This is America, Football and Turkey!

Happy Thanksgiving!
I found this vintage postcard. It is a great picture, isn't it.
Go to my Japanese Blog - Kimamaya-notes was posted a different vintage postcard. Check it out.

It is big holiday for American. Family weekend!
Football and Turkey! This is American way.
My way ...... My son's Ice Hockey Tournament and Turkey.

I'm going to make my Japanese Chicken and we are going to our American Family's.

Hoodie's Chicken (Japanese fried chicken)Ingredients
1 lb Boneless thigh
3 tablespoons Japanese soy sauce
2 tablespoons sake (Japanese rice wine)
2 cloves garlic,chopped
Grind ginger (same amount of garlic)
4 tablespoons cornstarch
Vegetable oil (for deep frying)
Extra --- Scallion, Sesame seed

Directions
Cut chicken into bite-size, get rid of fat part and marinate in a mixture of soy sauce, sake, ginger and garlic for at least 1 hour. (more hours is always better)

Addition: If you like scallion. cut scallion little piece and marinate with with them.

Addition: I usually put sesame seed and mix with them before putting on cornstarch.

Roll pieces in cornstarch or put cornstarch into the bowl. Don't put too much cornstarch on pieces of chicken!

Heat oil to 350 degrees F in a deep pan.

Fry chicken in small batches for about 2-3 minutes or until golden brown and crisp.

Drain on absorbent paper.

Put them in Oven 350 degrees for 30 min. ( It makes less fat)

Serve hot.

Enjoy your meal!

Father and son's Turkey on Thanksgiving day!

Thanksgiving day was also my son's father's birthday this year.
He came over and cooked a Turkey.
My son is not living with his father since he was two and half year old.
We started this combination of two celebrations (Thanksgiving and Birthday) having a family dinner eight years ago at my house.


















This year,
Father handed his Turkey recipe to his son.
Turkey recipe - Soften 2 sticks of butter at room temperature and mix in herbs - basil, garlic, pepper, parsley (chopped). Clean the Turkey and then rub the butter mixture over the breast, legs and thighs. Any left put inside the turkey along with a quartered lemon, stick of celery and a quartered onion. Also put inside salt and pepper. Warm up the oven to 350 degrees. Cook the turkey 20 minutes per pound and then let stand outside the oven for 15 minutes before serving.

Uncooked turkey is pretty much scary looking to me.
I know when a turkey gets tan, he is really good looking!

Our turkey was getting a little tan after one hour in the oven. Father put potato around it.
Potato recipe - Boil them for about 10 minutes so they aren't quite cooked then put them around the turkey for the last hour of cooking.





We waited another two more hours.







Look at our turkey,, gorgeous!

Potato were still in the oven.
Father asked son to cut a turkey. Son struggled to cut it too much. So father needed to show the way of cutting.

Hurry up. "I'm hungry!" Mom said. (It's me!)















It was a delicious dinner, the potatoes were especially great!!! Crispy and tasty. Vegetables were cooked right but he forgot to cook stuffing. Ready made stuffing was on the table but we did not approve of that taste.

My son was asking where is the whipped cream when I was preparing our desserts.
My son opened the refrigerator without me seeing what he was doing. I said, "Don't use it!"
His father was taking a nap at the chair because he was tired from cooking or Tryptophan in Turkey?
Our son setup the Video Camera and put shaving cream instead of whipped cream on his hand.
His father was half wake and ate it. Oh, my,, he was spitting it all over the floor.

Two of them blamed me because I didn't let my son use whipped cream!

How many people cook everyday?

I don't cook everyday!
Every year I'm getting worse and worse with this.
I work at home. I eat morning and lunch by myself.
My dirty dishes are in my kitchen.
Who is going to clean them?
I know it won't be my son, not my dog. Who else will do it?

When I get into my work, I even forget to sleep... Of course, I forget to cook as well!
"Mom, I'm hungry. I don't want to go out." my son says,
My dog? He might say..."Mom, I'm hungry too!"

