Christmas in Japan

[prasantrin]

What I want to know is your and your mother's usual food preferences.  Do you two usually go for Italian food?  What kind of food do you usually have back home?

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Interestingly, we very rarely eat Italian food in Canada, not even at home, and my mother has always said doesn't really care for it too much. When I was younger, we would have spaghetti every so often, but as an adult, I would sometimes go out for Italian with friends, but it wasn't something I often craved. In Japan, though, I tend to eat pasta more because it's easy to make, and easy to transport (for my bento when I'm working). But my mother almost never eats Italian. We had Italian once last summer, but that was it for the entire two months I was home. We ate at Trattoria Ihatovo three times in 8 days! That's more than we've eaten at Italian restaurants in Winnipeg over the last 2 or 3 years!

This restaurant, along with many Italian restaurants in Japan, is so very different from what is available in most of Canada (and perhaps even in the US). While I've never been to Italy, I think good Italian restaurants in Japan are closer to what one would get in the country of origin--fresh ingredients, simple dishes with the flavours of the ingredients really shining. In most of Canada, Italian food is what one gets at the Olive Garden (chain restaurant). Even the restaurants owned by Italian families serve food similar to Olive Garden food. Heavy on the sauce (either tomato or very heavy cream sauces), overcooked pasta--that's Italian food most Canadians are used to.

We usually eat rice and foods that go well with rice. When my mom's alone, she eats a lot of fish and vegetables, and simple soups. In Japan, I often make easy foods that will last me a week--mac&cheese or lasagne, chicken (roast or oven-fried), Chinese dishes like sweet and sour pork or mabodofu...

When my dad was alive, we ate more Thai food, but it's rare that we eat that at home now. We do often dine at our friend's Thai restaurant, so we get our Thai fix that way. We also eat a lot of Chinese food when we go out to eat.

One of the things I love about Japan, and that I miss when I'm not here, is the variety and quality of the foods and pastries one can get. Even when I lived in Ujiie (Tochigi-ken), we had a little Italian restaurant that had a wood-burning oven for making pizzas that most Canadians would not think of eating (the average Canadian would balk at having potatoes and gorgonzola on pizza!). The cakes and pastries, too, are far and above the quality and variety I can get in Winnipeg.

Of course, when I'm in Japan, I miss Old Dutch potato chips, Greek food (which I don't eat very often, but I like it), and good Cantonese food (especially dim sum!). And sweet potatoes!

[prasantrin]

On December 21st, we made our way to Kyoto again for the Toji-in Flea Market.

Held on the beautiful grounds just outside the temple area, the flea market is quite different from what it was way back when I first lived in Kyoto ('93-'95). Back then it was a couple of dozen stalls selling mostly used goods of varying interest and quality. Now, however, it was a jam-packed with goods of all kinds.

Right from the beginning, food was a big part of the market.

Lots of beans

Anyone know what these ones are used for? They were a beautiful shade of purple.

and other things

This stall was selling those little fish, like the ones used for chirimen jako. See the lady behind the umbrella? She's standing in the line for this stall. See all those people behind her? They're also in line. There are about a dozen more people around the corner that you can't see, and I think we counted about 30 people in total at one point. I'm not sure why this particular stall was so popular, but it was doing scads more business than similar stalls.

Mom ate the suji from this stall. She said it wasn't very flavourful, and the suji was still a bit tough. She also complained that other people got more suji than she (she had a lot of konnyaku in hers), and that she needed rice to really appreciate it.

I had these mochi dango. Still warm from the pit, they were perfect!

A tai-yaki stand. These weren't as detailed or as neatly made as the ones Peter Green had in Korea.

Wasabi was only Y400 per root! And those piles of ginger were only Y200 each! So much cheaper than the supermarket, but I didn't buy any.

This woman was selling 6 or 7 types of chimaki, but after having just steamed my own sticky rice in lotus leaves that morning, I didn't want any. My mother, on the other hand, happily obliged in buying an unagi chimaki, with its teeny piece of unagi and nice plump sansho.

