hawaii reconnects

Reconnected with Revolution Teas recently...they were having a sale on these two teas at Safeway.

Been enjoying the Sweet Ginger Peach as an iced tea and will save the Earl Grey Lavender for lattes this Fall.

Have you reconnected with any foods/drinks lately?

earl grey chocolat chaud

Do you like Earl Grey tea? What about dark chocolate?

What about chocolat chaud (hot chocolate)?

If you answered yes to all of these, then you'll love this.

I recently saw this on Pinterest, it is a great way to get inspired not only about food, but fashion and other topics too. (WARNING: you will have lots of fun looking at all sorts of photos, and the time will fly!)

The original recipe is here, and this is what I did.

Earl Grey Chocolat Chaud : 1 serving
1/2 cup of milk
3 squares of 71% Valrhona chocolate
1 scoop of Mariage Frères Earl Grey Imperial tea leaves

Put the tea into a pot and add the milk, heat on low
While the milk heats, add the chocolate and whisk
When the chocolate is melted and well incorporated, strain the liquid into a mug
Add some cute marshmallows...voila!

NOTES: I liked this, the tea flavor is there but very subtle. I have other brands of Earl Grey, so I can't wait to try them like this.

earl grey lavender tea latte

Made my own Earl Grey Lavender Tea Latte using the Earl Grey Lavender Tea I bought from Ali'i Kula Lavender.

I first tasted this combination here.

This is so delicious and so easy to make.

Just brew your tea (about 3 minutes), add a cube (or two of sugar), then froth your milk.

So comforting.

Tomorrow is a National Holiday (Bunka no Hi, Culture Day), we're heading out to Kyoto to visit MIL.

things I've been enjoying

Tirol chocolate has teamed up with Frito-Lay, chocolate covered cheetos...different but soothes the sweet/salty cravings....128 yen (about uS$1.28)

Found this Ritter Sport bar at Carrefour, Caramel Nuts, I checked out Ritter Sport's site, can you believe that this bar is made in Germany but has never been sold in Germany? Amazing!

Caramel cream with hazelnuts and rice krispies....it made for gooey s'mores...298 yen (about US$2.98)

Pafonte's cream pan (bread)...a cute tiger shape filled with delicious custard cream...150 yen (about US$1.50)

Ooh, and the Lavender Earl Grey Tea Lattes are back at Starbucks...yeah! (short 370 yen (about US$3.70))

What have you been enjoying lately?

starbucks

I think I've told you that I go to Starbucks often. They recently came out with a Lavender Earl Grey Tea Latte...mmm all the flavors I love.

This latte is sweetened with honey and it isn't sickly sweet like their Chai latte. I think I'm going to have this again.

Does your Starbucks have a special beverage out now, what is it?

earl grey nib muffins

I love Earl Grey tea! The citrusy aroma while sipping a cup is very relaxing and comforting to me.

I was excited to try a new recipe for Earl Grey Muffins.

This recipe comes from a muffin shop in Tokyo, they just came out with a cookbook and as I flipped through the book, the recipe for the Earl Grey Muffins jumped out at me.

Here is the recipe if you'd like to try them. If you can weigh your ingredients to the metric, it will be more precise than the US measurements I have on the side. I added cacao nibs to it because I wanted a bit of chocolate and nuttiness in there.

Earl Grey Nib Muffins adapted from "She Knows Muffin" makes 6 muffins
150 grams flour (about 1.17 cups)
6 grams baking powder (about 1.3 teaspoons)
1 medium egg
80 grams sugar (about 0.62 cups)
50 grams butter, melted (about 3.5 tablespoons)
70 mililiter milk, room temperature (about 0.29 cups)
contents of 1 Earl Grey tea bag (about 10 grams or about 2.5 teaspoons)
1 handful of cacao nibs

In a bowl, sift the flour and baking powder. Set aside.
In another bowl, beat the egg and sugar together until almost fluffy.
Put the butter and milk into the egg mixture and stir.
Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture and add in your packet of tea and nibs.
Mix well.
Divide evenly into 6 muffin holders.
Heat your oven to 180C (350F). Bake for 25 minutes.
Check the 2 middle muffins for doneness with a toothpick.
Enjoy!

NOTES: these muffins were so light and airy! The citrusy aroma from the tea is just right and the nuttiness from the nibs give it a nice crunch. If you have loose leaf Earl Grey, run it through a mill or food processor before adding it to your batter. The recipe only makes 6 muffins--which is perfect for us. If making 6 muffins is too much of a pain for you, please double or triple the recipe. I hope to try more recipes from this book soon!

happy 2nd birthday!

Last year, I made cupcakes with Magnolia Bakery butter cream frosting to celebrate this blog's birthday. Blogging for me this past year has been about trying new recipes, learning from others, sharing new food experiences and making new friends.

For this year's celebration I wanted to try something different...cheesecake.

I've made cheesecake in the past, but with those ready-made pie shells. To try something different, I wanted to use earl grey tea since I love the taste and aroma of it. I've also only discovered earl grey since moving to Japan (I know, I was living under a rock....plus, I had some leftover from our trip to New Caledonia.)

