avocado

When I bought this avocado, I don't think that it was indented on the bottom...

I tried to look online to see what caused it to do so but couldn't find anything
 

When I cut it open I found out why...

I'm glad I was able to eat the bulk of it and didn't have to throw the whole thing out.

sakurazaka

Tuesday, I went to check out one of the spots for blossoms, Sakurazaka (literally cherry blossom hill)

Apparently this particular area was the model for Masaharu Fukuyama's song "Sakurazaka".

On this particular day, the blossoms weren't quite ready and at the time I was putting this post together, Tokyo was still waiting for the weather people, to see 5 flowers on the specific tree (there were only 4 flowers) to announce the start of the cherry blossom season.

It is the Vernal Equinox (First day of Spring & a holiday) today, hopefully the weather dudes will be able to see one more flower bloom so that this cherry blossom season can get started.

cool

Stumbled upon this house nearby that has an avocado tree in their yard.

Satoshi doesn't believe that it is an avocado tree, but if you zoom in on the photo, you may be able to see a few avocados still on the tree.

I hope to make friends with them...

p.s. it's Valentine's Day...hug the ones you love.

thank you

Earlier this year, our neighbor chopped down the avocado tree in their yard.

Their avocados were HUGE, creamy...too bad I learned to like them a little too late in life (I was a super picky eater growing up).

My brother says other avocados will never taste as good.

The owner's mother, (before the owners that live here now) planted the tree from seed many many moons ago.

Man, the tree was at least two or three stories high...

The ripe avocados would literally bomb our roof as well as theirs (even taking out a couple of their skylights)

The roots have crawled under the dividing stone wall and part of our patio foundation.

And the falling leaves would be constant.

But, there was so much shade that it gave us, and I loved the sound of the rustling leaves in the wind.

Even the owners (now) would hang out under the tree and talk story.

They say that all good things have to come to an end.

I'll miss the tree, the avocados and especially the shade...thank you!

On another note, it was a short 4 weeks or so for me in Hawaii, lots of eating, lots of terrorizing bonding with my furry niece, lots of catching up with friends and family.

I appreciate Satoshi for always letting me do this once a year...thank you!

I'm heading back to Osaka today.

Be well everyone!

e.a.t.

Recently the fruit/vegetable stand I go to had beautiful avocados from Mexico. Usually at the big supermarkets we pay 100 yen or so for a teeny orb, but this time the fruit/veggie stand was selling 2 for 250 yen and they were at least 2 times bigger!

I got this idea from Rachel's blog, La Fuji Mama.

Take a piece of bread and toast it.

Mash up an avocado with some lemon juice.

Top it with an egg cooked to your liking.

Breakfast, lunch or dinner is served.

NOTES: so simple but so delicious! I mashed my avocado with some lemon juice and a little balsamic vinaigrette. I also added a little ground black pepper. I topped my toast with an over-easy egg. And the bread I used was a walnut raisin. I have to admit I added a little too much lemon juice, so it was puckery, but for breakfast, it really woke me up!

What have you been eating?

halloween eats

What did you do on Halloween? Satoshi had plans, so I partied alone...

I "made" myself some scary sushi...I got the idea from a commercial for sushi vinegar. Their version was jack o'lanterns.

I bought the sushi from the market and just added the "scary" eyes and mouths. I made jack o'lanterns with salmon and ghosts with ika (squid).

I made some guacamole. I didn't have jalapenos so I just sprinkled some of that habanero salt that Kirk gave us...so good!

I munched on some Pop popcorn in their Rogue Blue (cheese) flavor...really cheesy and quite piquant.

For dessert I had a mont blanc which had purple sweet potato and pumpkin puree in place of the chestnut topping.

And for something to drink, this white beer by Baladin, an Italian maker. Super citrusy.

Hope you had a nice, safe Halloween.

thank you

The house next to my parent's house has a huge avocado tree.

It was planted by the previous owner's mom over 20 years ago from 1 seed.

That tree is now 15 to 20 feet tall.

Some of the fruit are so high up that most times, they ripen and come crashing down, bombing everything below.

Over the years, the avocados have gotten considerably smaller, but, they are still bigger than anything any supermarket sells.

They are super creamy and best of all, free.

Thanks K & B for letting us pick them!

magurozuke avocado donburi

Sunday, the weather was crazy!

We started off with clouds, then it turned into scary gale winds. We even had to tie things down on our lanai!

And then the rain, boy, did it rain. And then within a couple of hours our temps dropped over 10 degrees...The world is really falling apart.