Scads of mentaiko. Mom would have liked some, but we were going to be out for many more hours, so we passed.

We bought a few non-food things that day--some old kimono (three for Y2000), Nishiki indigo-dyed fabric scraps, and my mother's beloved geta-like sandals. We almost bought them at a store in Arashiyama, but she decided against it, then promptly regretted not buying them. As we were leaving Toji-in, who should we see but the guy from Arashiyama selling the same sandals for the same price! We couldn't pass them up this time.

On our way to the bus stop, we passed a shop selling freshly-grilled unagi. It looked and smelled delicious, but we were on our way to lunch so we had to pass.

Edited January 3, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[prasantrin]

For lunch on the 21st, we went to Ten-you (the bento.com site spells it "Tenyu", but the restaurant, itself, transliterates the kanji as "Ten-you"). It's owned by the famous Tawaraya Ryokan which is oft visited by the famous and fortunate of the world (rates start at roughly Y50 000 per person, regardless of how many people are sharing a room).

I have no pictures, but I love this shop. Although I doubt Ten-you is the best tempura shop in Japan (though I do prefer it to Ten-ichi), I still love it. It's really the shop, itself, that I love. The word "genteel" comes to mind when I think to describe it. The decor is so very simple simple yet sophisticated. And I always feel as though I am a very special guest when I am there. Some might think of it as a place for snobs, but it's not pretentious in any way. It's pure Kyoto, and I mean that positively.

I had the tendon kaiseki (Y3600 or thereabouts)--a huge bowl of tendon preceded by three other dishes. I can't remember what they were, but they were delicious. The tendon was good, but I prefer a sweeter sauce. My mother had the cheapest kaiseki set (which was about Y5500). I can't remember how many pieces of tempura she had (served piece by piece as they were fried), but the highlights were the shrimp (including her beloved shrimp head) and the scallops. She still talks about how sweet the scallop was, and how perfectly it was cooked.

After lunch we walked around a bit, then went to Daimaru (my favourite department store in Japan, and the Kyoto branch is my favourite branch) to pick up some treats.

I love packaging in Japan, as wasteful as it is!

M. Debailleul used either dry ice or ice packs for their treats, plus a nice padded wrapper to protect my goodies. I bought two coffee macarons (packed with dry ice) and one pistachio something--dacquoise (packed with an ice pack)? They were excellent. I wish I had bought more, but I can always go back!

Enfant had really wonderful Florentine bars. The crust was rich and buttery. I ended up eating most of the two bars I bought for us.

Angelique is based in Tokyo. I bought brown macarons, and more brown macarons. Actually, I think two were caramel and two were coffee. They weren't very good, and we still have three of them in my fridge. I suspected they might not be very good, because they weren't refrigerated when I bought them, and I wasn't given any sort of cooling system with which to carry them home. The folks at Debailleul gave me very strict instructions for the care of my goodies (definitely put them in the fridge within 90 minutes, don't jostle them around, etc. etc), but this place didn't seem to care how I handled them. I could have sat on them and farted and they probably wouldn't have cared. Perhaps that would have improved their flavour...

Just a few more shots to show from the following day. On the 22nd, we attended my student's piano recital (she won a competition recently). May I mention not-so-briefly about the talent of Japanese musicians? The performers in this recital all placed in or won their categories for a piano competition in the Takarazuka are of Kyoto. We had intended to go later, since my student would be the second last to perform, but we ended up arriving there on time. The first performer was an adorable little boy somewhere between the ages of four and six. When his name was called, he ran onto the stage with a huge grin and bowed dramatically. When he took his place on his much propped up piano chair (and put his little feet on his very cool pedal extender, the likes of which I had never seen before), we were prepared to be bored to sleep with his version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars or whatever beginner piece he would be playing. He was a pre-schooler, after all.

