SuzySushi

Thanks, Susan! Hope your Internet's back to normal soon. That's very frustrating.

Enjoying my neighborhood yet? Sorry if the photos make everyone here jealous! I'll be discussing poi later on in the blog--that's a whole page on its own! Poi is not very Christmasy though, so today I'll stick to Christmas preps. Don't worry about bogarting my blog (where did that term come from, anyway?). I'm curious to hear what other people are doing to celebrate the holidays.

Sorry to hear you're chained to your computer! That's how I was, until mid-last week. What type of Pacific vegetables do you mean? I use a lot of Asian vegetables, many of which are grown here, such as bok choi, choi sum, ong choi, Japanese cucumbers, daikon, etc. But as for native Hawaiian vegetables, although I eat taro and taro leaves, I've never cooked them from scratch. Some of the markets here also carry a lot of Filipino favorites like sweet potato vines and other greens whose names I can't recall off the top of my head. From time to time I've tried them, but am generally disappointed -- either they taste like spinach, or they have a bitter note, which my husband enjoys in food but I don't. [Edited for spelling]

Good morning! I've just come back from walking Tuffy. The valley is beautiful and peaceful in the morning, with tiers of low mountains overhung by clouds visible in the distance. Sunrise in the valley The weather is cool in my valley, typically five to 10 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than Honolulu. Cool enough to wear a sweater or light jacket mornings and evenings in the winter. This morning, the temperature was 55F/13C. Don't laugh! That might be warm for winter by mainland standards, but not here where houses don't have central heating or extra insulation. I was planning to take you on a walk around my neighborhood, even before Sandy asked. . . This is what I experience in the morning when I walk the dog. Flowering bushes grow in profusion, even in the winter. (You can see some of the beautiful flowers at this link. Click on a type or color to see more species.) Bougainvillea in shades of fuchsia and orange. Red and yellow hibiscus. The yellow hibiscus is the State flower. Also yellow are the blooms of shrub-size hau trees. Pink and purple lantana. Fragrant white ginger and spider lily. Exotic bird of paradise… This one's right outside our door. I can't identify all the species of trees that surround us. Majestic eucalyptus and Norfolk Island pines interspersed with groves of slender bamboo. Flowering plumeria. Amazing African tulip trees with showy, six-inch trumpet-shaped flame-red or golden orange flowers. And lots of landscaped palm trees near the houses, a gazillion types, from date palms and stately royal palms, to fan palms and fern-like palms whose names I don't know. This is the path through the woods around our condo complex. An African tulip tree across the street On weekends like this, when traffic is light, the sounds of songbirds punctuate the early morning silence. (See pictures here.) Among the few I recognize are noisy mynah birds; Java sparrows, colorful with their hot pink beaks; Hawaiian cardinals (the males are grey and white, with red crests); Japanese white-eyes (small green finch-like birds); common house sparrows; zebra doves, which look like they're wearing blue eyeliner, and a few pigeon-size spotted doves; red-vented bulbuls with their loud songs; golden plovers, which migrate here in the winter; flocks of tiny twittering finches that disperse in a cloud of flight when I approach. We even get some lone white egrets. Near the stream across the street from our old house two blocks away, there lived a brood of wild chickens, a rooster and several hens. I'd hear and sometimes spot them in the mornings. No other wild animals, save for an occasional mongoose (introduced to Hawaii in the 1880s to control the rats that were feeding on Oahu's sugar cane -- only the rat is a nocturnal animal and the mongoose is diurnal, so the attempt failed). I hear tell there are feral pigs living in the woods nearby, but I've never caught a glimpse of them, except for one sorry specimen laced to the roof of an SUV recently, thoroughly dead and destined for someone's barbecue. I'll try to answer a few questions now. . . Let me know if the pictures are showing up too large for your computer screens, and I'll make the rest of them smaller.

Aloha and e komo mai! Hello, and welcome to a tropical Christmas from suburban Hawaii! I'm delighted to be doing my first "official" eGullet blog this week. To give you some background, I'm originally from NYC but moved to Hawaii 16 years ago. I live in a secluded valley in central Oahu with my husband Michael, our 10-year-old daughter Wendy, my grown stepson Daniel, and our 3-year-old Japanese spitz dog Tuffy. The area where we live is dense with pine and eucalyptus forests and cooler than most of the island. With its clusters of peaked-roof, delicately gray houses, it recalls an alpine village -- and I love it! My blog will record a combination of local traditions and personal eccentricities. We don't practice any religion, but Christmas preparations (and decorations) are pervasive in Hawaii, as are those for Japanese New Year's, and we celebrate both holidays in our own unique way. My daughter is off from school this week. So all bets are off as far as "normal routine" is concerned. We may have a houseful of her friends over -- or not, if everyone else is away. (You ain't seen nothin' till you've survived a sleepover with six giggling 10 year olds! ) The mad rush of cookie-baking and holiday shopping is almost over. Later today we're planning to decorate the gingerbread house (which we didn't get around to doing last week) and tonight we'll have a family dinner, just the four of us (plus the dog, of course). Tomorrow we're hosting Christmas dinner for nine, ranging in age from 10 to 70+. To keep things interesting, we don't have a dining room table! When it's just us, we normally (or maybe that should be abnormally!) eat at our computer desks or sitting in bed. This get-together will be buffet style, served on paper plates, and we'll scrounge up seating as we clean the house. During the week, we're planning to gawk at the Christmas displays downtown; tour the North Shore, where life is even more laid-back and we can sample some local treats; and shop for New Year's foods at a Japanese supermarket. Midweek, we're invited to a friend's home for more holiday festivities. And to cap off the week, in honor of eGullet, on Saturday we'll be throwing a backyard BBQ/luau/pool party. And now for some audience participation: I'd love to hear about your holiday traditions. It's 2 a.m. here now, so I'm going to catch some sleep. Meanwhile, nou ka hale. ("My home is your home" -- and please take your shoes off in the Hawaiian custom before you come inside.) Note: Throughout this blog, I'll mostly be using anglicized spelling, without the accent marks used in politically correct Hawaiian spelling. (Example: Hawaii vs. Hawai`i.) See you in the morning! Suzy

