Umami Mart

I have a confession to make: I am not a fan of potlucks. I’ve always found it to be a lot of pressure and kind of take them too seriously. But bringing a home-cooked dish to a party is not only financially practical for the party host and guests, but also supposed to be FUN, […]

Feeling out of the loop can make you feel old. I was feeling that way on Sunday night when I didn’t recognize a third of the bands and artists that took the Grammy’s stage. I didn’t know when Maroon 5 ended and Foster the People began… it was all just so confusing. By 10 o’clock, […]

Avocado sashimi with yuzu kosho is the easiest dish to make. It’s great to serve your guests before the main course. It’s also an ideal option to serve yourself when you are feeling really lazy but a little fancy. I prepare this for myself when I am craving something heavier than a salad and more […]

I’m going through Yoko withdrawl. We were literally joined at the hip for the last month, gearing up for our GIFT OF FOOD benefit: chatting, Skyping, meeting with each other, organizing, coordinating, planning with our other awesome collaborators. It was definitely a huge team effort to put on THE GIFT OF FOOD, and without Yoko, […]

I used to be amused by the number of Kewpie mayonnaise tubes my 85 year-old grandma had stashed in her packed fridge in Tokyo. I would visit her house every few months to clean out her fridge. She would forget that she already had certain condiments and kept buying them because they would get buried […]

So I’m having an old friend over for dinner, and he’s a vegetarian. Don’t we all hate cooking for vegetarians? None of my tried-and-true-recipes-for-normal-carnivore guests, like Beetroot Chicken or Bloody Pot Roast Beef, would fit the food customs of my friend. Luckily I recently had a fab side dish at another (non-vegetarian) dinner party some […]

This title might be deceiving. You know I cook a lot, from lazyass to the it-will-take-all-day kind. But fish is something I’ve never explored much. As I mentioned last week, something about the eyes, the mouth, and the flesh freaks me out. In Japan, where fish supply is abundant, most people buy fish whole, and cut […]

One of my loyal Monday night regulars brought me these on the other week. A bag full of Chinese sausages! YAY! He grew up in  San Francisco and swears that this one butcher in Chinatown, Mow Lee Co., makes them the best (774 Commercial at Grant, 982-5767). He brought me the regular pork kind, and […]

Remember when I made kimchi fried rice? It has become my staple meal when I feel ultra lazy. Read: ALL THE TIME. So how panicked was I when I went to the kitchen yesterday to take out all the precious ingredients out of the fridge, but then realize that I was missing RICE. Epic FAIL. […]

– Organic food fraud at Target: basically sums up why I loathe corporate/USDA-summoned “organic”, it’s all such a farce. Don’t even get me started on Whole Foods. Ugh. Get your lazyass to the farmer’s market! (Huffington Post; via Tmonkey) – Probably the funniest review I’ve read on the KFC Double Down sandwich. “Like grief, the […]