Family visit and Halloween

It has been a while since the last post. In October, my family came to visit us in NY. It was very short and I felt really really sad when they left. I couldn't stop crying at the airpot but luckily my son kept me busy and thing get back to normal quickly.

Sometimes I wonder how my life would have been if I stayed in Japan. It was my decision to come to the U.S. and stay here and I am very happy with my choice however I would love to have families around somewhere close by. Then, I also think about those people who live in Japan but do not see their family often. When I think about it, I spend weeks with them when I go back and I think maybe we don't spend that much time together at once if we live in Japan. So maybe overall the amount of time we spend together are same or more then average. I just wish I could see them more often :-)


While they were here, I didn't cook much but my mom made Japanese breakfast for us everyday so I definitely enjoyed having someone cook Japanese breakfast for me everyday :-)

There was a Halloween Party with my son's friends while they were here so I took them to the party. They enjoyed little kids dressing up and enjoying the party.

Everybody brought some food and enjoyed the day together. I am so thankful to have such wonderful friends to share those moments with! My son is growing up so fast! I am trying to enjoy every events, every moments and every conversation with him.

While my family is here, I tried to make Red Snapper Rice (Taimeshi) with my mom. She never made this so this was first time for both of us. We got a nice big red snapper from Korean supermarket.

I think it came out pretty good but since I never had this before I was not sure how it is supposed to taste. For me, it was lacking some flavor but I guess it shouldn't have strong flavor. My aunt and uncle told me that this is how it supposed to taste so I guess we did it right. Since I LOVE ginger. I added extra ginger.

And this is a cake we ate together. It was from Whole Food. My son was so happy to see this cake but at the same time he was scared of it.

It went by so fast but I really really enjoyed the stay of my family. My son was so happy to have many people to play with. I guess this was how the family used to be. With many people in the family or more close with your neighbors and so on. Nowadays, it is rare to have such a big family but I think it might be a good environment for kids to grow up in :-)

I would love to have my family here again. I just wish the flight was shorter. I am excited for their next visit already!

A trip to Mystic, Connecticut

I have been wanting to go to Mystic Connecticut for quite some time ever since I saw it on TV. I was finally able to visit the other day. It was not too far away from where we are but since we didn't want to rush and fully enjoy the area, we decided to stay one night.

The first day was a beautiful day and we left home early to get there before everybody.

First, we got breakfast bagel near our place before we get on the freeway and start our trip. We do this sometimes when we go for a road trip and eat it in the car while we drive.

There are many bagel shops in NY and we have a few in our area also. It is great to be able to get fresh baked bagel anytime you want it. Since I am not a big breakfast person, I shared one breakfast bagel with my husband.

Then, we arrived at Mystic Connecticut.

There is a place called Seaport in Mystic. You have to pay to get in but there are a few old wooden ships and planetarium and so on. I think it is quite possible to spend a while day here in Seaport. Actually that is basically what we did. There are some activities and a house for kids also.

My son liked the ship so he had lots of fun exploring the old ships.

It was a beautiful day and the view from a small boat was beautiful like this.

For lunch, we went outside of Seaport. We ate at a restaurant called "Harbor House" which is in a hotel on a little hill where you can see the ocean.

I had clam chowder and a lobster roll. This is clam chowder I ordered.

Clam chowder was really good. I like those smooth chowders which are not too thick so it was perfect for my taste.

I forgot to take a picture of lobster roll. It was OK. I mean I think it is because I don't love lobster. I know I don't love lobster but sometimes I had to order to reconfirm that. Every time I eat lobster, I kind of regret it because I knew that I don't love it but I order it anyway. Oh well, I hope I will learn someday.

For dinner, we went to a small Mexican restaurant close to where our hotel was (which was not in Mystic). One of the reason we went there was because when I check their menu online, I found Horchata. My husband and I LOVE Horchata and every chance we get to drink Horchata, we take it.

Horchata is a typical Mexican drink (I think it is typical...) made from rice and sugar and cinnamon. When I was living in California, it was quite easy to get this drink since there were many Mexican restaurant around but after we moved to NY, Horchata had become something which is not easy to come by so we get super excited whenever we find it.

We loved Horchata so much, we actually tried to make it at home once. It tasted good but was quite a process.

Anyways, this restaurant was very casual, reasonable and good! It was a small place but very popular and people were just coming in non stop. We ordered lots of different thing but the best was of course tacos.