So, did you know how to make (and toss) pizza before you started working at that restaurant, or did you learn on the job?

I agree with Abra. The chocolate-dipped ones look very pretty! Is the one that's cut open in the center the same type, and could you post a recipe?

Celery leaves are the best part of celery, IMHO!

I've heard that pineapple cores are what pineapple processing plants make the canned/bottled pineapple juice from, after canning the softer parts as canned fruit. Pineapple cores are also delicious in lassi (blend with yogurt, sugar to taste, and enough water to thin for a "smoothie") -- a friend from Malaysia suggested this.

Are humans hard-wired to see holy images in chocolate, tortillas, or even a grilled cheese sandwich? Some scientists think so. LA Times article

These look absolutely fabulous. I love the variety in your selection, and your beautiful presentation. And thanks for the link to the pistachio-cranberry shortbread. Those look like a real winner, and will be one of the recipes I do in my annual cookie-baking assembly line next week.

OOOF!!! That puts all the jokes about Girl Scout (UK - Girl Guide) cookies to shame! And it brings up a converse story, told to me by a Japanese friend in New York. She had another Japanese friend who complained to her that the canned tuna in the United States tasted terrible. Turns out she couldn't read English well, and she'd been buying canned cat-food tuna. She thought the pictures of cats on the labels were the brand's logo.

Butter and soy sauce is also a great combo on corn on the cob!

Furikake popcorn is very popular locally in Hawaii, where it's marketed as "Hurricane Popcorn." Some people even mail packages to friends and relatives on the mainland!

Oh, geez, now you guys have me craving haw flakes! It's almost 11 on a Sunday night and noplace that sells them is open. Grumble grumble grumble.

What an exciting blog! I can't wait to read more and see more pictures!

Well, now it's my turn to have an "aHA!" moment. I have to try the miso in risotto!

Japanese rice also makes for decent paella.

Oh, geez, where do I start??? Soy sauce... miso (good in dressings & marinades)... panko in place of Western breadcrumbs for almost every application. Wasabi is also good in dressings & marinades, as well as in mashed potatoes. I love ponzu sauce and a splash of that often makes its way into salads. Soba sauce is good as a dip for cold leftover plain spaghetti! Matcha as a flavoring for baked goods like cookies or cakes. I'm sure I'll think of a dozen more in the morning when I'm more lucid!

Oh, yeah, there was this lamb cake I baked one Easter, using a mold a friend had bought at a garage sale. When I umolded the cake, the head cracked off. I cemented it back together with frosting, with a couple of judiciously-placed toothpicks, frosted and coconutted the whole cake, and no one was much the wiser. After a second try using that cake mold didn't work, it went to the Goodwill pile.

In one of the other threads, Swisskaese observed that if guests are strictly orthodox, they may have a problem with your plates and utensils. I found that to be the case with the husband of one friend, who refused to eat or drink anything that was served in my home because it was prepared in a non-kosher kitchen. Yet, another kosher friend ate a vegetarian meal I prepared. To play it safe, I would ask the guests ahead of time.

Have you tried one of those nonstick Japanese rice paddles? They're made of white plastic with little nubbles. Not elegant, but they do the job!

I don't know why the "rule of thumb" (or knuckle) method works, just that it does! This is how I learned to cook rice in a saucepan from my Asian friends. It seems to work no matter what the size of the saucepan, as long as the amount of rice is proportionate to the size of the pan -- e.g., I wouldn't try to cook just 1 cup of raw rice in a 5-quart Dutch oven. Maybe as Sheetz suggested, the water level above the rice is meant to account for evaporation as the pan comes to a boil. I know that another Asian method of cooking rice, besides covering the pot at the outset, is to bring the rice and water to a boil uncovered and cook until the water above the rice evaporates and pinholes appear on the surface, then cover, turn the heat to the lowest setting, and steam until the rice is fully cooked. [edited for spelling]

I vote for a head-and-torso shot, with or without hands!

Memory might be serving me incorrectly, but I thought other people do munch on the dried salty shrimp as snacks. Leastwise, I seem to remember seeing packets hanging from a rack at a checkout stand at one of the supermarkets here. They might have had other spices as well. Have to go hunt that down now and photograph a packet for documentation! (They're too salty for my health...) Likewise, doesn't everyone (in the know, that is) eat haw flakes?