Kelly Azuma

Today I woke up early and decided to go into the city. Yasu dropped me off at the station and I caught the train in, it takes about 45 minutes.

Firstly I went to the Nick Cave Exhibition at the WA Museum. I had been wanting to go, and as I was footloose and fancy free, I decided to.
It was a great look at one of my favourite musicians, and there were quite alot of personal trinkets of his, and even a bespoke suit made for him in London. Lots of his notes, artwork, and even his office! Also lots of videos of interviews, video’s, and framed photographs. I spent a good hour in there wandering around and reading, the exhibition itself was quite big.

Afterwards I went to some of the Japanese supa’s and picked up some groceries including some Hamburg Sauce for the hamburgers I made for dinner.

I also dropped by a store called Utopia, which makes Japanese pan and cakes. This store is very much the same as a Japanese panya, and there was all kinds of pan, currypan, sausagepan, to matchapan, melonpan, anpan, cheesepan etc. I bought Yasu a cream cheese pan for $2, and a bag of 6 matcha anpan for $3. The prices in Utopia are pretty much on par with the prices I spent on pan at Obihiro station. All this time it’s been there and I didn’t know. I have a feeling I will be a regular customer.

After mincing around the city for a while, I had had enough so I got on the train and came home. I caught a bus to our house, and when I got home, Yasu was in bed. He’s just gotten over his flu so I don’t blame him. The weather wasn’t all that good either, mostly overcast, so a great day for snuggling.

I made us a cup of tea and we had the pan for afternoon tea. Yasu devoured his cream cheese pan stating it was the best he had ever had. It was actually quite large for the price, about 15cm diameter. Yasu also had two matcha anpans, and I had one, so there are three left for tomorrow.

We were watching Softbank Hawks take on Chunichi Dragons, and surprisingly Softbank won by 4. So that was good. I’m pretty used to seeing CD beat the pants off every other team. After baseball was over, I made dinner, and the Teriyaki hamburg sauce was loved by both of us. Very nice. Made by a brand called Ebara.

So that was my saturday pretty much. A very nice day.

I have a supplier that I regularly buy Japanese candy and sweets from for my blog Sweet Pursuit.

Yesterday he let me in on a little secret.

He bumped into the Pepsi rep in Japan and she told him what this years Pepsi flavour will be.

Are you ready??

SHISO!!

Yes, Shiso Pepsi. You heard it right.

We thought Yoghurt, Cucumber, and Hawaiian were weird, now you just wait for this one. I bet it’s gonna taste twice as weird.

It will be released on June 23rd and according to the rep it is “very authentic and strong”.

Tonight turned out to be pretty good. Yasu came home at 6pm and I made bulgogi for dinner, which I had tweaked around with, the sauce now tastes exactly like the original Korean style bulgogi.

Then for dessert I made a carrot cake loaf with cream cheese and lemon icing. It was totally divine. My little mouse couldn’t stop nibbling it, and now there is only half left. He has some in his bento tomorrow though so that should keep him happy.

We watched サラリーマンNEO tonight that Yasu had recorded last night. It was good but Sexy Bucho wasn’t in it tonight. Having looked up the website he’ll be on the next episode so I’m happy about that. I can get my fix.

One more day for Yasu to work then 3 whole days together. Our car is in the mechanic at the moment though and won’t be ready til next Tuesday so we probably won’t be going anywhere over the long weekend as we only have the company car, unless we pay for the petrol. We’ll probably end up going for a picnic in the hills not far from our place though. It looks like the weather will be nice.

I got a surprise in the post today. I won a double movie pass to “night at the museum 2″. I’m not really a fan, I saw the first one and it wasn’t my cup of tea. Though a friend did tell me it has a few laughs, so maybe I’ll rope in a friend of mine to go with me.

