Stoned Baked Japanese Sweet Potatoes~ A veil of night

It was around 6 pm when I got off my work in mid January, Austin Texas in a very tasteless industrial shopping mall parking lot.

As I was driving out of that parking lot, suddenly, I surely felt a veil of night and felt indescribably content.  It was like the whole scene was enveloped in mist and I felt very nostalgic.

Catching such moment when driving alone was so incredible that I had to think, "What was that?" as if I saw a ghost.

I remember that moment was a little hazy and light blue, and it was far from the miseries I had to witness every day in my environment.

Even though it was a split second feeling, I felt that moment forever.

I remember that moment was so quiet that it had a power to make me someone I never thought I could be...a quiet person.

Maybe, I am a truly quiet person because I was able to catch such quiet moment.

That moment was a collection of intangible things in a split second.

Maybe, I really don't need anything anymore such as a brand new car, a nice house, a spouse, retirement savings, etc. if I can feel such moment.

If I can feel such moment with a jazz piano of Bill Evans, it would be a complete world to me.

As I am writing these amazing feelings, I feel a strong presence next to me which is gazing at me so intensely and hoping forever that he can have flying Japanese sweet potato I am eating.

I remember that long time ago in Japan, I heard sound of whistle and voice like singing "Ishiyaki Imo~, Ishiyaki Imo~<stone baked sweet potatoes>" from a push-cart vendors selling stone baked Japanese sweet potatoes after dark...it was definitely a veil of night...in a very cold season eating hot Japanese sweet potatoes was one of the best eating snack memories in my life.

Now in US, I am thinking of nostalgic intangible quiet moment with my huge black lab sitting next to me, throwing him Japanese sweet potato cooked in a microwave and enjoying his vacuum like sound catching those in the air.

I could never train him to be a world champion of Frisbee but...maybe, a world champion of catching Japanese sweet potatoes in the air.

Anmitsu - beautiful people do not just happen

I have learned a new joy after experiencing my soul mate's death. 

This joy, which cost his life, is very interesting. It is like a game because I play with my emotions and desires by being caught in a paradox.

It is comprised of a strong sentiment coming from yearnings for something that I really want to get but cannot because I decide I better not to get. The stronger I yearn for and abstain myself from it, I become more powerful.  The sentiment is so strong that it brings me tears which can purify my being emotionally, spiritually and physically.  This whole process gives me a deep joy. It is almost like an ecstasy.  

I strongly yearn for my sexuality, ego, and to some extent, vanity.
The more I abstain from sexuality, I become more sexual than ever.
The more I abstain from ego, I am in control of myself more than ever.
The more I abstain from vanity and focus on spirituality, I become more physically beautiful.

For some reason, I connect this new joy with Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's words:

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known 

defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, 

and have found their way out of the depths.  

These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity
and an understanding of life that fills them with 

compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern.  

Beautiful people do not just happen. 

Maybe because, I found my way out of his loss and I know that I no longer can be knocked down by deep sorrows.

Maybe because, enjoying those thick layer of emotions (a new joy) can make me so human that I can appreciate and have a sensitivity.

Maybe, what really makes me human is when I break the abstinence after playing such game and I become true to myself.

Therefore, I have decided to continue to yearn for more and more my sexuality, ego and to some extent vanity, so that I can pursue this new joy.

Unfortunately, when it comes to Japanese desert, I have no control to play such game.  I yearn for it and have to eat before it is too late for my soul. The ultimate desert that I yearn is Anmitsu which contains many beautiful colorful ingredients like those thick emotions.  The ingredients are mainly Agar (Japanese gelatin made by sea vegetable) which amazingly balance nutrition and beauty for my body and soul and I feel that Anmitsu makes me so human and very Japanese.

Anmitsu

Ingredients:

For Kanten jelly:

1 2/3 cup water

1/2 stick kanten (agar agar), or 1 tsp kanten powder

1-2 Tbsp sugar *adjust the amount to your preference

For Syrup:

1/4 cup water

2/3 cup sugar

For Toppings:

1/3 cup anko (sweet bean paste)

fruits slices, such as kewi, strawberries or oranges

ice cream

• Soak kanten stick in water for one hour or until softened. Squeeze softened kanten and tear it into small pieces. 
• Add the kanten pieces or kanten powder in 1 2/3 cup of water in a medium pan and bring to a boil, stirring. Turn down the heat to low. Simmer until the kanten dissolves well, stirring. 
• Add sugar and stir well. Pour the liquid in a flat container and cool to firm. 
• To make syrup, mix 1/4 cup of water and 2/3 cup sugar in a sauce pan and heat to dissolve sugar. Cool the syrup. 
• Cut kanten jelly into small cubes. Serve kanten jelly and fruits into individual bowls. Pour syrup over the ingredients and top with anko.

