Chasing Monkeys

Chasing Monkeys

There is nothing in the world quite like those eyes.  Eyes veiled in a thick curtain of lashes, but wide, slightly watery, filled with admiration.  Then the smile, overflowing with all the joy that their little bodies can’t hold inside. It isn’t the way they look at you; it’s why.  Maybe because you helped them pick up a toppled truck, retrieve a stolen toy, or get one more Graham Cracker from the box.  Even the smallest favor can impact their world.  
  The moment I stepped onto the playground, my feet sank deeply into the spongy astro turf. I was transported back to a world of make-believe.  No longer a student, but their counselor.  The highest honor had been bestowed upon me: caring for children. Spotting my favorite camper brought a surge of love and pride to my chest.   Dylan was swinging from the monkey bars, his cheeks puffed out with the intense concentration it took to make it to the other side.  The moment he spotted me, his fingers released their grip.  Dylan hurdled from the monkey bars and sprinted towards me.  In the past days we had developed a deep personnel connection.  We understood each other.  His tiny fingers curled into my hand and the rush of sparks in my palm sent a smile to my face.  He jumped up and down, “Kewen,”  He could never seem to get my name right, so each time it was a new nickname.  “Kewen, we ride bikes now!”  He trudged forward, forcefully dragging me to the bikes.  Immediately, I saw him hop on the smaller of the two tricycles.  
We had established the bike arrangements on the first day.  
He had insisted, “I take the big bike!”  
I pleaded, “Dylan, I’m too big to fit on the little bike.”
His feet dragged across the ground as he pouted, “I’m faster on the big bike!”  Kneeling down so we were on the same level, I put an arm on his shoulder, “Dylan, I don’t think the bike is fast.  I think that you make it fast!  You’re like a superhero!  Like Flash!”  His chocolate brown eyes lit up like a tree on Christmas as he immediately switched bikes.
Though my legs were cramped between the wheels and the handle bars, I launched onto the winding bike path.  “Watch out!”  I narrowly avoided Graham as he stormed across the bike path after a group of screaming girls.  To my left, the rest of the kids played on the playground.  Isabella led the way across the bridge with her elaborate fabric wings, “Follow me to fairy land!”  
Hannah argued, “Why don’t you follow me?”
If a two year old could pull an exasperated face, this would be it.  
Isabella drawled, “Because I’m the leader so I go first.”

It really made you wish that you were their age again.
I snapped back to reality when Ms. Garcia called the children to the grassy area for group circle.  There was lots of pushing and shoving and deciding who was going to sit on whose lap.  All grass at our school is artificial, so it felt like stiff popsicle sticks on my legs.  “Criss cross apple sauce!”  Dylan made a bee line for me and plopped into my lap.  Though it was hard on my knee, from surgery, I could deal with it if it made him happy.
Our head coach stood in the middle of the circle, barking out explanations for the week to come. He gestured wildly with his hands, somewhat like a crazed gorilla.  Introducing the counselors and providing information about study trips was his main and only job.  Though he thought he did everything.  

The gym echoed with the sound of little feet jogging across the polished floor.  Thundering next to me like a playful puppy, was Dylan.  “I’m beating you Kewen!”  With his words I slowed my pace so that he was, in fact, beating me.  He raised his balled fists in triumph and ran to catch up with a friend.
“Kewen!”  I felt a tap on the back of my neck, and a tiny tickle of breath by my ear.  Spinning around on my scooter brought me face to face with Dylan, Jolie, Lochlann, Graham, Hannah, and Camille.  Camille jabbed a finger in my face, “Chase us.”  I tucked my legs underneath me so that I could lay across the scooter and propel myself after them.  “Alright, but I’ll give you a head start. I’m pretty fast!”  
Dylan yelled, “Not as fast as me!”
My hands paddled across the floor as I slithered after a group of screaming two year olds.  Alas, they turned at the last second and I slammed into the wall.  I was about to tag Dylan, but his smile stopped me in my tracks.  My cheek was throbbing from my collision with the wall, the muscles in my arms ached and burned, and I could feel the sweat at the nape of my neck.  Once I saw his smile, none of that mattered.  If I could keep him smiling like that forever, I would.  Soon, I was surrounded by dimples, bright teeth, flush faces, and rosy cheeks as they tackled me.  

