this and that

Barium poo buster...

Since most of our barium poo did not flush, we pulled it out so it won't clog up the toilet.

shh!don't tell him that his picture was uploaded...

Chirashizushi at Ichiriki...I think the fish could've been fresher, it was kind of watery which to me says it was frozen?! then defrosted.

Not sure if we'll be back...I thought the sushi chef wasn't too enthusiastic with his job..he was literally throwing the fish pieces into the dish!

I thought most sushi chefs delicately place the sliced fish onto the plates…

Such a cute dog sitting outside Mart Iijima.

Most people in our neighborhood have teeny chihuahuas or huge golden retrievers.

Kakiage soba at Shibusoba...

Thought this was delicious...Satoshi wanted to try this place but afterwards thought they were overpriced.

I think the pineapple top that I planted is actually growing because I spotted these tiny sprouts!

We checked out the Jiyugaoka Department Store in front of the Jiyugaoka Station, it reminded me of some of the old shopping buildings in Osaka.

Random cat in Jiyugaoka at Okusawa shrine.

Mouth.on.fire...this soupless tan tan men at Isshinshuka was only chili 1 level but it was so spicy!

I was coughing and my nose was running, loved the thin noodles though.

Some baked items from Tadashi Yanagi for "research"...I'm looking for a shop to order from for my host sister's birthday in November.

Our case numbers in Tokyo went down to 19 one day.

Second vaccine rate is up to 70%.

Crossing fingers that the next wave will not happen.

If you are celebrating Halloween this year, please be safe.

Have a nice weekend.

daikon rice

Since I bought a whole daikon, I was interested in cooking it with rice.

I found this recipe on Shirogohan and made it twice....

Makes 2 servings.

1 cup rice, washed

1 piece of aburaage (about 2-inch by 2-inch)

2 round pieces of daikon (about 1/2 inch thick), peeled and cut into cubes.

150 milliliters dashi (stock)

1 tablespoon shoyu (soy sauce)

1 tablespoon mirin (sweet rice wine)

1 okra, minced

Pour hot water over the aburaage to remove the oil, cut into strips then into squares.

Add the aburaage and daikon to the rice then add the dashi, shoyu and mirin.

Cook the rice on "takikomi" mode, hopefully your rice cooker has this.

After rice is cooked, mix in minced okra and serve.

NOTES: the original recipe has you use the daikon greens but since the daikon I bought did not have any, I added some okra, feel free to add green onions.

We enjoyed this, the daikon gets really soft and soaks up the dashi.

I will make this again.

yosenabe

Yosenabe literally means collection hot pot.

You put whatever you want into the hot pot.

I cooked half a daikon, 1 carrrot, 1 "stick" of gobo (burdock) and the outer part of some chinese cabbage.

Then I cooked the nabe set I purchased from Benny.

The price of the set was super reasonable and there was all sorts of seafood...bummer that one of the clams did not open after being cooked.

The crab was kind of slim pickings too...but the broth was flavorful

Our blog rarely had nabe on it in the past, but now that "someone" eats at home more, we can have nabe more often.

If you eat nabe (hot pot), what is your favorite ingredient?

love technology

We tried ordering from Dominos the other night.

Not used to the app, I ended up trying 3 times before I could actually order what we wanted.

It was cool watching it go through the stages.

And then our food was out for delivery.

Talk about nail biting…at first we saw it arrive and be delivered somewhere else!

“enjoy your meal” the app said.

Then a message saying “wi-fi connection is bad”

“Your food will arrive shortly.”

Since the floors in our building are confusing, we figured the guy was lost in our building.

And then it arrived.

Since the delivery was later than promised, he gave us a coupon for a free liter of soda.

Not sure when we will order again but it was an interesting experience.

FYI: large pizza…half seafood special half tropical, ultra crispy crust

this and that

Mother Nature threw us straight into winter over the weekend.

The temperature was in the 50s!

Super cheap oden set at the market...1/2 off!

I pre-cooked some daikon and carrots then added all these different fishcakes.

And also added some spinach towards the end.

We ended up eating some the next day for lunch.

Mizore nabe...grated daikon, chicken, spinach and carrots.

Eaten with ponzu.

Rain and cold temps one day brings more snow on Mount Fuji.

Our ward started handing out vaccine passports in July so the other week we applied for our vaccine passports (before “the rush”)...surprisingly it only took one week to receive it.

So analog though...copy of the vaccination record, copy of your passport, copy of a photo id and a form filled out...mail it to the city office with a self-addressed envelope…they mail you the vaccine passport.

