foodie saturday

Saturday, it was blazing hot and humid.

Satoshi's been studying for a test, so I decided to get out and about.

I don't know how I found out about the lotus flowers at Shinobazu Pond in Ueno, but I decided to check it out.

Click on the photo to view the video.

The southern area of the pond is called "Lotus Pond" and is filled with lotus plants and flowers.

It was amazing to see.

Since I was near the Ueno Zoo, I stopped in to get cooled off and to try panda stamped anpan from Wholesome Bakery.

Last year, the panda at the Ueno Zoo gave birth, so they've been celebrating with all sorts of panda goods.

The anpan was a brioche bread filled with sweet bean paste.

With an iced coffee, it hit the spot.

Then I headed to Ginza.

I wanted to check out the Hiroshima Antenna Shop, boy! was it hard to find.

I did find it eventually...

It was getting close to lunch time so I popped into Oslo Coffee and ordered their croque monsieur.

The sandwich was oozy and delicious.

Again, it was nice to cool off and take a break.

My last stop was Ginza Six, a relatively new building filled with shops and eateries.

I wanted something sweet so I tried Philippe Conticini's citrus parfait.

Super refreshing with all the different citrus used.

It was fun watching them make the parfait right in front of you too.

It's still brutally hot and humid.

Still, it was nice getting out and about.

Wholesome Bakery (2022: no longer in business)
1-57 Ueno Park, 3153 Ueno 1F
Taito, Tokyo
Phone: 03.6806.0430
Hours: 6:00-22:30

Oslo Coffee
5-8 Ginza, inside Ginza Core 1F
Chuo, Tokyo
Phone: 03.3289.2264
Hours: 11:00-22:00, closed when Ginza Core is

Philippe Conticini (2021: no longer at this location)
6-10-1 Ginza, inside Ginza Six B2F
Chuo, Tokyo
Phone: 03.3289.4011
Hours: 10:30-20:30

sad

Back in 2008, we visited the Karasuma peninsula and saw 13 hectares (about 32 acres) of lotus blossoms!

We were in awe and amazed by the beauty of this area.

(photo from the Kyoto Newspaper) This is what the area looks like recently...all the lotus roots have disappeared.

They aren't too sure what caused it to die off (global warming, disease, maybe other reasons) but how sad is this?!

renkon shoga gohan

I was watching a show the other week and they were talking about foods that help bring your immunity up.

The show also talked about different prefectures in Japan and what they eat for longevity.

One food item that caught my eye was renkon (lotus root) shoga (ginger) gohan (rice).

In Kumamoto prefecture, they eat a lot of renkon (lotus root) and one way they like to eat it is with rice.

There wasn't a recipe given so I pieced together different recipes to come up with this...

Renkon Shoga Kamameshi : serves 4
2 cups rice, washed
45 grams shoga (ginger) thinly sliced
400 mililiters dashi (stock) (2 cups)*
40 mililiters (8 teaspoons) shoyu (soy sauce)
20 mililiters (4 teaspoons) mirin (sweet rice wine)
20 mililiters (4 teaspoons) sake (rice wine)

*To make dashi
450 mililiters water
4 grams dashi konbu (seaweed for dashi)
4 grams katsuo-bushi (dried bonito)
Put the konbu into the water and just before coming to a boil, remove the konbu.
Add the katsuo-bushi and turn off the heat.
Strain the dashi in a cheesecloth or paper towel.

For the renkon:
50 grams renkon (lotus root), washed well and chopped into small pieces
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoons sake (rice wine)
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons shoyu (soy sauce)
1 tablespoon mirin (sweet rice wine)

After washing the rice, add the ginger, dashi, shoyu, mirin and sake and cook in your rice cooker
In a frying pan, heat the oil and toss the renkon to coat
After the renkon is coated with the oil add the sugar, sake, shoyu & mirin
When most of the liquid has evaporated add renkon to the cooked rice

NOTES: You might be wondering why the renkon isn't added to the rice to be cooked together? Apparently it will lose its "crunch" if you cook it in the rice cooker. Another point that the show made was that renkon shouldn't be peeled, just use it as is, lots of vitamins in the "skin", so scrub it well as it grows in the mud.
My ginger was really mature so there was lot of "strings", if you do use mature ginger, cut up finely instead of just thinly slicing.
Also, I would use sesame oil instead of olive oil, to give the renkon and rice a little more flavor.
Overall though, this took some time to make but I liked this and will definitely make this again.

p.s. Last night we had a lightning "show". The rain was hitting our glass door on the lanai, knocked over several plants and gave everything a good drenching. These sudden showers are one thing but the amount of rain they bring are krazy! Stay safe & dry everyone!

nature thursday

Thursday, I packed myself some lunch and headed to Banpaku Koen, this was the site of the World Fair in 1970.

From our place it is about 15 minutes by monorail. I've heard that this monorail system is the most expensive in Japan. From our place to the park it costs 360 yen (about US$3.60).

When I got to the park, there was no one there...I realized I was really early (half an hour early). Luckily, there was shade to wait for the gates to open.

There were photographers out in full force. As soon as the gates opened it was literally "a race" to see who could get there first and get a good positioning.
Luckily, the place is so huge that you really can't get in someone's way.

After sweating it out for an hour or so, I decided to get into the shade and have my lunch. What did I pack? A deconstructed spam musubi--rice on the bottom, a thin layer of egg, spam seasoned with mirin, shoyu and sugar, tsukemono, furikake & some leftover orzo salad. It was nice to sit under the shade and enjoy the view.

