aramaki rose park

We visited Aramaki Rose Park on Sunday.

We brought some baked items that we had picked up from Manpuku Bakery (a croquette sandwich, bagel with egg, pastrami, zucchini and lettuce, potato foccacia and yakisoba pan). Some bing cherries and two small thermos' of coffee. Everything was so good.

We love this park, and going there early in the morning (it opens at 9:00), is so peaceful.

Hope you had a nice weekend.

le weekend

Recently, a huge Tsutaya opened up at the new Lucua 1100.

Tsutaya is mostly known for its video rental shops but has recently emerged with bookstore/cafes.

This particular Tsutaya is a bookstore/cafe. The interior is rather dark but there are tons of seats for you to grab a coffee and browse their books.

I particularly like that they open at 7:00, perfect for when I go to Umeda when Satoshi has his German class. We usually get there before 9:30 and the amount of places serving breakfast at this time is quite limited.

In Tsutaya there is a Starbucks and a cafe called Le Garage.

I tried Le Garage's blueberry bread pudding and an iced coffee...650 yen (tax included).

The bread pudding was dense and not too sweet and there were lots of blueberries in it.

The iced coffee was good.

I hope to hang out here more often.

Krazy salaryman (businessman) left his bag at the table next to mine and went MIA for over 30 minutes...he should've paid me to watch his bag!

People in Japan way too trusting...

Sunday we went to check out the roses at Aramaki Rose Park. We've been coming here since 2006.

We love getting to the park right when it opens so we can eat our breakfast in peace and quiet.

This place is getting quite popular, there were tons of people when we arrived on Sunday!

Our breakfast was spam egg onigirazu, cherries, pickles, cherry tomato & island lava cookies. I also made hot coffee for Satoshi and a coldbrew for me.

Am loving the fish eye lens.

How was your weekend?

sunday

Sunday the weather was quite summery, I think the high was 25C!

We packed a spam musubi bento and went to check out the roses at Aramaki Rose Park.

Arriving close to 9:00, we had the whole place to ourselves. It was nice, no one smoking or talking loudly. Just peace and quiet.

As the tour buses of people arrived, we left and went home to figure out what to do about lunch...

We ended up hanging out at the Itami airport (which is nearby where we live)...just gazing at the planes, dreaming of places to travel to.

The airport also has a huge furniture/interior store, so we did a little window shopping...I think we may change our dining table soon...whoo!

The weather was fabulous...to the point of being, HOT! At least it wasn't humid.

What did you do on the weekend?

weekend of roses

Saturday was a beautiful day. After Satoshi's German class, we grabbed some things for lunch and headed to Utsubo Park.

There were tons of people as they were having their Rose Festa.

After eating and walking around the park, we headed towards Nakanoshima Park.

It's been so hot that I've been drinking iced coffee.

Nakanoshima's roses were beautiful and many people were out and about trying to get the best pictures.

Sunday, I packed us some things for breakfast and we headed to our favorite park, Aramaki Rose Park.

Besides the bento, we also had rice balls filled with aburamiso and some topped with preserved sakura (cherry blossoms). We also had some fruit (bing cherries, strawberries) and shared a brownie by Fat Witch (I'll post about this another time).

This park never disappoints.

(panorama of Aramaki Rose Park)

We walked to Takarazuka after this and found ourselves in a bit of a timeslip, I'll post about this too, soon!

Have a nice week!

aramaki rose park

Wednesday, Satoshi had the day off so I packed some foods for our breakfast, and we headed to Aramaki Rose Park.

We love this place especially during Spring because the blooms are the most plentiful.

One item in our bento was this chicken which was really easy to make.

Baked chicken with mustard adapted from "Colorful Bento" for 2 servings

120 grams chicken thighs, skinless, boneless (1 serving = 60 grams)
2 teaspoons tonkatsu sauce
2 teaspoons grainy mustard

Mix tonkatsu sauce and mustard together, spread onto chicken pieces

In 150C (300F) oven bake for 15 minutes

NOTES: This was easy and delicious.

Also in our bento was some goya kinpira, kinoko (mushroom) shigure-ni, a few rakkyo and rice.

For the shigure-ni, I upped the amount of kinoko (mushrooms) and instead of beef, used konnyaku (jellied devil's tongue).

I also packed some coffee in a thermos.

As with previous visits, the park was filled with lots of school children and elderly people.