Satoshi and I had to request for it separately too…

Hoping we all can travel abroad soon...

Saw some items on social media and wanted to try...

Ippudo is selling their ramen soup in the heated drink area of the vending machines.

Since Satoshi shouldn’t be drinking ramen soup we shared this.

150 yen...tasted like watery loco moco gravy/cream of mushroom-y though...gah!

Spam musubi from Family Mart...this one had spam, egg, tuna & mayo in it.

Too bad they don't fry the spam before making the musubi.

At least you need to heat it up before eating but it was so messy, rice falling out here and there while eating.

Our pandemic physical yesterday was fast! everyone was lent an ipad after check-in which beeped every so often to tell you where to go for your next test.

Up until now, Satoshi's company paid for our physicals. 

Since he retired, we are lucky that our health insurance pays for the physicals and I only had to pay $14 for my mammogram.

Again, hope our results will be good.

Over the last week our numbers have been scarily good...2 digits every day.

The amount of deaths is still very high though and there are severe cases still as well.

Tokyo is talking about opening up for eateries and bars starting October 25.

Right now all eateries serving alcohol need to close at 20:00.

If Tokyo opens up, the eateries and bars will need to pass certain criteria to stay open past 20:00.

There are other establishments that haven't been abiding the rules from the start...we'll see what Tokyo decides to do.

"Someone" has already made plans to meet up for drinks with friends next month....

Have a safe weekend.

it's that time of year

It's that time of year to get "the girls" mammo'd and the dreaded barium test.

In the past, Satoshi goes on another day because of work but this year we are going together.

Hopefully our results will be good.

hishidaya's shumai

Shumai, what we call "pork hash" in Hawaii can be found all over Japan.

I was able to borrow Hishidaya's cookbook from the library and scribbled down the recipe for their shumai.

Unlike the "cute" shumai you find at most Chinese restaurants around Japan, their shumai is HUGE.

I didn't make them huge like their recipe, instead I used the ingredient portions they noted in their recipe and made them into "normal" sized shumai.

I am sharing my adapted version.

Hishidaya's shumai : makes 24

400 grams ground pork

2 tablespoons oyster sauce

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon sesame oil

2 teaspoons cornstarch

pepper

24 shumai wrappers

Mix everything together and them spoon into the shumai wrappers

Steam on medium heat for 8-10 minutes.

NOTES: I didn't read the recipe correctly and ended up omitting the onion that they put into the meat mixture.

If you want to add onion, add about 50 grams (1/4 onion) minced to the mixture with 2.5 teaspoons of cornstarch.

After watching many youtube videos on how to form shumai, I still couldn't get the hang of it and my shumai were uneven and pretty ugly looking.

I steamed this in a frying pan with parchment paper and water, but would steam on shredded cabbage and parchment next time.

I omitted the 2 teaspoons of ginger juice that the original recipe notes because I was lazy and didn’t want to defrost some ginger, but would try adding some the next time I make these.

When steaming, I also want to try covering it with a wet cloth to see if the “tops” will stay moist, it looked a bit dry.

Still, this was super tasty and was "inhaled" by "someone".

Since the shumai had so much seasoning in it, we ate this with black vinegar only, though a little karashi (mustard) would've been nice too.

I would definitely make this again.

kirin coffee

Back in April we took out Kirin Coffee's egg sandwich.

Fast forward to October and we had lunch there.

I ordered their spice curry...the coffee rice is cooked with coffee, surprisingly it wasn't bitter.

Their curry was rich with chunks of beef, carrots and potatoes.

Satoshi ordered their udon napolitan.

The noodles cooked until soft and their tomato sauce is not sweet.

Both meals come with a small salad and drink of choice.

I ordered an iced coffee while Satoshi ordered hot coffee.

Love their different coffee cups.

Kirin means giraffe in Japanese and you can find giraffes just about everywhere in the cafe.

Love the sink outside of the bathroom too.

Everything was delicious and we already know what we want to eat the next time, we'll be back.

Kirin Coffee

7-7-20 Omorinishi

Ota, Tokyo

Phone: 03.6424.4275

Closed Mondays and Tuesdays

Hours: Weekdays 7:00-20:00, Saturdays & Sundays 8:30-20:00

kirinkan

Kirinkan is a non-profit organization that provides work opportunities for people with disabilities.

One event that they have a few times a month is "pan no hi"...bread day.

I've often seen their flyers but have never been able to check them out until last Thursday.

We picked up a few of their baked items to try.

