Seems we have a new Japanese word

…inspired by Prez Obama

http://schott.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/29/obamu/?emc=eta1

I notice a lot of interesting things in my neighbourhood while I’m out walking my dogs. 

For one, eventhough I live in the suburbs of west Tokyo, and it’s hardly the inaka, there are plots of land that are farmed by…oh, I don’t know who.  They must come out and tend these plots very early in the morning, or perhaps not at all, because I’ve never seen anyone around. 

There are several patches of land that grow persimmons, which are all over the place now that it’s autumn.

I just love the bright yellow, orange and almost red colours that dot the landsdcape.

There’s also eggplant or nasu…small purplish-black ones.

They’re pretty small, and my cell phone camera’s not very good….

Tried zooming in…this is the best I can do

Then, there’s even the odd grape vine or two…

These are not tended to, a few of them can be found around the edges of some plots…it’s like some bird pooped out grape seeds and they grew into a grape plant? hahaha…grape vine?

And then, there’s field of  negi (I think)  with taro in the back.

And chestnuts (brown piles in the photo).  Someone swept them neatly under the chestnut trees.

These little fields are located within a kilometer radius of my home.   Jun told me that the city rents out plots of land to people who want to grow their own produce.   How cool is that?!

Janae needed a bento for lunch today.  She’s going to a traffic safety training class and won’t be back to school in time for the daily lunch.  So, eventhough I’m not used to cooking in the morning, and dreaded waking earlier than I usually do, I managed to have some fun putting the lunch box together…

Menu :

Ume and Shiso Leaf Onigiri

Shirasu Onigiri

Brocolli and Carrot

Tamagoyaki

Tsukune (from yakitori shop)

And there you have it, a bento for Janae

Went grocery shopping today at our favourite supermarket, Odakyu OX.  This is what  we bought for dinners for the next three nights…

Since we had some shopping vouchers courtesy of our new cellphone service provider, we bought a few things for Janae.

It’s fun to shop for clothes when you have a daughter!  Janae and I had a lot of fun looking around and trying on stuff, but I think I tired her out because she was too tired to model the clothes for me once we got home.  So, I decided to do a fashion spread on the tatami mats.  Actually it’s a good idea to take photos of stuff you buy because once you put them away, you forget what you bought in the first place (well, I do).  I may do this more often

Today was supposed to be Janae’s undokai or sport’s day.  But the school made a last minute decision to postpone it to next week because half the children were quarantined at home for swine flu. 

So, we took the opportunity to go to Shinjuku to meet Jun’s older brother, who lives in Nagano, but was in Tokyo for business.  We met him for lunch and for some sight-seeing.

Since we met at Shinjuku Station and no one had any idea what to do for lunch, I recommended taking a look at the restaurants on the 6th and 7th floor of Lumine…my favourite haunt when meeting friends during their lunch breaks.  We thought it’d be a good idea to recommend restaurants that served anything but Japanese or Italian food.  So we gave him a choice of Vietnamese, Spanish or Thai food.  And since the queue outside the Spanish restaurant was pretty impressive, and the interior looked really cosy and nice, he chose Amapola.  Good boy!  I was craving paella! 

So, I had the seafood paella lunch set.   It came with bread and olive oil, a salad and coffee / tea and dessert for about ￥1,300.

June had the seafood bouillabaisse, Janae the hamburg with buttered rice and BIL the Iberico pork and mushroom paella.

I didn’t want to lean across the table to take a photo of BIL’s paella, sorry.

Anyway, after lunch, BIL wanted to see the temple at Asakusa. 

This is us at the entrance or outer gate.  Not the best picture – Janae had her mask on, was also busy with her camera and the photo she had just snapped.  Sunlight was streaming directly onto Jun’s face…but it’s the only one we have in front of the iconic kaminarimon or thundergate.

Another picture, rare candid shot of me of me laughing! ha!

I took this one!

From let to right : Jun, BIL and Janae.  I don’t think they look remotely related, Jun and his older brother.  Anyway, BIL is about my age…Jun is three years younger.

Janae insisted on having some Kibidango.