But this little boy played a piece more difficult than we expected with such musicality that my mother and I were stunned into embarrassment. We were not only embarrassed for thinking his performance would be boring, but we were also embarrassed for our own meager talents. My mother was quite a good technical player when she was young, but these kindergarten and grade school children blew her out of the water! We couldn't help but laugh at ourselves. It makes me wonder if so many more Japanese have an innate talent for music than, for example, Canadians, or if it's that they are given more opportunities to have that talent nurtured.

On to my food. One station away from the hall of the recital was a little counter selling roll cakes. Gokoku can only be found at two locations, neither of which is particularly convenient to me. That's actually a good thing, because if either were closer, I'd be really large. The cakes are soft and delicate, but flavourful.

Strawberry Millefeuille (look at that cool box!)

Earl Grey Souffle

eta pictures of brown macarons

Edited January 3, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[sanrensho]

Hi Rona, and Happy New Year. I'm enjoying this blog a lot, especially the dessert photos.

Coincidentally, I made two roll cakes (matcha biscuit w/azuki mascarpone cream, macha biscuit w/macha mascarpone cream and ama natto) for a New Year's Eve party that we had a few days ago. So the matcha liqueur that you sent me is being put to good use.

My wife occasionally gets the purple beans sent to us from her parents. She boils and braises them much in the same way as the kuro mame that are omnipresent in Japan during Oshogatsu. The flavor and texture is excellent, IMO.

[Hiroyuki]

I was going to say the same thing about the purple beans (murasaki hana mame).

As for wasabi, I can get it for similar prices (less than 400 yen) at a local supermarket here. Wasabi ranges greatly in price depending on the quality.

Edited to add: Maybe it's only me, but I have never seem that type of millefeuille... I only know the multi-layered type. Is that a popular one?

Edited January 3, 2008 by Hiroyuki (log)

[helenjp]

Those purple beans get simmered in shoyu in Shikoku。 They are not sweet, which seems rare in Japanese bean cookery. Haven't had any recently, but they used to be extremely salty, and rather hard and powdery.

So did you hand out a few macarons at the piano recital?

[prasantrin]

sanrensho--good to know the liqueur is being put to good use! I found some little bottles of the Dover matcha liqueur if you're interested in doing a comparison. The store doesn't always have the matcha in stock, but I can always keep my eye open! And thanks for the info on the beans--those sweet kuromame are actually one of the few ways I like to eat beans (generally speaking, I hate beans).

Hiroyuki--Less than Y400 for one wasabi root? I don't think I've ever seen that price where I am. One of the things I really miss about living in the sticks is all the cheap produce. In my case, I used to get huge bags of home-grown foods for free from co-workers--kiwi fruit, persimmons, yuzu, rice...I never get that where I am now! There was a little plot of land near the school where I work that was farmed, and the owner used to sell his produce quite cheaply (most things were about Y100 or Y200), but he sold out and an apartment building is going up there now.

[sanrensho]

sanrensho--good to know the liqueur is being put to good use!  I found some little bottles of the Dover matcha liqueur if you're interested in doing a comparison.  The store doesn't always have the matcha in stock, but I can always keep my eye open! 

Thanks so much for offering. I think I'll be OK, as long as my trip to Japan this year pans out (crosses fingers).

[prasantrin]

It's now January 11th, my mother has come and gone (she left on the 7th), and I still haven't even gotten to Christmas! But now that my VCR/DVD player with BS-decoder is broken, I have no English-language shows to watch on TV, and now that I have also misplaced my TV remote, so I can't even make my TV speak English to me, I have plenty of free time to finish.

Hiroyuki: I have no idea why that roll cake was called millefeuille, because it wasn't anything like millefeuille. At first I thought it was coated with pieces of puff pastry, but they were almonds. Maybe the shop thinks the extra layer of icing and sliced almonds make the cake layered like millefeuille?

Helen: I love the anecdote about your former FIL! Yes, Hankyu is really a wonderful department store. I hope they renovate it soon, though. The depachika always makes me feel claustrophobic. I've never been able to go when it wasn't packed with people, and it's so poorly arranged that it's difficult to get around. eta: And macarons never get shared! Except I probably should have shared those ones from Angelique, because the last three are still in my fridge! And that's really saying something about how crappy they are...

