As the title of this post implies, I made fried food! It was somewhat impulsive. I was cleaning out our freezer and I came across a pack of Nanka Seimen egg roll wrappers that I purchased quite a long time ago. To be honest, I'm not even sure when I bought these, but after defrosting them, they didn't have any noticeable freezer burn so I didn't want them to go to waste. I remembered a type of egg roll that my Mom used to make for us when...

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One of the benefits of visiting my parents on a weekly basis is that my Mom is sure to feed us something new and interesting. My Mom’s latest side dish, and a new favorite of mine is myoga no misozuke. Myoga, also known as myoga ginger, is native to Japan and Southern parts of Korea and is an edible flower bulb which grows similar to a root beneath the dirt. When I was younger I always wondered what this strange...

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This week is proving to be quite a busy week as we settle into a new routine and I get ready for a big celebration this weekend. Bebe E started nursery school last Thursday, but it was a day for her to acclimate to her new surroundings with the comfort of my presence in her classroom. However, the other day Bebe E went to school all by herself, and she didn’t shed a tear when we said our goodbyes. As a matter of fact, she was so eager to...

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  I haven’t wanted to cook much, and I’d like to blame my cooking “slump” on our recent heat wave, but the fact that we have the A/C blasting practically all day long, doesn’t really give me an excuse not to cook in our ice-box-home. :) Last week, when I was putting Bebe E to sleep, we were lying down after I read her a few stories, and she said to me, “Mommy, will you make me tomato soup.” I said,...

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  Whenever my husband and I enjoy a simple dinner of sashimi or temaki sushi (click for recipe) at home, I am always reminded of my Jiichan (grandpa), and my Baachan (grandma). (Photo: Halibut or Fluke, also known as hirame in Japanese.) Although my paternal grandparents moved to Japan before I completed elementary school, over the years, I was fortunate to spend a lot of time with them during my trips to the “land of the rising...

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There’s nothing more traditional in Japanese cuisine than cold tofu simply garnished with sliced green onions, katsuobushi (dried shaved bonito) and fresh grated ginger. This is exactly how my Mom served hiyayakko (cold tofu) to us all the years my brother and I were growing up. (Photo Credit: Hideki Ueha) Hiyayakko often made an appearance at dinner as an accompaniment to a meal of grilled fish, steamed rice, miso shiru (soup), and...

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  Growing up, one of my favorite vegetable dishes was yaki nasu, or grilled Japanese eggplant, simply served with shoyu and garnished with katsuo bushi and fresh grated ginger. (Photo Credit: Hideki Ueha) Most kids don’t like eggplant, and I might be deemed weird, but growing-up, I loved most all vegetables with the exception of the “forbidden three”: brussels sprouts, bell peppers and bitter melon. My favorite was eggplant,...

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  How about them LAKERS?!? ALL season, I haven’t blogged a peep about a single game played by my favorite L.A. Lakers – – – a complete anomaly! Right?!? (My past Lakers posts can be found under the Category section “Lakers”, if you are interested.) I admit that I was turned off by the lockout at the beginning of this season, coupled with the fact that Phil was no longer our fearless leader (I was slightly...

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