Happy Thanksgiving! (humans and animals)

The joyous day is finally here! Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!

After sleeping in and watching a part of the Macy's Day Parade, madness in the kitchen began!

Actually, there wasn't too much madness because I made the pies yesterday.

We had our Thanksgiving meal around 1:30 so that we could have a break and have dessert, then go again for round 2 later tonight. Even the animals got Thanksgiving dinner today! Kuma is a very sleepy puppy right now, vegging on the couch with Mommy and Daddy. Kyu is stuffed and tired as well.

Now, some photos! :-) Below is the preparation of the bread cubes for the stuffing. Gary and I always make homemade bread, so we decided to use some for our stuffing too. Kuma is very curious.

The bread cubes have been toasted in the oven.

Preparing the turkey to be put in the brine. Kuma wants to eat it.

Leah's pie crust recipe! Gary and I put in partitions so we could do half pies.

Half pumpkin, half pecan pie before baking.

Fin!

Half coconut cream, half chocolate cream pie!

Photos from today:

Corn pudding prior to cooking. Having our awesome standalone Kitchen Aid mixer was so helpful! Thanks again to Pavel and Kim :-)

Making gravy...

Aromatics for the turkey

The big bird prior to cooking

Making stuffing...

Adding the bread cubes...

Ready to bake!

Green bean casserole ready to bake!

Everything baking in the oven

Itadaki ma~su

Our cute little Thanksgiving dinner set up

Kyu's Thanksgiving feast

Kyu- loving his little feast!

Preparing Kuma's Thanksgiving feast

Kuma LOVING it

Licking the floor, looking for fallen scraps

Gochisousama! Happy Turkey Day!!!!!!!

And the Thanksgiving Cooking Preparation Commences!!!

Yesterday I began preparations for the turkey. I attempted making vegetable broth for the first time so I could brine the turkey in a couple of days. It's really not hard, just time consuming...unless you are bad at reading. Instead of adding more GARLIC cloves, I added cloves. If you don't know, they are very different things. When the broth was all done, it smelled funny and tasted awful. I revisited the directions and realized my mistake. First batch, down the drain.

Today I am in the process of trying again!

Step 1. Cut up lots of vegetables and put it in a pot

Step 2. Add one gallon of water and boil for 2 hours!

I also made candied ginger to put in the brine!

Also, not very hard, and unlike the vegetable broth smells really good :-) All you do it boil the ginger then when the water reduces, add sugar and watch it carmelize!

More pictures to come as the big day approaches :-)

Good bye Canada, Hello Thanksgiving Dinner!

Due to my recent emergency appendectomy, Gary and I have decided to cancel our trip to Canada with my parents over Thanksgiving break. We were going to go to Niagara Falls, visit my uncle in Toronto, drive down through New York and visit Palmyra... it was going to be so much fun. However, surgery is not cheap and sitting in a car for 7 hours cannot be good for my recovering body. So, the new plans are put into place. Staying in Columbus for our first Thanksgiving as The Peterson's! This also means my first attempt at roasting my own turkey!!!!! I am totally up to the challenge, and loving the opportunity.

My game plan is to make the following items for our feast:

1. Alton Brown's turkey

2. Mashed potatoes (duh)

3. Homemade gravy (also a first!)

4. Green bean casserole

5. Corn pudding

6. Homemade stuffing (also a first!)

7. Half chocolate pecan/half pumpkin pie

8. Half chocolate cream/half coconut cream pie

I'm also going to attempt to make my own vegetable broth to brine the turkey with. We will see how it goes... With a little bit of time on my hands, I decided to go all "super wifey" on Thanksgiving pricing. I have looked at a number of ads and have been slowly buying up all the ingredients necessary for the Thanksgiving feast. If any of you are curious, here are some of the awesome prices I found:

Butter - $2/pack of 4 at Meijer

Potatoes - $1.50 for 10 lb bag at Aldi

Pecans- $2 for bag at Aldi

Chocolate chips- $2 for bag at either Meijer or Kroger

Pineapple- $2 at Kroger or Meijer

Green beans- $1/lb at Kroger and Giant Eagle

Fresh herbs- $2/pack at Giant Eagle

Chicken broth- $1/32 oz at Aldi

Ham- $1.50/lb at Walmart

Turkey- 49 cents/lb at Kroger or Giant Eagle

Because of what I have to leftover to buy, this girl will be going to Giant Eagle tomorrow with $5 off coupon in hand :-)

Smoked Salmon Tea Sandwiches & Stuffed Tomatoes

I've been slacking quite a bit since coming back to the US (not on the cooking, just on posting photos and recipes), but here is a quick one to take a little break from bar studying! :-)

Stuffed tomatoes ingredients:

- 2 tomatoes (I used vine because they are my fave)

- 1/8 cup olive oil

- 1 minced garlic clove

- 1/4 tsp. kosher salt

- 1/4 tsp. black pepper

- 3/8 cup of cheese (pref. parmesan or gorgonzola)

- 3/8 cup of bread crumbs

Stuffed tomatoes instructions:

