Mixed Plate Friday (Japan)

Dec12

Saiboku

Saiboku was such a cute town with its pork restaurants and grocery stores! Unfortunately we did not get to try any of the pork products during this trip, we just did a quick walkthrough before heading to a shrine and then off to Kawagoe. I would definitely like to return to try out their products!

Sayama Cha Cola

Chan’s friend got this for us. They were told that this area was known for the sayama cha cola (green tea mixed with cola). I’m not usually a big fan of green tea so I wasn’t too sure about this. Well let me just say, I tried it a few days later in the hotel room and freaking loved it. It wasn’t too sweet and had just the right amount of carbonation. I liked it a lot, Chan didn’t love it as much as me which meant I could have the rest of his bottle. A win is a win.

Time to buy some cloting. LOL, not as much funny Engrish signs this time around.

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Shunkashuto – Kawagoe, Japan

Dec10

Chan and I were hanging with his friends and made an impromptu trip out to Kawagoe! Totally unexpected and so awesome because there is a Snoopy Village there! We started off with a warm and nourishing udon meal on this rainy day (the only rainy day of our trip) at Shunkashuto. I think the restaurant is geared towards tourists but it doesn’t matter, it was still so good.

Kakuni (Boiled Pork) | ¥800

Yummy kakuni for the table to share. What can I say? Broke-da-mout tender, fall apart in your mouth kine. Delicious!

Sweet Potato Tempura | ¥420

Yum! So glad they ordered both side dishes because I wanted to get a full set that included these sides but didn’t…and they ordered them as sides anyway. Isn’t life great? LOLOL.

Shrimp Tempura Noodles | ¥1550
classic udon noodle dish topped with deep fried shrimp tempura

I was excited to eat some shrimp tempura with “tick” udon noodles but soon regretted my choice after my fellow dining companions got their meals. Not that my dish was bad, not at all, it’s just that theirs was better!!!

Kakiage Noodles | ¥1380
ukiuki is happy or a delightful noodle dish with kakiage shrimp and veggie fritter
kakiage is deep fried shrimp and veggie fritter, which uses a variety of ingredients, such as shrimp, onions, sweet potatoes, carrots and japanese parsley.

The other three including Chan got the kakiage set and damn, take a look at that kakiage. The kakiage we get here in Hawaii looks so sad compared to this. If I knew this is how their kakiage was made, I would have definitely gotten this. Chan let me have a taste and it was so good! Big chunks of vegetables and shrimp – fried light and crispy. Dang. I enjoyed this restaurant a lot!

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Hong Kong Hanten 0410 – Shin Okubo, Japan

Dec8

A visit to Japan is not complete without a visit to Korea Town for some bomb black bean noodles. LOL, I think we had this for our first sit down meal. Hong Kong Hanten 0410 is a restaurant owned by Paik (Baek) Jong Won, he’s one of the judges for the Culinary Class Wars! Excited for the new season starting soon. Anyway, as I mentioned in my last post – this is probably my most favorite jjajangmyeon ever.

Tangsuyuk (Half Size) | ¥980

The half size is perfect to complement our noodle dishes. I think we got the full size last time and it was too much. Gotta have the sweet and sour sauce on the side for dipping – the pork is fried up perfectly crisp.

Gogi Jjamppong | ¥1180

Chan’s jjamppong, his favorite. He got the beef one and it was good. Look at how red the soup is. I tried some of the soup, tasted good!

Jaengban Jajang | ¥2100

KABOOM. Okay, this dish is to serve 2 people. I don’t care. I almost chickened out of ordering it but Chan told me just to go for it. I don’t know why this dish has to be made as 2 servings. Anyway, this is more of a stir-fried version with so much good veggies and seafood. Ahhh…just salivating as I think of this dish. It was super good yet again. Why don’t we have this here in Hawaii?? Gotta wait for my next trip to Japan or Korea to eat this again.

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Mixed Plate Friday (Japan)

Dec5

Do you peep what I peep on a walk through Shin-Okubo in Japan?

Funny yeah?? I don’t know who this belongs to but it was fun to see a bit of home in Japan like this.

Every time I saw this company’s signage, I had to take a picture and send it to my friends to tell them this was their communication style. I never even looked up what they do lol.

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HNL -> NRT – ANA Flight

Dec3

Yes, we splurged for Business Class. If you don’t care to see what Business Class has to offer, please move along. It is pricey but I think can be very worth it for long legs of travel. The ability to lie flat and sleep is priceless.