There was a swimming pool at the hotel we stayed in so my son really really enjoyed swimming. He just started to swim on his own with a little floating thing on his arms when we stayed in Germany with my in-laws. We would like him to keep swimming and be comfortable in water so we will try to take him to a swimming pool even in winter.

Next day, we swimming in the swimming pool again and checked out the hotel then head to a town called Essex to ride a steam engine train. But first, we went to a restaurant to have lunch.

We went to a restaurant which we found online and I had fish and chips there.

Sorry for this kind of smoky, blur photo... I don't know what happened here.

I LOVE fish and chips. Every time I see fish and chips in the menu, I feel like I have to order it (especially when I haven't have fish and chips from that particular restaurant before).

This fish and chips was really good. And French Fries.  is probably my favorite food in the world and I especially love truffle french fries. They had truffle french fries on the appetizer menu so I asked them if they can make my fish and chips with their truffle french fried. They were happy to do that for me and I was extremely happy.

I just love truffle fries. It was super good. The fish was good also but the truffle fries were the highlight of the meal for me.

After the lunch, we went to ride a steam train. My son loved it and it was quite nice ride.

On the way home, we kind of got stuck on traffic but it was a wonderful weekend trip. I highly recommend Mystic CT for weekend trip if you are living in NYC area.

A trip to Germany

So, we just came back from a Germany trip. We went to see my in-laws and we had such a great time together. I was able to go have coffee and stuff all by myself. Even though I love spending time with my 2 year old son, It was quite nice to have some time alone without my baby.

My son had a wonderful time there with his grand parents. They play with him so nicely and patiently. I enjoyed watching them play with my son.

His German improved quite a lot. He has having a conversation with his grand parents in German! It is amazing how quick they learn. Their memory is so great that they remember some words just listening to it once.

We also spend some time with my son's great grand mother. She was soooo happy to see us. It was also fun to see her play with my son. In German, a word "grandmother" is "Oma" and my son calls his great grandmother "Oma Oma" which she liked a lot :-)

He even made some friends. The kids who were staying close by us for their vacation were really really nice to my son. They were 9 year old boys and they love playing soccer. They took our son and played with him so nicely. My son loved them also. It was so funny to see my son interact with them. He was really trying to act more grown up like them.

One cute thing which happened was when we went to have ice cream with those two boys. My son was sitting in between the boys and everyone was eating ice cream. My son was looking at one of the boy and he was so happy that he is eating ice cream with them. Once in a while, he would stroke the boy's face to show his affection. Then, I think he was overwhelmed with his affection to this boy, he kissed on his arm. It was cute but he had lots of ice cream around his mouth so the boy's clothe got all dirty. We cleaned it and everything was fine and we were laughing a lot. Great times!!

I ate a lot on this vacation but managed not to gain weight. Yahoo!

I learned some dishes from my mother-in-law so I will be making those sometime.

Also, I bought a Germany cooking magazine (though I can not read Germany) so I would like to try some of the dishes from this magazine also.

Trip to Japan

Sorry I haven't updated my blog for a while. I was in SF area for about a week and then in Japan for about 6 weeks.

It was great to see many of my friends in California. Two of my friends who now live in Europe are back in California for vacation while I was there so I was lucky to see them also.

And, Japan was fantastic. I really enjoyed spending time with my family and friends. My parents and my sister enjoyed having us, especially my son.

He is learning a lot and while he was in Japan, he learned a lot of Japanese. He only speaks Japanese now.

I enjoyed food in Japan and my mom cooked for me every day. My parents looked after my son everyday and I was very spoiled. Now, I am back to my normal life. I have to say good bye to my spoiled life. I really enjoyed it. My parents really enjoyed having their grandson with them everyday.

I admire their patience and willing to play with him everyday, all day and actually enjoying it. It made me happy to see them happy. My son made them laugh so much everyday. They told me that the house is empty and quiet and they are sad after we left.

I am glad that I was able to stay there for a while. It went by so fast and I was really sad to leave but I appreciate my husband for letting me go there for such a long time with my son.

Everybody is happy and I am very happy.

Now, I have to get back to my normal life. I am looking forward to cooking again!

Germany and Croatia Trip

Hello! It has been a while since my last post. We had a family vacation and went to Germany and Croatia. Germany is where my husband is from so we went to visit his parents and his grandmother (my son's grandparents and great grandmother.) Croatia was where my friends had their wedding so we went there to attend the wedding.

