Keep Calm and Carry On: The Diary of Foodie and Gourmet

Greetings to everyone! Just wanted to wish everyone a very Happy and Healthy New Year! May 2015 bring you peace, prosperity, good health, and happiness! Here's to another year of blogging and sharing my adventures, recipes, and thoughts with you all! I hope that you continue to enjoy my blog and continue to read my posts!

After spending a couple days in Tokyo, my family and I went on a brief excursion to another famous Japanese city, Kyoto. Kyoto is renowned for it's rich history, beautiful architecture, ancient traditions, traditional foods, and of course --- Geishas. I have been to Kyoto several times, but never around New Years. I was eager to experience Kyoto during the holidays, since I had been told that it is absolutely stunning.  Our journey began with a Shinkansen (bullet train) from Tokyo Station to Kyoto Station. We arrived at Tokyo Station early since we knew it would be mobbed with travelers AND because we wanted to buy bento boxes. In Japan, bento boxes are a common and essential part of travel culture --- the two concepts are like a ying and yang of sorts and go hand in hand. In Japan, these bento boxes are lovingly referred to as "eki-ben" since eki means train station and ben is short for bento.  At the risk of sounding pretentious, eki ben is a joy that cannot ...

We ended our first full day in Tokyo with dinner with our good friends, M and J. I say friends, but M and J are more like family. My mother has known them longer than she has known my father and they are like my second parents. Every time we visit Tokyo, we stay at their house, and it is always so much fun. For me, in addition to the array of delicious foods, hanging out with my Uncle M and Aunt J is the highlight of visiting Japan. For dinner this evening, M and J took us to a very tiny restaurant near their office, which specializes in Okinawa cuisine. To quote from wikipedia: "Okinawan cuisine incorporates influences from Chinese cuisine and Southeast Asian cuisine due to its long history of trade…Besides vegetables and fruits, they use lots of spices…Okinawan cuisine's condiments consist mainly of salt, miso, katsuobushi, or kombu…Another characteristic of Okinawan cuisine is its reliance on meat, specifically pigs." It's a fascinating, delicious, and diverse...

Our first day in Tokyo, my family and I visited one of my all time favorite places --- Tokyo Station (Tokyo Eki, 東京駅 ). I love Tokyo Eki because it is a gorgeous building and also because it is filled to the brim with interesting stores and delicious restaurants. I could easily spend a week there and still be perfectly entertained! This past June, my mother and I spent a lot of time exploring Tokyo Eki. We were really excited to take my father here, since he hadn’t been to Tokyo Eki post-renovation. We quickly learned that this may have been a mistake. From the moment we arrived at Tokyo Eki, to the moment we left, we were accosted from all directions by armies of people. I couldn’t believe how many people there were! No matter where you stood (or hid), you weren’t safe. The incessant pushing and shoving, the stop-and-go traffic, it was infuriating and also quite claustrophobic. At one point, I just wanted to give up and go home! I managed to retain my composure and soldier...

Season's greetings from Japan, everyone! This year, for the first time, my family and I will be spending the holidays in Japan. We left on Christmas Day, which was a bit bummer, but the fact that we get to spend New Years in Tokyo makes the sacrifice worthwhile. In Japan, New Years is THE BIG holiday. It's most comparable to Thanksgiving in the USA. It's the holiday where families and friends get together and feast all day long. It's filled with tradition, delicious foods, and quality time with friends and family. (I've written about New Years in the past ).  I've never experienced New Years in Japan, so I am really excited. I've heard stories from friends and family about how magical it is, so I'm looking forward to experiencing it for myself!  In the meantime, I will be doing some traveling and enjoying all of the foods Japan has to offer. Besides Tokyo, my family and I will be traveling to Kyoto and the Izu Peninsula. I'll be blogging...

Thanksgiving weekend, Benedict Cumberbatch's latest film, The Imitation Game, hit theaters. I was one of the first people in line to see this film and I couldn't contain my excitement. Ever since I learned about this film one year ago, I had been counting down.  For those who are unfamiliar with the film, The Imitation Game  tells the story of Alan Turing, a mathematical genius. During the Second World War, Turing was recruited to work at Bletchley Park and he became a celebrity there. His brilliance paved the way for many innovations in codebreaking and his astounding vision for future technology laid the groundwork for modern computers (formerly referred to as Turing machines). Unfortunately, the story of his astounding triumphs was kept a secret for nearly thirty years, because of the wartime Official Secrets Act. Instead, for a while, Turing was remembered by his non-Bletchley contemporaries for his suicide and gross indecency charge. Over the past several decades...