Serve immediately and eat until you feel turning Japanese..

Soba - tears and chuckles for long happy life

One morning in Santa Rosa California, I saw a man walking carrying his dry cleaning clothes being placed on a hanger.  I started crying watching him walking down the beautiful tree-lined street nonchalantly and lightly.  I was deeply moved by the ordinary scene, a man doing one of his regular routines.  

One afternoon near Bodega Bay California, I stepped out my house to take my dogs for a walk. I stopped under a big tree at my front yard because felt gentle ocean breeze from the Bay, and then, I looked up a bright sun rays shining through the branches of the tree.  I felt tears running down my cheeks.  At that moment, I heard a jazz piano in my heart  ~The Koln Concert~  played by Keith Jarret. I was deeply moved by the ordinary nature, the gentle ocean breeze and a bright sun rays.

One evening in Austin Texas, I was driving to my work against after work traffic due to my graveyard shift. I was looking up the heavy clouds in the overcast sky, and all of a sudden, I realized that working for graveyard shift, having gloomy weather and not having anybody (except for my dog) to wait for me when I come home after work can be raw materials to produce a deep joy. 

I did not cry this time, but instead, chuckled.  

Strangely, it took relatively depressing scenes instead of the ordinary beautiful scenes to make me chuckle.

One night in Austin Texas, I finally gathered the courage to cook for beautifully corrupted people who try to construct their lives due to heavy body and mind abuse.  I realized that I have to keep on living my life for them to help them realize that they have not lost anything important in life yet because their pure hearts trying to become happy have not been destroyed yet. 

I was able to gather this courage after all those tears and chuckles.

Now, sitting at my desk recollecting all those sorrows and joys, I have never imagined that I would be so busy cooking Soba (buckwheat noodle) for my friends and family and chuckling and having tears of laughter this year, 2012.

Now, it is that time of year that I have to prepare Soba (buckwheat noodle), a bowl of hot noodle soup.  In Japan, we traditionally eat Soba on New Years Eve while waiting to greet the new year and end the old year because the long noodle symbolize the longevity, the long happy life...

Soba

Ingredients ・4 servings:

• 4 bundles of dried Soba noodle (buckwheat noodle)
• green onions (chopped)
• 6 cups Dashi soup stock (dissolve 2 teaspoon gragules or 1 stick)
• 1/2 cup Mirin
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1 ~2 teaspoon sugar (optional)

Cooking:

<Noodle>

• Cook Soba noodles until al dente
• Drain when done

<Broth>

• Boil Mirin and add sugar (optional) in medium heat
• add water , Dashi soup stock and soy sauce
• Bring to a boil
• Serve soba noodle in a bowl and add soup
• Sprinkle green onions

~Serve immediately and eat while hot~

Turkish Coffee - Ingredients for happiness at my memories' cliff

Sometimes, memories can illuminate the best flavor 

that we can never re-create no matter how much we try.

One of those was my mother's pound cake tasted by my sister at a Christmas Eve in 1960's. My sister tried to re-create the same flavor after she grew up and married with three children. She tried it with all those rich and gourmet ingredients that she could buy in 1990's but always failed.

It was because the taste she remembered was consisted of her mother's big proud smile when she opened the rectangular box in front of her family after the dinner (I was a baby so don't remember it), a vivid contrast between my sister's feelings of being betrayed by her mother not providing a typical Christmas cake which should be decorated by Santa Clause & reindeer in a square box and completely unexpected flavor coming from a bumpy British style pound cake with lots of dried fruits and nuts which looked like a confectionery box distributed at a funeral, and a simplicity of those days with much less technologies than nowadays which enhance people's five sense sharper. 

She ate the whole cake even the last crumbs.

Those three ingredients - my mother's big smile, vivid contrast, a simplicity of the time- were short in my sister's recipe.

