Thanksgiving in Japan

As American Thanksgiving comes to a close in America (it's already after noon on the day after here), I am finally getting around to typing a post. We've been busy with one thing or another, so I'll try to get you all updated.

Before that, here's our Thanksgiving dinner:

We don't get turkeys in Japan (unless we're looking to order one to be delivered) and even if we did, we don't really have the microwave space to cook it in. We did learn how to use our microwave as an oven, though. Apparently, you can put metal in the microwave when using the oven settings.

Our meal consisted of chicken, corn on the cob (from Hokkaido, Japan's northern-most island...where all the wheat, corn and cows grow), a butter croissant and mashed potatoes with creamy chicken-mushroom dressing.

It was just the two of us, so this was more than enough food. After dinner, Toshiko visited for tea and sweets.

Monday was Japanese Labor Thanksgiving. It's not a major holiday, but Nat had the day off. One of her coworkers (who also happens to be our neighbor) went fishing earlier in the day and offered some of his fish to us. The three near-identical looking fish are horse mackerel and the reddish one is sea bream. The sea bream's fins are spiny and it has sharp teeth.

This was my first time to clean or fillet a fish. I think I did pretty well, but I know I could have done a lot better. The first day, we ate two of the mackerel. I made a mixture of yellow miso paste, crushed garlic, grated ginger and sake. I spread the mixture over the fillets and pan fried them for a couple minutes, flipped 'em, fried them for a minute more and they were done! Mmmm!

The next day, we ate the other two fish. This time, I rubbed salt, pepper, paprika and thyme into the fillets and marinated them in olive oil and sake (white wine would work just as well, but all we had in the house was red wine and sake). They only need to marinade for half an hour to an hour. If you have other things to prepare for the meal, just let them marinate while you get everything else ready. Chop up half an onion and some garlic and start frying them in some alive oil. Place the fillets on top of the garlic and onions, skin-side down. Fry for two to three minutes and flip for one last minute. Delicious.

Sunday, we went hiking to see a waterfall near Miyazu with some of the English conversation group members. I'm sorry to say we forgot to bring our camera, so you won't be able to see how awesome it was (unless Nat gets the pictures off of her cell phone). Afterward, we went to lunch and did some shopping.

Saturday (yes, I'm taking you backward through time), Nat made spaghetti carbonara and we invited another one of Nat's coworkers (also our neighbor) over for dinner and movies. I made garlic bread and a salad. We watched Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and Moulin Rouge.

I think that's all of the things that we haven't had a chance to tell you about yet. They're not huge events, but they're what's been keeping us busy for the past week. Tomorrow, we're going to see an exhibit of wood block prints. I'm excited.

Obviously, since American Thanksgiving isn't celebrated in Japan, Black Friday doesn't exist here, either. It also helps that Christmas isn't nearly as big of a holiday as it is in the west (though they do celebrate it...with KFC and cake, from what I'm told; apparently, western holidays are supposed to be celebrated with western food). I went shopping today just because I could do it without fear of being trampled or mugged in the parking lot. Be safe, everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and we are both very thankful for all of you!

Mexican dahlias
(These are much taller than me.)

寒いね! (It's COLD!)

Brrrrrrrrrrr. It's cold. It's getting to the point where I'm not a fan.

Last night I went out to the Lawson (our convenience store -- about a 20 minute bike ride away) to pay the internet bill. I felt a little safer this time than I did last time, but it still freaks me out. I stopped at the Komeri (housewares and garden store) and grabbed a garden spade for the strawberry SEEDLINGS (thanks Alex XD). I chatted with the cashier a little and she smiled and told me that the middle school was full of kids with colds, and to be careful. It's kind of nice being well-known in a small town.

We got our Playstation 2 from Alex's mom and our movies and games from my mom so now we are SET FOR WINTER. :) However, this is also a good opportunity to sort of elucidate on my specific brand of OCD. I have this...I mean...sometimes my room/desk/whatever is a huge mess, but when I have a collection of things in a space, like, a collection of CDs in a CD case, I HAVE to sort them in a logically sound fashion. So I spent about an hour sorting our case into - TV series, movies, anime TV series, anime movies, PS1 games, PS2 games, Gamecube games, and Wii games. Within those categories I subsorted into alphabetical order. I felt better after it was done.

So, now, when I get home, I smooch Alex, cuddle under the kotatsu, and pop in a game.

However, my OCD gets me here too. The strange thing is, if I have a list of things, or a sequence of things, even if the list was placed in a non-relevant order, I have to do them in that order. I started playing Chocobo's Dungeon because it was alphabetically the first of the PS1 games. The disc crapped out (typical) so now I'm playing Chrono Cross, which I've been meaning to play for EVER but finally am getting a chance to. Twitch, twitch. Must play in order...