Now, on to my holidays. My holidays started on Dec. 21, and we were supposed to go to Koyasan on the 21st and 22nd, but we postponed to attend my student's piano recital. Instead, we left bright and early on the 23rd for Koyasan.

Koyasan is the birthplace of Japanese Buddhism. It's a very holy place for Japanese who practise Shingon Buddhism, and you'll see many pilgims with their hats and bells, hiking around the mountain to get to each sacred site. It's quite a beautiful place, and if you're visiting Japan and you have the time, you really should try to visit it. It's quite different from the rest of Japan--it's very peaceful and the air is so fresh. We didn't arrive in Koyasan until around noon--it only takes about 2 1/2 hours from my place, but we took our time with train transfers, so it took us around 3 hours. The first place we visited was our shukubo (temple inn) to drop off our things, and take a brief rest.

All inns in Japan give you a little snack and the necessities for making tea.

I particularly liked this little cookie--I ate a monk!

Then we started our sightseeing. One of the most interesting places to visit is Okunoin Cemetery. You'll see many pilgrims passing through here.

It's the largest graveyard in Japan, and it has an interesting mix of "tombstones".

The guy on the right has a rasta/rainbow thing going on.

And what was this one for? The employees of an airline? I thought it was rather cool, and it looked like something you'd find in Roswell, not that I've ever been to Roswell.

My mother started to get tired, so we found a little bench she could rest at until I got back from Okunoin. I don't have any pictures of Okunoin because you are not allowed to take pictures on the grounds, but I think it's one of the more beautiful places I have visited in Japan. It's the mausoleum of Kukai, who is the founder of Shingon Buddhism, so it is considered to be a very holy place--no pictures, no food or drink, no smoking, etc on the grounds. Unfortunately, you can find many, many pictures of the grounds and even the inside of the hall on the internet, taken by those people (mostly non-Japanese tourists) who don't give a crap about respecting other people's religions, beliefs, or customs. But I digress...

At 3:30-ish, it started to get foggy. It was beautiful, but who wants to spend time in a graveyard when it's dark and foggy? Actually, I would have, because I think it would have been beautiful. But along with the fog, a chill set in, so we head back to our shukubo.

Edited January 11, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[prasantrin]

Back at our shukubo, called Eko-in, we got ready to take a bath before dinner. I prefer to take baths a little later in the evening, so I remain warm and toasty when I go to bed, but my mother was wary of taking baths with others, so she went early, hoping to avoid other guests. Unfortunately, there was one other guest (another non-Japanese) who had the same idea, so she was stuck!

This is me trying to look coquettish in my yukata.

And that will be the last picture you'll see of me here...don't say I didn't warn you about my mother's photography skills!

Our dinner--completely vegetarian, as it is temple cuisine. At this shukubo, there were two options for dinner--Y10 000 and Y12000. I tried to request one of each, but I guess you could only choose one option per room, so we had the Y12 000 dinner. Y12 000 isn't only for the dinner, by the way, but includes the price of the accomodations.

Clockwise beginning at the top: konnyaku (I don't particularly care for konnyaku, and this wasn't any better or worse than other konnyaku I've had), edible flower simmered in something sour/sweet, seaweed, cucumber, some kind of fruit (it was quite tasty!), and pineapple.

Gomadofu with a bit of wasabi. I like gomadofu a lot, and luckily, my mother was quite full, so she gave me most of hers!

Left to right: vegetables wrapped in egg, wakame roll? (nothing inside), snow peas, and something like kamaboko but not kamaboko (it was better!). Behind it all is Koyadofu, which is really is really just dehydrated tofu. It was like a sponge (in texture and, I imagine, in taste), but I ate it, anyway. And my mother's, too!

Tempura--you can never go wrong with fried food!

Soba--it was mushy, but I ate it, anyway (notice a theme, here?)

Our soup. I wanted to buy some of the little candy-like balls of flour (what are they called, again?), but I never got around to it. They're so cute!