It was a very hot day, but very nice to be close to nature.

Hope you have a great weekend!

arashiyama

Satoshi had the day off, so we went to Arashiyama.

Most areas were decorated for Tanabata on the 7th. (See the large bamboo poles with decorations hanging from them?)

It's ayu (river smelt) season too, we saw this old man fishing with a really long pole.


Last year, we came about the same time to see the hasu no hana (lotus flowers). This year, they seem to be a little late.

There were some blooming, but I think in a week or two they will be in full bloom.

There were some tombo (dragonfly).


From Tenryuji, we walked to Sagano-yu. I think I heard about this cafe from Tamakikat. This building used to be a sento (bath), but was renovated into a cafe.

The interior was kept with the sento theme--with the tiles and mirrors to make you feel like you are inside the bath.

I had the curry 1200 yen (about US$12), this came with a salad.

Satoshi had the parma ham with tomato hot sandwich--950 yen (about US$9.50). The portions are a bit too small for guys.

Drinks were separate. My ice coffee was 600 yen (about US$6), look at the size of the ice, it was huge! We both agreed that this place was expensive but worth it for the atmosphere.


After lunch, we walked to the JR torokko station, inside the station is an exhibition of older SL (steam locomotives).

It was weird seeing a piano, a gorgeous chandelier and the SL together in the same room.

As we made our way back to the Hankyu station, we noticed a sign advertising a great view.

We decided to check it out. The Arashiyama Monkey Park is located at the top of Mount Iwata.

The admission is 520 yen (about US$5.20) per person and it is worth it.

For the most part of the "hike" it is a steep climb up the hill. You can hear the monkeys rustling in the trees.

Before you go in there are several rules.

1. Don't stare the monkey in the eye
2. Don't touch the monkey
3. Don't feed the monkey outside of the feeding area
4. Don't take a picture on the way

I didn't read the 4th rule and Satoshi disregarded all of the above.

As we got to the top, there were two monkeys along the path, doing "their thing".

Satoshi decided to stare at the monkey (the one with the arrow), and pointed at it.

The monkey got pissed, screamed and chased him. Of course, Satoshi screamed and...ran...

Me, I stopped dead in my tracks and too frozen to move. So there I was with the groomed monkey to the right of me, and the angry monkey to the left of me, between Satoshi and me.

Satoshi kept calling me, come on Kat, come on Kat...but I was too scared. I could hear the monkey hissing at me.

Finally, the monkey gave up and walked away. I stared at the ground, but still it was scary.

I asked Satoshi, "didn't you see that you weren't supposed to stare at them". He said, "yeah, but I didn't think they would do anything."

I said, "but you shouldn't have ran." He said, "I didn't think it would follow me."

As if I weren't already perspiring enough from the humidity.... talk about panic.

So at the top, there was a beautiful view of Kyoto. There was also a resting area.

You could buy food to give the monkeys, but you could only feed them with you inside the resting area and the monkeys outside.

After all that stress, we climbed down the mountain and decided to have some soft serve or soft cream as it is called here. This one was tofu (white) and kuromame kinako (black bean with soy bean powder), the wafer sticking out is called yatsuhashi, it is a famous sweet in Kyoto and is made with cinnamon. The soft serve was not sweet and hit the spot.

Despite the humidity and unnecessary stress, we still had a nice day and made it home just before the rain.

Sagano-yu
4-3 Imahori-cho, Saga-Tenryuji
Ukyo-ku, Kyoto
Phone: 075.882.8985

Arashiyama Monkey Park
8 Genrokuyama-cho, Arashiyama
Nishikyo-ku, Kyoto
Phone: 075.872.0950
Open: 9:00-17:30 (closes earlier during autumn 16:30)
Closed only during severe weather conditions

Have a great weekend! and Happy 4th of July to you in the States!

arashiyama & uji

Satoshi had the day off today, so we went to check out the hasunohana (lotus flowers) in Arashiyama and Uji. The last time I went to Arashiyama was during cherry blossom season and the last time we went to Uji was last month to see the ajisai (hydrangea).

I got up at my regular time and made us a bento (boxed meal) for breakfast--tamagoyaki (omlette) with shiofukikonbu (seasoned dried kelp), asparagus with bacon, pickled veggies, ume (pickled plum), rakkyo (pickled shallots) and rice with tororokonbu (shaved kelp).

Our first stop was Arashiyama. I have often seen the empty pit at Tenryuji during Autumn and Spring, but never when the lotus flowers are in bloom.

Luckily, we were able to see them today. The lotus flowers are fenced in, so we had to use our zoom lens to get up close. There were lots of blooms and not many people so it was nice.

From Arashiyama, we caught the train to Uji and went to Mimurotoji. The lotus flowers were in pots in the courtyard of the temple so you could get pretty close to them.

Since it is a weekday, not too many people were out and about, so it was really nice and peaceful.

I was surprised at how tall they were!

After admiring the lotus flowers we headed back to Osaka for lunch and stopped at a cafe called Gokan. Gokan means 5-senses in Japanese. This cafe is located in an old bank building. I wrote about it (here).

Lunch was cold cuts, salad, brioche and croissant. There was also a nice matcha (green tea) dessert that came along with it.

It was a nice day (very humid), but nice in other ways.