Sushi!寿司!Sushi!

When it comes to Japanese food, Sushi may comes up to your mind first, I believe.

A few times a month I go to a local Sushi bar near my house and enjoy eating sushi and drinking beer and kinds of liquors, which is my hobby and my important opportunity to be relaxed and stressed out. And I went there tonight.

Tonight I enjoyed some kinds of Sushis like sliced tuna shown above, mackerel, and a fried balloon fish.

Enjoying taste of sushi is not only my pleasure in a sushi bar.
I enjoy talking with the master of the sushi bar over the counter about various issues such as how our bushiness are now and which fish is best in this season. (Today he recommended a bubble fish.)

I know there are many shushi bars in the world but Japanese traditional sushi bars have usually a case in which sliced fish are displayed as the above photo shows and guests can choose their order among them. The master is willing to be a lecturer on the displayed fish.

-- from iPad

Reanimated komatunas

I set up some vinyl tunnels 3 days ago for my komatunas which had been suffered from poor germination and I'm very happy to see today how effective they are.

You can see arrays of my komatunas have grown well in the above photo.
I saw much less germination and only smaller sprouts but the growth only for 3 days are so impressive. Fortunately it was very fine through this week, which could make the air inside the tunnels warm.

The first generation komatunas shown above seem to welcome the vinyl tunnels. They have been troubled in less germination and growth but since the tunnels were installed their growth has been so remarkable that I can expect to harvest them in the near future.


-- from iPad

Setting ' a warm shelter ' for komatunas

As a winter is coming to Osaka, the temperature down gradually recording 15C high and 8~9C low, which would be welcomed by my Chinese cabbages (Hakusai), white radishes and cabbages but not by young komatunas since they need warmth in the air for their growth

I set up a vinyl shelter for them to prevent cold winds and keep the air inside warmer. When I put my hands into the shelter I could feel the air getting warmer so I can expect it could be helpful for my komatunas. The rice husks which I mentioned in the previous post seem to be effective for expediting the growth of komatunas judging form their germination rate and growth.


-- from iPad

Cooking black chili.

'Black chili', which my wife's aunt gave us , is a vegetable which we had never seen till now. It's exciting to cook and eat vegetables which we have never seen and eaten isn't it?



The appearance of black chili is more round shaped and fleshier than usual
green chili. And it's interesting to see the black color changing to green when the chili are grilled ! You can see the color change easily on a dish made by my wife.



My wife grilled the chili with sliced pork. The taste is not spicy but milder than usual green chili and delicious!

-- from iPad

How to use rice husks

As the last post shows I got 2packs of rice husks from my wife's aunt and I'll show you how to use the rice husks in my garden.

I put the rice husks on the surface of my planting beds, which can keep the beds warm, and finally the husks will be natural fertilizer.

-- from iPad

Visiting "our teacher's farm

Today my family visited my wife's aunt who run large scale farm producing various kinds of vegetables and who is our teacher in gardening. We have learned a lot about how to run my garden. We visit her today to get rice husk. I'll show you how to use the rice husk.





In this season her aunt, family, and friends are very busy in harvesting and packaging komatunas. The komatunas are so beautiful and fresh that they are distributed to many stores.





















We found a rare kind of vegetable there. It's a "black chili". We have never seen that. If you know its scientific name and name in English, please let me know. And I'll show you how to cook them later,,,.





We talked with them a lot about growth of vegetables, weather, soil,,,,.
Everything is useful and helpful for us. We are so lucky that we can relay on her who is a veteran of raising vegetables.
-- from iPad

The first job after having vacation in a tropical island

The first thing I did after the trip to the Okinawa district was heading to my garden and seeing what happened there while I was in Okinawa.
Fortunately my wife cared the garden for me and I'm happy to see growth of my vegetables.

Today I recultivated planting beds, which can make water, fertilizer and nutrition penetrate soil well and reach for roots of my vegetables.
An atmosphere in Osaka have been dry and it made the surface of soil hard.

-- from iPad