Entertaining in Japan

I am excited to say that I have joined not only the HSL-51 (Tim's sqaudron) Officer Spouses' Club but also the Atsugi Officer Spouses' Club (AOSA).  Through both organizations, I have made many new friends.  Tuesday night, I joined Leslie, Sarah and Rebekah at Brittany's house for food and wine and to watch the Bachelor finale.  I took the oyster crackers that Mom so generously sent us as well as a homemade pound cake (they loved them both!).  It was my first attempt at a pound cake in Japan!

Tim had a night flight Wednesday so Leslie and Jennifer came over to see the house.  We then ventured to Yamato Station to eat dinner at an Izakaya.  While there, we sat on the third floor and were interrupted by a 6.8 earthquake.  That is one way to get your Martini shaken not stirred, Mr. Bond.  No damage.  No big deal.  (We were also awaken by a 5.1 earthquake this morning).

Thursday morning, I met the AOSA Cooking Club at 9:45am where we departed for the Zama Community Center (Camp Zama is a nearby U.S. Army base).  The Cooking Club is a group of Atsugi Spouses and Japanese Military Self Defense Force Spouses (JMSDF) (co-located at NAF Atsugi) that meets once a month to share recipes.  This month, it was the Japanese women's turn to cook.  I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the women, learning the Japanese techniques, and gorging myself on scrumptious, homemade food!

The Menu:

Sweet Potatoes Boiled with Lemon Flavoring

Nabana with Mustard Dressing

Chawan-mushi Savory Cup Custard

Assorted Tempura

Onigiri

Sakura (cheery blossom) Tea

Tempura Batter:

1 egg yolk

Chilled water 

Hakurikiko flour

Vegetable oil for deep-frying

Making Tempura Vegetables

To determine if the oil is heated to the correct temperature, test it with a chop stick.  If the oil boils around the end of the clean chop stick, it is ready for frying.  

You want to avoid dipping the cooking chop sticks that are covered in batter in the oil while dropping the veggies into the oil otherwise it will splatter.  

Tempura

The tempura ingredients before (back to front, left to right): shrimp, lotus root, Japanese sweet potatoes, zucchini, mushrooms, some sort of flower, and asparagus

After

The vegetables were dipped into the batter before directly frying in the oil.  The shrimp were lightly scored along the spine to keep them from curling in the oil and then had the very tip of the tail shell cut off because it is very wet - you want all the tempura ingredients completely dry to keep the oil from splattering.  Then, the shrimp were covered in all purpose flower before being dipped in the batter.  

Before: parsley, onions, carrots, kamaboko fish paste (the pink and white ingredient)

After

Left: Nabana with Mustard Dressing

Right: Tempura carrots and veggies

Nabana is rape flowers, often used to make rape seed oil.  Before the yellow flowers bloom, it is boiled and blanched (as we did) and used for cooking.  

Mustard Dressing:

Bonito stock (using bonito bouillon cubs or fish stock)

Soy Sauce

Sake or a dry white wine

Mustard

Rape Flowers / Nabana

The growing table

Grating Radish as a garnish for the tempura sauce

Tempura Sauce:

water

soy sauce

mirin sweet cooking sake

bonito flakes

Radish and ginger to flavor

Left and Right: Tempura

Center: Sweet Potatoes Boiled with Lemon Flavoring

Sweet Potato

Lemon

Sugar

Salt

Onigiri: flavored rice balls formed into triangles

Directly to the left is the cup with the Pickled Cherry Blossom tea

The small bowl towards the left with the yellow and green substance is the Chawan-mushi Savory Cup Custard:

 Small Shrimp, chicken breast, carrot, shiitake mushroom, ginko nuts, trefoil, kamaboko fish paste, eggs

The final spread!

I left lunch ridiculously full.  However, my cooking was only barely over.  That night, I was to go to my friend Ashley's neighbor's house for a breakfast for dinner girls night.  So after stuffing my face with tempura and other Japanese delights, I went home to  make a hash brown casserole to take to dinner.   

Still not quite sure whose house I was actually going to for dinner, I boarded the train with Jennifer and headed to meet our friends Ashley and Gillian in Zama (the town where Camp Zama is located).  As we entered Ashley's neighbor's house, I saw my friends Leslie and Rebekah.  It turned out the neighbor was Sarah who I had been to Cooking Club with earlier in the day.  What a small world!

