Our bathroom has been upgraded! Sort of.
Japan is the only place I've been that offers completely useless toilet decorations.
Of course I had to have one.
Showing posts with label I Heart the Hyakuiin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label I Heart the Hyakuiin. Show all posts
Saturday, November 16, 2013
Monday, February 21, 2011
すし パーティー！ (Sushi Party!)
This is completely unrelated to the rest of this post, but it's worth mentioning because it was really good! The label says apple, milk, and lemon, but I could swear I tasted honey too.
Aaaaand on with the show!
We tried something new: hosting a sushi party. I wasn't sure what to get or what to expect, but I had help from some Japanese friends. Husband and I went to the store and guessed at a variety of fish and vegetables.
Shown here are avocado, tako (octopus), maguro (tuna), asparagus, and rice mixed with sushi vinegar.
On the stove were two types we weren't sure were okay to eat raw, so our awesome friends cooked and seasoned them while I chopped vegetables. The sticks on the left are some sort of mystery fish, but it had a great buttery flavor. The salmon sticks on the right were labeled "sashimi quality" but we weren't sure if it was meant to be eaten raw or just as good as the stuff that's meant to be eaten raw. It probably would have been fine, but we cooked it just to be safe. The yellow thing at the bottom is tamagoyaki, the rolled omelet often served as sushi. I'm so excited that I know how to make this now that it's a little silly. But I need to get a rectangular frying pan to properly cook and roll it.
Cucumber, carrot, avocado, and (cracked pepper) cream cheese.
Pickled ginger! It looks pretty gross, but it has a great zingy flavor.
I have these awesome rice molds for making maki (the cylindrical sushi) and on the right is for the tiny lumps of rice raw fish sits on. Have I mentioned how much I love the 100-yen store?
I'm no expert, but the molds worked moderately well for me.
Most people had a plate of ingredients:
Then folded those ingredients into a small square of nori. I converted to this method pretty quickly, it was much less of a pain in the neck to put everything together.
After sushi, we introduced our friends to the Kinect and the dance game we've been playing. Crooked helped.
I thought it would be fun to get some video of people playing the game, then Crooked decided I should pay attention to him instead.
Aaaaand on with the show!
We tried something new: hosting a sushi party. I wasn't sure what to get or what to expect, but I had help from some Japanese friends. Husband and I went to the store and guessed at a variety of fish and vegetables.
Shown here are avocado, tako (octopus), maguro (tuna), asparagus, and rice mixed with sushi vinegar.
On the stove were two types we weren't sure were okay to eat raw, so our awesome friends cooked and seasoned them while I chopped vegetables. The sticks on the left are some sort of mystery fish, but it had a great buttery flavor. The salmon sticks on the right were labeled "sashimi quality" but we weren't sure if it was meant to be eaten raw or just as good as the stuff that's meant to be eaten raw. It probably would have been fine, but we cooked it just to be safe. The yellow thing at the bottom is tamagoyaki, the rolled omelet often served as sushi. I'm so excited that I know how to make this now that it's a little silly. But I need to get a rectangular frying pan to properly cook and roll it.
Cucumber, carrot, avocado, and (cracked pepper) cream cheese.
Pickled ginger! It looks pretty gross, but it has a great zingy flavor.
I have these awesome rice molds for making maki (the cylindrical sushi) and on the right is for the tiny lumps of rice raw fish sits on. Have I mentioned how much I love the 100-yen store?
I'm no expert, but the molds worked moderately well for me.
Most people had a plate of ingredients:
Then folded those ingredients into a small square of nori. I converted to this method pretty quickly, it was much less of a pain in the neck to put everything together.
After sushi, we introduced our friends to the Kinect and the dance game we've been playing. Crooked helped.
I thought it would be fun to get some video of people playing the game, then Crooked decided I should pay attention to him instead.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
What Are They Eating Now?
I was excited to find a mint plant kit at the hyakuiin (hundred yen store).
It even had picture instructions (reading left to right, of course).
Tiny, tiny seeds...
As of yet, it hasn't sprouted. But it hasn't been that long, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
In other news, the husband has a Halloween Initiative - he's doing his part to encourage the Japanese to get into Halloween by, whenever he finds a store with Halloween items on display, he buys some. Obviously not every store every time, but one of his reliable visits is the pan-ya (bread store) he passes every day on his way home.
These are pretty scary looking, but the filling is sugary and delightful.
BLAARRRGH! SCARY PUMPKIN SHOWS ITS SEE-FOOD TO YOU!
Also food related, we gave Domino's another chance. Again the delivery was as fast as promised. On the box was this advertisement:
Which I can only interpret as a poster for a horror event on October 29 in which mutant triple-clawed crabs emerge from your pizza to attack you.
The man pizza: pepperoni and pineapple on a stuffed crust pizza. Not stuffed crust like a ring of cheese around the outside, but more like the crust is a quesadilla.
The woman pizza: mushrooms and pineapple. Two of my favorite kabob ingredients with the added bonus of bread, cheese, and pizza sauce. I was very pleased.
Flier that showed up in our mailbox. I don't know what they are, although I suspect at least a few are pumpkin croquettes (yum!). Hooray for Halloween!
On the left, Halloween hi-chu, sort of like a hardcore Starburst (not to be confused with chu-hi, an alcoholic beverage sold in grocery and convenience stores). On the right, corn soup flavored puffed Dorito things. Corn soup has a very specific flavor here, it's like cream of corn with sweetener. You'd have to try it to understand, but it's very distinctive. These are sort of like Fritos mixed with a touch of Cool Ranch. Weird, but not bad.