I can't remember what this was. Yuba?

My mother enjoying her meal. We had to prop her up on many zabuton because she has knee and hip problems. That was one of my worries about staying at a shukubo--they're not really designed for people with mobility problems. But one of my mother's dreams in life was to lie on tatami mat, so I'm happy to say I have helped fulfil one of her dreams!

We got a souvenir from the inn!

And they're engraved! The left chopstick says "Koyasan Ekoin" and I don't know what the right one says--something about long happiness?

Edited January 11, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[Hiroyuki]

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I can see the characters:

航空　aviation

殉難者　martyr

之碑　's monument

Thanks for this post of yours. You reminded me of something I have forgotten for decades. The history of Japan!

Edited January 11, 2008 by Hiroyuki (log)

[prasantrin]

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I can see the characters:

航空　aviation

殉難者　martyr

之碑　's monument

Thanks for this post of yours. You reminded me of something I have forgotten for decades. The history of Japan!

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So it's for the kamikaze pilots? We thought that might be the case, but weren't sure. There were many war memorials throughout the graveyard--not just for Japanese, but for other countries' soldiers, as well. I really wish I had gotten one of the audio guides. Many of the monuments were included in the guide, but when we were at the tourist information center, I didn't think to get one.

What a mistake that was! Next time!

[Hiroyuki]

So it's for the kamikaze pilots?  We thought that might be the case, but weren't sure.  There were many war memorials throughout the graveyard--not just for Japanese, but for other countries' soldiers, as well.  I really wish I had gotten one of the audio guides.  Many of the monuments were included in the guide, but when we were at the tourist information center, I didn't think to get one. 

What a mistake that was!  Next time!

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I'm not sure but probably not.

The "balls of flour" are temari fu (wheat gluten shaped like handballs).

The characters on the right chopstick are:

厄除　yaku yoke (expell evil)

長寿 Choju (longevity)

箸 bashi (chopstick)

[prasantrin]

I'm not sure but probably not.

Perhaps just those who have died in plane accidents, then.

The "balls of flour" are temari fu (wheat gluten shaped like handballs).

The characters on the right chopstick are:

厄除　yaku yoke (expell evil)

長寿 Choju (longevity)

箸 bashi (chopstick)

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I love fu! I once had fried fu somewhere in Arashiyama, and though I am already biased toward anything fried being good, fried fu was really outstanding.

I shall use my chopsticks with the hopes that they will help expel evil from my body while giving my long life...

On to the rest of Koyasan...

We were quite tired that night, since neither of slept well the night before, and we got up earlier than we normally would have. Combine that with a lot of walking, and you have the ingredients for a great night's sleep! NOT!

I don't know why neither of us slept well. It was very cold that night, but that doesn't normally affect us (we're from Winnipeg, you know, so we're used to cold). We were both wide awake at 5, and just before 7, I left to attend morning prayer services while my mother decided to try to catch a bit more sleep.

Morning prayer services were held in the dimly lit lantern hall (room?). Two monks chanted while the guests (there were 16 of us in total--4 Japanese and the rest non-Japanese) watched. I think the monks were chanting prayers for the dead, but I could be wrong. No pictures allowed. My mother came in about 5 minutes after prayers started. She was brought by a monk who came by the room twice to make sure she was up and out. I guess everyone has to attend the services (in part because that's the time when the futons are put away and breakfast is set up).

After the morning prayer services, we went to another building where the fire ceremony was held. This ceremony is, I think, to purify the souls of the living of greed, anger, and stupidity (I read that somewhere). Again, no pictures allowed. But I don't think the ceremony worked for everyone present, because one tourist set up his digital camera in such a way that the monks wouldn't notice it, and he proceded to film the whole ceremony. He was stupid, and I was angry. This was also the same guy who took up four seats on a very crowded bus (his bags needed their own seats, you see) on the way back to the train station.

After all the ceremonies were over, we retreated to our rooms and found our breakfasts.