For the crust, I used the shortbread recipe that I used to make macadamia nut shortbread in August, but I cut the recipe to one-fourth. Instead of the nuts, I added about a teaspoon or so of earl grey tea. (I emptied one tea bag into a little bowl and sprinkled in the tea (not all of it) as the dough came together.)

This was my first time using a removable bottom pan. Since there are only the 2 of us, making a huge cheesecake would be nice, but you know who would be eating it?? Yours truly!...So, I found these cute removable bottomed tins at the 100yen store (only US $1! each). After pressing in the dough (which I thought was pressed in quite thinly)into the 1st pan, I had only a little left for the 2nd pan (which turned out to be the best). I filled the one with only a little "crust" with the cream cheese filling and put it into the refrigerator to set.

The one which I thought was thinly pressed in (I think I was supposed to use the weights to keep the dough from puffing up), turned out to be a thick shortbread cookie. Light and flaky this went nicely with a glass of milk.

Even though the cheesecake didn't turn out how I envisioned it would, I am happy with the results--the crust was flaky and light, the earl grey flavor was just right and matched with the cream cheese filling.

I can't believe that another year has passed, it has definitely been filled with lots of exciting foodie experiences, disasters and successes in the kitchen and the most important...friendships. I really appreciate all of you who take the time to read my adventures, I am surely having fun writing about them. I'm looking forward to Autumn and Winter because it will be cooler, but most of all, I'm looking forward to all the delicious ingredients and adventures they bring.

Happy Birthday!

meyer lemons

Earlier in the year, I had seen many posts about Meyer lemons. I've never tried them, but they sound really wonderful.

The other day while Satoshi and I were shopping, we came across Meyer lemons...from New Zealand! The color of these lemons were a bit orangey not the "lemony" yellow that I'm used to seeing. Even though they were pricey, I wanted to try them.

I zested one of the lemons and kept it aside to make scones. With the juice, I made this refreshing pasta with shrimp, capers, garlic and veggies for our dinner one night.

With the second lemon, I zested it again and used both the juice and zest to make my favorite lemon oregano vinaigrette. Doesn't the lettuce I bought for salad look beautiful? They call it "bouquet" lettuce. The one head comes in this BIG wasteful plastic container so that the fragile leaves don't get bruised (the sad price to pay to have non-bruised lettuce). It was the first time I've seen this type of lettuce in the market and it was love at first sight. Although the price would end the relationship...it was expensive...

Since I still had some cream leftover from making cheesecake (which I'll post about later), I used it to make earl grey scones and added the Meyer lemon zest I had set aside. The aroma of these guys coming out of the oven was heavenly! Of course, I had to taste one as soon as it came out of the oven. Delicious!

I was wondering though, are the skins of this variety of lemon softer than regular lemons? They were very easy to juice and zest. Still, I'm happy I was able to try them.

ho ho ho....bah humbug...sigh

It is Christmas Eve. Satoshi had to work. He also has to work tomorrow, Christmas Day.... Christmas, what is that? I grew up celebrating Christmas with my family, having dinner with family and friends, but in Japan it is different.

Christmas is for couples. Restaurants have expensive romantic dinners for two. Last year, we went out for a nice French dinner. The price of cake also goes up. Can you imagine paying $40 for an 8-inch round cake? I can't, so I usually make some kind of dessert instead of buying.

Here is a picture of our tree.

In Japan, they don't sell freshly cut ones, so for our first Christmas I bought one in a pot. That one died after 3 years, so this is the one we've had for the past 2 Christmases.

Anyway, because of a flight delay or something, Satoshi called to say he would be late, so dinner was my usual "table for one"--I guess I should be thankful that he called early enough for me to eat at a decent time.

I started off with some olives and cheese...one of the cheeses was interesting with bits of almonds. It really went well with the Yalumba 2004 Shiraz Viognier--a dry red with hints of cinnamon and spices.

A filet and baby leaf lettuce with bistro-style vinaigrette, a recipe I saw on Bean and Plum Discover the World (this blog no longer exists) and mashed turnips with olive oil, salt and pepper.

And for dessert a little cup of chocolate pudding infused with Republic of Tea's Green Earl Greyer (a green tea with bergamot oil) tea--I actually intended to make truffles, but the ganache was too soft, so now it is a pudding... strawberries and a slice of cheese cake by Marutoya, from my host-sister, Tomoko, she is a foodie too and loves to order food items from different places around Japan. The cheese cake reminded me of New York style cheese cake with a nice cookie crust.

I guess while I'm feeling sorry for myself, I'll have another glass of wine while I wait for Satoshi to come home.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

more sweet treats

Last month, Satoshi went to Cairns for his company trip. This is one of his "omiyage" (souvenirs) that he brought back for me. DFS(Duty Free Shoppers)Earl Grey shortbread cookies.

The box is really cute!

Also, last month when we went to Kobe, we bought some cookies and friands(like pound cake) from Chocolat Republic. They had some pretty interesting cookie flavors, green tea (the green round one), black pepper (the yellow round one) and wheat germ chocolate chip. They were actually very good, even the black pepper one!!

The Kobe Chef Club is a company that makes desserts that you can find at most convenience stores and supermarkets. Their desserts reflect the rich style of Kobe.

Winter Truffle came out last year and is back again this year...I, of course, bought the dark chocolate one. It is basically a pudding that has the thick, rich consistency of ganache (the filling that are found in truffles).