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A Note from a Del Ray Farmers’ Market Purveyor
Madam is passing along the following request (a bit late, sorry): Hello, I represent my family’s farm, Smith Meadows, each week at the Del Ray Farmers Market. I need an assistant every Saturday from...
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Caboose Cafe (Ethiopian)
Photo: Caboose meat combo III, chicken infillay, beef alitcha, doro watt, zilzil tibbs, beg watt, with salad and “harvest veggie” (carrot, green bean, onion, and tomato), and gomen (collards). You’d...
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Sushi Taro (Japanese kaiseki and sushi)
Dining at Sushi Taro the night before Veterans Day: a treat in honor of my husband’s present (and my past) service to our country. It was also his ploy to stop temporarily my obnoxious keening for...
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Mijinko mystery
Photo: Dinner at Mukune-tei, the restaurant at Daimon shuzo (sake brewery) in Osaka. January 2008: I’m at the John Gauntner Sake Seminar, it’s the last dinner of the week. We’re upstairs in the...
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What price sake?
Photo: 1.8-liter bottle (isshōbin) of Tsukasabotan junmai sake. $49.95 at H-Mart in Falls Church. A recent Japanese staple supply trip required making an inventory of the pantry, renting a Zipcar for...
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Shichihonyari junmai
Photo: Shichihonyari junmai. 60% seimaibuai. Et-chan and Te-chan at Tokyofoodcast were raving so much about the Shichihonyari 80% nama genshu that my fingers scrambled blindly to the Sakaya Web site...
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Tsukinokatsura “Heiankyo” junmai daiginjo
Photo: Tsukinokatsura “Heiankyo” junmai daiginjo. I was expecting a great deal from this sake, as I once had an almost religious experience tasting its sister sake, Tsukinokatsura “Yanagi” (Willow)...
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Née Sei Shonagon
Oh those dire times, back in July 2008, when Madam, your blog mistress, with misgivings and many protestations of 寂しくなるだろうよ (I will miss you) was required to move back to the United States. Farewell,...
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New Year’s greetings
Photo: Sushi Taro’s Osechi ryōri (New Year’s food) That wrapped box is a bit of a pink tease, hmm? I just received an e-mail from my former Japanese teacher in Yokohama. She thanked me for my nenga jo...
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寿しtaroの御節のお品書き (Menu for Sushi Taro’s Osechi)
Photo: 重箱, jūbako, multi-layered box to serve food at New Year’s. The jūbako is like a Ph.D. in Japanese culture in a box, how to start? The oshinagaki (menu) lists 43 items, in Japanese, so there was...
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Dassai sparkling nigori junmai daiginjo
Photo: Dassai sparkling nigori junmai daiginjo 39. A Frankenstein of unnaturally joined parts: daiginjo nigori sparkling sake. Man, what a party-pooper I am. I was hoping to like this. Ooh, sparkling...
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Pembroke Springs Retreat (Japanese-style B&B)
Photo: Ikebana in the sunrise room (the guest room with Japanese decor) of Pembroke Springs Retreat. I haven’t had a proper bath in a year-and-a-half. A friend was concerned that I was missing Japan a...
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Nandemo Miso Soup
Photo: Nandemo (Whatever) miso soup. Tonight there was a potato, a yellow onion, a piece of daikon, some curly kale, and two kinds of miso. Yes, I splashed in a little sake. Oh food bloggers bring us...
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Sunday breakfast and omusubi leftovers
This one’s for Tyson for reminding me that a blog needs to be fed. Photo: Sunday Japanese breakfast at home. Broiled aji hirakiboshi (split-open, lightly dried horse mackerel), rice, pickles, miso...
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大雪
Photo: Ōyuki (big/heavy snow) in Del Ray. The NPR announcer says, “Tonight’s forecast is snow and blowing snow.” We have continuous supplies of electricity, heat, cable, and internet. There’s a...
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Momokawa Diamond junmai ginjo
Photo: Momokawa from SakéOne, Oregon-made sake. I first tasted sake, like most Americans, in Japanese restaurants which served standard Japanese restaurant sake. I drank it, as they served it to me,...
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Trevor Corson at Zentan (sushi, sake, lecture)
Photo: Sushi chefs preparing plates at Zentan. March 3rd at Zentan restaurant in Washington, D.C., Trevor Corson (a native of the D.C. area and author of The Secret Life of Lobsters and The Story of...
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On the bus
Sunny late afternoon, riding the bus home from work. I’m reading my Japanese textbook and murmuring the words. I’m on the aisle and beside me is a woman with a flat American accent talking to another...
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Apricot blossoms
Photo: Dwarf Chinese apricot (Prunus armeniaca ‘Chinese’ ?), but it looks and smells like my favorite ume (Prunus mume). Last spring we had the entire yard redesigned by Paul Henderson, a local...
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73 degrees, clear, with scent of Amelanchier
Photo: Amelanchier x grandiflora ‘Autumn Brilliance’ (Apple Serviceberry) Warming earth, blue sky, and blossoms, but not those of cherry trees. The white blossoms perfume our garden path and remind us...
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The SakéOne Challenge, Part 1: Momokawa Silver and Momokawa Diamond
Photo: SakéOne’s Momokawa Silver Tanrei Junmai Ginjo. IMHO, Silver beats Diamond. Back in February I wrote a not-so-flattering post about a bottle of Momokawa Diamond. SakéOne’s Vice President of...
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The SakéOne Challenge, Part 2: Momokawa Organic Ginjo and Momokawa Ruby
Photo: Momokawa Organic Ginjo (junmai) and Momokawa Ruby junmai ginjo. Link to Part 1 of the SakéOne Challenge Momokawa Organic Ginjo (junmai) A few weeks back when I tried the Momokawa Organic Ginjo...
