Handmade nerikiri wagashi

It started with these. I took a wagashi class!

I made both of these!

More about that on Sushi Day later, but it was pretty awesome getting to hang out and make wagashi with Rachael and Jen (and Jen’s mom) all day.

Shin Sen Gumi Hakata Ramen

And how can you go wrong with a huge bowl of ramen afterwards?

Hi Rachael!

Rachael, Son, and I went to Shin Sen Gumi Hakata Ramen after the wagashi class… my first time there, and man was it good! Between the three of us, we got a ton of toppings to share, and spent the meal discussing some very exciting things that I’ll get to tell you all about very soon (and raving about the ramen, of course!)

Nom.

As if that wasn’t enough, then we drove to Son’s parents’ house, where we feasted on grilled catfish.

Vietnamese grilled catfish

And then goofed off with the fish head before eating it.

Son’s finger as fish bait

“Kiss it!”

Fish kisses

After we recovered from the weekend of gluttony, there were definitely open-faced bacon and kimchi sandwiches on Japanese milk bread.

Bacon and Kimchi Sandwich

Yeah, that happened. Don’t judge me.

Fierce red nails

Fierce red nails make me feel like I can conquer the world.

Thanksgiving Pie!

Trust me, I needed that extra boost of confidence when my pie crust ended up looking like this. At least the Thanksgiving Twofer Pie that I make every year still tasted good, even if the crust looked like a five-year-old had patched it together…

I fail at pie crusts

The next day, Son’s coworkers decided they wanted to go get Vietnamese food.

Spring rolls

So off to Pho Ever we went!

Egg rolls

We stuffed ourselves with spring rolls, egg rolls, broken rice, pho, ca phe su da… while Son was nearly in tears from laughing at his coworkers’ poor Vietnamese pronunciation (and even the waiter joined in!)

Broken rice w/ grilled pork & a fried egg

For some reason, even though we were all beyond stuffed, the guys wanted to go get boba. (The glass Son and I shared was huge… as big as his head!)

A huge glass of boba milk tea

And sugar toast (butter and sugar toasted on Japanese milk bread). I think Son is addicted, now.

Sugar toast

And squid balls. (Similar to takoyaki… but would it be right to call them ikayaki? I don’t know.)

Squid balls.

Then, as if it wasn’t a gluttonous enough week already, Thanksgiving happened. (I am so thankful for you readers!)

Hi-Chew

It started with a Hi-Chew. (Why… I have no clue. It was Son’s idea – he pulled them out of his jacket pocket on the car ride to our Thanksgiving festivities.)

Thanksgiving

And of course there was food. Soooo much food. (In between the eating so much I wanted to burst and laughing so hard there were tears running down my face, I was ready to faceplant on the table… food coma!)

Dessert table

In typical Kajiwara fashion, there were way too many desserts… possibly more desserts than actual dinner food.

7-layer dip

But it’s all good, as long as Grandma brings her 7-layer dip.

7-layer dip thief!

Even though Patrick stole the chips and ate it all.

Gluten-free chocolate chip cookies

There were even gluten-free chocolate chip cookies and a delicious gluten-free apple tart from Good Habit.

Pumpkin Pie Fudge Brownie Bars

Since I always have leftover pumpkin pie filling, I just had to make these Pumpkin Pie Brownie Bars. (In related news, everyone at my physical therapy office adores me now… ~_^)

Korean something or another

And to fill out the food-filled week… that mess-in-a-pan happened. We’re not sure what it is. It started with three packages of silken tofu, a few pieces of butternut squash… then three types of kimchi, several pieces of pork that Son’s parents gave him, and two eggs. An odd mixture, to be sure, but that’s the sort of thing Son loves. (I stayed far away from it…)

What sort of interesting things did you eat this week?

Palm Springs.

Awesome people.

It’s a good combination.

Painting our nails

I got to go to the Homefries U Back To School Weekend.

Pretty much summer camp for grown-ups.

Coffee and breakfast breads

There was lots of good food, of course.

And cameras. We may not have all been food bloggers, but we were definitely all camera people. (Which was awesome, because there was a very cool photography session with Michael Friedman.)

Cameras out!

And peppered brown sugar bacon. Oooohhhh, that bacon.

Tracy making candied bacon

(I’d make it at home, except there’s a definite danger of the entire batch disappearing before anyone else gets to try it.)