My son said, "Let's go to the Ramen noodle place!"
OK! Thank God. I don't need to cook!.
I started to drive and began thinking... We ate there last week. I still remember the taste.
I said to him, "Why don't we go to the Japanese supermarket to eat?"
He wasn't happy but we had already passed the Ramen noodle place.

So we went to the Japanese supermarket food court!
Once he ate his favorite, he was happy and asked me to buy a snack!
Yes, I did!
We bought two of them. It is called Tai-yaki
My son kept asking me, " You will eat yours or not?"
"I need to take a picture."

Here you are!
I took a picture with my Medetai!
It is shape like "Tai"
Outside is made like a pancake, sweet red beans paste are inside.
Yaki means grilled.
"Tai-yaki"


Japanese always ask,

"Will you eat the head or tail first?"

My son said, "I eat from tail, don't criticize me!"

How about you?

Artwork in Paris! - Food!

I found many things in common between Japan and France.

One is food, food, food!

Many of my friends said me, "You should go to Paris. You will love it there."

I didn't have the chance to go there for a long, long, long time.
Finally, I was in Paris. Now I know why.

I was thinking about food since I woke up and all day long.
I went to the bakery at the corner of the street. I ordered un double café and un croissant.
I was in heaven to drink strong, delicious café in the morning!
Très Bien!

One of our lunches was at Gérard Depardieu's restaurant.
La Fontaine Gaillon.
"L'E CAILLE DE LA FONTAINE"
near OPERA GARNIER.

A waiter didn't mention to us that they had a lunch menu and he recommended to us all the fried foods in their menu.
The reason why he did this?
Because we spoke English? We are American? It wasn't a nice attitude. I needed to say something to him! Otherwise it was nice place to have a lunch.
The lunch menu was around 40 Euro.
At least we had "Foie gras" for our starter.
(Expensive? Yes!) (Good? Yes!) - Sorry, no picture!
Here is my main dish. (Picture below)

This is view from my chair. (Picture below) There were hotels across the street.
I could see MIRO's artwork in our room. I recognized it was his artwork at once.
I couldn't take a picture of it but it is in my memory.

We ended up in the restaurant called "CHEZ PAPA" our first night in Paris.
We wandered our area (MONTPARNASSE/6E ) without looking at the map for two hours. We didn't know North or South, East or West.
We saw TOUR EIFFEL from a distance.It was very, very beautiful even if we didn't know where we were.
Finally, we got back to one of bars that was in a familiar area. I insisted to get one beer at the bar. I was very thirsty!

A man (He was around late 20's) was working over the counter. He spilled one of the glasses toward me. It seemed that he asked me
"Are you OK?" in French.
I had a chance to ask him. "How do I say OK in French?"
"OK is OK in French!"
"We are hungry, where should we go to eat?"
He asked, "What do you want to eat? French?" "Why not?"
He gave us directions and the name of the restaurant. Just as we were about leave, I whispered to him, "Don't tell anyone, I'm a tourist." He smiled at me.
We walked around the cemetery yard that was surrounded by a wall. The place was very big.
We didn't see any one walking on that street. When the cemetery wall finally ended, there was "CHEZ PAPA"
Thank God!!!!

A lady was sitting at the end of the table. When we were seated, she looked at us and said, "Bonsoir"
I believed she was French.
We asked a waitress. "Do you have an English menu?"
The lady seated said something in English to us, it was perfect English.
She was an American. She was born in NY, where we come from. Wow!
The light was above us! She helped us order and gave us much information about Paris.
Gérard Depardieu's restaurant was one of them.
She is a flight attendant of American Airlines. She travels to Paris often, of course!
She was surprised that we were in a local restaurant. It was south French food and Très Bien!
I guess I'm a master of traveling. I know how to get local info. from local people.
We had a lot of fun conversations with our wine. It was a nice start in Paris.
Thank you, Joni!

I will post our other dinner places sometime. All of them were very good and we enjoyed drinking wine wherever and whenever we ate!