On the train with my casserole tote

The ladies at dinner

  

 Left to Right: Rebekah (picture on Left) - Rebekah was my sponsor
                       Jennifer (picture on Right) - husband is in Tim's squadron and has been here since April but Jennifer just arrived 3 weeks ago due to the earthquake and Tsunami last March
                      Me
                       Leslie - husband Chaz is a fellow Warlord of Tim's
                       Gillian - husband is a single seat Jet pilot - husband in Guam for SFARB
                      Ashley - husband is a single seat Jet pilot and she just graduated from Vandy as an NP    specializing in Internal Medicine and Midwifery- husband in Guam for SFARB

                      Sarah Geary - our gracious hostess who that was also Tyler Donati's sponsor.  Her husband is down in Okinawa with Tyler and the other HS-14 pilots.

                  

It has been a great week with friends!  Tim has flown twice and had a good week at work.  Even as I write, we are preparing to go to Zama to have dinner and drinks with our friends Leslie and Chaz.  We are settling in quite nicely and meeting amazing people!

We love and miss you all!

Photo Essay Of Sorts (aka PEOS)

I'll start with a disclaimer:

Regrettably it has been a long time since our last post.  As you can imagine, much transpired in that time frame.  What follows is a somewhat, but not chronologically, summary of Claire and my recent happenings in the land of the rising sun. 

Enjoy!

Right now it's Monday night and I brewed a batch of Prechter Pilsner yesterday.  It should be ready around mid spring and I cannot wait.

On the left is the boiling wort, that which will become beer.  On the right is me and my wort; this was a very tough picture to take.

These two pictures are from the inside of a bathroom at a pub Claire and I met another couple at last Friday night.  I thought the decorations were interesting.  The red bull cans were glued together, however the bathroom smelled like red bull so I'm not too sure if they were rinsed out...

The pub was interesting.  It was tiny and after the only employee took our order, he went behind the bar, fired up the grill, donned an apron and began to cook us our dinner.  He did one dish at a time.  Unfortunately, I was last in line.  What was also interesting was a group of 6 or so Japanese businessmen that came in about half way through our meal on what appeared to be a pub crawl.  They had a few rounds of shots before departing for what we assume was another pub.  Next time we'll have to follow and join in! 

 Here is Claire at Chilis! At Naval Station Yokosuka, they have a Chilis.  They also have one at the Air Force base we flew into back in December.  We very much wish they would put one closer at our base, NAF Atsugi.  Yokosuka is, without traffic, about a 45 minute drive.  We went by there to set up a service called G.I. Bill Pay.  Now all of our bills and rent will get sent there and they set up payments so we don't have to worry about it.  It should be very nice.  We'll just have to remember to go tell them to cut it off whenever we leave this place.

This is a futuristic train I saw pulling in the other day and felt compelled to document it.  I think it is neat.  We'll have to take a trip soon to give us an excuse to ride the bullet train (this is not a picture of the bullet train, it just reminded me of it).

Two weekends ago, Claire and I woke up one Sunday, midday, and said, "Lets go check out Tokyo Disney Sea!" And we did.  I'm an avid Disney world fan, and this park did not disappoint.  Here is me infront of Geni and the world.

 On the left is Claire at the restaurant where we had a delicious roast beef and lobster and scallop pasta for lunch.  The photo on the right is great.  I just love Geni's face! He was cracking us up all day.

This is just a funny sign that I felt inclined to share.  Enjoy.

Above and below are some photos of our great snow day a week or so ago.  The top and bottom are from our bedroom window of the snow covered garden that adjoins our property.  We must have had 7 or 8 inches that day.  I know its no Stavenger but it was wild!

The aircraft picture on the left is our flight line.  Usually you can see the runway, the buildings on the other side of the runway and the mountains in the distance.  This day you couldn't even see the runway.  The photo on the right is a snow covered helicopter they pulled into the hangar.

It's not Chilis, but its closer and still Mexican food.  It's Mike's TexMex! There are two, both a short train ride away.   We held out as long as we could, but finally the craving was overwhelming! We showed up at 5:25 pm only to find out they don't open until 5:30 pm.  We weren't discouraged; we waiting those long five minutes in the cold, freezing rain, and were rewarded with delicious margaritas and tacos and burritos.  It was certainly worth the trip.  As we were finishing up, a few friends of ours were just coming in; naturally we pulled up a chair and spent the evening with them. 

 These next five photos will seem weird, but interesting in their own right.  Don't think less of us.