There are not so many food pictures from this trip which I realized after I came back. We ate great food while we are on vacation but we are taking many pictures of our son and forgot to take food pictures.... But there are some so I would like to post them here.

First stop was in Germany to see my husband's grandmother (my son's great grandmother). She is 90 years old and very strong and eats well and drink well. She used to own a restaurant so she is a great cook.

She loves my son and was very happy to see him. She played soccer with my son in her garden. My son loved her garden. He ate grapes and tomatoes from her garden and picked some flowers and run around.

And this is oma's famous Schnitzel. She makes this dish for us every time we are there because we love oma's Schnitzel so much. It always accompanied by pan roasted potatoes.

We also had some tomatoes from her garden. Sweet and delicious!

Also, she made something called "Dumpf Noodle"(I am not sure about the spelling). This is Pan fried bread with sweet vanilla sauce dip. My husband loves this dish. I also love the combination of somewhat salty bread with sweet vanilla sauce.

We met up with my husband's cousin and his wife for dinner also. We went to this Italian restaurant which we always go when we visit them. This is my favorite Italian restaurant in Germany!

First, we had some appetizer. My favorite is grilled octopus!

My dish was scampi curry cream sauce pasta. I think this curry cream sauce is quite popular in Germany. I see them often in many restaurants. I love it!

My husband ordered rolled lasagna. I love the idea. It was also really good.

After having great days with Oma and relatives, we flew to Croatia to attend my friends wedding.
Both of us had never been to Croatia before. It is always exciting to visit a new country.

First, we were going to pick up a rental car at the airport but the car was not ready so we had to wait for a few hours at the airport. Finally, the car was ready and we start driving then realized that we didn't have the navigation system which we ordered so we went back to the airport and got the navigation system.

When we went back there, we met two other friends who are also attending the wedding. It was funny to see them there. They were also renting a car and trying to get to their hotel. We talked a bit and off we went to hit the road.

The problem was that the navigation system kept telling lie to us. It took us to completely different place first. We reset the navigation system and tried again. Seemed like it was working this time. To get to where we were staying, it took us about two hours and the navigation system took us to a mountain road. Our son got sick and threw up in the car. We changed him and clean and rest a little bit but we still had to drive a bit more. I felt bad for my son and fortunately he went to sleep after that.

We stayed in a town called Gradac. It was a touristic town by the beach. Everyone was walking along the beach at night having fun. It was very nice small town.

The wedding was great. I stay up till 4:00am and partied. It has been a while since I partied.

In Croatia, we had some meat and seafood. Our favorite was Cevapcici. It is finger size grilled ground meat with some spices. It was so good that we ate this almost every day while we were there. Unfortunately I didn't take picture of this dish....

We stayed in a hotel called "Marco Polo". It was a nice small hotel and we had a dinner at this restaurant last night of our stay.

For appetizer, we had tomato risotto and squid ink risotto. I loved squid ink risotto.

For main course, I had a fish plate. It was more like for two people but the fish were fresh and tasted really good. Also the shrimp was sweet and excellent!!

My husband had something like shrimp rolled fish with Champaign cream sauce. It was good but the Champaign sauce was quite strong. If it was strong for me, I can not imagine how it felt for my husband since he doesn't drink :-)

Anyway, the dinner was great and the service was also great. My son played with some stones in a flower pot.

After Croatia, we went to visit my husband's parents for about 10 days.  They were so happy to see us and their grandson. It was very nice to see how they play with my son and how they talk to him.

We met up with some friends also and had a great time. The weather was great and we enjoy our stay there.

The night before we left, my uncle and aunt came to Germany from Japan to attend a tour of Germany. It was perfect timing because we were still there. So we met up with them for dinner.

My husband's parents have met them in Japan also so they knew each other.

It was just for a few hours but it was great to see them in Germany. They also love my son and played nicely with him. It is like my son have three sets of grandparents. He is a lucky guy :-)

Oh, this is what my mother in law made for us. It is with raspberry, blueberry and blackberry with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream. This is easy but taste so good! I learned how to make it so I will post the recipe when I make it. Like always, my mother in law is great at presentation. Look how beautiful this dish is!!

