january the first two days

On the 1st, we did our usual things like hatsumode. No shops or restaurants were open around us, so we just laid low.

And had osechi for dinner. Nowadays we don't eat all the celebratory foods, we just purchase the ones we (Kat) like (s) to eat.

I also made tataki gobo , namasu and dashimaki egg in place of the datemaki type

I had wanted the one cup of Sawanoi sake, but the shop I went to only had this cute bottle, so that is what I got

On the 2nd, we went to see a Japanese movie, “Grand Maison Paris”

(We had seen the J-drama ("Grand Maison Tokyo") and was interested in seeing the movie)

A lot of the dialogue was in French with Japanese subtitles so I had to watch “by feel” because my French is bad and my Japanese reading is not so good

Keeping the French theme, for lunch, I wanted to check out Le Bretagne Creperie in Kagurazaka and were lucky they were open (most places were not)

They are part of the Breizh Cafe group and most of the wait staff speak French

Loved this, it made me feel like I was in France 

There was a one drink minimum and you each had to order one main dish,  desserts could be shared

Satoshi ordered the Galette Kagurazaka with white wine

Inside the galette was St Jacques crevettes (shrimp) poelees (pan fried), herbes sauce fruits de mer (herbed sauce for seafood), bechamel au crabe (crab bechamel), fromage (cheese) and creme fraiche

I ordered the Paysanne with red wine

This had potatoes, raclette cheese, sausage and a grainy mustard sauce

So cheesy and the edges of the galette were so crispy! love!

And then we ordered dessert to share...Dame Banane

Bananes poelees (Pan fried bananas), a la sauce Rhum caramel (rum caramel sauce), noix (nuts), raisins, chantilly and canelle (cinnamon)

So delicious, not too sweet, I usually don't like when bananas are pan fried, but this was delicious…total 9900 yen tax included)

A bit pricey for lunch but I hope to try other items on their menu.

After eating so much we walked from Kagurazaka down to Kanda to catch the train back home.

It was a nice day, glad we got out and about.

Le Bretagne Creperie

4-2 Kagurazaka

Shinjuku, Tokyo

Hours: 11:30-22:00 (Mondays-Fridays), 11:00-22:00 (Saturdays & Sundays)

end of december

Happy New Year!

Hope everyone had a safe holiday season.

Apparently putting the weekends and holidays together, one could have had 9 days off from work here.

Here's what we did...o-soji (cleaning) 

This year was a little more intense cleaning, since "my helper" was under the weather last year

Bad ramen at Ramen Zabuton...the broth was just shoyu, no depth, the noodles or something smelled, the menma was really l-o-n-g, the char siu wasn't seasoned and not tender and the egg was just boiled, not seasoned...

I.am.a.ramen.snob...ha!
 

One of the sunsets at the end of December

Grateful for the 93 year old grandma who gave this to Satoshi, it was so delicious!

I also learned that dried kaki which I learned as hoshigaki is also called korogaki (literally meaning dried tears)

we saw Mount Fuji from the pasta restaurant that we had lunch at one day

Krazy Tokyo People: the lady who terrorizes our cleaning lady!

She was sweeping up dried leaves in front of our building as well as picking leaves off of our bushes to throw into our lobby!

Oh, and from February until July, there will be big changes at our apartment, one is that there will be a lock on our entrance so "you know who" cannot just come in...

Tried the Craft Curry...it was just ground up roux, nothing special, glad I tried it but wouldn't buy it again, especially since there is sugar and flour in it.

Will post some of our New Year adventures in the coming days.