Alysse Abroad

Well, maybe this one should be titled "Meals I Can Almost Make."  I made okonomiyaki for myself and it almost entirely fell apart when I transferred it onto my plate.  But, I have to say it still tastes absolutely amazing. I coated a pan with olive oil (I think my problem was that I didn't use enough olive oil) and mixed in a bowl chopped cabbage, sliced red bell pepper, some chicken and onion from when I made my soup, and two whole eggs.  Then I poured the mixture onto the pan and waited for it to cook on one side before flipping it over.  This is where things went a little bit wrong for me, since the egg started burning before it was solid enough to flip, but I flipped it anyway and waited for the other side to cook.  Then I transferred it (well, tried to) onto a plate, and coated it in mayonnaise.  Another amazingly easy meal that is far more delicious than I can express. I just want to note that mayonnaise in Japan is much different from mayonnaise in...

This is an easy meal that I make quite often.  I usually have some rice to make, which in a rice cooker takes 30 minutes, but once I cook it I can save some for microwaving later.  So, as long as I have either some leftover rice or a pre-packaged microwaveable rice dish (they sell them for cheap at all stores) I can simply heat up some rice in two minutes, and throw in a fried egg (maybe another two minutes) and sprinkle on some shrimpies.  This shrimp stuff is 105 yen at the 100 yen Lawson and is great alone with the rice, too.  Just mix it all up and it's a really great tasting meal that fills me up because of the rice and egg.

When I first got to Japan, I realized that a lot of the things I used to eat in America require ingredients that are either hard to find or cost too much in Japan.  I've had to learn to make due with what I can get in grocery stores, and I think I've done pretty well for myself.  So, as mentioned (in the grocery shopping post) I am going to show you a few of the meals I make for myself.  I want to show you how I incorporate Japanese ingredients into foods I know and love, and I also want to brag a little bit because finally I'm getting good at cooking! I've already shown you things like onigiri and sukiyaki, but I want to show you more normal meals, too (full meals that don't require extra time or tools). Today I made myself soup with chicken, onion, carrot, and renkon (lotus root). I know, I know, it looks fantastic, right?  Well, fear not because I'm going to tell you how I made it! I cut a chicken breast in half, and then butterflied the thicker half.  Th...

Tonight Olivia and I caught the last of a beautiful pink and orange sunset sky right above campus.  We ran outside to take pictures/video, and I'm so glad we did because within less than a minute it had gone away.  I thought I would share it with you.

I thought I would  share with you what exactly Japanese currency looks like, just because.  I'm just going to dive right into it, but first I want to mention a few things worth noting: It's name: "yen," however, in Japan we pronounce it "en" The symbol:￥ The exchange rate: horrible 1￥ front. 1￥ back. 5￥ front. 5￥ back. 10￥ front. 10￥ back. 50￥ front. 50￥ back. 100￥ front. 100￥ back. 500￥ front. 500￥ back. 1,000￥ front. 1,000￥ back. 2,000￥ front. The Japanese 2,000￥ is like the American $2, in that they aren't commonly seen and elicit an "ooh, cool!" (or rather 「あ！すごい！」when they do turn up. 2,000￥ back. 5,000￥ front. 5,000￥ back. 10,000￥ front. 10,000￥ back.

Do you remember that post I did way back in the beginning of my Japan adventure called "Okashi"?  Well, here is the next one, as promised.  I went grocery shopping recently and decided to show you everything I bought, in addition to the few okashi pictures I had been saving up.  Some of these things are very normal, but I wanted to do this for a couple of reasons: 1. I thought you might enjoy seeing what I eat, since it has something to do with my current life. 2. Before I got here, as well as during the beginning of my stay, I was trying very hard to figure out how to go grocery shopping, because half of the things in grocery stores here are things I don't know much about and don't recognize, and the things that I would recognize are packaged differently than I am used to and are titled in Japanese anyway.  So, I hope if someone who is having the same problem I was stumbles across this, they will find it useful. 3. Another problem I had during this time was how t...

As I say time and time again, I am kept pretty busy here.  But, being a 20 year old college girl in one of the best cities in one of the best foreign countries with lots of great friends, I have fun when I can.  Over the last couple of weeks I've done fun stuff including... A weekend in Kichijoji - Kichijoji is a nearby town that has a lot of good shopping, food, entertainment, etc.  It's fun both during the day and at night.  I went one Saturday to get lunch with some friends and do some shopping. We got curry at this well-known place, and it was unbelievably amazing.  There was all-you-can-eat naan, too!! My two curries were butter chicken (the orangey one) and saag mushroom (the greener one).  I also got this Indian yogurt drink that grew on me pretty well. We didn't get so much shopping done as we did Purikura and walking around, but it was fun. So the next day I went back again, with a different group of people. We found this really ...