A Happy New Year!

A Happy New Year to everyone!!!!

I hope everyone had a nice and peaceful holiday.

For us, my very close cousin "Mon-chan" who is like a sister to me and her husband visited us from Japan for a week during the new years holiday, so we spent a Japanese style new years eve and a new years day. This was very special for me because the New Years eve and day are important family holidays just like Christmas is in the USA. Aibo-kun and I used to visit Japan around this time of the year, but since I went back in spring, we've decided to stay in LA this time.

Since the New Years Eve was a pretty cold day, we decided to stay home, cook warm dinner, and watch this Japanese music show called "Kouhaku Utagassen" which most Japanese people watch on TV right before the new year's countdown.

LA has such a large population of Japanese people that we can watch this show on a local channel! My friends in Michigan wish if they could have it, too. It is a pretty big deal.

Another tradition is to eat "Soba" noodle (buckwheat noodle) before the countdown, so during the show, Mon-chan and I cooked some and tried to finish eating before the "Happy New Year!!!"

We woke up late on the New Years Day, and I prepared a simple small New Years dish setting using the plant in our yard. I used to cook the whole new years dish when I lived in Japan and would love to make them here, too, but we were just too busy this year. Maybe next year.


Then the main course was a soup bowl with mochi (rice cake). Mon-chan and I made the soup from the leftover crab from the night before, and it made a really good broth! Right before putting the mochi into the soup, we cooked the mochi just until they puffed up.









Surprisingly, we were still not full, so cooked some more mochi and this time, ate with a drop of soy sauce and nori.

The mochi I bought this year was organic brown rice mochi from an organic Japanese supermarket, and this was a big hit!

Then came the dessert time♪

Mon-chan brought this cute Japanese sweets just like fortune cookies made for the new years, so four of us broke a few pieaces each.

Mine were "Procrastination is the thief of time.", and "Better now than later", so I guess I should be more active this year!

It was a very peaceful new years with lots of laughter, and hope that this happiness will continue throughout the year 2009, not only for me, but for everyone!