Some kind of green vegetables with grated nagaimo

Slices of nagaimo served with a smidgen of ume-flavoured sauce, and a side of something simmered. The simmered thing reminded me of exoskeletons, but it was actually quite tasty.

Egg?

and miso soup to warm your bowels.

We spent the rest of the day wandering around, trying to get to the various temple sites, and missing buses by seconds. The latter was very upsetting, because buses only come about once an hour in Koysan. The town is small enough to be able to walk everywhere, but with joint problems, it was very difficult for my mother, so at the end of the day, we took a taxi back to our shukubo, picked up our bags, and made our way back home.

But this was Christmas Eve, and it was going to be late by the time we got home, so we needed to pick up some food for dinner.

At the depachika in Takashimaya in Namba, I got some fried chicken (nothing says Christmas in Japan like fried chicken!) for myself, and some teriyaki chicken for my mother! How cute is the little leg skirt they give you? The teriyaki wasn't very good, though.

Edited January 11, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[prasantrin]

Merry Christmas!

Belated, that is...I can't even claim to be on time for Orthodox Christmas! I did say I was very good at procrastinating, didn't I?

Christmas morning, my mother went to mass while I went to the gym. There were actually a lot of people at the gym, probably working out so they would look hot for their Christmas dates. Christmas in Japan, you see, is a time for families or couples. Many a love hotel is full on Christmas Day...

My date was my mother. We had lunch reservations at our favourite Italian restaurant--our third meal there in 8 days. Gee, do you think my mother liked the place? We had made reservations for the special Christmas lunch.

The food is quite good here, but one of my favourite things about the place is the cutlery rests.

They have cats and dogs, but I always get the cat.

Freebie dish (I guess we were regulars by this point, so we qualified for freebies)--the ouefs en cocotte I mentioned the first time I wrote about this place. It was just as good as the first time, and this time we had bread to go along with it!

Roast Beef Salad with Red Wine Reduction.

Pasta course--my mother ordered the carbonara, and I had the bolognese. I thought hers was too rich, but she really loved it. Both were full servings, which was a bit much, but we managed!

Main course--My mother had the scallops with mushrooms, and I had the roast chicken. I didn't like the scallops--the sauce was quite sweet to my tastes, but my mother really enjoyed it. The chicken was simply but pefectly cooked--moist and juicy, and the skin was crispy! The potatoes on the side were not very interesting. They weren't bad, but I just find potatoes in Japan generally lack flavour, and are rather dry/grainy.

We were so stuffed at this point, that while my mother managed to finish her food, I left almost all the potatoes on my plate. But dessert was still to come.

I had the strawberry cream cake (strawberry shortcake is the traditional Christmas cake in Japan, I think), and my mother had the tiramisu. The strawberry cream cake was quite light, and very refreshing after all the food we had just eaten. The tiramisu was OK, but it wasn't the best example of tiramisu, I thought. My mother had no problem finishing it, though.

This was an excellent Christmas meal, and an excellent value! Each course was a full-sized serving, but we paid only Y2200 each for our meals. It was really too much food for us, though, and we didn't even bother with dinner that evening.

Edited January 12, 2008 by prasantrin (log)

[CaliPoutine]

And that will be the last picture you'll see of me here...don't say I didn't warn you about my mother's photography skills! 

But I really want to see a non fuzzy picture!!

[Hiroyuki]

Some kind of green vegetables with grated nagaimo

Slices of nagaimo served with a smidgen of ume-flavoured sauce, and a side of something simmered.  The simmered thing reminded me of exoskeletons, but it was actually quite tasty.

Egg?

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The "green vegetables" look like warabi to me with nameko.

The "something simmered" looks like artificial meat made from soybeans. I was once given something like this, and it contained some julienned ginger.

Egg? It looks like ganmodoki (made with tofu and vegetables) to me.

In #35, you mentioned konnyaku. It looks like sashimi konnyaku, so it should taste better than regular konnyaku! But pineapple in a Japanese dish!? And, mushy soba...

Thanks for showing us a good example of shojin ryori. Everything looked so bland!