Amuse
Purple Yam Nicoise Salad
Spam & Caramelized Maui Onion Crostini

Purple Yam Nicoise Salad

Sounds better than it tastes, which is bland

Spam & Caramelized Maui Onion Crostini

So yeah, I’m pretty sure I was eating “raw” spam here. I mean I ate it but…it was basically raw spam. I know it’s not really raw but you know what I mean! It wasn’t too bad lol.

Japanese Cuisine – Washoku

Shusai (Main Dish)
Simmered Sea Bream in Soy-based Sauce | Steamed Rice

The fish was seasoned and cooked well! I enjoyed this!

Miso Soup

Zensai (A Selection of Morsels)
Japanese Omelet, Simmered Runner Bean in Syrup, Grilled Squid with Dried Fish Roe, Deep-fried Fishcake

I enjoyed this zensai very much so, not sure what runner bean is but now I’m curious. Very nice appetizer!

Kobachi (Tasty Tidbits)
Steamed Chicken with Flavored Soy Sauce

Eh, it’s fine.

ANA Original ~Kaoru Fukuoka~ Tonkotsu Style Ramen
a mild tonkotsu style soup paired with thin noodles that complement the soup perfectly. toppings like red pickled ginger and flavored oil are available. please enjoy with your preferred seasoning.

If they offer up a noodle, I gotta try it! Very happy I tried this. Too bad I didn’t get it when we came home too. The flight home felt so much shorter so I didn’t have enough room in my tummy for it.

Noodle Pull!

Yum!

Sandwich Set
Warm Basil Cream Chicken Sandwich | Yogurt with Passion Fruit Jelly

The sandwich was just whatever but the yogurt, oh the yogurt was so good. Felt like the plain yogurt was a thicker texture and the passion fruit jelly was wonderful. I’m going to try to make my own at home.

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ANA Lounge – Honolulu, HI

Dec1

ANOTHER TRIP MEANS ANOTHER LOUNGE VISIT. Was so excited to go to ANA Lounge. We had seen videos of this lounge and I got all excited that we would be able to board the plane straight from the lounge. Didn’t happen. The opportunity is there but I think it only works for the first flight of the day, no such luck for the second flight. It’s a very nice lounge and offers some good food! Check it out.

Udon!

They have the noodles at the bar ready to scoop into your bowl, you can choose either hot broth or cold broth. These are the only toppings, no protein. It was okay, nothing special.

Curry! (Hawaiian Style)

I guess I should have known that since it was Hawaiian it wouldn’t be good, it wasn’t that good. I prefer Japanese style curry! I wouldn’t get this again.

Acai Bowl, Fresh Fruit, Ham and Egg Sando

The acai bowls are all rock solid frozen, forreal. It barely defrosted as I was eating my food so I couldn’t even enjoy it because I didn’t want to lose a tooth. The sandwich is very good! How come sandwiches always taste better when I don’t make it? Serious question.

Apple Juice

I don’t know what it is about travel, but I only drink apple juice when I am traveling. I enjoy it on the plane and during the trip too. Do I drink apple juice when I’m home? No. Don’t ask me why.

The orange honu ready for us to board!

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Off to Japan…

Nov7

As you read this, I should be on my way to Japan. Another chance to make beautiful memories with Chan in one of our favorite places to travel. Our fear this trip is if the local Japanese people will hate us since we are foreigners and some foreigners are not doing us any favors with their bad behavior in Japan!

As always, feel free to follow me on instagram. I will be posting stories daily of our adventures! So excited for this trip, I am super burnt out from work and just life in general so I need this breather. Short blog vacay, see you folks soon!

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Restaurant i-naba – Honolulu, HI

Nov5

I had a rare chance this day to have a lunch with two of my brothers. I used to go out with all three of them all the time – nowadays, 2 would be a rare outing. Most of the time, I’m with only one of them. It’s a good and bad thing. I surely miss the old days and being around them, my wallet doesn’t miss those days (lol). But another good thing is, it means they are growing and becoming more independent. I think all three brothers are growing up well.

Anyway, I decided to give them a taste of good Japanese food by taking them to i-naba. It’s a double edged sword, I give them a taste of good food and they either don’t appreciate it fully or maybe acquire a taste for it. Ha! Anyway, I really enjoyed it even though my wallet didn’t. It’s okay, another memory to add to their banks.

Tempura Soba | $30.00
2 shrimps, 1 white fish, veggie tempura, and zaru soba

Bara Chirashi Bowl & Soba | $34.00
chopped some kinds of sashimi served over sushi rice. also comes with regular size zaru or kake soba (we chose zaru).