All gathered around

We hung out around the gorgeous house (and laughed until we nearly cried), we lounged by the pool…

Sandals

But we’ll leave the swimsuit pictures out of this.

Making breakfast pizza

Did I mention the amazing food?

Joy and Tracy doing their thing

We got to see Joy and Tracy be their awesome, wonderful selves.

Behind the scenes

And we totally got behind-the-scenes access to how Joy photographs her blog posts.

Sprinkle the arugula…

(And then got to eat the results when she was done!)

Brunch

More amazing food. Early in the morning and later in the day we would eat outside, and then retreat to the cooler house when it got too hot outside.

(It was too hot outside)

And there were friendship bracelets.

Friendship bracelets!

Er… friendship anklets. Awesome either way.

(Or in my case, anklet.)

We got to learn about sparkling wines and gin…

Learning about gin

Too bad I don’t drink. But it was still tons of fun… and a pretty cool experience since I’d never have tried any of it otherwise.

Pasta dinner

A delicious pasta dinner, with garlic bread to die for.

We were all laughing so hard on the shuttle ride back to the hotel after the second day, you’d never know we were all completely exhausted.

*snap snap snap*

Day three was a short day. But still fun!

Tracy teaching us all about spices

Tracy gave a neat little lesson about spices (I think I just fell in love with smoked paprika.)

But we were all really waiting for the doughnuts that Joy was frying up.

Mmmm… doughnuts…

Ohmygod those doughnuts.

Ohmygod, that entire weekend. When I got there (late, thanks to bad timing and awful traffic), I was terrified – I didn’t know a single person who was going to be there. When I left, I had made so many new friends. We bonded over food (of course), same names (there were two other Al(l)isons there!), and dance (who knew there were so many other food bloggers/Joy the Baker fans who are dancers? Unexpected, but totally awesome.)

So much awesome.

If, on a whim, you decide that it would be totally awesome to walk five miles along the beach to the semi-annual Memorial Day/Labor Day weekend faire… do not, I repeat, do not wear sandals. Especially if you’re not used to walking long distances in sandals.

If you already made the poor choice of wearing sandals, and you’re beginning to get blisters on the bottom of your feet, leaving the bike path to go walk barefoot on the sand will not make them feel better.

Mixing in the sugar

If you did decide to walk barefoot on the sand, and you find your blisters are getting worse, you may find that walking in the water relieves the pain temporarily. You may also find that the occasional unexpected larger than usual wave may make it look like you had a rather unfortunate accident.

However, if it so happens that due to certain poor choices on your part, you have ended up with blisters on your feet and a large splash of ocean water up the skirt of your dress, just own it. Totally own it. If you’re like me, then remember that you’ve definitely had far worse blisters from your pointe shoes, and had to keep dancing through the pain. So this? This, where your feet hurt like crazy and your butt is still damp? Yeah, this is nothing. (Keep telling yourself that until you believe it.)

Crumble filling

But even once you’ve totally owned the pain, and you’re rocking the damp dress, you really don’t want to make the long, painful 5-mile walk home. Especially now that it’s getting cold outside and starting to rain (wait, what? This is Southern California, what’s that wet stuff coming from the sky?) So be smart and call your mom to come pick you up. Because that’s what mothers are for, right? (I love you, Mom! Don’t worry, I bribed paid her with kettle corn.)

Just out of the oven

Also.

On a completely unrelated note, if you decide to make a crumble, it may not be the best choice to make it with the first pluots of the season. (Ohmygosh sour.)

And apparently you’re supposed to cook certain fruits, such as pluots, before you put them in said crumble, else you may end up with something that’s more of a soup than a crumble-ish dessert.

But if all else fails (and this applies to both soupy crumbles and unhappy feet), a nice big scoop of vanilla ice cream makes everything better. Promise.

Crumble soup

(No recipe today, because I promise you, you don’t want to be making an epic fail of a dessert like this!)

I only just realized that… I like blueberries.

I’ve never been much of a fruit person. I’m horribly opposed to anything that even hints at sour. (I’m getting better.) For years, the only fruits I would touch were bananas.

Of course, I always loved blueberry muffins. You know, the kind that came from a box mix, with little blue bits that seemed only vaguely related to the plump, juicy blueberries that you find at the farmer’s market. (I’ll admit it – I still prefer those types of blueberry muffins over all others. I can’t help it, I grew up with them… they’re comfort food.)

But real blueberries? Bleh. Ew. Ick. No thank you.

