This weekend was kind of a “hunker down” weekend. The weather turned clear, and an icy wind came blowing in, lasting through the weekend and still continuing as I write this Monday morning. Instead of going out and hiking I preferred to stay inside where it was warm and read books and watch movies. Since Kuniko was working both days of the weekend she wasn’t able to get in on the relaxation until the evenings.
We had a bit of a high calorie weekend. Friday was our first experience making raclettes. Kuniko scored some gruyeres cheese as well as some raclette for our experiment, and it turned out to be delicious. Melting high quality cheese like that is always shocking when you see how much oil comes out, but when the same unmelted cheese is on the cutting board you wouldn’t hesitate to pop it in your mouth. Anyway, we served the raclettes with potatoes, pickles, and french bread from Kuniko’s favorite bakery in Motomachi. Yum.
Saturday I grilled some steaks out on the BBQ in the cold wind, and thanks to some spicy rub that my parents got me for Christmas (from Penzeys spice) they turned out great. Some of the best steaks I’ve ever cooked, actually. Finally, yesterday we made tacos with some of the Canasta raw tortillas that I forgot in America and were subsequently sent by mail by my folks. The tortillas held up just fine on the journey, and were very delicious. We’ve got some leftovers from yesterday, so it will be back to tacos tonight – I can’t wait.
This week is a little more social for me. Wednesday I’ll be going to the “tach” – for some tachinomi drinking with Bill and Gary. This means plenty of smoke in my clothes afterwards, so I’ll need to remember to dress appropriately as well as stock on an Fabreeze before then. Then on Friday I’ll go out with some students (both former and current) to have some garlic okonomiyaki in Tarumi. The last time I went out with these guys I ended up with an ink-stained fork in my bag so who knows how it will turn out this time.
Well, I guess it is time to get some gloves and a jacket and face the icy winds outside – no more putting it off.