Anyway, the weather dude had forecasted the rain, so knowing this, we stocked the refrig and stayed indoors.

Dinner was really simple. Magurozuke avocado donburi.

Adapted from "Uchigohan" serves 2

20 mililiters mirin (sweet rice wine)
30 mililiters shoyu (soy sauce)
1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds
170 grams maguro (tuna), sliced
5 leaves shiso (perilla), thinly sliced
yellow onion, thinly sliced
1 avocado, deseeded, peeled and sliced
rice, cooked

Marinade your maguro in the first 3 ingredients, 10 minutes before serving.
While waiting for your maguro, prepare your avocado, onion & shiso
After the 10 minutes plate everything up
Enjoy!

NOTES: if you don't want your rice to be piping hot when you plate it up, put some into your dish while waiting for the fish to marinate.

After marinating the tuna for 10 minutes, there was hardly any marinade left, so I drizzled what was left onto each serving.

This got a "thumbs up" from Satoshi, in fact, he ate really slow (which is unusual for him) savoring it all, I guess he really enjoyed this one.

I want to try this one again using different kinds of raw fish.

hawaii eats

We recently received two avocados from my Mom's friend.

Mom waited patiently for them to ripen so that she could mash it up and eat it with sugar.

She said as a child she would eat avocado mashed and sprinkled with sugar for breakfast, or sometimes as a snack.

Well, growing up, I was a picky eater. And though I knew she used to eat avocados this way, I had actually never tried it.

Until the other day.

The verdict? it was good, not mountain moving though and I think I would prefer my avocados in savory fashion.

"the cake"

I mentioned it was Satoshi's birthday yesterday.

I also mentioned that he had to work. Since I knew he wouldn't be home for dinner until at least 20:00 and that we wouldn't be eating until then, I decided to make him a "cake" of avocado and spicy poke instead of buying/making something sweet.

I think he was pretty happy with it.

hokulani's

Well, it has been a week since I've been back. Grandma is up and around. She uses her cane, when she remembers to (she's never had the need to use one up until now, so this is a good sign that she doesn't really need one.) We have been taking turns staying with her at night, but will try to let her stay by herself after this coming week.

Since I still have to eat...this is just a little round-up of what I've been eating...

From our neighbors...these bambucha (huge) avocados...These actually "fell" into our yard like a bomb...SPLAT! from tip to end they are about 6 inches long! creamy and delicious. (Thank you!) Can you believe the ginormous tree grew from a single avocado seed planted over 20 years ago?

A lunch of 3 crispy tacos with guacamole from Diego's....US$4.50+tax. More than the tacos, which were really dry, I enjoyed the homemade guacamole and homemade salsa. If there is one thing I miss in Japan is Mexican/Tex-Mex food. UPDATE: as of 3/2012, this place has closed

Lunch with my Aunty M at Ryan's. Satoshi and I used eat here often, loving their appetizers and frozen li hing margaritas.

My aunty and I shared the mango stacked salad (refreshing!), buffalo wings (spicy!) and their sweet potato fries (loved their BBQ aioli!). I'm sure if it were happy hour, my Aunty and I may have had some of their reknown mojitos...(Thank you for lunch Aunty!)

Hokulani's Red Velvet Cupcakes...4 for US$10...bought at the New Food and Product Show...Aunty M and I thought there were way more products than food.

They seemed smaller than the ones I picked up from Cake Couture. I guess these cupcakes were sitting out for awhile...the parts that weren't frosted were dry and the cream cheese frosting had a hard shell to them and seemed a bit greasy....meh!

My Dad, who is a man of few words, said they were okay, but he wouldn't have spent $2.50 for it. I guess it was good that we got to try them, will we go back? probably not.

What have you been eating lately?

sunday

Sunday also started off rainy but turned out to be a sunny day.

Dinner was again a hodgepodge of salads, plus an avocado-maguro tower.

We also tried Westmalle Trappist's Tripel, a Belgium beer...628 yen (about US$6.28) for 330 ml.

This one had punch! 9.5% alcohol to be exact....a little bitter and cloudy with a little fruity aroma, but for me, more drinkable than the Orval.

At least when we went to Yamaya on Saturday they had more Wychwood's Black Wych beer, not at the great price I got it at the first time, but nice to know they still carry it.

trying new recipes

This past weekend, I tried a few more recipes from "The Food You Crave" by Ellie Krieger.