Back on the playground, I was tired.  Hollis sprinted up to me, flanked by the rest of my campers.  She announced, “You’re the bad witch, and we are the princesses and princes.”  Before I could object, they took off.  I had already experienced their great stamina first hand, so I tried to leisurely jog after them.  I tagged bodies, fingers, legs, and heads.  It was no use, because they just kept going.  They didn’t seem to grasp the concept of freeze tag.
They were so ecstatic and their happiness seemed to be catching on.  My heart felt as though it was going to burst when the kids giggled and screamed upon seeing me.   They looked up to me, literally as well as emotionally.  It felt as though a warm honey glow was radiating from my body.  In that moment, I made a promise to myself and the kids.  I’d always be back to play with them, make them happy, and keep them smiling for as long as I could.

                                                                                                 That's Dylan 

See you soon!
The Watermelon Radish

Cupcake Wars; Shakespeare Style

Greetings friends and followers!  I bring news of  the Shakespearean cupcake wars, where each young soul is assigned a category from The Tempest.  They are then given the challenge to create a  handsome cupcake deserving a reward!  Your very own Watermelon Radish partook in this affair, and was assigned the topic of Ferdinand.  Shall we see how she represents the handsome hero of our own bards famous play?

I was given the topic of Ferdinand the prince, the daring new love of Miranda.  "'tis fair morning when you are by at night,"  These soft spoken words of Ferdinand convey his love for Miranda.  The moment he happened upon her nestled deeply into the island, he knew he had found an angel.  To represent the deep new love of Ferdinand and Miranda, the cake is sweet red velvet.  Since Ferdinand is a prince, rich chocolate frosting coats the top of the cake to symbolize his monetary wealth.  The silver wrapper represents the many tears he cried for the loss of his father in the storm and inevitable shipwreck.  The delicate white chocolate flowers on top illustrate his growing love for the exotic island.

It all began with a box of red velvet cupcake mix, because that seemed the best to me.  I had the help of my grandparents caregiver, and my friend, Brianna.  She bakes a lot, and gave me some helpful tips.  Instead of oil, we used butter to make the cake moist.  When I opened the box, the mix was brown.  I was, naturally, very confused.  Red Velvet cake should be true to its name, and be red right?  Brianna assured me that when we began to mix the cake, it would turn red.  That was a relief, I really hate chocolate cake!

  

I definitely made sure that the batter tasted just fine before we baked the cakes in the oven, and I might have tried the frosting (just to be sure that it was good!).  Next up where the "delicate white chocolate flowers" that I spoke about in my speech.  It definitely wasn't delicate trying to make them.  My mom had been experimenting Friday night when I wasn't home, and I'm positive that I wouldn't have been able to make them if she didn't.  I had done some research in a cooking book (given to me by my friend Maya) and decided that using Wilton's melting chocolate would be the best.  The best way to do this, was by using a lot of plastic spoons.  When I got home on Saturday, we immediately got to work with the white chocolate.  After dipping each spoon in the newly melted chocolate, we stuck them in the fridge and waited for the chocolate to harden.  After they did, we took them out and began attempting to peel the petals off of the spoons.  My mom explained to me that you had to bend the plastic so that the chocolate started to peel off, but not to break the spoon.  This sounded easy at first, but not as easy when shards of plastic were flying around the room at alarming rates.  You have never felt frustration, until you have tried this.  Some spoons worked perfectly well, and led me to believe that the next spoon wouldn't give me any trouble.  So I proceeded to break the spoon.  After many trials, complete flowers were finished.

Once we had set our our many tools of the trade, we decided that it was time to prepare the actual cupcakes.

The rich chocolate frosting was lovingly spread across the top of the cupcake, and my fingers (yummy). I had to be very gentle, or else the cake would lift up and leave gaping holes of red.  After the chocolate was spread as thick as we dared, the flowers were attached to the cupcake.  We attached the flowers by spreading a thin coat of chocolate on the bottom.  Then we squirted a perfectly textured dab of pink in the center of the Lilly, and then added yellow sprinkles.  The cupcake was complete!

