sake

Some sake or shake that I bought yesterday at San A. There was a display. Big bottle on the left was ¥398 and the two pack on right was ¥298. I have no idea of where they are from. From same place, but different quality?

tori negi don - 鶏 ね ぎ 丼

A donburi I bought for brunch this morning while out shopping at the commissary. From San A on my way back home. Had just been put it out, so still hot! Was pieces of deep-fried chicken (with skin - ono!) over rice then covered with a sauce mixture of round onion, green onion & enoki mushrooms(?). Delicious! Umai! Also bought more dried ika strips, takuan, sake and soki (pig rib tips) to make soki nitsuke.

pork hash w/ hotaru-ika (firefly ika)

Something I just thought I'd try something different.

1/2 lb. ground pork mixed with just chopped shiitake, green onion, cornstarch, sugar, sesame oil, oyster sauce & shoyu. But mixed in also are blanched baby ika, that's sold as pupus here in Okinawa & mainland Japan. Are about 1" long, & very tasty. I can eat a tray of them just dipped in a miso sauce as is the custom or just hot mustard, as I drink my biru. So mixed everything & steamed - see result. Great taste, great smell, & resulting juices are great on rice!

pork hash w/ salted egg

"raw" salted egg (it's been 30 days!)

couple "raw" eggs on top of 1/2 lb. ground pork mixed with strips dried ika, chopped shiitake, green onion, cornstarch, oyster sauce & shoyu before steaming

after steaming

My lanai garden

My little garden on my lanai. From left - Chinese parsley, gai choy (mustard cabbage), negi & basil, more negi.

Chinese parsley


gai choy (two weeks)


basil (just sprouting)

Miso Shiru 2

Miso shiru from a different place for lunch today. One of my workers was going out to get something so I asked him to get me one. Not as big as the other Miso Shiru I wrote about a little while ago, can tell by the rice container, but it was so different, good tasting and inexpensive! Only ¥350 - couldn't believe it!

In the miso soup was tofu, luncheon meat, chikina, bean sprouts, round onion, and bits of pork. Then with the rice was a bit stir-fried chikina/tuna and stir-fried bean sprouts. And I didn't discover until I reached sort of the bottom that there was an egg in there. The white cooked by the hot miso soup with the yolk still runny! A very good lunch! Perfect size! And again only ¥350. おいしい!

This place is called Tsubaki and it's card is below. Terriffic place! Going to have to try and eat in there, not taking out.

Plain jook again

Plain jook but this time my sides are an Okinawan dish of stir-fried liver and chives, kinpira and takuan. Simple but tasty!

Chinese parsley + satoimo

Update on my Chinese parsley - doing well! Could actually start using the young tender stems ad leaves.



Also have planted some gai choy (Chinese mustard cabbage) and they have come out. Gotta thin out shortly. Maybe in a couple months I can make sin choy (salted mustard cabbage) and have with yau nyee (ika)! A favorite dish of mine at home - Sin Choy Chow Yau Nyee.



RONW asked about taro - this is what I have - a couple small satoimo plants growing on my lanai.

Jook lunch today

Plain jook I cooked. With it I just brought peidan (century eggs), rakkyo (pickled onions), tofu mui (fermented bean curd) and the prepared sake I just posted on. Just wanted to eat the jook plain, heard it is more Shanghai-style. Plain jook but each spoonful is then intensely flavored each time differently. Was pretty good! Will expand what I eat with it. Can eat picking at a piece of hum nyee, a patty of pork hash, a fried fish, or some Okinawan stuff - maybe stir-fried chikina - it's wide open. Just like eating plain rice. Called qing zhou (Mandarin) or tseng jook (Cantonese). I also read that it is in the small plates genre getting popular everywhere.

cheap & tasty breakfast

For some strange reason, almost all of the egg/luncheon meat musubis were sold out at the usual 7 AM time at Oasisu, when there's usually still 2 or 3 dozen. None of my favorite sake, or even my second favorite of chikina. Only a couple ume and a potato croquette. Must be some projects going on somewhere close by. So settled for a little bowl of soba (¥100) and some mini sake musubis (¥130 for the pack of 2). I like the soba for the jiru - hot & salty! Nice for the chilly & rainy 60° weather yesterday morning.

yamazuke sake

I asked some of my folks about the sake in the musubi. One girl said you can make your own, cooking and flaking the salmon. Someone else said it can be bought premade, and today brought in a bottle for me. There are probably different brands from all over Japan. So I'll go check out the markets. Think this would be really good over a bowl of hot rice! And a raw egg yolk! Might be really good sprinkled over jook.