Yesterday I was still abit foggy-headed so I just ordered pizza from Domino’s for dinner. I got a good deal of 3 pizza’s for $20. Aussie bob (Egg,bacon, cheese, and bbq sauce), Supreme (all minus capsicum but extra anchovies), and Double Bacon Cheeseburger (beef, bacon, cheese, mayo, bbq sauce). They were all really yum I have to say, but sadly something has happened to the size of Domino’s pizza, in that they have made a Large smaller. Oh well, lucky we ordered 3. Yasu took the rest to work for lunch.

After watching the Japanese news, Yasu switched over so we could watch Thank God You’re Here, but サラリーマンNEO was on at the same time, so he recorded it for us to watch later. Then Yasu ran a bath and I watched Criminal Minds, which was a really good episode about a killer with OCD.

After that I jumped in the bath and had a very relaxing soak with バスクリン(天然カモミール）.

I stayed up a while and tried to finish the book I’m reading, Four Fires by Bryce Courtenay, but it’s quite a big book (770 pages) and it was 3am before I finally turned in, and I still haven’t finished it.

It’s a really good book. A part of it talks about a character who is this boys dad, and he talks about his time in a concentration camp in Borneo under the Japanese. I was reading that at 3am and just started crying because it sounded so much like my own grandfather’s experience. I have real compassion for those men and women who went through so much during the war and could never escape their experience or the nightmares they had about it every night after.

This coming weekend is a long weekend for Foundation Day, so Yasu will have the whole 3 days off and I’m looking forward to spending time with him again.

This is for Nagaijin who asked for a copy of the Azuki An recipe that I attempted to make yesterday.

I have scanned the pages from the book, I hope it comes out ok for you to see. If not, please let me know and I will re-do them. Sorry for the crookedness of the pages, the book did not quite fit in my scanner so I had to tilt it slightly to get it to scan the whole thing.

If you click on the image you will be able to see the full size.

Yesterday Yasu and I both felt unwell, me not so much, just abit of a cough and a mild sore throat, but Yasu had all the flu symptoms as well as aches and pains in his body. I told him to stay home from work and his boss said that would be a good idea so he can get over it.

Yasu spent most of the day between bed and the tv. I tucked him up with a blanket and pillow in front of the tv and made sure he had meals and drinks as well as flu pills.

I had been soaking the azuki beans overnight so I decided to make Azuki-An. I have a Japanese and English Japanese recipe book.　「英語でつくる和食」

I followed the recipe until the end, but I knew something wasn’t right, so I read the Japanese, and it said something totally different. It turns out the translation was wrong. So I ended up with Azuki that was mashed but not enough into a paste, and I had already thrown the water it was cooked in. Arrgh!

I had planned to make dorayaki. I still went on and made it but the mashed azuki was too dry, so it wouldn’t stick to the pancakes. In the end I got some condensed milk and spread it on the top so it stuck better, though it overpowered the azuki. We still enjoyed it though. I have learnt a lesson for next time though. But I’m kind of mad at the recipe book for not translating it properly. What is the point of having English and Japanese if one is not translated into the other correctly? It means that now I have to read the Japanese description first anyway to see if it’s the same, so no time will be saved.

Yasu likes Azuki alot, it’s his favourite food. So with the leftover Azuki he put it in a bowl and poured milk and made his own “azuki miruku”. He said it was “yum”. Not something I would eat, but as long as he was happy.

I had a yearning to make some Japanese food for dinner, so I made some sushi rice, agedashi-dofu, and some yaki udon. I served it with some daikon tsukemono on the side, which Yasu did try (even though he hates tsukemono). We really enjoyed the meal.

After I cleaned up, Yasu decided to go to bed, and so I tucked him in and rubbed Vicks (which he refers to as “bips” haha so cute) on his chest. He asked me to stay with him as he was lonely. I did for a while and tried to get up but he said that if I’m not there he can’t sleep. I quickly turned off all the lights and went to bed with my book. After about 10 minutes he started snoring so I knew he was going to be ok. I went to bed not long afterwards myself.

This morning Yasu went to work, but his boss sent him home because he wasn’t convinced that Yasu was a hundred percent better. So he stayed to supervise his workers and tell them what to do and then came home again at 10 am.