Hana Soba | $36.00
cold broth soba, topped with tororo (grated yam), uni, ikura (salmon roe), green onion, dried seaweed and tamagoyaki. also comes with tempura (shrimp, squid and veggies)

I don’t know if you remember my previous post but the last time I came, I really wanted to try this Hana Soba. They said they were out of uni and could give more ikura which I said no to. I finally got to try it this time!

Miso Soup and Takuan

Mixed Rice

Bleh, not great.

Tempura

Their tempura is always so good. Lightly battered and fried crispy. So so so good.

The star of the show. Did it live up to expectations? Well…I think I’ll go with less is more for soba from here on out. Sure it tasted good but once everything was mixed up together – I couldn’t really taste the different between the tororo and the uni. It just all melded into a cold soba dish with no distinct flavor. The tamagoyaki felt super out of place, it was certainly a choice to add that in. While I was glad to have tried this dish, I would just stick to the plain zaru soba tempura set next time. Less is more as I said.

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Recipe: Pork Tofu and Watercress Stir Fry

Nov3

I saw this old school recipe online the other day and decided to make it as meal prep for my weekly breakfast. How was it? Good! The only thing is, I make such a huge batch that I get tired of it pretty easily. That’s the thing about meal prepping, I save a lot of money and time but get so tired of the food by day 3 or so. Wish I had the mentality of eating to live rather than living to eat. Hard life (lol). Anyway, I’ll share the recipe below. I think I found this from the Electric Kitchen website. The only thing I changed was to add rehydrated bean thread noodles at the bottom of my container before pouring over the stir-fry to make it a heartier dish and because I’m carb crazy.

Pork Tofu and Watercress Stir Fry

Ingredients:

  • 1 teaspoon oil
  • 1 pound lean pork, thinly sliced
  • 1/2 cup shoyu
  • 1/4 cup water
  • 3 tablespoons sugar
  • 1 medium onion, sliced
  • 1 medium carrot, sliced
  • 1 (1-inch piece) ginger, crushed
  • 1 (20-ounce) block firm tofu, cubed
  • 1 bunch green onions, chopped into 1-inch lengths
  • 1 bunch watercress, chopped into 2-inch lengths

Directions:

  1. In a large pot, heat oil and brown pork.
  2. Add shoyu, water, sugar, onions, carrots and ginger.
  3. Bring to a boil and simmer for 5-10 minutes.
  4. Add tofu, green onions and watercress and simmer gently until watercress is wilted.
  5. Salt and pepper to taste.
  6. Serve immediately with rice.

Noods!!!!

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Mixed Plate Friday

Oct31

Pileus Cloud
(If this photo is yours, please let me know so I can credit you)

Not much of a mixed plate today, just a bit of storytelling. About a year ago, I went to a conference and was speaking with a fellow attendee who is originally from China. Part of our introduction assignment was to discuss the origin of our names. I have never asked or been told about the origins of my Chinese name. My English name, yes. My parents did not know English and asked either the doctor or a friend to name me and were given the name Jenny.

Anyway, the Chinese colleague I was seated next to was so warm and genuine that I felt inclined to ask her about my name. I’ve had a complicated relationship with Chinese people, a lot of my family members are directly from China and I have been treated quite poorly in my upbringing which has brought a hesitancy to talk to or be nice to other Chinese people in fear of getting hurt like I have in the past. Anyway, I wrote my Chinese name out for her in Chinese and she diligently started up looking the characters to find the meaning.

Soon, she told me it meant little cloud which was amazing to me because I just never assumed my name had any meaning (much like Jenny). Then something told me to look up my mom’s name and asked her to look it up as well. I forget the exact meaning of my mom’s name but it is associated with clouds as well which really touched me, that I was called little cloud after my mom.

Now about a year later, I got asked about the origins of my name again but decided to do the googling on my own. I looked up the name myself and pulled up pileus cloud. Do you see that image on the top of this post? Apparently the iridescent pileus cloud occurred in China, isn’t it just such a majestic sight? I feel so creatively charged when I think about this image and my name’s connection. I think about how much thought and consideration was taken in coming up with my name. The meaning is so deep. I do hope I have a chance of seeing an iridescent pileus cloud in person one day. Something about my name now brings me such a heartwarming feeling. If you don’t know the origins of your name, I do hope you go out and find it. You could be very pleasantly surprised like I was.

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