Chinese New Year arrived quite early this year on Monday, January 23, 2012. I wasn’t prepared for it as I was still recovering from Oshogatsu (Japanese New Year’s) and dealing with life’s curve-balls. I debated whether I would cook this year or not; whether I would write a 2012 Chinese New Year’s post. Last year, I was highly motivated and made two dishes: Chinese – style egg rolls and Jai (or Buddha’s...
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The holiday season is in full swing! Earlier last week I was feeling a bit overwhelmed with all that I needed to do, yet all-in-all it’s been great. Most all of our Christmas shopping is now done, presents are wrapped and under our decorated tree. Christmas cards have been sent. Bebe E “wrote” her letter to Santa and even visited him and his elves (twice) at South Coast Plaza. She told Santa she wants a bicycle (a.k.a....
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Agedashi tofu is one of my favorite Japanese appetizers. We order this regularly if we happen to be dining at a Japanese restaurant, but interestingly, it’s not something my Mom made for us when we were growing up. I think this is because the tofu is fried. On a good note, it’s only fried for 3 to 4 minutes. (Does that really make a difference? Probably not, if it’s fried, it’s fried, right!) Big Onechan also loves...
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The convenience of having a Japanese supermarket near my home is that I can pop on over to the store to pick-up a few things, but more importantly, I can buy sashimi for a really simple and quick dinner. We don’t feed Big Onechan sashimi since her idea of sushi is an avocado roll or tamago, and Bebe E is too young for sashimi, but when I need a quick dinner for Bebe Dada and I, my go-to item is inexpensive wild maguro (tuna) from the...
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One of the easiest appetizers I enjoy serving (and eating) is bruschetta. And let’s be clear that the Italian pronunciation for bruschetta is: brus’ket.ta. Note, the “ch” is pronounced with a HARD “k”, not a “sh”. It drives me up the wall when I ask for brus’ket.ta at a restaurant, only to be incorrectly corrected by a server with a response that goes something like, “you mean, you...
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I love Fall, not just because of the mild, yet cooler weather (with the exception of the 90 – plus degree temperatures we experienced last week) and the color of the leaves changing (in limited areas of Southern California), but because of all the wonderful festivities that take place in the Fall such as Halloween, family birthdays, and Thanksgiving. By far, Halloween is one of my FAVORITE holidays, but ironically I married Bebe Dada who...
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It’s rare when I start writing a post and I have absolutely nothing to write about. My mind is blank. Yes, I could go strait to talking about the food, but that would be a little like my last post – a little boring, no? Since squid, or ika in Japanese, is from the sea, I decided share a few photos from summer related to, you guessed it, the sea! I’ve been fortunate to have always lived within two to four miles from the...
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Surprise! I’m alive! OK, I’m just being obnoxious. Two weeks, going on three, is probably the longest I have EVER gone without updating my blog. I’m not sure why, but time has REALLY been flying by the last few weeks and on Friday, I realized that a few weeks had passed without a new post! Horribly shocking, I know! (Photo Credit: Hideki Ueha) Perhaps the weeks have been flying by because school and soccer season started....
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