[prasantrin]

Craaaaaaappppp!!!!! I just lost my New Year's post! I'm annoyed! Do we have an "annoyed" smiley that isn't a smiley?

Randi--I found another picture that isn't so blurry, and I put it in my New Year's post, but since that has disappeared, you'll just have to wait a little bit longer! Except it's still not a great picture--backlighting and all...

Hiroyuki--is that the same warabi as the warabi in warabi mochi? Isn't it somewhat carcinogenic? I thought the egg thing was tofu, but it tasted more like egg to me. The pineapple was a bit out of place, but what was the red fruit? I didn't think it was ume, because it was bumpy, and it was very sweet. I didn't think the food was very bland. I rather liked it, except for the mushy soba and the spongy koyadofu. I was thinking that I should eat like that every day. I would lose weight for sure! But I don't think I could eat more than two meals in a row of it...

Now I'm going to try to compose my New Year's post again in such a way not to lose the whole frickin' thing if my IE dies again.

[Hiroyuki]

Craaaaaaappppp!!!!!  I just lost my New Year's post!  I'm annoyed!  Do we have an "annoyed" smiley that isn't a smiley?

Randi--I found another picture that isn't so blurry, and I put it in my New Year's post, but since that has disappeared, you'll just have to wait a little bit longer!  Except it's still not a great picture--backlighting and all...

Hiroyuki--is that the same warabi as the warabi in warabi mochi?  Isn't it somewhat carcinogenic?  I thought the egg thing was tofu, but it tasted more like egg to me.  The pineapple was a bit out of place, but what was the red fruit?  I didn't think it was ume, because it was bumpy, and it was very sweet.  I didn't think the food was very bland.  I rather liked it, except for the mushy soba and the spongy koyadofu.  I was thinking that I should eat like that every day.  I would lose weight for sure!  But I don't think I could eat more than two meals in a row of it...

Now I'm going to try to compose my New Year's post again in such a way not to lose the whole frickin' thing if my IE dies again.

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Take it easy, rona. You said you had plenty of free time, didn't you?

I meant warabi shoots. Warabi mochi is made with starch extracted from warabi roots. Warabi shoots are carcinogenic, but don't worry. Eating that amount of warabi won't do you any harm.

I can't tell what the fruit is. It's kind of fuzzy in that photo.

I don't like koyadofu, either. But my father, who is from Shinshu (Nagano), likes it very much. (Koyadofu is called shimi dofu in Shinshu.)

[prasantrin]

Here I go again!!!

Happy New Year! I’m only 11 days late—not nearly as late as I was for Christmas!

January 1st, my mother went to mass while I went to the gym (notice another trend here?). My gym was open Jan. 1, but closed Jan. 2-4, so I figured I should start my new year out right! Maybe this will bode well for my resolution to get back to my pre-summer gym attendance. Or not…

After we each returned home, we went to Mondoyakujin, also called Tokoji. Mondoyakujin (Japanese link, brief English explanation here) is a little bit famous in my area, but in my four years of living just a 5-minute walk away, I had never been there. Technically, I still haven’t been there because we only went that way for one thing…the food stalls, specifically the takoyaki stall!

I don’t know why my mother loves takoyaki so much, but every time she comes to Japan, she has to have takoyaki. The stall we went to had just run out before we got there, so we had to wait about 10 minutes for a new batch (there were other customers ahead of us, too). While she waited in line, I went to get some cotton candy (just a 5-minute wait). I returned in time to find this…

Look how happy she is!

This version had fairly large pieces of tako, too.

After getting the takoyaki, we returned home. We were just a few minutes downhill from the temple, but my mother’s back and knee were bothering her, so we left. And that was our New Year’s Day!

On January 2, we went to my neighbour’s house to celebrate the new year with them. Much food was involved, of course!

For Randi, a sort of non-blurry picture of me! Not taken by my mother, of course.

It’s still not a very clear picture, but it’s better than the other ones!