Everyone in my family enjoyed them, including my grandparents.  I felt very touched by these comments because my grandpa doesn't ever eat cake.  My mom and dad shared one, and I had the last. It tasted perfect!  I loved the moist cake, and the chocolaty frosting!

I guess that all of that hard work payed off, because yesterday at school we heard the winners of the cupcake wars!  I was one of the winners in my class!  The other winner was my friend Maya.  I had so much fun, even though all the cupcakes were good!

Duffs Cake Mix and Sushi

All of my friends have been talking about Duffs, and posting endless streams of photos.  On more than one occasion, it had peaked my curiosity.  I did not expect, after getting in the car with my friend

Eliza and her mother Ellie, to be told that we were going to decorate our own cake.  

The bakery smelled like icing, sugar and candy.  We were handed a clipboard filled with options for the genetic makeup of our cake.  We had originally thought that we were going to make an Avengers themed cake, because that is our favorite movie.  After seeing what they had to offer, we realized that a cake with such a complicated theme would be extra hard to create.  So we were left to think about what we wanted.  Many ideas were thrown around, but none made us overly exited.  At that moment 

I was reminded of something that my godmother Lynn made, a giant piece of sushi with real fish.  She had referred to it as a sushi cake.  So, why couldn't we do that, but without the fish?

Eliza and Ellie loved my idea and we began plans for our cake.  It would be made up of vanilla cake, and the frosting would also be vanilla.  The outside would be built of white fondant.  Fondant is thick creamy sugar paste.  You may be thinking, sushi isn't white.  Ah, but the rice is!  Our amazing helper, who was extremely nice to us (let's call him Alex), cut large slices of black fondant and wrapped them around the sides so it began to resemble a sushi roll.

We were really getting into it, snatching pieces of fondant and sugar, then moving our newly clothed cake to our table.  We were each given another large piece of white fondant by Alex and we proceeded to learn how to stick fondant to fondant.  Fondant is an extremely sticky material to work with, especially when your hands are wet.  Soon, there was a circle of water on our cake, leaving a lopsided circle in the middle for fish.  After about a half hour the entire wet area was covered with over sized "rice" grains.  The fondant "rice" began to harden and we began working on the next area of the sushi.  The avocado and the salmon, only the most important parts!

I cut cubes out of my fondant and set them down on the table, wondering how I was going to get them orange.  Eliza had the same problem after cutting triangular slices of "avocado" out of her fondant.  Alex pointed us to the dye rack, the only part he forgot to point out were the gloves.  Only a minor detail right?  No.  I still look like Snooki gave my hands a terrible spray tan, and Eliza's hands have green spots.  But, back to the story!

 I grabbed the dye bottle labeled orange while Eliza picked up yellow and green.  I tried squeezing the orange, expecting it to come out like liquid, but it was actually colorful paste.  I did the only thing I could think of, smashing the fondant cubes between my hands until they turned as Orange as the bottle.  I also helped Eliza with mixing green and yellow, then molding them together.  I stuck the orange cubes to the clear circle with water and then went around each one with orange butter cream frosting.  To top off the salmon look, I sprinkled sparkly orange sugar on the icing to give them impression of salmon roe.  I know what you're thinking, I'm so full of good ideas, right?  Eliza did the same with the avocado, using green frosting.  

The cake looked heavenly, I didn't know whether to continue working on it or take a giant bite out of the side.  I obviously didn't do the latter.  Then we sprinkled the sides with brown granules of sugar that looked like sesame seeds.  Finally, we added some green grass peeking out from underneath as a garnish.  It turned out amazing, better than we ever could have hoped.  It was our baby!

I tried the cake with Eliza that night, it was so good!  I love how the vanilla cake compliments the sweetness of the butter cream and the fondant.  It might be the best cake I've ever had!  If you'd like to check out our cake on instagram go to @DuffsCakeMix and click on the picture of the sushi cake!  It has over 850 likes, last time I checked and over 33 comments!  I feel so accomplished.  Please go there, it is so fun!

Bye, 

See you soon,

The Watermelon Radish 

Wedding Soup

On Tuesday it was cold, and my dad decided that it would be a perfect time to try out a new soup recipe.  We all agreed that soup was a great choice for a day like this.  After school I went to tennis and got home about 7:30 PM.  It was very cold outside, the air smelled wet, like mist, and I thought that it might rain yet again, so I rushed inside our warm house. I slammed the door shut keeping the cold where it belonged.  I was immediately bombarded by the smell of chicken broth in the kitchen.  Rubbing my hands together in delight,  I followed my nose. There was a pot of broth, simmering on the stove and spitting with delight, the soup that was going to serve as our dinner.  I quickly rushed upstairs and changed into something cozy.  Just as I had plopped onto my bed to read Animal Farm in my fuzzy pink polka dot pajamas, my grandmother's voice came over the loud speaker.  She requested our presence, putting an emphasis on, "Come to dinner NOW!"  She only said, "Come down to the table Arthur (my grandfathers name)!" I sighed, how easily I was forgotten!  Even though I wasn't called downstairs, I hustled to the table and gave Grandpa his pills.  My parents were already downstairs with Brenda, marveling over the Italian Wedding Soup.  The soup had steaming broth with pieces of spinach and egg floating in it, and each person got some tasty meatballs.  In the meatballs there was, ground beef and pork with a pinch of salt, a sprinkling of pepper, a handful of mushrooms and a substantial amount of garlic.  We all sat down and sprinkled some parmesan cheese on the soup and dug in.  At the beginning it was very hot and I very nearly burnt my tongue, but it soon cooled down.  The meatballs had a light flavor and added a nice touch to the soup.  They were very mild, but were still hearty and satisfying.  The egg tasted just like the scrambled eggs I have in the mornings, and I liked them best.  There were also pieces of spinach that were soggy and chewy.  The broth itself was very flavorful and made from chicken stock, which was very noticeable.  I was told that there was also fennel, but I couldn't taste it!

That's all for tonight!
Watermelon Radish  

Sweet Chop

Today my friend HK came over to talk about the Science Fair. We came up with some really interesting topic ideas, we just have to get our teacher to approve them. When we were done with Science we tried to figure out what next to do. We wanted to go on the computer, but we did that a lot the day before, so we were stumped! We thought for what seemed like forever, and then it came to us! We would open up a fake smoothie shop in the kitchen called The Sweet Chop, because the smoothies will be sweet and we chop stuff up to put in them. Down the stairs we ran, my mom agreed to let us do it, IF only we didn't waste food! We decided to make a brochure/recipe book for our future smoothie shop. The first and foremost thing we had to do was take out the blender and plug. It would be really sad if we got everything ready and forgot to plug it in. Our first smoothie would be called, 'The Desert Smoothie". We both knew that raspberries went really well with chocolate so we based this recipe off of that fact. First we placed 9 frozen strawberries into the blender, followed by a few chunks of frozen raspberries. We also added 3 spoon fulls of marshmallow sauce, for flavor, and I can't say we didn't taste some (just to make sure it was OK). Then we searched high and low for the chocolate sauce, but it was nowhere and we were kind of impatient, so we settled for the next best thing. A packet of cocoa powder that my grandmother uses to make hot chocolate. We put this all in the blender and started it but it wasn't blending, and we searched for the solution. Then we realized that we needed some sort of liquid to break it down, so we added 1/4 of the gallon of milk. Or something like that. Then we blended it and it turned a muted pink color with white swirling around at the bottom. We were eager to try it so we left some small pieces of frozen raspberries in the blender. To make it look good we put a swirl of whipped cream on the top, with a real raspberries for a garnish, not to mention the caramel sauce. It tasted like a raspberries with a tiny tinge of chocolate that you would get once in a while. It was super sweet, and it was hard to drink all of, but we managed. Then we decided to make another one, I mean whats a smoothie shop without more than one smoothie? NOTHING!

This one was called "Healthier Than The Last One Smoothie". But I'm not sure the title was accurate. This one was a mixture of mango and bananas, witha little whipped cream. And a little too much orange juice! I Didn't exactly like it, but my mom did , and that's all that mattered.

The next one was our best by far, and if you can then make it yourself! We called it, "The Blizzard". The exact recipe was:

2 milk chocolate oreos, 1/8 gallon of milk ( We think), 5 peppermint chocolates, and as much marshamllow sauce as you want! It was the best, all I can say is, "It tastes like the holidays!"

Makign smoothies is a reall blast, try it sometime

The Watermelon Radish

Boba Before Tennis

After volley ball practice on Tuesday last week, my friend Maya and I made plans to go to the Tea Forest for drinks.  The Tea Forest now has a new name and a big Gelato counter, but it will always be the Tea Forest to me.  When I arrived Maya and her mom were already in line, ordering Boba.  Some of you may think that I'm crazy, but I've never tried Boba before in my entire existence on this planet.  I decided to try it, if so many people liked it then could it be too bad?  Maya and I sat down at one of the small wooden tables, the ones who make a lot of noise on the hard concrete floor, with our Jasmine Milk Tea Boba's.  Maya started drinking without hesitation, and after slurping on the straw for a couple of seconds the small black tapioca balls started to emerge.

Without any further adieu I tried the fragrant jasmine tea.  It was eye crossing sweet and while you were drinking it you could smell it in your nostrils.  It wasn't long before I saw one of the tapioca balls, it was stuck on the top of my straw.

                                               

I soon found out that the Boba tasted exactly like the mochi that you get at a frozen yogurt shop.  The tea was way to sweet for me, and I could only drink a little bit.  The boba were chewy and you had to  chew them about twenty times to be able to swallow! OK, not twenty, but a lot.  That was my eventful Tea Forest escapade before tennis, but I do have one more small piece of information to share.  

We are hatching sea monkey eggs in science. In our control beaker we put 1000 ML of water and 5 ML of salt.  In our "Whatever we want" beaker we put 1000 ML of water and 38.5 ML of salt. We're talking Dead Sea salt here! In each beaker we put one scoop of sea monkey eggs, and ours did the strangest thing.  In the super salty container all of the eggs clumped together and rose up towards the surface.  Our teacher said that my group put more salt in our experiment than any group before us!  Because we are just cool like that.  We named the super salty ones, which we are pretty sure will shrivel up and die by Monday, Fred.  We named the somewhat normal eggs Mason, and we are pretty sure Mason will hatch,  because Mason is behaving and staying on the bottom like he is supposed to.  More from my Sea Monkey experiment in the next post!

That's all folks!

-Watermelon Radish

I scream, You scream, We all scream for HOMEADE ice cream

When my parents took their long trip to Spain I was left in the hands of my grandparents, Brenda, my good friends Nikki and Jennifer, and my friends families.  When Nikki was there to greet me after a long and grueling three days at "WOLF Camp"  I was so happy I could have died(which I was on the verge of doing anyway).  To make up for all the hiking and mosquito's we had two days of laying around and having fun.  Nikki brought her Vita Mix juicer so that we could have homemade smoothies and her low fat ice cream.  I think we only left the house one time, and that was to eat at CPK and then get dinner for everyone.  Some nights we made ice cream with little else than frozen walnuts, frozen bananas and whatever frozen fruit we wanted.  It doesn't look like the sugary stuff that the tycoons advertise on TV, but it sure is good.  It's very creamy and fruity, you can't taste the walnuts at all!  I recommend strawberry and pineapple.  While eating the ice cream we watched 'Tangled' the super funny Rapunzel story, 'The Princess and the Frog' a new take on the Frog Prince, and the Turtle-Man.  Please comment if you have seen the Turtle-Man, he is the whackiest guy on Animal Planet, he has a strange team, no teeth and he dives for turtles.  I think he is hilarious.  The fun weekend with Nikki had to end on Monday, my first day of school, as I was taken against my will, to school.  After school I was on the road again, moving in with another family.  While at my friends houses I had some  great home cooking.

When at the Gubernick's house, whom I have mentioned before, I had a number of terrific meals.  My favorite was a tofu stir fry with sticky rice, the tofu was soft and marinated in a sweet sauce, and the rice was nice and....sticky.  There were some vegetables like asparagus, that added a nice crunch to the meal.

At the Vizard's house, who I'm sure I've also mentioned, I had a light salad with Dijon mustard vinaigrette and pizza.  The vinaigrette was pungent, and tasted like a combination of mustard and lemons, a perfect idea!  The pizza was exactly what I was craving that day, and I talked animatedly over dinner.

