Posted August 31st, 2010 in Food | 4 Comments »
It’s been raining! I really should put “no junk mail” sign on the mail box at home… We receive many kinds of fliers everyday, and I don’t read all of them anymore. I now just check it online if I want to know some info.
aa
When it rains, I can’t check the mail box because of the snails. I don’t know why but they are always hiding inside the mail box, and sometimes between letters. (>口<)
Yesterday we got a new IKEA catalogue, but it was left on the top of the mail box and was soaked with water.
aa
I don’t feel like eating rice these days, so I’ve been munching on noodles or bread. I tried making shoyu udon the other night - which is just a cooked udon noodle with simple condiments eaten with just soy sauce.
The soy sauce is not a normal soy sauce, it’s actually mixed with dashi. We normally buy the dashi soy sauce from the shop, but it’s very expensive in Perth so I tried to make it myself.
I first soaked thickly sliced bonito flakes (1 handful) in soy sauce (1 cup) along with konbu seaweed sheet (about 3 cm) overnight. It would be nicer if I had niboshi, but I didn’t use it this time. Next night, I cooked udon noodle, drained well, and ate with condiments and dash of the dashi soy sauce.
aa
… It tasted actually ok. I added some lemon juice and ichimi togarashi (chili powder) too.
This may sound gross to some people, but I cooked chicken liver too. Liver is high in iron.
With 2 tbs soy sauce + 2 tbs mirin + 1 tsp ginger. This tastes good. My mum used to make this at home. If you buy chicken liver in Japan, it comes with another offal (stuck together) and I especially like the another one. It has texture and yummy (to me)!
a
Posted August 28th, 2010 in Food | 2 Comments »
Cheese scrambled egg, bacon, sauteed spinach and toast - a typical breakfast, but I love this 
It seems that there are more than 200 people died from the heat in Japan this year. My family and friends says it’s been very hot and humid. There’s one 20-year-old man who passed away because his air-con was broken on that night. It’s around 36°, but the humidity is high. Besides, all the area is stuffy (many buildings)…
I’ve been reading this blog (in Japanese) since last week - she is Korean, and lives near my house in Japan! She’s been in Japan for 18 years now with her husband (Japanese). I always get surprised that many Korean people are fluent in Japanese.
I love Korean food 
But, same as Japanese food here, I can’t find the “real” Korean food in Perth. I really miss the proper way of eating Korean BBQ! And, other Korean food such as komutan soup (oxtail soup), sundubu (spicy stew), kejan (marinated raw crab in spicy soysauce-based sauce) etc… There are many Korean restaurants in Japan, but I believe there’re many in Eastern states too.
Korean cuisine is quite similar to Japanese cuisine, I believe. They use many kinds of vegetables - even the ones Japanese people are not familiar with, such as leaves of sesame and dodoku (carrot-looking roots). I love Korean side dishes - namuru dishes, muchimu (mixed - like salad) dishes, chimu (stewed) dishes…. The roasted and stewed beans ( I remember Hana BBQ had this dish) is my favorite! They goes very well with steamed rice
In Japan, I always order Korean chilled noodle at yakiniku restaurants during summer. I love the texture of the noodle (made from potato starch). I had a funny experience in a Korean restaurant in Perth few years ago. I ordered this chilled Korean noodle, but the waitress kept saying “oh, you shouldn’t order this. I don’t think you’ll like it”. I knew what I was ordering and told her that I used to eat this in Japan all the time. She said “Oh, ok then. You should be fine”. She thought I had never eaten the dish before, and non-Korean people wouldn’t like this dish. I wondered why they’d put this item on the menu… (did I tell this story before already?)
Posted August 23rd, 2010 in Perth WA | No Comments »
On Sunday my friend came over for Oden and Chirashi-zushi party! I started simmering the tofu, konnyaku, daikon radish and boiled eggs on Thursday night so that they would absorb the soup and flavor very good. On Saturday I added some nerimono (all sorts of fish-cakes) to finish-up. It looked so yummy!