We each got our own little box of food. Almost everything was purchased—one of those department store osechi things, but a few things were made by my neighbour (she’s also my landlord, by the way). I know the kuromame were made by her, but I’m not sure about the other things.

There was plenty of other food, too

And it can’t be New Year’s without tai! This is tai, right? We had already eaten some of it, so they flipped the skin back so I could take a prettier picture .

Then we had tea. Jasmine tea. I’d never seen jasmine tea like this before, but the back of the bottle said “jasmine”, so it must have been jasmine. We really enjoyed it, and now I’m on the search for some whole jasmine tea (but then I also need to get a glass tea pot in which to brew it )

We also had some goodies from Tokyo—these were all very good, especially the meringue! And we were lucky enough to be given the rest of the box to take home! Also in the box were sembei with different New Year’s pictures stamped in them, and some delicious dehydrated apple slices (no pictures of the apple slices).

I just have a few more shots, but those will have to wait until next week as I don’t have a card reader at home.

[Hiroyuki]

I just can't believe this! What gorgeous osechi! I can't even imagine how much it cost! Ise ebi (spiny lobster)!

I have never associated New Year's Day with tai ... Only mochi, o-zoni, and some osechi for me...

[SuzySushi]

What a wonderful blog! I don't mind that you're late for Christmas and New Year's... keep on going!

[prasantrin]

I just can't believe this!  What gorgeous osechi!  I can't even imagine how much it cost!  Ise ebi (spiny lobster)! 

I have never associated New Year's Day with tai ...  Only mochi, o-zoni, and some osechi for me...

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I'm very fortunate to have such generous neighbours who love to share meals with me! They really are wonderful people--an old Nishinomiya family who have lived on the same property for hundreds of years. They built the apartment in which I live (it's a small building, with only four apartments, and it's right behind their house) specifically for the foreign English teachers at my school, so in the past, they often invited us over for special meals. My first summer here I attended a barbeque extravaganza at their house (I used to have pictures up somehwere--meats and vegetables from all over Japan, etc.), and the following Christmas, they had a chef come to their home and prepare a luxurious Italian meal (complete with truffles!). I still get invited over sometimes, though my co-workers have not been so fortunate.

I guess I've been lucky with tai. I've only spent o-shogatsu in Japan twice (the first was about 14 years ago), but I've always had tai. I don't really care for it that much (and this version was very very dry), but I always feel honoured when my hosts offer it to me. My first New Year's was also my first experience with ikura at a friend's house (in rural Shiga--her family owned a golf course out there). Another friend (also a Canadian) and I didn't know it was expensive, and to my embarrassment, we ate almost the whole dish of it! But I realized my love for it then!

We had Kansai-style (I think they said it was Kansai-style) o-zoni, too, but I didn't get a picture. It was sweeter than o-zoni I've had before. My neighbour made it herself, and she even cut the red carrots (which I didn't know were indigenous to Japan, or so they told me) into flower-like shapes.

[prasantrin]

A couple of more complete pictures of our osechi meal. These are pictures taken of pictures my neighbour gave me of the meal, so they're a bit blurry (I don't have a scanner, and I didn't want to ask her to email me the pictures).

These are the three main boxes of food.

And in this picture, you can see the tai before it was cut into, and all 5 boxes of food.

Before my mother and I arrived, they had distributed most of the boxes into our individual osechi boxes.

As I mentioned earlier, there were some things they cooked themselves that you won't see in the boxes. I might not have taken pictures of all of them, but I've already posted the pictures I did take.

[smallworld]

Clockwise beginning at the top:  konnyaku (I don't particularly care for konnyaku, and this wasn't any better or worse than other konnyaku I've had), edible flower simmered in something sour/sweet, seaweed, cucumber, some kind of fruit (it was quite tasty!), and pineapple.

The fruit looks like a yamamomo (mountain peach), called yumberry in English.

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Beautiful! I love Koyasan, and you're right-- it really suits the fog.

I'm really enjoying your report, and paying special attention because my parents are coming this spring. Does anything from your Mom's visit stick out so far as a must see, or complete waste of time?