So, now we are back to NY settling down again. I missed NY and my neighbor and friends. Everybody was so happy to see us back. It was very nice. So, I am going to start cooking again. Looking forward to try some new things which I learned in Germany :-)

Two days trip to Upstate NY (Hudson Valley Area)

In mid November, we went for one night trip to Hudson Valley area. We went to Hudson Valley last year also. (Click here for the post of last year Hudson Valley visit. Hudson Valley 1. Hudson Valley 2)

We ate lots of great food and enjoyed out trip last year and we also had a great trip this year. I planned this trip and decide where to stay, where to eat and stuff. My husband loved everything I planned so I was very happy :-)

First of all, before we go to the hotel, we stopped at a town called New Paltz and had lunch at this restaurant called "The Village Tearoom".

I ordered smoked salmon salad which was really good.

My husband ordered "Mushroom bread pudding". Ever since he had mushroom bread pudding at the Standard Hotel in Manhattan last year (Click here for that post) he order this dish every chance he gets.

I forgot to take some pictures but they also have many different kind of baked goods and I ordered scone. They also had clotted cream which I have been looking around for a long time. Since I can not find them anywhere, I asked them if they can sell clotted cream. They told me that they can sell it for $8.00 per jar. It is quite expensive but I know I can not find it anywhere so I bought it! Now, I can make scone at home and eat it with clotted cream and have a proper afternoon tea! I am so happy :-)

After the lunch we ordered tea and chocolate cake.

By the way, there was a nice park close to this restaurant. Everything was made of woods and lots of kids and parents were playing. We played there also with our son and had a great time. I wish we had something like this close to our place.

Then, we head to the hotel. The hotel we stayed was a lodge and it had two stories. The bed was in upstairs and there was fireplace downstair. Also there was a river running right in front of our room and it was really nice and relaxing though it was right by a main street. It was quiet and nice.

Next day, we stopped by Culinary Institute of America for lunch. We came here last year also. This is a school where people learn how to cook and be trained. They have many restaurants inside of this school. Since we have a small child, we went to the casual restaurant called "Apple Bakery Cafe".

I ordered hanger stake with leek and potato. It was great. The plate was beautiful.

My husband ordered truffle grilled cheese and kale chips.

I never had kale chips before but this kale chips were super good. We couldn't stop eating this chips.

And, this is our main reason we came here. The truffle french fries.

We had this last time we were here and loved it so we ordered again. Well, it was good but I guess we were more impressed first time around.

I wanted to have dessert here but I was full so I bought a cake to take out.

When we got home at night, I had this cake which I bought. This was HudsonValley Apple Butter Cake. Isn't it pretty?

And it tasted wonderful! I loved it. I wished I bought more than one. I can easily eat 5 of them at once. Well, I guess it was good that I bought only one ;-)

Well, this trip was great. It was just a few hours away from home but we got to experience different things and eat lots of different stuff. My son loved playing in the fallen leaves. We all had a great time. Especially my husband and I was very happy that I was able to make him happy :-) We will definitely do this again!

Trip to Germany

Again, it has been a while since my last update but I was in Germany for about three weeks with my husband and my son. Since my husband is from Germany, we went to visit our parents, grandma, cousins and friends. Also, my parents came to visit Germany from Japan! so it was a big reunion and we had such a great time.

We went to many places this time since it was my parents first time visiting Germany.
Last year, my husband's parents visit Japan. We also wanted to be there while they are there but since I was pregnant, we decided not to go to Japan that time so my parents took them around for sightseeing and stuff. I was little bit worried about it but they had a great time!

So, this year was my parents turn to visit. I was so happy to be there with them. Also it was nice that both of our parents got to see our son again.

We ate a lot during the stay but I don't have much picture of food this time....

While we were in Germany, it was really hot in the first week but after that, it was perfect temperature and weather.

But while we were there, East Coast had an earthquake and hurricane. We were worried if everything is OK at home but now we are back and relieved to see everything is OK.

So, my parents had a great sightseeing. My in-laws planned great trip for them. I was able to go places with them to translate some stuff so I was very happy.

We went to a few castles around Munich area. Neuschwanstein is one of the most famous castle in the world. I think many people know this castle since it was a inspiration for the castle at Disneyland.
Anyhow, I took a great picture of the castle. The weather was perfect and it looks beautiful.