I've got a headache today, but I'm holding out for the weekend -- three day weekend! Plus, I don't have my naughty shogakko (elementary) tomorrow! I only have the sweet angelic shogakko today. <3

I Sing The Snooze Button Electric

Lately I've been having a ton of trouble waking up. I've got this habit of smacking the snooze button about four times before actually waking up and then zooming around the house, grabbing a piece of toast, and absolutely trucking to school on my bike in the span of ten or twenty minutes.

Last night, I went to bed late; around 12. I was a little worried about what would happen in the morning. My snooze duration is about 5 minutes long, so I set it to be 10 minutes instead.

The difference was incredible. My alarm went off at 7:00 as it usually does, and I smacked the snooze button. The next ten minutes, I was actually able to relax and wake myself up. It seems like when there's only five minutes I spend the whole five minutes frantically trying to relax, all the while knowing it's going to go off again any minute, but with ten minutes it actually seems like a fair amount of time to snooze. When I got up, I wasn't tired and didn't have to rush too much. It was amazing.

Sunday we had the cooking party with four ladies from Eikaiwa - Toshiko, Sanae, Mieko, and Keiko. We had a ton of fun. Toshiko and Mieko both brought salads, and Mieko also brought us some strawberry saplings! We'll have strawberries next year if I don't murder them horribly! I made spaghetti carbonara according to my mom's recipe. I want to make another batch of it soon and bring it to school for bento for a little while, since, amazingly, the six of us ate the whole pan of it (and believe me it makes a crapload of spaghetti). Of course, we were full as all, but...

The new student is really cute and sweet. Luckily her assistant teacher DOES speak English, and actually owns the import store in Omiya! She's super nice, too. The students are being really nice to the new student as well, so I'm happy about that - Japanese schools are known to have bullying problems sometimes....

Hm, I think that's all I have to update about.

Seriously: Autumnal Infestation

So, you remember how I posted about the abundance of persimmons in our house? Maybe the post from less than a day ago about how I was trying to use up some of our persimmons? Or maybe the several recipes I've fabricated so that I can use up some persimmons?

We just got six more.

Don't get me wrong. I've learned to love persimmons rather quickly and I tend to wonder why I hated them so much as a child.

Luckily, we have a plan to use them all up before the weekend is out. Tomorrow, I shall make the persimmony rice pudding (again) and package it up to hand out to our English conversation group tomorrow night. Sunday, Nat's having some of the ladies over for a pasta lunch. The last of our persimmons will become fritters for dessert.

I fully expect to receive more persimmons on Sunday. It's the seasonal gift and, being a more rural community, everyone is related to at least one person with a persimmon tree. I was saving some seeds to see if I could start a persimmon bonsai. Maybe I should rethink this...

Persimmon Fritters

So, I had some corn starch kicking around and wanting something to do, so I did a quick mental inventory and decided that our autumnal infestation of persimmons might help. I also wanted some lunch, so you will be horrified to know that this is what I made for lunch: Deep-fried persimmon slices. As delicious as these are, I assure you that I do not plan on making a regular habit of this.

So, here's the recipe:

Persimmon Fritters
(Another failure to have measurements)

Ingredients:

• 1 ripe Persimmon, peeled and sliced into thin wedges.
  
• Corn starch (I don't know how much. Enough to coat the persimmon wedges at least twice. Also, if I mention flour at all in this recipe, I actually mean corn starch. I apologize in advance as I expect to make this mistake often.)
• 1 tsp. Salt
• 1 tsp. Paprika (You might actually be able to leave this out, if you want. I've never been able to taste paprika so I just use it to add color....not that it added much.)
• 1/4 - 1/3 cup Sugar (I didn't measure it, really. But roughly this amount.)
• A mild oil for frying in. (You'll need roughly two inches or more. I did this in a sauce pan because I was only frying up one persimmon and I didn't need anything larger.)

Equipment:

• Cooking Chopsticks (extra big ones for nabbing things out of hot oil....or some tongs are good too. Whatever you prefer for cooking operations of this nature. Just be aware that you'll need it.)
• A sauce pan (or a pot, wok or deep-frier; whichever you feel safest deep-frying in)
• Ventilation (Not that this is a particular smokey recipe, but it's always safe to have around when you're cooking...especially if you choose to fry with olive oil)
• A bowl - for the corn starch and the mixing and the things
• A plate with a paper towel on it (or a similar setup so the fritters can cool and dry).

Instructions:

• Mix all the dry ingredients (corn starch, sugar, salt, paprika) in a bowl.
  