I feel ok, but I still have the cough which my asthma is making worse. Somehow the Ventolin isn’t working either. I feel ok apart from that but trying to keep a low profile to conserve energy.

Yasu has to go back to the workshop later tonight, around 7pm to close, because only he knows the security code because of him being the supervisor. I’ll probably go for a ride with him a little later.

I think I’ll make cottage pie for dinner tonight, something easy but yummy and good on a cold night like tonight.

Today turned out to be a somewhat lucky somewhat unlucky day.

I headed up to the shops around 12pm to post off a parcel to a friend who recently had a baby.

I also had to take a coat back to Target that I had bought on lay-by, that when I got it home I didn’t like the way it looked (it looked better in the store mirror…funny that). I got a refund and went in the store but couldn’t find something to replace it that I really liked.

I went into another store and found a black skivvy. I had been looking for one for a while and it was marked down to $10 so that was a bargain. I also got a nice furry hoodie in a dark fawn colour which is sooo warm.

I was heading to do some shopping when I passed a new hair salon that had just opened and they were advertising for hair models for the students to practice on. I enquired and they asked if I would like my hair cut in June, and it would be for free. If I wanted a colour I could get it half price. So I agreed to have my hair cut mid-june and made an appointment. If I’m happy after the cut I will go back again and get a colour.

Afterwards I went to the grocery store to buy a few things, and happened upon Tofu. I have eaten Tofu in the past and never really liked it as I hate squelchy slimy foods, but as it was on special I thought I would take it home and see what I could do with it. I like making traditional Japanese homestyle foods and a challenge suited me.

I next went to the health food store and found they had Azuki beans to buy, $4.48/kg. I got about 50 grams and it cost me 44 cents. Very cheap!! I have them soaking in the fridge now, and will attempt to make Azuki-an tomorrow. I can’t believe the store has been selling it all this time and I never knew. I’ve been buying the really small cans of Azuki-an at the Japanese supermarket for around $6 for a 100g can.

Anyways, so I bought my Azuki and a bag of Japanese senbei that I love. I went to my friend’s cafe but she wasn’t there as her young son is in hospital with a bad asthma attack (he has them often). Another lady was working, also a friend, and she gave me all these muffins that they had excess of because it was a very slow day. I also got some freshly made plain croissants for my breakfast tomorrow, and a cup of tea.

I set my cup of tea down on the table and as I was reorganizing my bags I accidentally knocked the cup of tea towards me and the whole thing went all over my jeans and down my leg so that one side of my jeans was totally wet. I had some tissues in my bag so managed to wipe the table and my bag, but I had to go catch the bus with wet pants. Ugh. Especially as the weather is quite cool now, it was quite uncomfortable!

On the way to the bus station I passed a newsagent and because my day couldn’t get any worse I purchased a scratch ticket. I was amazed when I won $6 so I was now $5 in front. Yay.

When I got home I looked in my letterbox and just about died, it smelled like a fart-bomb had exploded in there, but I know what really happened. The tsukemono that my friend sent from Adelaide had arrived! Not only that, it had leaked all in the parcel and outside, so that the bag was totally wet and the post people had had to put it in another bag and tape it up. I unwrapped it and found the Daikon and Daikon leaf tsukemono inside. I had to dash off a quick email to my friend, I’m waiting to see if it’s still edible. I put it in the fridge and now the whole fridge stinks. Hah!

After that I threw my jeans in the washing machine and started making 肉豆腐 (Niku-dofu). I finished cooking just as Yasu arrived home and then I served it. He couldn’t stop saying “yum, yum!” and he loved it. I liked the flavour but I still have an issue with the flavour of Tofu. It’s the same flavour as the outside of いなり寿司. I find it hard to get used to that flavour for some reason. But as long as Yasu loved it, then that’s all that matters to me.

肉豆腐

After dinner Yasu had a 玄米茶 and I had a 紅茶 and now we are chilling out with a muffin.

My day has been a mixture of highs and lows. I’ve never had a lucky and unlucky day at the same time before. I think it’s pure optimism that has kept me going today. haha