Saturday's dinner was the "Cowboy Steak with Coffee and Ancho Rub". Wow...that was easy and good! (Word of caution for those who cannot sleep after having caffeine late in the day, don't make this dish for dinner....I ended up having a hard time sleeping.)

I served it on some chopped lettuce with the recipe for "Cucumber-Avocado Salsa". I forgot to buy a lime for the salsa so I subbed raspberry vinegar. It tasted okay, but I think the flavor would have been brighter/cleaner with the lime. Gotta try this again.

The next day for breakfast, we had the leftover steak stir-fried with onions and rice.

In Hawaii, whenever we have steaks for dinner, my mom always makes this dish for us, either for lunch or dinner, the day after. Just add the onions to the pan and let them brown then add the steak to warm.

Sunday's dinner, I tried the "Caesar Salad with Lemon Pepper Shrimp". Another easy and delicious recipe. I didn't have egg substitute so I just left it out. The recipe calls for garlic-scented croutons, but I just toasted some cubed breads and added the garlic (minced) to the lemon pepper shrimp. Also since I couldn't find romaine, I used green leaf.

So far, every recipe I've tried from this book has been easy , delicious and never left me feeling hungry!

the past couple of days

Thank you for your Christmas wishes. Satoshi was able to take the day off so we spent the day together. (Christmas is not a national holiday here, so if it falls on a weekday, most times Satoshi has to work--I think this was the first time in 7 years of living here that he was able to take the day off.) To our family and friends, we appreciate all of your cards and gifts.

This Christmas was rainy and cold. I was hoping to see some flurries but there were none to be seen.

We had our annual Christmas party on the 23rd with two other families. I brought two cream cheese dips. One with smoked salmon and one with roasted garlic and served them with Ritz crackers. It was a nice gathering and nice to see our friend's children who are getting bigger each year.

Our Christmas dinner last night was a pupu (appetizer) party. I made a version of Deb's ahi, avocado, crab towers. For some reason, the market didn't have maguro today, so I subbed salmon cut for sushi. I did it a bit chunky but it was still delicious.

We also had slices of apple with smoked cheddar.

There was also some chips and a glass of Two Oceans pinotage, a South African wine.

Dessert was chocolate dipped strawberries.
Recently, I bought a fondue pot by Vanilla Patisserie, which I found out is a shop in England. DHC, which I have written about before, was selling these pots in dark 70%, milk with hazelnut and white at an introductory price of 800 yen (about US$8). Of course, I bought the 70%. Just warm up the pot in some hot water for about 10-15 minutes and you are good to go.

Despite the rain, it was a great day. We hope you had a Merry Christmas and were able to enjoy it with family and friends.

food...nature...blast of heat...repeat

Sunday had to be most sauna-like day to date...this year. Still, we didn't want to stay at home, so we decided to check out the falls in Minoo Park.

From the Hankyu Minoo station to the falls it is 2.8 kilometers. Of course we couldn't just go straight to the falls, on the way we stopped into Hashimoto-tei for lunch.

Satoshi had the loco moco (900 yen about US$9), he knew when he ordered it that he may be disappointed, but ordered it anyway. When his plate arrived, he knew from the aroma that it would be different. He says that Kaka'ako Kitchen's is still his favorite.

I ordered the black curry (900 yen about US$9). This spicy concoction was delicious and had a lot of punch. It may look like a lot of rice, but with the amount of spiciness, you need it.

After re-fueling and cooling off a bit, we checked out the Konchukan (insectarium). The admission was 270 yen (about US$2.70) per person. Can you believe, that for all the years we have lived here, we had never stepped inside this place? We were glad we did though, there were lots of yucky bugs on display as well as a live butterfly area. I was amazed at how some of the butterflies had numbers written on their left wing--I think this is how they keep track of them.

From the insectarium, we continued walking toward the falls. There was another museum of sorts, but I can't tell you what it was (Satoshi didn't know what it was either)--at least there was no admission.

Right across the unknown museum, we stopped into yet another cafe (Yamamoto Coffee) along the way to keep cool. Satoshi had some coffee and I had an iced coffee (600 yen a piece--about US $6 each).

Just as we came out of the cafe and started to make our way up a slight incline, there was a man giving out samples of yamaguri (mountain chestnuts). It turns out that these are from Shiga prefecture, so they weren't local. But they were really easy to peel and delicious. We bought a bag to take home (600 yen or about US$6).

Finally, after 2 hours, we made it to the falls. There were many people in the waters below the falls. After re-energizing in front of the waterfall's spray and seeing a sign that said "beware of snakes" (eww), we started to head back.

