New Year's Day breakfast 2020

We started 2020 with a quiet New Year's Day meal.

As with other years, we had ozoni soup with rice cakes, kuromame black soybeans, datemaki seafood omelet, tataki gobo burdock root in sesame vinegar dressing, shrimp, lotus root in sweetened vinegar, grilled saikyo-zuke black cod, and so on. It was simpler than usual, mainly because the meal was meant to be for us only. No guests were involved this year, since my father passed away last fall.

Osechi New Year's Day breakfast, 2019

Once again this year, a smallish, basic lineup of osechi perfect for a breakfast for two.

Finding good fish is always a challenge in our town despite its location on the seacoast. Yet this year it was a case where a series of problems can lead to an amazing solution. Earlier in December following several days of power outage, we made grilled kasuzuke salmon out of defrosted salted salmon fillets, and it struck me that the taste of the fish, which was a bit dry due to my mistakenly grilling it slightly too long, would probably go really well in ozoni soup. Tom agreed that the taste would be a great match, and we bought a fillet of sockeye salmon for the ozoni. As it was previously frozen, I salted the fillet to extract excess moisture from the flesh and marinated it in sakekasu sake lees for two nights while preparing our ozoni to the semi-final flavoring stage. On December 30th, grilled kasuzuke salmon was added to the soup, which was simmered to blend the flavors, chilled overnight, and simmered again with the last flavor adjustment on the 31st. And after all that, we were rewarded with one of our most successful ozoni ever on the January 1st.

Breakfast, August 17, 2016

Summer is finally here, and local corn has started to look appetizing. Weeks of chilly days up until mid August have already turned the giant leaves of the maples partially yellow around our house. Before we lose the warm weather, we had a breakfast featuring a couple of summer vegetables.

• Tomorokoshi gohan / steamed rice with corn, topped with julienned shiso perilla leaves (209 kcal; 79 mg sodium)
• Mini tomato to nira-iri nattojiru / miso soup with fermented soybeans, cherry tomatoes and garlic chives (80 kcal; 231 mg sodium)
• Zukkiini to tofu no yuzukosho-itame / stir-fried zucchini and tofu, yuzu citron pepper flavor (78 kcal; 60 mg sodium)
• Horenso no ohitashi, kuko no mi-zoe / spinach marinated in light broth, with goji berries (16 kcal; 30 mg sodium)
• Hijiki no itameni / braised hijiki seaweed (17 kcal; 79 mg sodium)

Total calories & sodium content: 400 kcal; 489 mg sodium  (For Tom: 608 kcal; 523 mg sodium)

Breakfast, January 1, 2016

Every year, while taking care of final prep for the big breakfast on January 1st, I harvest several camellia leaves in our garden. I plate the glossy green leaves with chrysanthemum-cut kabu turnip served with grilled fish and scallops as a part of the osechi New Year's Day meal.

My parents' house in Japan is surrounded by sazanka [sasanqua] winter-blooming camellia hedges, and their red blossoms give us a striking show during the holiday season. I always loved to see them blooming against a blanket of pure white snow through windows framed with shoji paper screens. Nowadays my parents don't get much snow, and this view of simple beauty with its contrasting colors is largely a memory from the past. So the camellia leaves I pair with kabu are a memento of a lost scene. 

Breakfast, May 21, 2015

Last week, Tom got off one of his three medications. His heart is pretty much functioning normally again (!) except for one condition that seems to stay with him.
The doctor complimented him on his diet, which made me happy.

• Steamed rice with toasted sesame seeds (130 g in photo; 218 kcal; 1 mg sodium)
• Kakitama oroshi no misoshiru / egg- flower and grated daikon radish miso soup, with seri water dropwort (51 kcal; 255 mg sodium)
• Iridofu / scrambled tofu with bracken, burdock root, carrot, yu choy sum, king oyster mushroom and egg (137 kcal; 131 mg sodium)
• Fuki to age no gomani / Japanese butterbur and thin deep-fried tofu in sesame-flavored broth (88 kcal; 102 mg sodium)

Total calories & sodium content: 494 kcal; 489 mg sodium  (For Tom: 594 kcal; 541 mg sodium)

Breakfast, September 8, 2014

For the past one year, our first choice for breakfast has been oatmeal. Every day Tom has been cooking rolled oats with equal amounts of water and whole milk, and we put our preferred toppings when we eat. The main drawback is that we get really hungry before 11 am.

I have been excited about an upcoming trip to Japan recently, and by 5 am, my eyes were wide open. So I decided to cook a Japanese breakfast to start our week.

Breakfast, January 1, 2014

We were grateful to be at the table to enjoy the osechi New Year's meal this year, although the number of items was fewer than in previous years. I am still in the process of figuring out the balance between less sodium and good flavor, especially with simmered dishes, and this year's osechi preparation basically became a series of experiments for that purpose.