And then, the other day at the farmer’s market, a vendor offered me a taste of the blueberries she was selling. I tried to politely turn her down, but she insisted: “They’re very sweet…” Not wanting to be rude, I popped one in my mouth, expecting to have to suppress a scrunched-up sour expression.

Imagine my shock when I realized I actually liked it.

As in, “OH MY GOSH WHY DID NOBODY EVER TELL ME BLUEBERRIES COULD BE THIS GOOD?!?!”

Needless to say, I bought a basket of blueberries immediately.

It seems my tastes have changed over the years. The biggest, sweetest blueberries that don’t have even the faintest hint of sour or tart? Those taste like crayons to me. (Not regular crayons, more like a specific scented crayon that I had when I was a child. The most obscure comparison ever, I know. …which is not to say I’ve ever eaten a crayon…)

But those blueberries that have just enough sour to make you sit up and notice… those are the best. The tang brings out the flavor of the blueberry, and makes you want more. It’s not sleepy-boring, but also not so sour as to make your face scrunch up into a pucker.

I’ve been putting them in my cereal, eating them plain… but I’m thinking it’s time to actually make something with them. A crumble or crisp is sounding really good right now… but I’m curious – if you had a basket full of blueberries, what would you make with them?

Breakfast at a diner in Berkeley

Bags of homemade peanut butter cookies for WCLA

Sometimes that’s okay.

Steamed clams for my birthday last year

Tons of homemade sushi for New Year’s 2011

Papaya salad at the 2011 Tet Festival

For example, for my family’s little Memorial Day BBQ (which you’ll get to see next post), I made quite a few dishes that I had never attempted before. That’s a lot more effort than what normally goes into our barbecues, but… that’s okay. Everybody enjoyed it, and the work was well worth the effort.

Grillin’

Sandwich from the Manila Machine food truck

Nem nuong (Vietnamese pork) sandwich

On the other hand, I definitely try too hard when it comes to blogging. I want every post to be perfect and have an amazing recipe and gorgeous photos. (Don’t we all?) But then that just results in me not blogging at all, because I don’t know what to say, or I don’t have a recipe, or maybe the photos were merely taken with my iPhone.

Saltine topped with sliced tomato and tuna salad

Clam chowder in Santa Barbara

Deep-fried red and white bean-filled mochi balls

But I do eat.

Ramen

Apple pie on a stick

A lot.

A whole lotta bacon

Munchies at trivia night in Monterey with my family

(Every day, in fact!)

Fried rice topped with a fried egg

Toasted sandwich thin with Nutella

It’s not always fancy…

Fried egg, bacon, and kimchi sandwich

Bacon-fried rice (a New Year’s tradition)

But that’s okay, right?

Red bean-flled taiyaki (fish-shaped mochi cakes)

Food from the Flying Pig food truck

(I mean, just look at all these food photos you’d have never seen if I hadn’t decided to write this post!)

Shredded zucchini for zucchini bread

Japanese donut with adzuki bean filling

I have a lot of food stories that I could share with you… even if it’s of a day that consisted of other people’s recipes (like our Memorial Day BBQ), or a visit to a restaurant, or simply a sandwich I made that I thought was fantastic. But you guys never get to hear these stories, because they’re not… well… they’re not perfect.

Food from The Counter Burger at Fiesta Hermosa

Mother’s Day tradition: salmon from Otani’s

Tempeh and spicy daikon from the farmer’s market

Why the sudden change? I’ve been reading Shauna’s blog, as part of a job that’s requiring me to go through all the posts she’s ever written there. She’s an amazing blogger, a wonderful writer, with great photos and well-tested recipes.

Shauna’s daughter Lucy at IFBC 2010

This is how you know you’re eating with food bloggers

Not an unusual sight

But if you read from the beginning, you see that she doesn’t try to force herself to be perfect. Some days she didn’t have the words, and posted nothing more than a photo. Sometimes there was no recipe – she just needed to write… about celiac disease, about her wedding, about where she went that day. (And with all due respect – and I think she’d agree – her photos from the first year of her blog weren’t all too great.)