Chocolate walnut.

Earl Grey cream.

Filled with lots of tea flavored custard.

Filled with walnuts and dark chocolate cream.

We also tried their curry pan and chikuwa pan.

The curry pan had curry and cheese in it...delicious.

Their chikuwa pan was interesting, there was a 3 or 4 inch sized chikuwa filled with cheese running lengthwise and aonori worked into the dough...it was also glazed with some okonomiyaki sauce and bonito flakes...so ono!

I'm glad we got to try these and it was a nice way to support a local N.P.O.

We'll be back.

Kirinkan

3-19-1 Nishikamata, Hasunuma Fureai Center 2F

Ota, Tokyo

this and that

Saw some figs at the market, pretty sure these are the end of the season.

I put them on top of toast with cream cheese and some proscuitto...delicious!

If I had some honey I would've drizzled a little on there too.

Love social media for all the info!

One of my IG friends who also lives nearby posted about visiting a bakery, Pan to Espresso to (literally bread & espresso &)

This bakery's main shop is near Omotesando and when we lived in Osaka I got to try one of their franchise shops there.

They now have about 12 around Japan and I think 1 overseas.

Anyway, since Satoshi was going out on an errand and would eat lunch out, I went to check out this bakery.

I picked up their chili dog and carrot cake.

The chili dog was a hot dog topped with lots of tabasco, pickles, beans and cheese...mouth.on.fire....but meh! not what I was expecting for "chili"

Their carrot cake was delicious. The cream cheese frosting tasted more like it had more yogurt than cream cheese in it which would probably explain why it was so soft.

I am glad I got to try these.

Tokyo people...this guy "sped" past me...

 As we crossed the Nomigawa, I saw what I thought was a fish coming up stream.

When it got closer though, I realized it was a rat!

It then, stopped to rest and was hanging onto the wall for dear life…eek!

Even though he saw it, Satoshi couldn't believe that rats can swim...

Tokyo's daily cases have dropped to 2-digits.  

Unfortunately, deaths in Tokyo have been around 20 a day.

A lot of prefectures around Japan have had 0 cases daily.

So far we have had about 5 waves of this virus and the experts warn that number 6 will happen, probably during the winter months.

Hopefully the government will prepare accordingly so we won't push the medical services to the extremes again. 

I hope everyone is doing well.

Have a safe weekend.

tokyo people

I thought all the stuffed animals she had on her bag was cute.

I focused in on his rolled up jeans.

The pattern on her shirt was so cute.

terrace dolce

We checked out a kissaten (coffee shop) in our shopping arcade, Terrace Dolce that has been around for 40 something years.

I had their napolitan...I enjoyed the fact that it wasn't sweet like some napolitan can be from the ketchup.

Satoshi had their hamburger plate.

The soup they served with both our meals was so junk...wakame in consomme soup does not match...

The coffee is brewed by siphon method...pretty cool to watch.
 

 There are other items on their menu that we want to try and it was nice to listen to jazz while dining...we'll be back.

Terrace Dolce

7-64-2 Nishikamata

Ota, Tokyo

Phone: 03.3739.4840

Open daily 10:00-20:00

cream cheese soaked in tamari

Cream cheese worked better than mozzarella.

If you want to try, I would suggest soaking it in this mixture at least overnight.

Translated from the internet

2 tablespoons tamari shoyu

2 tablespoons mirin

1 tablespoons sake

36 grams cream cheese (2 pieces 18 grams each)

Heat mirin and sake and bring to a boil to burn off alcohol...about 3 minutes.

Take off the heat and add the shoyu

When everything is cooled, add your cheese.

NOTES: easy and tasty. 

The cream cheese I buy is in individually wrapped "cubes"/ squares that are 18 grams each.

When I made the sauce I thought it wouldn’t be enough and doubled it, so I had quite a bit leftover after soaking the cheese in it…(the recipe above is the original amounts.)

So, with part of the remaining sauce, I squeezed in some lemon to make ponzu and have been using the rest of the sauce as I would shoyu.

Something different but delicious.

I would definitely make this again.

social distance

Friday, we ate at Burger King.

It was kind of early 11:00-ish, so there were not a lot of people.

There was a table in between me and Satoshi.

Way too much ketchup in my Whopper Jr...

Don't forget to throw your rubbish into the "tarsh can"...

Everyone into Halloween these days.

Probably the largest coconut-ish planter I've seen...

Tokyo people...waiting in line for ramen or "taking some kind of class"?!

Have a good week.