another murasaki trip

Dad's treat for mom's bday. yum =)

I have to label these pictures before I forget what they were! Seared toro with shiitake mushrooms sauteed in butter and garlic. Garnished with shiso. Dai-san knows how to make my mom happy, for sure. She loves the seared toro!

Seafood soup, warm and cleansing.

Bluefin tuna.

Yellowtail, a nice big piece =).

Shima Aji, this had a wonderful juicy texture. One of Dai-san's favorites.

Dai-san's other favorite, kanpachi. Another fish with wonderful texture, sprinkled with a little sea salt and spice.

One of my favorites, amaebi. Can't come here without getting it. The head is prepared fried or in miso soup - I absolutely love the miso soup version!

Fresh uni. Another one of my favorites. Murasaki always has fresh uni, and it's tasty!!

valentine's: a rare cooking opportunity!

mike and i, not sure what to make for valentine's day dinner, turned to the internet to find a recipe for some kind of pasta with tomatoes. we were in luck! it turns out there are a ton! we picked a champagne, tomato, mushroom sauce with shrimp. can you guess which bowl was mine? we also made strawberry shortcake for dessert. both turned out delicious, so i wanted to keep a pointer to the recipes for posterity! hopefully allrecipes doesn't go kaput.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Champagne-Shrimp-and-Pasta/Detail.aspx

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Scrumptious-Strawberry-Shortcake/Detail.aspx

i did cut the shortcake a little small, so it was difficult to make a nice piece of shortcake with strawberry - but you could just pile the strawberries on top. yummy anyway. next time, i'll remember to cut the shortcake into bigger pieces, maybe 2x2 in squares instead of 1x1 >.<... also, sadly, i completely forgot that you can make whipped cream out of heavy cream! sigh. so we initially ate our strawberry shortcake without whipped cream. oops!

highlights from a week in mammoth

a fun, slightly dramatic, weekend

we went to mammoth! 8 of us stayed in this teeny condo which boasted a .25 bath the size of a small utility closet. you could sit on the toilet and wash your hands at the same time!

we had 2 people go tumbling down cornice and another quite steep drop off the top.

we had a broken wrist and some painful butts.

we watched sweeney todd. blech.

but we all had a great time and tasty omelettes!

cliiiimbin' in piiirate's coove

hooray! finally a little climbing spotlight on this supposed climbing blog. i did manage to not write anything about my first trip ever to bishop; but maybe I'll write about it someday...

more new years!

raja's party... and then some lucky people get to hang with jude law!

highlights from new years eve at masa sushi

melt in your mouth goodness. i know... so cliché! but i loved every little bite! costa mesa. ask them about their special new year's boxes!