Then it was time for BIL to return to Nagano.  So, after we saw him off at the bus station in Shinjuku, we went back home.

We got back at six and after giving the dogs their dinner and taking them for a walk,  I lost the mood to cook dinner, so we ate out again.  This time we felt like having Japanese food…Kamo Udon!  We love this  – it’s a hearty udon noodle soup with slices of duck breast, scallions, sliced burdock and fish cake.  It’s topped with yuzu peel which I fish out because I am not a fan of citrus flavours…except for maybe lemons.  Anyway, there’s a restaurant within walking distance that has a decent Kamo Udon / Soba.

It’s a small restaurant and we usually get the counter seats because the tables are always unavailable.  But we managed to get a table today  

There’s a menu on the table, but the best food is not on the menu…it’s written on pieces of paper pasted all over the place, so it’s always exciting to look around the restaurant to spot something new and interesting! 

It has an open kitchen and you can watch the chefs prepare your meal if you’re at the counter.  It can be quite mesmerising as they’re always moving!  Anyway, below is a bad shot I took of the kitchen…the head chef is a pretty big and scary guy, and I wanted to be discrete, so….

We decided to have some tempura as well…so we tried the yama imo (mountain potato) tempura, maguro (tuna) tempura and hotate (scallop) with cheese and nori tempura!  I had a beer, Suntory Malt.  I usually drink beer when I eat anything deep-fried, it helps keep the palatte fresh…yah!ha! good one!

Now that I blog about this, I realise we didn’t do too well with making sure we had a balanced dinner…left out the greens! 

Tomorrow we’ll probably stay home to wait for a gyoza delivery.  BIL arranged for us to receive some gyoza from one of the many specialist gyoza shops in Utsunomiya when he was there a few days ago.  Guess we’ll have a green salad to with all that gyoza…and perhaps some ramen…and beer

Today was a another laid-back day. I vacuumed and dusted…had to…what with Tashio dropping fur all over the place…I regretted not cleaning yesterday.  Did the laundry and hung it out to dry. It was a pretty warm and sunny day today.  Had breakfast at home.  Then went out for an early lunch.

We walked to Coco’s, just happens to be across the road from Canadian House.

I had been talking about trying matsutake mushrooms (pine mushrooms) all of last week.  I’ve been in Japan almost three years now and had yet to try this very popular autumn delicacy.  Looks like so …

And whaddya know…I finally find it in a humble family-style restaurant in my neighbourhood…part of the new Autumn / Winter menu!  Gotta love Japan and her seasonal menus!

So, of course I had the only dish on the menu with matsutake mushrooms…can’t remember what it’s called, but it had gingko nuts, baby scallops and prawns.  Very flavourful! 

Jun had the crab, pumpkin and eggplant spaghetti cream soup…

And Janae had the foil-baked hamburg steak with a baked potato and rice.

Spent the afternoon napping…woke up and swore to self that today was the last lazy day!  We’ve got a lot to do and since we are going out tomorrow, we will only have Tues and Wed for major house cleaning and gardening.

Okay, feeling less guilty about all those naps I took

This is the first really lazy day we’ve had in a long while. Since we have a very long weekend, right through to Wednesday…thanks to Silver Week, we decided to take our time to get the usual weekend jobs done.

So, we went out for breakfast…to our favourite breakfast place – Canadian House. Had me a breakfast set with Brazil Santos coffee, Jun had the same. Janae had a pilaff and an iced matcha drink. On the way back, we dropped by the neighbourhood SevenEleven to get some bottled water and ice tea for later. Also walked out with a corn dog or what they call American Dog here. I usually never have fried snacks, but this is really good, not oily or anything. Whatever, I just love it.

When we got home, I sprawled out on the tatami mats and had a short nap. Jun took the dogs for their second walk of the day. I did not vacuum, dust or mop. I stayed away from the sink. I did absolutely nothing, but did manage to use the computer a few times throughout the day. I skipped lunch, which was basically yakinu rice burgers I got from Coop and a salad.  Nap again, day dream, read a little.   Then, we had tea…see, I meant it when I said I did nothing. Had some lovely walnut cookies one of my students baked for me.