This is one of the castle which Ludwig 2 built. He is a very famous king in Bavaria and everybody loves him. It seems like he was a bit eccentric but he sure had an eye for beautiful things. After hearing some stories about him, I thought that maybe it will be interesting to read a book about him or to watch a movie about him.

Well, this another castle is also built by him. This one has lots of flowers and also very beautiful.

This one is a roof of Church or Cloister which I don't quite remember where but it sure is beautiful. I guess this is how people imagine heaven.

We also went to Salzburg. We saw a castle here and also went to a great restaurant, visit the house of Mozart and had a wonderful cake.

The restaurant we went was a beautiful restaurant.

I had a wienerschnitzel.

Also, one of the thing I was looking forward in Salzburg was cakes from Demel. It is very elegant cafe and their cakes are amazing.

The waitresses are also looking good. You can not see it from this picture but they have a quite large slit on their skirt if you see them from up front!

It is difficult to pick one since they all look so good!

I picked this rich chocolate cake.

And my mom had this one.

Both of them were so good but personally, I liked the one my mom had better.

At home, my mother-in-law made wonderful dinners every night. We also went to beer garden a few times. I love beer garden. It is wonderful.

This is when we had an bavarian dinner at home one night.

We also went to see my husband grandmother who is my son's great-grand mother. She lives in wine area of Germany.

 It was really nice to see her and my son together. She was so happy to she him. Also, it was very nice to see my husband's cousins  they all love love son. My son is a very lucky boy. He is loved by so many people.

This is a plum cake. We had this with some whipped cream. This cake is not too sweet but taste good!

It was busy but wonderful 3 weeks. It was so nice to see happy faces of both of our parents when they see our son. It makes me happy to see them so happy :-)

NY is getting cooler now and it is time to cook again. I am looking forward to cook more.

Oh, when I was in Germany, one of our friend gave me this wonderful book about taking picture of food. The author is actually one of the blog which I love and read sometimes but I didn't know she had a book about taking photos. This is great since I would love to learn more about taking great pictures of food. I am excited to learn more about it from this book.

Parents visit from Germany and Japan

It has been a while again since I updated last time. I had been quite busy as you might imagine. Taking care of a baby if lots of work!

Meanwhile, our parents from Germany and Japan came to visit us and meet their grandson!

They helped us a lot by cooking, cleaning and playing with our son. It was nice to be able to take a nap while they took care of him. I loved watching them interact with my son. I can tell they love him so much and they were so patience with him all the time. He is lucky to have grandparents like them.

It is too bad that everybody lives quite far away. I feel bad that they can not see him too often. But now we have technology such as Skype so they get to see him via computer and this is wonderful.

When they stayed here, they cooked everyday for us and also they cooked some things and reserve them in freezer for later. They are just great! So I don't have to cook for a while.

Here are some of the things which they made for us during their stay.

First, there are the dishes German mom made for us.

This is Parsnip salad. I never really used Parsnip before but I really liked this salad. She sauteed Parsnip and put on top of green salad. The dressing was maple dressing which I love. I think Parsnip has a pretty strong taste when it is raw but I really liked it when it was sauteed. I would love to try using Parsnip from now on.

The other dish I loved was salmon with fennel. She cut fennel and mixed with lemon, olive oil, salt and pepper and put in the oven. Then, add salmon fillet and caper and parsley and put in the oven again until the salmon is done. This was delicious! It was very light and perfect dish for summer. I will definitely making this in summer.

She also made lots of potato soup and freeze them for us. I love her potato soup!!!

And, here are a few things which Japanese parents made.

First, Soba noodle. This is something my dad made for us. When we have noodle or steak, it is always my dad who cooks. He made this for lunch and it was great.

My mom also made some sweets. she made cream puff which I forgot to take pictures. And this strawberry shortcake. She said she hadn't make any of those for a long time so it did not come out perfect but I thought it was great!

She also made gyoza and spring roll and freeze them for us.

Anyway, it was great to have both parents to help us out. Now, I am on my own but I started to get a hang of it and feeling more confident. (Though, some days are still tough...)

I am enjoying this precious time I have with my son. He will grow up quickly so I will enjoy baby stage as much as I can. Now, he is 2months and half and we started to go placed with him. I love it! The weather is getting nicer and I think he came to this world in perfect timing.

Right now, I don't have much time for myself but this is a special bonding time for my baby and I so I will try to enjoy every second of it! I am really thankful to have him in my arms. He is perfect!