You could hear tons of semi (cicada) in the trees and every so often a slight warm breeze would blow.

There were bursts of komorebi (sunbeams) which came through the trees.

Halfway out of the park, we were hungry again. So, this time, we stopped into Per Caffe Bianco. This cafe is right across the street from the train station.

I ordered the zuccotto (850 yen about US$8.50 comes with a drink) and Satoshi had a margherita pizza (1100 yen about US$11). Satoshi said that the pizza was really good, with lots of garlic in it.

The zuccotto had slices of grapefruit, lots of nuts and lots of cream inside. It went nicely with my cute cappuccino.

I think in the U.S. this is called latte art, but since this was a cappuccino...I love cappuccino art!

Not wanting to go out again to find dinner, we bought some ingredients to try a recipe which I saw on Deb's blog. (One thing you should know about us, no matter how much we eat during the day, we almost never skip a meal!)

Deb's ahi avocado towers with sesame-cilantro emulsion were delicious! I adapted the recipe and added diced tomatoes to 1/4 of a chopped red onion, diced 5 ounces (150 grams) of maguro (tuna), sprinkled some red alaea salt, put 1 tablespoon of shoyu, 1 teaspoon of sesame oil and a pinch of black sesame seeds.









For the avocado layer, I used 2 small avocadoes. I couldn't find lime, so I used lemon juice from half a lemon without the zest.

As for the emulsion, I didn't have much cilantro, so we just used the few stalks that were on our lanai, and I added 1 tablespoon of EVOO and 1 tablespoon of sesame oil. I didn't do the crab layer. On top of that, we couldn't find won ton wrappers or tortilla chips, so we ate our towers with okara (soy lees) chips. The chips were too small to layer onto, so we just ate them on the side. I've crushed and sprinkled these okara chips onto Chinese Chicken Salad as they have the same flavor as won ton pi chips.

I was so happy to be able to use my ring molds. Since I don't have 2 ring molds the same size, Satoshi's tower was bigger than mine and he was impressed as to how the tower was put together. The "leftovers" I put into a bowl, but that was eaten up too.

Boy, we sure ate a lot today! At least we bonded with nature while doing so.

Hope you enjoyed today as much as we did, have a great week!

Yamamoto Coffee
2-28 Minoo-koen
Minoo, Osaka
Phone: 072.722.3477
Open 9:00-18:00

Per Caffe Bianco
1-8-1 Minoo
Minoo, Osaka
Phone: 072.725.7111
Open 9:00-21:00
Closed on Mondays (UPDATE: hours have changed to 11:00-21:00)

trying to re-create a fav

Everytime I go home and Satoshi has a chance to join up with me, we head to Kua'aina in Haleiwa. Satoshi has his avocado burger and I always order the BLT + avocado.

After finding crispy bacon, I wanted to re-create this sandwich, so I bought an avocado yesterday.

To my disappointment, the avocado wasn't ripe...I guess I should have known when the knife didn't go in nicely. Hopefully, it will ripen nicely without going bad. Maybe I can make guacamole with it or something....

I guess I'll just be thankful for a B.L.T. with crispy bacon in it.

kua'aina

Today Satoshi and I took my Grandma riding to the North Shore. On the way, my grandma mentioned that her friend had told her that the sakura (cherry blossom) were in bloom in Wahiawa. So, we got off the freeway and drove around Wahiawa town. Apparently, this part of Oahu is at a higher elevation so trees like these from Okinawa are able to thrive.

We happened upon a tree in someone's front yard, so we pulled over to take some snaps. The cherry blossom season is supposed to start next week for Osaka, so hopefully I'll be able to enjoy some of it when I return in two weeks.

After our cherry blossom viewing, we got back onto Kamehameha Highway and headed towards Haleiwa--this is Satoshi's "must visit" area every time he comes home. Another "must visit" is Kua'aina. This place has been making burgers since the late 70's. A specialty is their avocado burger (Satoshi's fav)--a half of an avocado is placed onto a 1/3 lb. or a 1/2 lb. burger with tomato, lettuce and a grilled onion. My favorite is the BLT & Avocado--a half of an avocado added to a BLT (bacon-lettuce-tomato) sandwich....sigh, good crispy bacon is so hard to find in Japan!

Check out the size of the ketchup! Plus, each table has a roll of paper towels, this should give you an idea that these sandwiches are NOT made to be eaten while driving in your car!

On our way back, we checked out the high surf at Sunset Beach. It was a nice drive and we had a nice lunch with my Grandma.