I can’t believe I forgot to take pictures! I must had been so busy eating and chatting… (>0<) So here is the image photo from Google…
(Mine was not this beautiful!)
One of the friend couldn’t join the oden party as she has been suffering from unfortunate food poisoning since last week.
I remember my first and last food poisoning was in Jakarta… It was terrible! I was on holiday, but couldn’t even get up from the bed. The whole body was cold/sweating/shaking/fever/vomiting/etc. I just wanted to lie down on the bed, I couldn’t even stand the gentle air wave from the air conditioner.
I hope she gets better!
Posted August 16th, 2010 in Perth WA | 6 Comments »
It was another cold night, and I wrapped myself in a blanket on the sofa and was watching tv with my husband. It was warm during the day though…
As I stretched my body, I looked up the ceiling. Then, I noticed something…. something black, something big…
It was a spider (>0<)!!
I remember, we had a terrible summer in this house few years ago. Many many huge spiders showed up one night, and we had to fight them until midnight. The thing is, both of us HATE insects - including spiders. We were both crying but had to kill all the spiders otherwise we couldn’t go to bed.
Image Photo
Those spiders were really huge. They were about the size of my face!! With the legs, of course. And the bodies were covered with thick black hair. Taranchula??
Next day we called pest control to spray all over the house. Since then, we started to spray insecticide all around the house in early spring each year. This year we haven’t done it, but we will do it this weekend to kill all the spider eggs before they hatch.
Fortunately there was only one last night. Our house has very high ceiling and it’s impossible to reach the spider. We had to drop the spider to the floor first, so my husband started to throw small balls to the spider.
After 1 hour…. the spider was still there. My husband was starting to be tired. We took the largest ladder from the garage, and tried to reach the spider by climbing up the ladder and using a combined two brooms. Finally, he could get the spider down….! It dropped on the floor, and tried to run away. Then I was in panic.
My husband and I are not trying to be cute, but we are truly truly afraid of insects - especially the one with this size. I was too scared to get close to the spider and kill it. I screamed, he screamed, and finally he became a man… - grabbed a slipper and bashed the spider. It’s over.
Afterwards my body was so warm: maybe from the thrilling and screaming. If there is one spider, I believe there should be more around this house. I’d better keep my eyes open…
a
Posted August 14th, 2010 in Eat Out in Perth - Japanese Food - | No Comments »
What a beautiful day today! Sun is out, the sky is blue… I love driving the freeway to the city and looking at the Swan River… It may be still bit too cold, but when it gets warmer you can see many people enjoying water sports, including canoeing, jet skiing, paragliding, swimming, etc. I saw few canoes in the river today.
I felt like something Japanese today. I asked my husband what he wanted to eat for lunch, then he replied to me with the usual answer… ” Up to you.” I hate the word! (#_#)
I said “Ok… Udon” coz I know he doesn’t like udon. After few minutes of discussion we decided not to eat udon, but ended up going to a food court and chose whatever we wanted.
I was actually thinking about teriyaki fish. We went to a food court and I had teriyaki fish at Matsu Sushi.
Umm…. presentation-wise, it’s not really great. The taste, it was ok, average. I don’t actually like them using basa fish, but well, almost all Japanese restaurants/takeaway shops in Perth use basa fish for teriyaki fish, so I can’t complain! I did enjoy it.
My husband had a mixed Chinese dish. Umm.. fried stuff.
Matsu sushi has quite a few shops across Perth. In Rockingham (Rockingham shopping centre), in Mandurah, in Morley (Galleria Morley), and in Leederville. The Leederville shop used to be Banzai Sushi and Noodle before, and now it’s Matsu Sushi Leederville.
You can dine-in at Matsu Sushi Leederville (and probably in Mandurah), and Matsu Sushi Leederville has liquor license now. I’m sure the food there are much better than Morley and Rockingham (in the food courts)
aa
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