Japanese traditional European influenced Christmas cake made by rich butter cream

Amazing simple bumpy pound cake with lots of nuts and dried fruits

Another one was a canned coffee that I drank while reading Japanese comic books at a bookstore on my way home after a summer short course to prepare for college entrance exams in a small city, Aomori in Japan.  (a summer of 1979?)  It only cost 80 cents from a vendor machine but tasted much better in my memory than a Turkish coffee with jaggery sugar and cardamon spice that I learned to make 25 years later.

It was because I was reading a funny comic book holding back my laughter in a quiet bookstore, and enjoying every sip of the coffee which was filled with lots of milk and sugar.  My body knew that all those unhealthy ingredients in the coffee would be evaporated into me holding laughter and energy.

I learned that the happiness consists of very simple ingredients - good memories and simple food.

In time, I grew to be a catcher in my memories visualizing a scene of my favorite novel "A catcher in rye".

...standing on the edge of my memories' cliff trying to catch good moments and feelings when those are going over the memories' cliff.....

I know those memories are eternally engraved in my unconscious level but I have to pull those to my conscious level so that those can save my life at a crucial time when I feel like I want to give up everything and fade away from a reality.

************************************************************************************

Due to those simple ingredients I held in my conscious level, I was able to enjoy every moments with my 89 years old mother in law when I went to see her for a Christmas dinner at a nursing home in Kansas, Missouri.  

I was even able to laugh out at a Christmas dinner table when I found out a professional caretaker of my mother in law had been believing all these years that I was a truck driver and romantically involved with many men at one time (maybe boyfriends at every cities?).  

This time, I did not hold back my laughter but laughed out, and said to her, 

" Oh really?  Do I look like a truck driver and being involved with multiple men romantically at one time?

It is impossible since I am still in love with her son who passed away four years ago and it may last another 500 years."

Turkish Coffee with cardamon

Ingredients:

• Extremely fine grind coffee beans such as Espresso, French Roast or Columbia
• 1/2 or less teaspoon ground cardamon
• Sugar (optional)

Making:

• Add water and coffee beans into a sauce pan
• Add cardamon and sugar
• Once all the ingredients are completely dissolved, brew over a medium heat
• First boil - as soon as it starts to boil, remove the sauce pan from the heat and let the froth down.
• Repeat this two more times since the three boils create a better taste

Natto - eternally grateful for my heritage

One of the happiest memories in my life was to swim with my dog, T-Bone when I was unemployed and desperately looking for a job.  It was a summer of 2009.

Never imagined that that summer would be such unforgettable and beautiful days, especially when I had been experiencing rejections one after another by the companies I applied for.

***********************

T-Bone would always make a big splash into the lake in front of my face, which make me see nothing but water splash and everything in sight become a blur on a horizon.

Then, he calms down.  We finally swim side by side reasonably and peacefully.

Lying on my back and floating like a paper doll on the water, I gaze into the faraway sky and wonder if I ever saw a blue sky whose edge was decorated with branches of trees.  

As I enjoy watching those branches moving slowly away in my sight, I gradually visualizing my sepia-tone pictures in my life that I cherish eternally.

***Soul mate,  my mother, my father, my dogs/Chako & Muddy,

Northeastern part of Japan - a huge elementary school yard with many trees where I swung on vines like Tarzan, - thousands of white swans in front of my house which migrated from Siberia ***

This is the moment that I can convince that there will never be an end but continuation.
This is the moment that I feel so powerful because I stop defining myself by neither the job I hold nor the title of organization nor any other secular achievements, but by the sepia-tone pictures that I cherish in my life.

I transformed that summer which could be my most desperate and miserable time to the happiest moments of my life.

***********************

A nine-year-old bobbed hair girl would rush home after playing so hard in a school yard Jungle because the beautiful sunset illumination on the trees telling her the time for dinner, telling her go home.

It was a summer of 1971 when the first MacDonald opened in Japan and people in Japan started eating American fast food, but I was so lucky that I had no choice but to eat my mother's home made meal every day because it would build my strong body that can tolerate a 110-pound-black massive lab as a play mate in a summer of 2009 when the global economic decline even started affecting me.

I would rush home with wet black monster after swimming so hard and run to the kitchen start warming brown rice, cutting Japanese pickles (tsukemono), warming miso-soup and preparing my most favorite dish called Natto, which I convince, is the most miraculous food on the planet and makes me a healthiest, happiest and, moreover, a person who can eternally grateful for my heritage.