• Add the persimmon slices to the bowl and make sure they are thoroughly coated in the corn starch mixture and let sit for a couple minutes.
• Start heating up the oil in a sauce pan.
• The corn starch should have absorbed some juice from the persimmons, making them now look uncoated. Coat the persimmons a second time.
• Once the oil is ready, start adding the persimmons one at a time. Make sure they still appear to be fully coated in the corn starch mixture before you add them to the oil
• Let the persimmons cook until golden. This may be difficult to tell sometimes, as the outer crispy layer may sometimes look more pale than it actually is. Once a piece starts turning brown, it's just barely overdone (but still delicious, so not a problem). Judge each piece's done-ness individually.
• As you remove the finished persimmons from the oil, place them on the paper-towel-covered plate or a cooling rack (over a paper towel) so that they can drain and cool (just a little...they're best when still warm, but not blisteringly hot).
• Optional: If you like, you can roll these in a cinnamon-sugar mixture, sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on top, or dust with powdered sugar. I haven't tried this yet, so I'm leaving the risk to you.

I'm ashamed to say that I ate them all. They were just so deliciously gooey on the inside and crispy on the outside. I need to make a new batch for Nat to try.

Natalie-senseiiiiiii!

I was woken up this morning by the sound of elementary school students screaming my name in the street. It was kind of surreal. But, I did tell them where I lived, so I guess it's only natural. They've been getting a lot more genki lately, last week they kept poking me in the chest. o_O Weird.

This past week was kind of busy. Tuesday we had the English recitation. Neither of my students won, even though I think both of them should have at least placed - but my school brought home first place trophies in every category last year, so I think the judges might have wanted to spread it out a bit. Me and the other English teachers were cordial and mature about it in the contest, but as soon as we got back in the car all three of us got angry and were loudly proclaiming that it wasn't fair. :) The students weren't with us, obviously. Our third grade girl was heartbroken and sobbing, and our second grade girl was quietly disappointed. They both worked really, really hard.

But I had to wear a mask because it was the high school's turn to have Swine Flu, and that's where the recitation was held. XD So here's me in a mask. The Japanese really like wearing surgical masks for pretty much every reason conceivable, and Swine Flu is no exception. They also wear masks when they have colds, when other people have colds, when they travel, when they're around other people who traveled, if there's a sandstorm, if pretty much anything happens, if Godzilla is rampaging in the streets and kicking up dust, anything.


Additionally, one of the people we met at the Aberysthwyst (sp. whatevs) karaoke night....passed away. Her name was Kumiko Oda, and she was not much older than I am. She was a gamer, and we were really looking forward to getting together to play video games. It turns out she died of a heart attack in her sleep. Her mother didn't try to wake her up for a while, because she'd gone out the night previous and her mother thought she needed the sleep. It was really shocking.

Also, on that note, I just want to say something -- we had a friend back home pass away as well recently, Isaac Loughrige. He was a great kid and we would play together when we were young and living in Marshall. He was part of my brother's little cadre of neighborhood boys and is just unforgettable. He passed away of complications from Swine Flu a few weeks ago. So, if any of our friends from Crossroads read this, please pass on our condolences to the Loughrige family.

The teachers are all worrying because we're getting a new student at our school starting Monday. She's from the Philippines and doesn't speak any Japanese. She speaks some English and one of the Philippine indigenous languages, but no Japanese. They've hired an assistant for her who speaks Japanese (but notably not English or the Philippine language...brilliant) but mostly the other teachers are going to be relying on me and the other English teachers. This includes one of the English teachers who is really not confident in his own ability, and essentially begged me, if I don't have any other classes when she's in his class, to come and help him.

So I'm going to be a lot busier from here on out....

Jesus gave me buffalo wings while I was PMSing last week.

That was pretty much the best sentence I could ever have hoped to type in this blog.

Pepsi Azuki

I have something today. I don't know if this is an amazing something or a something that is just amusing, but it is a something. This something is azuki (sometimes spelled adzuki) bean Pepsi. Azuki beans are sweet red beans the Japanese use in a lot of desserts and snacks. It is one of the primary Japanese flavors for sweet things. In addition to the plethora of traditional foods containing the bean, the Japanese have azuki flavored ice cream, azuki cakes and now azuki Pepsi.

We also went to a potluck tonight. I made my persimmon rice pudding for it. This was partially inspired by an incident where one of Nat's students stole the camera to look at the pictures and a teacher asked about the pudding and asked to try some. I also realize that my usual potluck fall-back of fried eggplant (with skordalia) doesn't travel well. Luckily, we're still in the height of persimmon season, so this is the perfect food for a Japanese get-together.

I expressed, when I posted the recipe for this, that it may be wise to use more than one persimmon for the recipe. More persimmons is definitely a good idea. Since I had one on hand, I went to the store to pick up more. The only ones that were ripe enough were smaller persimmons, so I ended up using my one normal-sized persimmon and three more smaller ones (this would probably even out to three normal-sized persimmons or five small persimmons). Since I was in a bit of a hurry, I used the blender to mash them into goo.