K-san gave me these icing-sugar-coated walnut cookies a day ago.  I scoffed down half the tin the day I got them.  They’re lovely, melty-in the mouth kind of cookies.  She’s promised to make me her famous chocolate-coated candied orange peels next.  Can’t wait for these.  They’re just heavenly   They’d have to be cos I don’t eat oranges.  I don’t like the way they smell…one of my many quirks –  I don’t like the smell of some fruits…bananas, durian, mangosteens, mangoes, etc. But her candied peels she makes from navel oranges taste divine dipped in dark, bitter chocolate…and they smell chocolatey, so I’ve happily made an exception.  Mind you I’m not in the habit of taking food from my students, but K-san, whom I’ve taught for almost a year now, is just really nice to me.  So, in return for all the lovely home-made treats she showers on me, I buy her favourite tea – Daruma tea from Lupicia tea shops in Sengawa or at Shinjuku station whenever I get the chance. 

After all that doing nothing, I decided to do something and cook dinner.  I decided to try my hand at making chawanmushi (steamed egg custard).  So, with the help of Harumi Kurihara’s Japanese Home Cooking book of recipes and youtube’s Cooking with Dog series…I made my very first chawanmushi.  Gosh, it’s so simple, you can’t go wrong.

In addition to chawanmushi, I made niku jaga (Japanese Beef and Potato Stew) I like it with lots of gravy, and some stir-fried vegetables.   Jun did the dishes

And there you have it – my lazy Saturday.

Change always comes bearing gifts.  ~Price Pritchett

Well, I think so. 

Now that the hot, humid Japanese summer is finally over and autumn is slowly approaching, I can finally look forward to :

• cooler days = days that I can actually wear make-up and it stays on (not that I wear much or any for that matter being a shufu and all). 
• days that I don’t break into a sweat just from climbing the stairs to the second floor to do laundry… or spy at the neighbours from the upstairs windows
• my body not emanating so much heat that I fear dying by spontaneous combustion
• more good hair days…less frizz and that just got-out-of-bed hairstyle (the tousled look may look hot on some, but not on  this 40 – something mum )
• lower utility bills now that I don’t have to leave the aircon on 24/7  (well I did try to gaman or endure some days, or parts of some days)

I even changed my keitai . 

This was my old keitai.

 

As you can see, I love things purply or lavenderish…

I changed mobile phone service providers over the weekend, and got a new keitai, shopping vouchers and some cash payback in return.  Wanted a purple one again (no change there), so got Sony Erickson’s W64s Pink Diamond…which really looks pretty much lavenderish-purplish

 

 

Looks lovely with the right lighting…like so…

My model is the first one on the left. 

Well, that’s all the change I have to write about for now.   Am going down to Family Mart to buy some ice-cream for tea…..unfortunately, my cravings for macadamia nut ice-cream will never change

…that make me happy.

Little thing #2 : Lunch with like-minded ladies

I met J & M sometime last year when I joined a book club.   The book club didn’t take off, but we found that we shared many common interests and life philosophies.  So we’ve kept in touch and meet up every month for lunch in Shinjuku.  They are busy pursuing their careers, life and love, while I am the ‘retired old lady’ of the group   But do we ever have a lot to talk about!

They are amazing ladies and I really look forward to our monthly get-togethers!

Happiness Rating : (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾)

…that make me happy.

Little thing # 1 : Going out for breakfast

I just love not having to make breakfast over the weekend.   We have brekkie here every Saturday morning, and sometimes on Sunday as well…
 

….it’s just a  little cafe about a  10-minute walk from our home.  I don’t know why it’s supposed to be Canadian.  The interior reminds me an English pub with its wood panelling and bar counter, sans the alcohol.  It has a nice cosy atmosphere and Jun enjoys his newspaper and coffee here. 

We usually have the breakfast set.  It comes with a thick piece of toast, a boiled egg, slice of ham, cucumbers, and potato salad and a really good cup of coffee.  They also have sandwiches, cake, pasta and some kind of beef stew with rice.  But we usually order the breakfast set at the happy price of only ￥500. 

Happiness Rating : (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾) (＾▽＾)