This has been a very different Chinatown International District Summer Festival than last year. I don’t know if it was the advance publicity, the relative novelty, or the great support from JACL and co., but last year was much busier at the summer festival than this year. I sold a lot more candy last year, even on the relatively challenging first day I had this time last year.

But I have a few things going for me this year… I have been directing people to YuzuMura.com more aggressively, with a promotional coupon, and I had additional products from Three Tree Tea to offer, and those have been doing well. I just wish we had one (still secret, sorry) product that isn’t going to be ready until about 2 weeks from now. It would be very tempting at an event like this.

I had help from Kaori (my roommate) and a woman I hired for the event who speaks Cantonese. But I didn’t do as much advance “training” as last time, so it was more seat-of-the-pants.

Afterward, two of us went to a cheap, decent Ethiopian restaurant in Columbia City. It was not bad, though I think I’ve been happier in other places… but the best Ethiopian meals I’ve had were probably in Chicago.

Hiromi just posted this photo from when we were headed to watch fireworks on July 4, in yukata (summer kimono, roughly). I wonder if I can ever find a less touristy yukata with a height suitable for me…

Hiromi had to go back home yesterday, so I took her to the airport to send her off. We drank two coffees on the way to the airport, because it’s Seattle and we only made one coffee stop this entire trip. We had a reasonably decent latte at Essential Bakery, and something else at the airport, which was a little overcooked.

Of course, we started enough of the days with an iced latte or perked up with a straight espresso or something made at home, so we didn’t walk around uncaffeinated. We had some of the most luxurious breakfasts I’ve indulged in for a long time. Everything happened deliberately most of the time, which is usual when she visits Seattle… I will never be able to shake the image that I move at my own pace. Actually I often have the urge to move at a frenetic pace when left by myself.

I got a bit of a sunburn on July 4, in spite of a relatively pain-free long kayak ride on Sunday. I forgot to apply sunscreen for a short meander along Alki on Monday, and I exposed my usually covered feet to the sun by wearing sandals most of the day. Somehow, although the burn was rather moderate, I had a slighly lobsteresque look on my feet, arms and legs by the end of the day, and walking around yesterday exacerbated the irritation a bit.

I went to Ikea today to arrange for additional parts for my bare storage shelving, which I’ve been using ever since I brought over my first ceramics order last year. I hate shopping at Ikea. It’s not that I am particularly opposed to their products, but I feel like I’m in a lab mouse maze, complete with traps and dead ends. They have signs to guide you where you think you want to go, but they always force you to walk through things that you have no need for, unless you happen to be their target audience with 1.8 children in tow, an outdoor garden, and a house whose kitchen you can alter at will. When you see a sign that tells you to walk straight through, then walk through a non-negotiable U-Turn path around another wall, only to see another sign urging you to walk straight ahead parallel to but in the opposite direction of the last sign, you feel a little manipulated.

Anyway, I now have more shelving to assemble. I also realized I’m going to need another small shelf, preferable something portable and ideally snappable for my Chinatown Summer Festival event this weekend, but that’s not a problem Ikea seems to be able to solve, so I’ll go and get something utilitarian at Office Depot or Staples tomorrow, I think.

I made these matcha muffins this morning, and we used up some recently made shira-tama and leftover ogura-an by placing them in the muffin batter. I think I first tried matcha muffins about 6 or 7 years ago at Kimura-ya in Ginza.

They actually looked substantially more matcha green before being hyper-illuminated, so I might reshoot these at some point when I get around to making some more, and try not to overexpose them so much.

Jason’s Matcha-An Muffins

1–1/2 cups flour
2/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 stick butter, melted
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp Matcha for Cooking
1/4 tsp salt

Ogura-an or your preferred type of anko (sweetened azuki bean puree), about 1/2 cup

Mix with a fork to a lumpy consistency, taking care not to develop strands of gluten. I filled a 24–piece mini-muffin pan with this amount of batter, using about a tablespoon of batter per pan. Using two spoons, press a bout a teaspoon of anko into the batter. We also snuck a few homemade shiratama into some of the muffins; when baked they taste kind of like yakimochi.

Bake at 375F (180c) for 22–25 minutes, until edges are browned. You can test one muffin with a toothpick.

Breakfast also included some leftover black raspberry pie, some very orange jidori no tamago medama-yaki (sunny side up orange eggs from very well-fed hens) with a little Ritrovo truffle salt, and watermelon.

Sonstiges

Hiromi and I spent the afternoon kayaking yesterday with Jennifer… we made our way from Portage Bay to the arboretum, then up to Madison Park and back. Surprisingly, three hours in the sun didn’t roast anybody. It was Hiromi’s first time on a kayak, so Jennifer gave a basic lesson to Hiromi while I was waiting in line to rent a 3rd kayak at Agua Verde.

Afterward I made a late dinner to take advantage of some decent but early heirloom tomatoes… insalata caprese, a salad with grilled figs, tomatoes and butter leaf lettuce, some bruised tomato garlic bruschetta, various leftover cheeses, and some tomato cream pasta with basil, just to complete the tomato-heavy theme. The day before we also had some tomatoes, but on ciabatta… also an egg white fritatta with morels and some earthy smoky cheese, and a salad with a crushed raspberry vinaigrette and lavender fennel cheese.

We also had a nice dinner at La Carta de Oaxaca on Friday night… preceded by cocktails at Fu Kun Wu. That seems to be a theme every time I end up at La Carta… the waiting list demands stopping somewhere else for a drink. But we got a table in 30 minutes… an impressive feat for a group of 7 on a Saturday night.