by Shigezo, purveyor of "healthy" food based largely on soy beans. After what I said about Japanese food not being as healthy as anyone thinks it is, it may seem odd that I'm buying into that idea, but I'll say that I believe this is wishful thinking on my part. I want this cheesecake to be healthier than the normal stuff so I can feel better about eating it. I only subscribe to the illusion when it suits my fancy. As someone who isn't a fan of tempura, but is a fan of cheesecake, I'm applying selective reasoning here. Indulge me, won't you?

The Shigezo page for this cheesecake is helping me along with my illusions by failing to provide much in the way of nutritional data. They do say that this is made with cream cheese, milk, cream, soy milk, sugar, egg white, gelatin and lemon. The claim is that the use of soy milk reduces the overall caloric value and enhances the nutrition. Since there are no calorie counts given, I'll take their word for it, because, as Fox Mulder says, "I want to believe."

Depending on how you conceptualize "cheesecake" this may disappoint. There is no crust and it is certainly lacking in "heft". Even for a Japanese cheesecake, this is super light and airy. My husband called it more of a "mousse" than cake, and felt that the taste was so mild that it tasted like nothing to him. My taste buds were rather more sensitive to its delights. I could detect cream cheese, soy milk, very mild sweetness, and the ever so slightest hint of lemon. The main drawing point for me with this was the texture. It was very fatty and rich on the tongue, but so light that it melts rapidly in your mouth. 

I liked this a lot. In fact, I ate the whole container at once and had to skip lunch. It was a very bad idea as I felt bloated, but I can't say I really regretted doing it just once. I'm sure, however, that it's not actually "healthy", despite the inclusion of soy milk and the lack of heft and sugary overload. It's not a very big container, mind you, but I think more appropriate servings would be three moderate portions and two somewhat large ones. That being said, I'm not sure fans of "real" cheesecake would be quite so keen. I love light, fluffy, fatty things which resemble whipped cream, so this was the bee's knees for me. Your mileage may vary.

Shigezo Tofu Burgers

Frankly, I'm not a big fan of tofu, and this came to my attention via a student who shopped at Shigezo's little tofu-laden market before attending my lesson. She pulled a package of burgers identical to the one pictured above as well as a tray of tofu-stuffed pot stickers (gyoza). I told her that the gyoza sounded good, and then she offered the tray to me as a gift. I have to remember not to say things like that to students or they will literally give me the food they had planned to put in their mouths. I thanked her, but told her I could go to the shop and buy my own. I also promised to buy and try the burgers because they sounded interesting to me.

Shigezo is a famous chain of shops in Japan that sells a variety of soy-bean-based products. There are a lot of shops in Tokyo alone. A full list (in Japanese) can be seen here. In my area, there's a shop about 6 minutes from my home. In fact, it took the place of a second branch of Okashi no Machioka snack shops. It's a pretty small and unimpressive-looking place, and very low tech. When I bought my packet of 3 burgers for 198 yen ($2.45), the woman wrote down the cost on a piece of scrap paper along with a bunch of other prices paid for by previous customers. There were items as obscure as tofu melon scones and tofu donuts, and a great deal of little square packages of tofu.

All of you omnivores out there who think a tofu burger is for vegan and vegetarian hippies who can't bear to see an animal suffer so that humans can enjoy delicious meat might think that this "burger" would get PETA's seal of approval. Not so fast... The Japanese aren't big into vegetarianism and their tofu burgers aren't made for people who want to eschew animal products. They're made to taste good and offer people a different eating experience.

To that end, this tofu burger is made with chicken and pork fat in addition to, of course, soy beans, and onion, bread crumbs, sugar, MSG, and various other spices. For something that looks vegetarian and healthy, it's packed with awesome taste-enhancing badness. When you open the package, it doesn't even smell like tofu, but rather like one of those meatloaf-style burgers you get in frozen dinners or shelf-stable plastic packages for heating and eating.

The burgers are very pasty and wet. Moisture collects in the bottom of the plastic tray and handling them doesn't encourage faith that the experience of eating them will be rewarding. I wanted to get a good, possibly crispy, brown coating on the outside of the burger so I put the tiniest amount of butter (about 1/2 a pat) in my smallest non-stick frying pan and cooked it at medium-high heat. I figured the butter would brown and that would transfer to the burger if it wasn't going to brown on its own (which I had no reason to assume it would. It looked good while cooking, and it smelled like meat.

That's my homemade whole wheat bread, the smallest pieces from the end of the loaf.

I had already decided to eat it like any other kind of burger with a bit of cheese and mayo. I picked up some pretty pathetic Kraft "real" cheddar singles several days ago in desperation (thank you, Costco, for being closed for over a month since the quake so that I couldn't buy real cheese instead of processed cheese lying about being "real"). In the picture above, it looks like a lot of cheese, but it's actually a half ounce slice. The burgers are very small, 70 grams/2.5 oz., and probably would not satisfy a hearty eater. Most burgers that you eat tend to be closer to 3.5 oz., and many Americans typically will eat 5 or 6 ounce burgers. This was fine for me though as I don't tend to eat a great quantity for dinner. Each burger, incidentally, is about 170 calories.

The taste is good. In fact, it doesn't taste like tofu to me at all and resembles a mild meatloaf-style burger. That is, the type which has a lot of fillers and not quite so much meat. The texture is very similar to Japanese "hamburg steak" (like Salisbury steak). It's soft, but still meaty. It even breaks off much the same way as meatloaf when you bite into it.

This is a very good tofu burger. In fact, I would definitely consider buying it again in the future if I want to have something pre-made on hand. The price is good and it's easy to prepare and cook and it is tasty and a little on the unique side. Even tofu haters may find this enjoyable. If you're looking to consume more tofu, but find it hard to stomach, this is an excellent place to get started. It's tofu for meat lovers.