After my first week at school I came home to my grandparents, Brenda, Stella (my dog), Cruella (my rabbit) and Jennifer.  I was overjoyed to see Jennifer.  That night we went out to Asahi Ramen on Sawtelle.  As we scored a table and sat down we were giggling like we hadn't seen each other in a long time.  But truthfully, I see her a lot while she is reading to my grandpa.  The first items to arrive were our pickles, now you must understand that these are no ordinary pickles, they are soaked in sesame sauce and a pinch of hot sauce.  So after we tried, unsuccessfully, to eat them slowly, we ordered another plate for each of us.  Then, using my sweet voice, I ordered a platter of noodles with pork and bean sprouts.  Jennifer specified a half order of fried rice and tofu.  The noodles were decadent and the bean sprouts were crunchy.  There was some sort of spice on the top, like curry or cumin.  The only problem was that after a while the pork and pork sauce on top was very rich.  The "Half Order" of rice didn't seem like a half order to me, or to Jennifer.  But combined efforts conquered the rice.  It tasted like any other fried rice.  Jennifer also had some of my noodles, but not the pieces with pork.  The tofu from the rice dish was soon soaking in soy sauce in its bowl while we half laughed half ate.  I made sure that Jennifer had chewed and swallowed whatever she had been eating before I told her a funny joke.  After our dinner we made a quick cupcake stop to Magnolia Bakery to have a late night birthday celebration for Brenda.  We had planned on beating Brenda and the grandparents home but we were a little bit later than we thought.  We arrived at the house and set out our homemade card and one chocolate cupcake with a sign and candle (not lit) in it.  As Jennifer turned off the lights I ran upstairs to get Brenda.  And once we had sung "Happy Birthday" we each had a very yummy butter cream cupcake.

         After drinking three glasses of milk to help with the rich and silky frosting, I went to bed.

The next morning, it was time to make HOMEMADE ICE CREAM!  One of the bonuses, even though making ice cream is the big bonus, was that it was going to be strawberry flavored.  So at about 8:00 in the morning Jennifer and I followed Brenda into the kitchen to get her ice cream maker.  Once she left us with little else than the ingredient book and some yummy items, Jennifer and I started to add them to a big metal bowl.

First we added some half and half cream, almost the whole carton, and then mixed it with vanilla.  I am, "BLUSHES" very good at whisking, so the mix was fluffy and blended nicely after only a few minutes.

While the ice cream sat in the freezer,  Jennifer and I went off to play tennis.  Jennifer and I almost died from the heat while playing, but we rewarded ourselves with a nice 'frosty' shaved ice.
While we were gone Brenda added the strawberries to our ice cream and then all we had to do was blend them together and put the bowl back in the freezer.  We were looking forward to a great dessert after dinner!

 Dinner was a long time away, and that didn't help.  But once dinner arrived we ate politely, but what we ate isn't important, this post IS about HOME MADE ICE CREAM (just read the title).  Once dinner was over we tried the pretty pink frozen cream.  It WAS good!!  The frozen berries were very sour, but the sweet creamy ice cream balanced the two flavors.  The ice cream was so yummy that I just had to have two scoops, which I did.

Finally, we sat down to watch The Incredibles and Lemony Snicket's: A Series Of Unfortunate Events.  The Incredibles was way better.

-Watermelon Radish

                           

Over the Summer

Hello friends, followers, and readers!

I know that most of you were sad, like me, to say goodbye to summer and hello to a long year of work, school, etc.  This particular summer is one of the best summers I've ever had!  One thing I've noticed over the past few months is that I have grown a lot!  It must be because of all the good food I've been eating.  During the summer a lot of my meals were spent eating outside, and with summery foods like chilled soup and light salads.  I spent many a day with friends on the beach, swimming in pools and oceans, and sleeping late.  I ate at many a good restaurant like Monsieur Marcell, Shu, Asahi Ramen, and Mulberry Pizza.  A note on Mulberry: try the white with spinach, it is delectable!  The spinach compliments the creamy cheese, and it is a pizza that can be eaten cold or hot.  I hope that everyone enjoyed their summers, and this post is a formal, "I'm back and ready to blog!"

Plan Checked!