All the dishes were made to contain less sodium by simply reducing the amount of seasonings, replacing seasonings or changing preparation methods. Some dishes were a bit disappointing in terms of needing more saltiness or tasting overly sweet; some turned out saltier than expected, showing there was more room to cut back. I did, however, make all my standard osechi dishes that carry wishes of good health -- kuromame black soybeans, tataki gobo burdock root and ebi no umani prawns. Tom has regained his strength and is in amazingly good shape, thanks to his active routine prior to cardiac collapse. We hope his health continues to improve this year.

Breakfast, April 23, 2013

A power breakfast.

Tom needs coffee to wake up in the morning.
I don't. My brain is up and running pretty much the moment I open my eyes in the morning.
But I need food to keep it going, especially before a big job.

Breakfast, January 15, 2013

Having rice porridge with azuki beans for breakfast is an old custom for koshogatsu, or “little New Year.”

Breakfast, January 1, 2013

The first meal of the year is big.

Along with ozoni, the New Year’s special soup with rice cakes, we had our usual dishes but with slightly different ingredients and fewer variations than in other years. As I started preparing most osechi New Year’s dishes on December 29th (I usually start on the 28th), I could not finish making some of the things we usually have. But I did make kuri kinton -- mashed satsumaimo sweet potato with sweetened kuri chestnuts, both colored with kuchinashi dried gardenia fruit to symbolize gold -- for our financial luck and prosperity this year!

Breakfast, December 3, 2012

We had lunch with Tom's sister and niece at Shanghai Garden in Seattle yesterday. My favorite dish at the restaurant is pea vine (shoot) saute. It is a very common dish, and Shanghai Garden’s pea vine saute tastes as good as those I used to have in Taiwan. Pea vine saute is not a fancy “wow” dish, but it certainly hit the spot and inspired me to make a decent breakfast the following day with ingredients we already have on hand and something just purchased in Seattle.

Breakfast, November 21, 2012

It is the day before the buttery-sugary feast. Recent radio shows about how to prepare turkey and side dishes make me feel full already. One of the most recent programs emphasized the importance of butter. We do not use butter excessively even with Western food, but tomorrow’s food is an annual exception. I will have six dishes with butter: panna cotta of beets, gougère, crispy cauliflower salad, baked yams, salmon-potato spread, and pumpkin cheesecake. Some only use less than 1 tsp of butter, but all together they are buttery. To counter the highly likely overdose, we had a butter-less breakfast as usual.

Breakfast, October 12, 2012

Tom has been a star in our kitchen lately. He bakes great bread. He is getting really good at pozole and dishes with beans, from soup to salad. He repeatedly made jabara kyuri to use as many cucumbers as possible from the greenhouse. He cooked warabi bracken for the first time, grilled eggplant for the first time, used a tortilla press for the first time, and he tried my new daikon radish grater for the first time – all in the last few weeks.

I get cranky, however, because of an insufficient variety and amount of vegetables. On a deadline-free, stress-free day after a few weeks of a hectic work schedule, one word was echoing in my head – vegetables, vegetables, vegetables….

Breakfast, May 14, 2012

The weather has been sunny and warm lately, and my body seems to retain too much heat even early in the morning. Something cool, along with other simple dishes, seemed a good choice for breakfast.

Breakfast, February 17, 2012

Extra cheese, double cheese, loaded with cheese...

According to what we see around us, Tom is "under-cheesed." Moreover, Tom is also under-mayonnaised, under-ketchupped, under-sugared, under-buttered, and under-meated.

Not taking in extra fat or sugar seems quite normal to me. However, not having built up your resistance to this stuff can cause digestive problems when you eat out at places where fat is loaded into the food, probably just out of habit. Poor under-greased Tom realized this yesterday when he experienced a serious stomach problem after eating a club sandwich somewhere local, and he is continuing to complain of discomfort this morning.  So for today's breakfast...

Osechi New Year's Day meal, 2012

As usual, I only made the dishes I like. There is no kazunoko herring roe or ikura salmon roe on our table, for example. And yet again, I gave up on making kobumaki rolled kelp with fish (salted salmon for us) inside. Another dish I didn't have the energy to make was kinton mashed satsumaimo sweet potato with sweetened kuri chestnuts for financial luck .... that have been a mistake.

Breakfast, January 1, 2012

Before the New Year's Day osechi brunch with friends, we had a small breakfast for just the two of us.

Breakfast, November 21, 2011

Before we pick up our turkey and start preparing dishes for Thanksgiving dinner, we need to create more space in the fridge and freezer. Space-taking lettuce and mizuna, leftover cooked dried daikon radish, and fish marinated in miso will be gone with this breakfast.

Breakfast, September 27, 2011

Mornings and evenings are getting chilly, but the days are still warm -- cucumbers, eggplant and tomatoes are still on their way from the greenhouse. Our meals these days are a mixture of summer and fall.

Breakfast, September 12, 2011

Tomatoes and Japanese cucumbers are now a regular harvest from our greenhouse.