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An early Pinkster feast
When leave the fig tree putteth out, When calves and lambs for mothers cry, When toads begin to hop about, We know of truth that summer’s nigh. So after Pos (Easter) when hens do cluck, When gawky...
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My pal Pogo
The heat here yesterday in Alexandria was intense, you know, for May. After a day of doing chores with no particular urgency, at 10 p.m. I went outside into the warm night air to sit on my front steps...
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The SakéOne Challenge, Part 3: G Sake
Photo: The G Sake, “Joy,” from Momokawa, the genshu junmai ginjo. I saved the last tasting for the big genshu. Genshu, basically undiluted sake, is different than “normal” sake (whatever that is) in...
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Saint André de Figuière, Magali Rosé, 2009
Saint André de Figuière, Côtes de Provence, Magali Rosé (cuvée signature), 2009. The “signature” wines being each named after one of “the three children of the estate.” 25% Grenache, 15% Cinsault, 30%...
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Shimeharitsuru “Jun” junmai ginjo
Shimeharitsuru “Jun” junmai ginjo. An old friend. The large swooping kanji in calligraphy is “Jun” (“pure,” as in pure rice sake, no alcohol added). One of the pleasures of sake, at least for me, is...
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Watermelon sake
Watermelon sake made with Otokoyama tokubetsu junmai. The recipes in The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook have proven reliable over the past two years. Their jambalaya is great and the spiced pecans and...
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Harvest
Edamame (fresh soybeans) and tomatoes. The edamame had been rubbed with kosher salt to remove (somewhat) the fuzz on the outside of the pods. All my garden plantings have been experimental and...
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A Seasoned Wok
Stir-fried cucumber and pork with golden garlic from Grace Young’s Stir-Frying to the Sky’s Edge. The beni shoga (red pickled ginger) just wanted to be there for the photo. Just ’cause are my favorite...
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Cardinal Death
Garden memento mori. Probably a gift from the neighbor’s cats. You shouldn’t chase after the past or place expectations on the future. What is past is left behind. The future is as yet unreached....
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Hong Kong Palace (Chinese: Sichuan)
Menu name: “North Szechwan Spicy Cold Bean-Starch Noodles” (chuan bei liang fen). The “noodles” were much like Japanese harusame (mung-bean noodles), but thicker and softer. Despite the name of the...
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A Question from a Reader
QUESTION: Has Madam been silenced by an evil cartel of Tea Party enthusiasts and vegetarians? –WL ANSWER: At some point during the hot summer here in D.C. the sake ran out; things looked bleak. Time...
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Del Ray Halloween Parade
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe. She had so many children, she didn’t know what to do… Filed under: Del Ray Pillow Book
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Never Too Angry to Spellcheck: The Jon Stewart Rally
The steps of the National Gallery of Art (West Building) Remarkably genial, polite, and youthful crowd carrying irony-laden signs: a huge gathering of people I would enjoy hanging out with. And so I...
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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Crisp, clear winter blue sky. No snow, but a 30 percent chance for Christmas day. We spent the morning rearranging things, weeding our belongings, deleting the dross to accentuate the good, useful,...
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Pants Optional Sunday
Señor, unless I am blind, you are wearing no pants. Sunday outing with a friend who speaks Japanese, with whom of course I rarely converse in Japanese. We have resolved to do better…sometime. First we...
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Jun Ai Shikomi (The Brew of Pure Love)
Japan Society Earthquake Relief Fund The label on the neck of a bottle of Sharaku 冩楽 junmai ginjo says: jun ai shikomi [pure love brewing]. In Tokyo on the evening of February 15, I was sitting...
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Cherry blossoms fall
From all these trees, in the salads, the soup, everywhere, cherry blossoms fall. —Bashō, trans. Robert Hass This year the cherry blossoms peaked in the cold and rainy final days of March. Two evenings,...
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Saturday Rapture
But many avoid death now as the greatest of evils but then welcome it as rest from things in life. The wise neither declines life nor fears not living; for life does not offend him nor does he believe...
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Slumdog Catbird
Gray Catbird nest with assorted Del Ray detritus Backyard bird feeder visitors this spring have included House Finches, House Sparrows, Blue Jays, Northern Cardinals, Common Grackles, Mourning Doves...
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August harvest
Alexandria summer: Heat, mosquitoes in the backyard, ugly new construction on our block, passive-aggressive boss, heat, ennui, heat— spray my calves with poison to keep the bugs off and step out into...
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Happy New Year 2012
Shunryu Suzuki’s 1969 English calligraphy, a framed page from Tricycle magazine Woke up and went to the George Washington Masonic Memorial: à la Japonaise we sat on the steps overlooking Old Town...
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Negative Space
Listening to Ann Cole. Growing Hakurei turnips and tatsoi. Not sure where any of this is going. In the meantime, to help the Tohoku region of Japan (or just to get some fine recipes), please go buy a...
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Emerson’s Journey
So priketh hem Nature in hir corages – Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, And palmeres for to seeken straunge strondes To ferne halwes, couthe in soundry londes (So Nature pricks them in each...
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Year of the Dog
Emerson has always been affectionate with me. That first night one year ago today, May 12, 2012, when he came home, Emerson sat near me constantly, ready to be pet, ready to be taken into our life,...
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So I got that goin’ for me, which is nice
Carlos is intertwined with my love of the pleasures of Japan. We met there while we were both in the Navy, meeting the first time at work in the windowless, cold bunker that was our command’s...
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