1. Pre heat oven to 375 degrees

2. Cut the tomatoes in half and use a spoon to take out the seeds

3. Place the tomatoe halves face down on a papertowel to let the water out

4. Combine olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper in a bowl

5. Coat the tomatoes in the mixture and let it sit for maybe 10 minutes

6. Mix bread crumbs and cheese in a separate bowl

7. Stuff tomatoes with bread crumb & cheese mixture

8. Drizzle left over olive oil mixture

9. Place tomatoes on a baking sheet and bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes!

Smoked salmon tea sandwich ingredients:

- 1 stick of unsalted butter

- 2 garlic cloves

- 1/4 tbs. dill

- 1/4 tsp. lemon juice

- 1/4 tsp. kosher salt

- 1/8 tsp. black pepper

Smoked salmon tea sandwich instructions:

1. Slice up maybe 4-5 pieces of bread into 4s (if you have french bread laying around I would imagine it would be even better, but I just used sandwich bread that I had)

2. While your tomatoes are in the oven, pop the bread into the oven to toast

3. Mix all of the ingredients with a hand mixer or food processor (or by hand if you like to work hard)

Farewell Japan

So today I would like to reflect and think about all the things that I enjoyed about Japan, and all the things that I won't particularly be missing.

Things I won't miss...

I won't miss the smokers (not particular ones, just in general... I will miss you Janice! Haha). Virtually everywhere in Japan still allows indoor smoking. Yuck! I also hated walking behind people who smoked as they walked because I would have to breathe their exhaust.

I won't miss people who can't respect personal space. Most likely because Japan is the most population dense area in the world, people just don't have a problem with invading your personal space. I can't tell you how many times people RAMMED into me and then didn't even apologize. This always amazed me, considering how polite Japanese people are in general, but I think it's just a different perception of personal space.

I won't miss pukers on trains. Not that this happened to me multiple times, but once is definitely enough. A few weeks ago, I was on the train home from Shinjuku and some dude was so wasted that he puked all over himself, then continued to stand and sleep on the train. SO NASTY!!!! I was/still am extremely traumatized from the experience.

I won't miss having to walk everywhere. Especially on rainy days. Occasionally it's nice because it's great exercise, but when it rains, it's no fun.

I won't miss having to leave 45 minutes early to get anywhere. Because you have to walk to the train station then ride the train, then walk to your next destination, most places take 45 minutes. I was lucky when I could go to Shibuya cuz then I could leave 20 minutes before and make it to Hachiko door-to-door. Hoorah for my car!

I won't miss the lack of green! Even in the boonies where my grandma lives, there is green but still no grass!!! Being from the Midwest, my lawn is oh so important :-)

Things I will miss...

FOOD!!!! Probably the only things I miss food wise in America are Five Guys hamburgers, Papa John's pizza, and Mexican food. That's really it. Everything else, I really will miss Japanese food. Japanese rice made in Japan is SO much better. Japanese sushi is of course SO much better. Japanese bread is SO much better. Japanese desserts are like one million times better than American desserts... I have no clue how I'm going to transition back to frosting... ew. Of course, can't forget Japanese ICHIGOs!!! (In non-Vivian language, "strawberries")

I will miss Japanese beauty products. I LOVE Japanese cosmetics, so I will miss going to the drug store and buying up cosmetics and anything beauty related here. Japanese shampoo and conditioner does amazing things for my hair so I will miss being able to buy it cheap here (don't worry, I stocked up).

I will miss Japanese baths!!! Sooooooooooooo relaxing. My dream is to one day have one in my own home in America. Okay Gary?

I will miss UNIQLO. So cute and so cheap! There is absolutely no replacement in the US. Even though there is a UNIQLO in NYC, it's so expensive! Sort of takes away one of the tiers of awesomeness.

I will miss the Loft. Why can't we have one in Columbus? I would totally decorate my house fully with Loft stuff. So cute!!! (www.loft.co.jp)

The convenience of the train system. Even though I hate packed trains, the availability of a train system is still really nice. Especially when you go far away, you can just hop on the bullet train and get somewhere easily. So much more spacious than airplanes! It's also nice because you can use your time transporting to do other things like read. I will also miss being close to places like Disney Sea and Disney Land!!! Ah, the luxury of being in Tokyo.

Finally, I will of course miss my friends in Japan!!! It was so nice seeing everyone throughout my time here, and I can't wait to see everyone again :-)

Good Eats in Tokyo.

It's been quite a while since I've posted last. Today I'd like to highlight some awesome places that I have gone to eat in Tokyo :-)

Ippudo

http://www.ippudo.com/index.html

They have a bunch of different locations around Tokyo (and around Japan for that matter), and in my opinion is the BEST RAMEN IN JAPAN. They specialize in Hakata style tonkotsu ramen, so thin noodles and pork broth. Delicious :-)

Roy's (Roppongi Hills)

http://www.hotpepper.jp/strJ000694243/

Not quite sure what type of food it is, but it's delicious! I think a lot of the dishes have a Hawaiian twist to it though. They have a GREAT lunch deal which is totally awesome (something like 1400 yen). If you get a good seat, you will also have a very nice view of Tokyo tower while you eat. Closest station is Roppongi.