On the left, the toilet was so colorful, I just had to document it.  On the right is my friend Mickey who is keeping this WC nice and clean.  I should probably explain this place further.  Coming home from an interesting dinner in the neighborhood, Claire and I stopped at what looked like a quaint bar about a block from the house.  It turns out that it is a small karaoke bar.  The only other person who came in was a regular who keeps his own bottle of whisky at the bar.  We struck up a Japanenglish conversation and before too long we were going back and forth on the karaoke; he or the bartender would sing a Japanese song, and I would sing some 80's or 90's classic.  It's nice to know this place is a short walk up the road.  Unfortunately they don't take credit cards and, like everywhere in Japan, is really expensive.  Before we realized it, we had racked up an 8000 yen tab between the two of us.  You live; You learn.

Below are some interesting posters that were in the same WC as Mickey. 

 Here are some random helicopter pictures.  The one on the right are a few of them in our hangar being worked on.  On the left is a bird's eye view of a rotor head.  Normally there would be 4 blades and a helicopter attached to this.  I think it looks like a transformer.  It's pretty cool I get to fly these things!

This delicious dish a tuna rib! The interesting restaurant we went to before the quaint little bar,  had a menu free of all English words.  After sitting down, staring blankly at the menu, and having the non-English speaking waiter talk at us, our neighbor took pity and leaned over and asked it we needed help.  It was very kind of her as she took us through a tour of the menu.  In the end she and Claire exchanged information and hopefully will get together soon and start a friendship.  Then we can go to more places like this and eat more delicious things.  They took this rib and cooked it in a big flame.  Then you pick around the bone, as if you're gnawing on the remains of a T-Bone steak.  It certainly was an experience! 

This sign greeted Claire, Tyler, Kyle, and I at the train station on our inaugural trip to Tokyo Disneyland.

These two pictures illustrate the absurdity of the Japanese railway maps.  It's just comical to look at. 

Here's the group of us prior to entry.  Left to right we have myself, Claire, Kyle and Tyler.  Japanese love the Peace Sign, so we felt we should try not to stand out by using it freely as well.

Upper left we have the always stunning Claire brimming with excitement prior to entry to the most magical place on Earth.  To her right is a brass quartet that was so kind as to greet us to the park.  Bottom left are the two who made this all possible: Walt and Mickey.  Then bottom right is one of the photos I took inside of the It's a Small World ride.

 This video shows some toy soldiers from Toy Story walking around signing autographs.

Here is the entry to the park.

These are two more pictures of the Small World according to Disney

Here we had a marching band.  I felt like I was at a Mardi Gras parade for a minute.

Finally here, the ever so helpful Claire, made these Japanese girls' day by offering to end their incessant photo rotation by taking one of the whole group.  She's also sporting her very stylish Mickey eared top hat! 

This is a pretty old photo, but I risked life and limb standing in the street to take it.  On the left is Tokyo Sky Tree,  the tallest structure in Japan.  On the right, the gold building is meant to resemble a full glass of ice cold Asahi Beer from which a drop splashed out onto a black counter.  That's what I'm told, at least, as this is the Asahi Beer company's headquarters.

These next four items are three videos and a photo meant to illustrate the madness that is walking in Japan.  I figured a picture says a thousand words and a video is made up of thousands of pictures.. you do the math.

 

This playful photo was quite difficult to take.  As you can imagine, balancing on these metal cones was no easy feat.  Claire, however, managed to capture us (Tyler, myself, and Kyle) in a moment joined balance.  Of note, also, are the spectacular hats we picked up at Tokyo Disneyland.  Aside from being awesome, they kept our heads mighty warm on that bitter cold day.

If you come visit us, don't be surprised if we take you here.  You know how I said in the caption for Mike's that we held out as long as we could... well that was a bit of a white lie.  In fact we found this place the second or so weekend we were here and have since been back a second time.  It delicious Mexican in the part of Tokyo called Harajuku.  The atmosphere is as enchanting as the guacamole is endless.

Finally I leave you with these to shots.  On the left, I am unable to contain my excitement after not only moving into our new home, but also assembling the new TV stand we purchased from the Japanese version of Target/Home Depot.  We celebrated with a bottle of sparkling Spanish wine.  On the right is a snapshot of the food court on base.  I was very happy to see Popeye's on the base.  Now I can get my red beans and rice on Monday's and reminisce about Nikita, the not too busy Popeye's employee back on Jefferson Hwy.

I hope you enjoyed the chronicle of the past few weeks in the lives of Claire and I.  Next time I'll try to stick to more of a chronologic flow.  I also promise to provide more pictures of our house as we get more and more moved in.  The process isn't complete, but once we at least get things straightened up and off the floor, we'll start capturing the functionality and comfort of our home for the next three years.

We wish we could have shared each of these memories with all of you in person.  Until we're fortunate enough to get to see you again, these updates will have to do.

We love all of you.  Sayonara!