How to eat Natto:

1. Stir the natto with chopsticks. Do not mash. Stir fast and well about 10 to 15 times until it becomes sticky.
2. Pour the seasoning that comes with Natto.
3. Add your favorite vegetables or condiments such as chopped green onions, sesame seeds, eggs, mustard, wasabi, etc.

Hachihai-jiru (tofu soup) - A tremendous gift

One of the hardest things in my life was to bring his things from his office to home. 
Some of those were his favorite worn-out igloo lunch box and a magic kaleidoscope tube wand that he looked into many times while designing his passion - sound system -

I never thought that I would feel that way, because I was just fine while gathering his things to clean his office with his co-workers, while walking to my car with them helping me to carry his things, while saying good-bye to them, while situating myself into my car seat for a long drive to home and while watching the co-workers fading away from my sight through my car window. I was just fine.

Then, when I was about to start the car, all of a sudden, it hit me...a reality that I was sitting in my car with his things from his office not because he quit his job but because he no longer existed.

For the first time in my life, I truly sobbed uncontrollably pounding my head against the steering wheel.
For the first time in my life, I truly felt lonely and noticed that all the feelings that I had ever had was nothing compared to the feeling I had at that moment in my car, in front of the steering wheel.

That moment was a beginning of a journey to discover how courageous, strong and compassionate I am. 
The moment came to me suddenly and it was transformed to a tremendous gift - a discovery of a new me- a gift that you never, ever want to miss.

I remember a great soup that I was fed by my great aunt long time ago in Japan, when I was so exhausted after crying so much over my mother's death.  The soup was called "Hachihai-jiru", which was made by dashi soup with lots of silken tofu, green onions and mushrooms.  It was so good that I gulped the soup and ate seven more bowls, and she said  "Hachihai-jiru was named after exactly how you are eating, eat more.."

八  = hachi =  eight

杯 = hai =  times

汁 = jiru = soup

I thought she was joking but she was not.  The soup gave me energy, courage and hope to live so that I can be stronger and more compassionate woman like those amazing ladies, my mother, aunt and great aunt, and all those people who fed their children.

Hachihai jiru

Ingredients:

• 1 package Tofu (silken), cut lengthwise
• 3 bunch Green onions, cut lengthwise
• 5 pices shiitake or shimeji mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 4 cups dashi soup stock (dissolve 2 teaspoon gragules or 1 stick)
• 4 tablespoon soy sauce
• 2 tablespoon Mirin
• sea salt

Cooking:

• Cook mushrooms in 4 cups dashi soup stock until the mushrooms become tender
• Add green onions and tofu
• Add Mirin and soy sauce
• Bring to a boil
• Add a pinch of sea salt

Serve immediately and eat eight bowls if you can...

Miso soup - a surge of happiness

I was driving from Austin to San Antonio to join my soul mate's half sisters' Thanksgiving dinner and looking up the cloudless blue sky which spreads unlimitedly in front of me, and almost suddenly, felt a surge of happiness.

Never imagined that I was able to feel like this by just looking up the sky when driving to such occasion, because such occasion should remind me of many memories with my soul mate... the occasion that I used to joyfully ride with him. Those days, I never imagined that a life could end instantly without any preparation.

This sky I was looking up was a magic, I thought.  

Then, I realized that there was no magic in this substantial world.  

I realized that magic was in me.

And I discovered that a surge of happiness could happen even in the most unlike situation.

As I was smiling and looking up the sky, I felt that maybe I have been living all my life just for this moment. 

Here I am,  I feel an urgency to share a surge of happiness but it is a glimpse of happiness, just like Miso soup that gives me an instant joy because of its taste but I have no doubt that its nutrition is not an instant but lasts forever in my body, which could be a magic of Miso (fermented soy beans) in this substantial world.

Miso Soup

Ingredients:

3 cup Japanese soup stock (bonito fish or sea kelp, called "Dashi")

1 table spoon dried wakame seaweed

1/2 package of Tofu (or any vegetables you like)

2 table spoon Miso paste

chopped green onions

Cooking:

• Heat up the dashi soup stock (dissolve 2 teaspoon gragules or half stick)
• Add hard ingredients such as vegetables until tender
• Add dried wakame seaweed and tofu
• Take the miso in a ladle, and add a little bit of the hot stock, Mix the miso and stock together in the ladle with a chopstick until the miso is dissolved. 

• Dissolve the miso mixture in the soup
• Don't let it boil or the flavor will dissipate
• Serve immediately