La VERONICA (Roppongi Izumi Garden)

http://laveronica.jp/

This place is very beautiful, the food is probably the best meal I have had in Tokyo, but REALLY pricey. If you want to splurge though, I would definitely recommend it. It is apparently European cuisine :-) The closest station is Roppongi 1chome.

Mitsuyado Seimen (Nakameguro)

http://r.tabelog.com/tokyo/A1317/A131701/13022005/

The best tsukemen place I have been to. It was featured on the Ramen Walker and they have a bunch of different dipping sauces. I tried the spicy one and it was really good. You can also opt to have your noodles either hot or cold. Whenever I pass by late at night there is a huge line out the door. Closest station is Nakameguro.

Yamachan

http://www.yamachan.co.jp/

There are also a number of locations of this place. They serve Nagoya food which is really good! They have delicious chicken wings there!!! The one that I went to was right by Tamachi station off of Keio dori, so close to school.

Iwaen (Kasumigaseki)

http://www.kasumi-d.jp/shop/detail/ks302.html

Probably the best Chinese restaurant I have been to in Tokyo. They are supposedly famous for their dandanmen. The prices are really reasonable for lunch. Located in the building I work in, and there is always a HUGE line during the lunch hour. Closest station is Toranomon, but Kasumigaseki is very close too.

Chikuzan (Shinjuku)

http://www.lumine.ne.jp/est/restaurant/each/chikuzan.html

Not that I have had the opportunity to go to many nice sushi places, but this one was the best place I have been. It is also quite pricey if you want to actually get full. It's located in LUMINE EST, so it's connected to the train station and very convenient to get to. Closest station is obviously, Shinjuku.

Waiting for Spring

Hello friends!! Hopefully everyone is doing well and keeping warm. I hear it has been getting a little warmer back home, so that should make everyone a little more happy! The weather here has been really weird. Some days it is gorgeous and very spring like. I can wear my spring coat and still be a little hot. Then there are other days when I have my winter coat and gloves on and I'm still struggling to stay warm. The weird thing is that such days can be back-to-back. So irratic.

Anyway, at this point, I am just ready for it to be spring! Spring time in Japan means cherry blossoms!!!! This will be the first time in my life that I am in Japan for cherry blossom season, so I'm very, VERY excited!!! Spring time in Japan also means the end and the beginning. Things in Japan all end in March, and start in April. So two of my cousins in Chiba just graduated (one graduated from middle school, and another from high school), and they will both be embarking on new journeys in high school and college, respectively, beginning in April.

Currently for law school, I am on spring break. Although, it doesn't really feel like it, because I am still working at the firm and teaching English (I'm taking a REAL spring break when Gary comes in a little over a week!) I think it will feel more like spring break when I am in Chiba with the family for the rest of the weekend. On Saturday, I'm going snowboarding with some of my relatives, so that should be an adventure! I have no clue where we are going, but I think they mentioned something about maybe Niigata perfecture. Who knows, we shall see!

As for other updates in my life, I now have 5 regular English students! I have no clue how I have time to do all this, but somehow I am managing. (I'm probably able to manage this because I don't ever spend time studying...lol). They are all very interesting people with interesting backgrounds.

Student #1
Korean man who is temporarily in Japan working for an IT company. He is learning English for fun, even though he is still learning Japanese at the same time. He is a trooper.

Student #2
Buddhist monk from Chiba. This guy commutes out to Tokyo from Chiba every week to have an English lesson with me. He is a graduate of Keio university, and is a very intelligent man. His English conversational skills are a little lacking, but his reading ability is pretty amazing. He likes to read about the law, so I find legal news articles for him to read and we discuss, and I'm always so impressed how he understands everything (even procedural jargon that most Americans probably wouldn't understand).

Student #3
Tokyo University graduate (for those of you who don't know, this is the Harvard of Japan), who currently works for some IT company owned by Mitsubishi. He works a RIDICULOUS amount of time. Lately he has been very busy, so he has been going into work at 8am (he works in Tokyo but commutes from Yokohama), and he goes home by taxi at 2 or 3 am. His cab fare is apparently around $150 (paid by company of course). He is probably my favorite student. Even though he's a Tokyo University grad and you think he would be really stuck up, he is really down to earth and a very chill person. He sort of looks like a Japanese gangster.

Student #4
My youngest student, although he is still a year older than me. He is originally from Kagoshima, where he went to school, and currently lives in Saitama and commutes to his job in Tokyo (Ikebukuro area). He is interested in learning English so he can study abroad in the near future. He is thinking about going to either Toronto or Vancouver. He is fun to talk with because he is very fearless in his English speaking. He may be the best English speaker I have among my students.

Student #5
My newest addition. He is a CPA who started his own accounting firm, which now employs about 80 people. I didn't know this until maybe a month ago, but apparently it's a big deal to be a CPA in Japan. Supposedly the 3 most respected professions in Japan are doctor, lawyer, and CPA. Who would have known. So anyway, this guy used to work for KPMG, hated it, so he left and started his own firm. At first it didn't go well, but obviously, he is quite successful now. He is also a graduate of Keio University, and despite his credentials as one of the Japanese elite, is a pleasant person to have conversation with.