Last night I had a sleepover with my good friend Eliza after tennis camp.  Once she arrived we hung out until my dad got home and we could go to dinner.  We ate at a restaurant on Sawtelle called Plan Check.  Eliza's parents told us about Plan Check and we decided to try it.  It was super crowded, but we managed to score a table outside next to the door.  The only downside to this table is that the door next to it was opened constantly when people came outside.  Our party decided to look at this positively, and gazed down at our menus.  The menus were slipped onto clip boards, and did not have too many choices.  Soon our waiter Adrian G. came outside, opening the annoying door, and helped us through our confusion about the menu.  We learned that 'ketchup leather' was ketchup that was hardened into a fruit roll up and placed on the bun.  Once the ketchup leather was exposed to the heat of the patty it would slowly melt.  I knew immediately that I wanted to try that!  Then Adrian told us about the two types of bacon and cheese, the pig candy and the specials on the menu.  Eliza and I knew what we wanted, so we moved on to the back and looked at the non-alcoholic beverages.  There was homemade soda, but since Eliza didn't like soda I didn't want to get it.  She soon convinced me, and I said I would get a glass IF she promised to try it.  There were many different house made sodas, cream soda, tangerine, lemonade and yuzu.  This last one surprised me, I love yuzu sauce on my sushi, but in a soda?  I decided to be adventurous so I went for the yuzu soda.  My parents ordered a couple of appetizers.  My soda came first, it looked just like the sparkling Lemonada that I drank on the Italian Riviera.  As promised, Eliza took a sip and loved it.  I don't know how to describe the soda, if anyone has ever had yuzu sauce on their sushi they will know the taste.  A yuzu is a Japanese lemon that grows on trees, it tastes almost exactly like a lemon except it has a sour and a saucier taste.  If you ever want to know what it tastes like, then go to Plan Check or a sushi bar!  Soon Eliza ordered her own soda just as the appetizers came.

There were cucumbers, dill pickles, a spicy cucumber, bread and butter pickles, pickled egg, jalapeno escabeche, and chorizo.  My parents tried some of each, Eliza had bread and butter pickles, dill, and a pickled egg.  I tried everything except for the jalapeno escabeche.  The dill pickles were what you might expect from a deli, dill pickles are only dill pickles.  The spicy cucumbers were definitely not spicy, or at least not to me.  There was a tiny kick, a measly bite, but the full extent of the flavor I picked up was that of sesame oil.  I was hoping that the bread and butter pickles would be more like Vlasic bread and butter pickles, I can eat those right out of the jar.  These pickles weren't as heavy on sauce, and weren't as soft, but they had a nice crunch and they were a light start to the evening.  Finally I tried the chorizo sausage.  Whenever I hear the word chorizo I think of my mom, she never likes them.  But these were different because the meaty sausage part was chewy and just a little hot.  I liked these sausages immediately until I bit into a rather crunchy bit in the middle, and I couldn't figure out if it was fat or garlic.  During this sensation of appetizer tastes we ordered our main courses.

My mom and dad have not eaten any red meat for over three months, so this was their big treat as they ordered a blue cheese burger and a chefs special.  They turned their noses up at Eliza and I, Eliza ordering a Plan Check Burger with just cheese and ketchup leather.  I stuck with a Plan Check burger and their "special" cheese which is a combination of cheddar, garlic, fish sauce and parmesan.  Just as we finished enjoying the appetizers my father decided to order some beer nuts.  The moment he ordered these nuts out burgers came in pretty black skillets.  With our order of sweet potato waffle fries there was some peach ketchup and with our regular fries there was ketchup that tasted like liquid gazpacho.

I tried every burger except for Eliza's.  My burger looked great, and I tried a piece of the ketchup leather alone.  As Alice said, "Curiouser and Curiouser!"  It tasted just like ketchup but looked like a fruit by the foot roll-up!  After sampling the outlandish leather I picked up my medium rare burger, which was cooked to perfection.  I was about to take a large bite when I picked up the scent of truffles.  My mind kept hopping around saying, Truffles?  Truffles!  The menu never said ANYTHING about truffles!  I could have been allergic to truffles and then die because I didn't know that they were in the burger.  I quickly brought this to the attention of my parents and Eliza, but my dad insisted that there weren't any truffles in the burger.  Though my truffle radar kept beeping I took a bite of the luscious burger.  The truffle taste was gone, and the juicy meat and rich cheese filled my mouth.

