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April 14, 2011
Ode to Japanify: Natto-A-Day
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, […]
April 12, 2011
The Gift of Food Benefit (SF): THANK YOU!
Photos by Travis LoDolce and Wataru Umeda. For an entire week after the Sendai earthquake and tsunami first hit, I was wrapped in an incurable, numbing daze. I would wake up with a pang in the pit of my stomach from the night before–I felt nauseous. Helpless. Hopeless. Thousands of people pronounced dead; even more […]
April 8, 2011
Old School Eats: Smoke House (LA)
The Smoke House is the sort of place where old-timey execs sip their nightcaps as they wait for their retirement (“I gave the best years of my life to this placeâ€) and where awkward co-workers carry on as if they are passing through town for work, treating their affairs as fleeting, one night romances. The […]
April 6, 2011
Happy Hour: The Desert Ain’t That Dry
The Prohibition Era figures prominently in the collective imagination of the cocktail world. The aura and mystique surrounding that era still wields great influence on popular culture. The popularity of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire is a perfect example of our still not fully reconciled fascination with that period, as is the proliferation of modern “speakeasies” in […]
March 31, 2011
Last Night to Drink for Japan at Camino (OAK)
Are ya’ll sick of hearing about fundraisers for Japan yet? Well, get over it–Japan needs us right now and we absolutely must do what we can to support it. You don’t hear me get all up on my soapbox very often, but for this, Umamimart must. And it doesn’t get easier than SIPPIN’ ON A […]
March 28, 2011
ReCPY: Let’s Make Onigiri! (Video)
My colleague Kristen who produces videos for Japan Society’s Youtube channel, asked me if I knew of any onigiri (rice balls) shops since they wanted to showcase them in an upcoming video. I thought, “How about I teach how to make onigiri in the video?†That’s how this project started. I had a lot of […]
March 25, 2011
THE GIFT OF FOOD: An Umamimart Fundraiser for Japan (SF)
MUSICAL LINE-UP (Update Tues. 3/29, 11:50am PST) Tommy Guerrero Gadget (Function 8 ) TophOne (RedWine DJs) DJ Orb Gabuã¡ã‚ƒã‚“ (Amoeba Records) +++ The night of March 10, here in Oakland California, was like any other night. I finished my shift early, was home by 10pm, slipped into my pjs and grabbed a beer from the […]
March 15, 2011
Help Japan!: A Yamahomo Fundraising Party (NYC)
UPDATED (Wed. 3/16, 2:37pm EDT): We just confirmed an anonymous donor who will match Friday’s gift, up to $10,000! So please drop by. We have a form you can fill out credit card information as well. Thanks, and hope to see you! +++ As you know, Japan is suffering tremendously from last Friday’s earthquake and […]
Umamimart Shop Quake Support
For the rest of March, the Umamimart Shop will donate 10% of every purchase to support the 2011 Sendai Earthquake and Tsunami relief efforts. Buy a mug. Support Japan.
March 11, 2011
Pushing Boundaries at Kappou Gomi (SF)
“Where the hell are we? Did we miss it?” I ask as we drive further and further away from the city center. Geary Boulevard is still bustling, but we’re way past Japantown now, and the storefront signs are getting harder to read. Besides, why would a restaurant like Kappou Gomi be all the way out […]