Random muffin. Hopefully pumpkin flavored, but at time of writing, we haven't tried it yet.
Another angry Jack O'Lantern confection...this is, as far as I can tell, a (fairly dry) cookie sandwich with a sweetened pumpkin (or possibly acorn squash, that's super popular around here) filling.
Huzband got this because he wanted spicy noodles, but it might actually be vegetarian. And for the record, it has a little bit of a kick. Not pepper spray spicy, but enough that just a taste made my mouth warm.
It even had picture instructions (reading left to right, of course).
Tiny, tiny seeds...
As of yet, it hasn't sprouted. But it hasn't been that long, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.In other news, the husband has a Halloween Initiative - he's doing his part to encourage the Japanese to get into Halloween by, whenever he finds a store with Halloween items on display, he buys some. Obviously not every store every time, but one of his reliable visits is the pan-ya (bread store) he passes every day on his way home.
These are pretty scary looking, but the filling is sugary and delightful.
BLAARRRGH! SCARY PUMPKIN SHOWS ITS SEE-FOOD TO YOU!
Also food related, we gave Domino's another chance. Again the delivery was as fast as promised. On the box was this advertisement:
Which I can only interpret as a poster for a horror event on October 29 in which mutant triple-clawed crabs emerge from your pizza to attack you.The man pizza: pepperoni and pineapple on a stuffed crust pizza. Not stuffed crust like a ring of cheese around the outside, but more like the crust is a quesadilla.
The woman pizza: mushrooms and pineapple. Two of my favorite kabob ingredients with the added bonus of bread, cheese, and pizza sauce. I was very pleased.
Flier that showed up in our mailbox. I don't know what they are, although I suspect at least a few are pumpkin croquettes (yum!). Hooray for Halloween!
On the left, Halloween hi-chu, sort of like a hardcore Starburst (not to be confused with chu-hi, an alcoholic beverage sold in grocery and convenience stores). On the right, corn soup flavored puffed Dorito things. Corn soup has a very specific flavor here, it's like cream of corn with sweetener. You'd have to try it to understand, but it's very distinctive. These are sort of like Fritos mixed with a touch of Cool Ranch. Weird, but not bad.
Random muffin. Hopefully pumpkin flavored, but at time of writing, we haven't tried it yet.
Another angry Jack O'Lantern confection...this is, as far as I can tell, a (fairly dry) cookie sandwich with a sweetened pumpkin (or possibly acorn squash, that's super popular around here) filling.
Huzband got this because he wanted spicy noodles, but it might actually be vegetarian. And for the record, it has a little bit of a kick. Not pepper spray spicy, but enough that just a taste made my mouth warm.
Friday, August 20, 2010
This Lunch Pleases Me
I will be sharing our climb of Mount Fuji, complete with pictures and video, but that's going to take more time than I have this afternoon. So for now, you must be satisfied with this.
At the grocery store, you can buy little packets of seeds and beans to mix in with cooking rice. It makes the rice a tad purple, but it tastes pretty good, and who can say no to beans and rice? It even reheats pretty well, I think.
And I cobbled together a better-than-expected salad of sorts - half a tomato that wasn't going to keep much longer in the fridge, a long-and-skinny cucumber, a couple shakes of basil, and a packet of soup seasoning consisting of freeze-dried onions and/or chives (not sure exactly what they are, but they had just enough taste to make this modest salad delightful). Lemon juice might have rounded it out, but I settled for a splash of lemon pepper marinade. Overall, I'm pleasantly surprised. I'm usually pretty boring with the food I make at home because I don't usually have an assortment of fresh ingredients on hand and because I don't really know what I'm doing in the kitchen.
Rounding it out with a bottle of something I've never heard of before, Rose Hip Water. Quite good.
I will now profess my love for the hyakuiin (100-yen store). Not only did I get the soup seasoning there, but I found the Japanese version of Smarties. Grape, lemon, strawberry, and melon, in their own single-serving packets.
Bonus curiosity: wine in a can. Nothing particularly special about either the red or the white in terms of flavor, but it was novel that it was in a can and slightly carbonated.
At the grocery store, you can buy little packets of seeds and beans to mix in with cooking rice. It makes the rice a tad purple, but it tastes pretty good, and who can say no to beans and rice? It even reheats pretty well, I think.
And I cobbled together a better-than-expected salad of sorts - half a tomato that wasn't going to keep much longer in the fridge, a long-and-skinny cucumber, a couple shakes of basil, and a packet of soup seasoning consisting of freeze-dried onions and/or chives (not sure exactly what they are, but they had just enough taste to make this modest salad delightful). Lemon juice might have rounded it out, but I settled for a splash of lemon pepper marinade. Overall, I'm pleasantly surprised. I'm usually pretty boring with the food I make at home because I don't usually have an assortment of fresh ingredients on hand and because I don't really know what I'm doing in the kitchen.
Rounding it out with a bottle of something I've never heard of before, Rose Hip Water. Quite good.
I will now profess my love for the hyakuiin (100-yen store). Not only did I get the soup seasoning there, but I found the Japanese version of Smarties. Grape, lemon, strawberry, and melon, in their own single-serving packets.
Bonus curiosity: wine in a can. Nothing particularly special about either the red or the white in terms of flavor, but it was novel that it was in a can and slightly carbonated.
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