The food at the potluck was delicious. There were more Americans present than Japanese. I had no idea what to expect, so I was actually a little surprised. It was fun, though.

Octopus!

When Nat and I started learning Japanese, we were jokingly warned to be careful if we were to ever order tacos in Japan. The reason for this is that "tako" is Japanese for octopus.

Today, I re-armed myself with octopus recipes and picked up a couple tentacles at our local grocery store. While you can buy octopus raw at some grocery stores in Japan, our store sells it pre-boiled, so you don't have to worry about pre-boiling it yourself (it can take a while). Also, it's much easier for the store to cut up an octopus that has already been cooked so that they can package it according to serving size (most people living by themselves will not be able to eat a whole octopus). The pre-cooked octopus at the store comes with one tentacle and a small piece of head per package.

The recipe I was following assumed that the cook would be using a raw octopus, so I still had to do some pre-boiling to get some of the juices of the octopus into the sauce and some of the seasonings into the meat, but that just made the octopus that much more tender. For those curious about the recipe, it's here.

It turned out really good! I accidentally misread the amount of cinnamon and doubled it, but that's what I get for reading the recipe from across the room. It was still good, though. This is definitely a recipe I'd be willing to repeat.

Tomorrow, we're probably going to eat mabo tofu from a boxed mix. Fridays are my easy meal days.

Kotatsu and Clear Soup with Japanese Clams

Today, I armed myself with new recipes and went to the grocery store. I was determined, today, to prepare some sort of seafood for dinner, be it octopus, clams, mackerel or ishitai (striped beakfish). Luckily, I had little choice in the matter, as most of the other aisles were still being stocked. There wasn't any ishitai (it's not one of the most common fishes we get here, but I see it in the grocery store once every few weeks). We can't get some of the ingredients for the octopus recipes I had on hand (dill or cloves) so I put that on hold until I can figure out some good substitutions. Mackerel was...well, I forgot my list of fish names written in kanji (the Chinese characters in the Japanese writing system), so I couldn't tell what fish was mackerel. We'll try this again some other time. Clams it was. I also managed to pick up a small bag of bay leaves. They were actually at the store this whole time, but I only just realized what they were. Part of the problem was that they were labeled in French, since the Japanese borrowed the French name of the herb (laurier). For those who don't know, a bay tree is also known as a laurel. I have been aware of the dual name of the bay/laurel for a long time, so I felt a little foolish that I hadn't realized what "laurier" was earlier. Especially since there was a picture of the leaves on the bag.

After dropping my groceries at home, I grabbed an umbrella (it's started to rain) and headed back out to go to our household goods store, Komeri. I picked up a cord for our kotatsu. A kotatsu is a low table with a heating element underneath. The top of the table is removable so that you can place a kotatsu blanket over the rest of the frame to keep the heat under the table. People then sit with their legs under the kotatsu to keep warm in the colder months. We have two of these. We didn't have any cords for either of them. So I picked one up and headed home. I would have bought two, but I wasn't sure if I had the right thing just yet.

On the way home, the sun was shining, and I tried a different route. Walking by the bay, I saw some flying fish jumping out of the water. It was pretty cool. I didn't have the camera with me (Nat had it for English recitation competition, which she may or may not write up a blog about later), but I have some pictures from the last time I was by the bay. Today was definitely more photogenic

When I got home, Nat was there! Yay! Apparently, today is some sort of holiday and her only duty at work was to attend the English recitation competition. So work was only a half-day!

Today's dinner was Japanese pumpkin cooked like acorn squash (that recipe with the brown sugar and butter and sometimes walnuts), clear soup with Japanese clams and sushi (if you get to the grocery store early, you can buy whole, uncut sushi rolls for much cheaper than the pre-cut ones).

For the soup, I basically used the recipe by Setsuko Yoshizuka at About.com, except I used green onion for the "garnish" and added some grated myoga. Mmmm! I spilled a little too much sake in it, but it was still pretty good.

For those wondering what myoga is, it's this stuff to the left, here. It's the sort of flower bud/sprout thing. Not the clams. It's sometimes called myoga ginger or Japanese wild ginger. I don't know if it's actually related to ginger or not. For the soup, I grated it really fine and let it simmer in the broth.

Supposedly, much of the myoga plant is toxic, but this part is considered safe. Still, I'm told that telling someone that they eat too much myoga in Japan is like asking someone if they ate paint chips as a child in the USA. We're going to play it safe and only eat a little bit...rarely.

We found a casserole dish. I don't really know why it's here. It doesn't fit in our microwave. We don't have an oven. I can't wait until I know how to get to the thrift store (or "recycle shop", as they call them here).