Tortilla soup from The Soup Bar

Slicing the turducken at Thanksgiving 2010

Layered cherry, coconut, and spinach gelatin

Now, this woman is a very, very well-known blogger, with multiple cookbooks (and another on the way), articles about her in all sorts of well-known publications, and (from what it sounds like) a TV show currently in production. (I’m so honored to be able to call her my friend as well.) So if someone like her is allowed to be imperfect, and just post whatever she wants, whatever moves her… then why on earth am I trying so damn hard? (After all, this blog is hardly anything… it can’t even hold a candle to my sushi blog, never mind to a blog like hers – and that’s okay. It’s not like I’m trying to get a cookbook deal or a TV show out of this… it’s just here for me to talk about my food, nothing more.)

Blueberries never try too hard.

Neither do tangerines.

California strawberries don’t have to try at all

Kale chips – amazing. Hardly any effort.

So I’m not trying so hard anymore. No more waiting for the perfect recipe with perfect photos and a perfect essay to accompany them before I allow myself to put up a post. That’s just silly. Nope… now you’re going to get to see what I’m eating, when I’m eating it (more or less)… no more silly perfectionism for me, thank you.

Pasta w/sauteed bacon+onion+garlic & a fried egg.

Taco time!

Flourless chocolate cake. Decadent.

This isn’t exactly a new recipe – it’s essentially this banana cream pie, except with slices of mango on the bottom instead of bananas, and topped with strawberries, kiwi fruit, and peaches. But it turned out so wonderfully well, I just had to share it with you.

…with mango, kiwi, strawberries, and peaches.

In Son’s family, and in many Vietnamese (and other Asian?) families, this type of fruit tart is traditionally eaten at all sorts of celebrations. I made this one for his mom’s birthday. The verdict? Even better than the ones they used to buy from the bakeries in Little Saigon. Success!

Everyone loved it!

Recently, I’ve really been wanting to start a garden. This desire to grow my own herbs, fruits, and vegetables began a couple of years ago when I really began to take an interest in cooking, and was only exacerbated when I was introduced to Diane and Todd’s amazing garden. Seriously, that’s my dream garden.

Skinny Chives

Problem is, my apartment isn’t exactly overflowing with free space, and I have, er, less than a green thumb. I’ve tried growing things before, and everything but some very hardy bamboo has died. Kaput. Gone all too soon. Heck, I’ve even managed to kill a Vietnamese herb that is supposedly considered a weed. I unintentionally killed a weed! This gardening aspiration was not getting off to a good start.

Itsy-Bitsy Sweet Marjoram

So when my brother got me a Chia Herb Garden for Christmas, I was understandably excited. Finally an opportunity to grow herbs in an easy, compact way that even I could do correctly. I mean, come on. It’s a Chia garden. I couldn’t possibly kill that… right?

The herbs have been growing for almost a month now, and they aren’t dead yet! In fact, they’re starting to look like the herbs that you buy from the store. These pictures were taken a couple of weeks ago, and since then the cilantro has begun to grow those spiky leaves that you normally associate with Mexican or Asian food, and the basil and chives are getting bigger by the day. And even though it’s still itsy-bitsy, I have high hopes for the sweet marjoram!

Graceful Cilantro

Everyone loves contests. Heck, who doesn’t enjoy an opportunity to win free stuff? Especially when it’s awesome, free, yummy, food stuff?

You may remember almost a month ago, when I raved about Sugoi’s garlic chicken. Since they sell the sauce online, we knew we would be ordering some when we got home. Since we were ordering some for ourselves anyways we figured, why not reward our awesome readers with a giveaway?

This sauce has many different potential uses – drench fried chicken with it, use it as a marinade, it can even be mixed with mayonnaise and used as a dip or dressing. It’s entirely up to your imagination!

So here’s your chance: just leave a comment on this post by midnight PST on Friday, October 24. Make sure to leave your name and email address, so I can contact you if you win. I will randomly pick two commenters, and announce the winners next Monday. Good luck!

Note: Because of shipping costs and restrictions, I’m limiting winners to those in North America. So sorry to the rest of the world, but one of these days I promise I’ll have a contest you can participate in as well.

Garlic chicken from Sugoi… yum!

As Sushi Day is the place where I write about the types of sushi I make, Fridgg will be my place for writing about everything but sushi. My diet and my life consist of so many foods aside from sushi, and it was very nearly driving me mad not to have a place to share them with you. Every time I bake, or make dinner for myself and Son, or go to a restaurant, I want to be able to share my recipes and experiences with you. I’m so excited that I finally can!

So come on in, kick off your shoes, and make yourself at home. I’ll be in the kitchen, where you’re welcome to join me, cooking all sorts of delicious goodies for you.

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