The flowers were in full bloom and every time the wind blew you could catch a "whiff" of the roses.

This particular rose was unusual and called "love".

The weather is slowing warming up during the daytime and it was nice to get out and about.

It's Friday here, hope you have a nice weekend!

things I'm liking

It's the end of the month, I'm cleaning out some photos and posting some random stuff I'm liking.

The weather was beautiful the other day, so I went to check out Aramaki Rose Park, I packed myself a bento, and went to check out the roses.

There was a slight rose fragrance in the air, though the rose bushes looked a little shorter than when we visited in the Spring.

I won these assorted coffees from Starbucks Japan. They were giving them away to 5000 people if you signed up for their online newsletter and as part of their celebration of 15 years in Japan...woot!

For this contest, you had to choose what you wanted to win. They were giving away a latte machine or a case of pre-made lattes or these coffees.

I figured everyone would choose the machine, and I don't have space for a case of pre-made lattes, so I went with the assortment.

I think it was a good choice. (Thank you!)

Muji's Rooibos Ginger Chai tea. Good with a little sugar and splash of milk, perfect in the evenings as rooibos is non-caffeinated.

Mini Reese's PB cups...they have no wrappers on them so be careful not to eat the whole bag in one sitting!

Muji's Amatriciana, just heat the bag in a pot of boiling water and pour over your favorite pasta.

I added a sprinkling of parmesan cheese and some ground pepper...delicious on a rainy day.

True North's almond pecan cashew clusters...serving size is 5. One cluster is the size of a sugar cube, let me tell you, they are hard to stop at just 5!

It is kinoko (mushroom) season here, I sauteed these (shimeji, eringi & maitake) with some chicken consomme, garlic, a little butter & chili pepper and served it over rice like a donburi (bowl).

Satoshi gave me the thumbs up for this dish.

La Bien Nommee's salted caramel with dark chocolate sauce which we got in France...this sauce gets firm in the refridge, but is still very delicious on hot scones.

Coco Ichibanya's curry furikake...starts off sweet and then the spiciness kicks in...good on rice!

A piece of cooked kabocha, mashed together with a hard boiled egg, some mayo and ground pepper...delicious on crusty baguette!

What are you liking these days?

p.s. Happy Halloween! if you're celebrating, be safe!

aramaki rose park

Wednesday was a beautiful sunny day. Satoshi had the day off, so we went to check out the roses at Aramaki Rose Park.

We've visited this park since 2006 and love it. Whenever we visit here we make sure to bring some food because it is great to sit and eat among the roses.

As we took out our bento and started pouring some coffee, we were the envy of an older couple..."oh we should've packed something to eat", said the lady, while checking out what we were about to eat.

We had tamagoyaki (rolled omlette) with chorizo and onion, some swiss chard mixed with mayo, some grapefruit, some sansho konbu (kelp with Japanese pepper).

We also had some musubi filled with ume (pickled apricot) & ikanago (sand lance, a tiny fish that is seasoned with soy sauce, sugar, a little ginger).

Flourless chocolate cake and a small thermos of coffee.

The park was filled with school children as well as elderly people in wheelchairs.

Lots of people enjoying the day as well as the flowers.

I don't care for some of the photographers though, they often go into the plants and "arrange" them for their shot.

Some even break off leaves and stuff...not cool.

It was the first time I've seen this climbing rose looking so pretty.

It was attracting a lot of attention too.

The sun was blazing but it was a great day amongst nature.

another "rosey" & foodie weekend

The weekend was beautiful. Sunny with a slight breeze at times.

Saturday, Satoshi had his German class so we went to Umeda early and checked out Boulangerie Takagi, which I wrote about here.

Luckily it wasn't too crazy inside the shop and we were able to pick out some items for lunch.

Satoshi chose a bread with salmorejo (chilled spanish tomato soup) with egg and some bacon on top (top left). He also chose a shrimp and bacon tartine (top right). There was also an egg, tomato and ham sandwich, but that was apparently eaten so fast that the camera missed taking its photo.

I chose the apple galette (bottom right) and a Sebastian style shrimp and bacon sandwich (bottom left).

I am not too sure what "sebastian style" is but there were marinated (sweet/sour) veggies in the sandwich which reminded me of banh mi (vietnamese sandwich).

We sat in the shade near Nakanoshima and enjoyed everything we got, it was also nice to people watch.

After lunch, we walked around the Nakanoshima Rose Garden.

We've visited this garden (pre-blog) and I must say they have really made this place nice. When we visited before, there were many homeless people here and there and it was kind of a scary place to visit.

Now there is grass and many rose bushes, just a nice place to hang out.

I was amazed at all the different varieties of roses too, like this one called "Edgar Degas", each flower on the same plant was a different color.

I love how most of the rose names are "positive" like "love", "peace" or of people like "Princess Aiko" (the daughter of the Japan Prince).

Somehow looking at all the bridges that cross the Tosabori river and Dojima river around Nakanoshima Rose Garden reminded me of Paris (though we've only visited Paris for a day--pre-blog).

Satoshi went off to his class and I walked around window shopping and stopping into Ig Cafe for a decadent custard filled french toast.

After more walking, we met up at Yodobashi Camera, where we had dinner at Gyo Gyo. They were having a "sale" on most of their items.

I chose their Hokkai "don". A bowl filled with a little rice and LOTS of different seafood pieces (octopus, salmon roe, squid, sea urchin, crab leg, yellowtail, marinated mackerel, scallop, clam, northern shrimp)...1280 yen (about US$12.80). This came with chawan mushi (savory custard) and miso soup.

Satoshi chose the uni hotate & ikura don (sea urchin, scallop & salmon roe bowl)...1280 yen (about US$12.80). This also came with chawan mushi & miso soup.

This shop definitely had fresh seafood and great prices.
Sunday, I made us a breakfast bento and we headed to Aramaki Rose Garden. We've visited here in the past and love it.

Our breakfast bento had some egg with canned teriyaki saba rolled into it. Carrot salad, tsukemono (pickles) & grapefruit pieces.

I also made some musubi with different fillings.

On our "breakfast picnics" I usually brew some coffee and put it in a thermos.

I re-used this plastic container that originally had dressing in it and put some milk in it for my coffee. I also put a horeizai (miniature "blue ice") with it so it wouldn't spoil.

(To get the milk into the teeny container, I used my "spice funnel" a teeny little funnel which is used to put spices into jars (got this at the 100 yen store)).

The roses this year were a little shorter in height than in the past, I think the weird winter weather played a big part in it.

The light rose fragrance that wafted here and there was nice and we enjoyed getting out and about. Seeing these blooms especially on a beautiful day really brought out an inner sort of peace too.

For lunch, Satoshi said he wanted to eat gyoza (pot stickers), so we stopped at Ippudo for lunch.

I tried their "tsukemen". Unlike ramen, udon or soba where the noodles are already in the soup, tsukemen is where you dip your noodles into the soup and eat them.

This soup was fish based with half of a soft boiled egg, generous pieces of pork, green onions, & smashed up ika fry (a crunchy sweet/salty seafood snack). Though I finished my meal, this soup was too salty for my tastes.

Another great weekend for us, I hope yours was just as nice!

ume pork

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about a foodie party we had and a dish that one of the wives brought.

She didn't have a recipe, so I tried re-creating the dish for dinner.

You need thinly sliced pork. I bought the kind for shabu-shabu (the hot pot where you wave your slices of meat in hot broth a couple of times then eat it). Try to buy meat that is a little bigger than the width of your shiso leaf.

Try to buy the same amount of shiso (perilla leaves/beefsteak leaves) as slices of meat. Luckily, in Japan, they sell it in packages of 10.

You need some ume paste, if you don't have any, just de-seed the ume and chop it up. I didn't have any, but did have a paste made with chopped up shibazuke (veggies that are pickled with red shiso), shiso, black sesame and ume.

Lay your piece of pork flat, put a leaf of shiso, then put some ume paste, then roll tightly.

Put a half tablespoon of oil in a pan and heat.

Cook until the pork is browned and cooked through. Some ume paste may leak and the red from it may be hard to tell if your meat is cooked through, just try to cook it for at least until the outside is dark brown in color.

This dish is easy and tasty. I think you could use thinly sliced beef or even flattened out chicken too.


With the leftovers, I put some into our breakfast bento on Sunday.
With breakfast and some coffee in tow, we went to our favorite park during this time of year--Aramaki Rose Garden. The roses are in full bloom.

There were many people there and the soft fragrance of the different roses was so nice and relaxing.