While I was mixed up in my flavor mix, Eliza had some of her, "Medium rare, but on the rarer side" burger.  She said that it was great, and continued to munch happily.

My mom's Chefs Special burger reminded me of a breakfast muffin and it tasted like a gourmet one too.  It had an over easy egg and bacon.

My dad's, the Blue Burger was loaded down with bacon and........you got it!  Blue Cheese.  It had an overwhelming aroma, and a taste that was even more so.  When you bit into it you thought, "WOW!  Blue cheese!  But whats that crunchy stuff, maybe bacon but I don't know."  Maybe my dad didn't think that, but I sure did.

After the meal was through and we were all stuffed it was time for dessert.  For months Eliza and I have had our eyes set on a small place near Plan Check called Brian Shave Ice.  We wanted to go there, and we wouldn't take no for an answer.  My mom was craving something chocolate, so she ordered the rocky road ice cream bar.  She seemed to like it except for the toasted almonds coating the outside.  When I had a small bite I decided that there was too much chocolate and not enough marshmallow.  We all agreed.

After we payed we walked along the streets heading for Brian Shave Ice.  There were so many flavors, fillers, toppings and more!  Eliza knew exactly what she wanted, mango, strawberry, blue raspberry, filled with vanilla ice cream, and condensed milk on top.  I didn't try hers, but she gets it every time she goes there so it must be good!

I tried green apple, strawberry, watermelon, filled with vanilla ice cream, and then condensed milk on top.  The watermelon part was light and refreshing, the green apple was sour and sweet, the strawberry was very yummy and sugary.  The 'snow cap' (condensed milk) wasn't very good at all, it tasted sour (not in a good way) and way to sweet!

After that we drove home, and Eliza and I went upstairs to watch an instant movie on Netflix.  We knew we could watch The Addams Family movie, my favorite movie.  And I almost screamed when I saw that Netflix had taken it off the instant list.  The sheer nerve of those people, I mean how could they take away MY favorite movie?  I mean really!!!!!!!!!!
After watching some Americas Funniest Home Videos episodes we went to sleep.

The Watermelon Radish

Dinner with Friends

A few nights ago my family packed our wine and cheese in a bag and drove over to our friends Jeff, Julia, Paige and Sidney's house for dinner.  The adults spent the first part of the evening conversing, while the kids played fun games like laser tag and hide and seek.  A normal game of hide and seek soon turned into tag, unbeknownst to the seeker.  We played that for a while, waiting for dinner to be ready.  My mom and Julia worked in the kitchen, so we had to avoid that room.  The moms made chicken picatta.  They pounded chicken, dredged it in flour then dipped it in egg.  They finished the chicken with panko/bread crumbs. Heating the pan with hot oil came next, then cooking both sides of the chicken while adding more oil.  At the same time Julia cooked some risotto, so both of them were flipping like crazy.  The dads sat in the living room and finished off the cheese that we brought for an aperitif.  They were oblivious to the three girls running through the room being followed by Andy, their small dog with a big bark.  I caught only snatches of their conversation about wine, cheese, vineyards and all the usual dad topics.  Soon, dinner was ready and we all gathered in the kitchen to load our plates.  The chicken was a masterpiece, it was now cooled and sprinkled with a sweet and sour lemon sauce.  You could still taste the clean white meat, and the bread crumbs gave it a nice crunch.  The risotto had miraculously been compacted into risotto cakes!  The were warm and gooey, due to the wonderful cheese that had been placed in the center.  I love green beans so I put some on my plate.  The only time I've seen white green beans is when I went to their house.  The fresh green beans were sugary and split in your mouth. There were also baked cherry and heirloom tomatoes.  They were warm and filled with warm juice.

Then came dessert time, I found out that Paige, a third grader,  had made the entire dessert herself!  She made the  fragrant raspberry sauce, the velvety brownies, but not the ice cold vanilla ice cream.  The brownies were chocolaty and warm, the raspberry sauce made them taste sour and sweet.  The ice cream, which I ate separately because I'm weird that way, was also very good.  It was all amazing.  

And it is always a treat to have
1. Dinner with friends (that have kids, especially if they are my great friends)
2. If the dinner is also super good too!
3.  If I can post it on my blog!

Kudos to the G family!!

Watermelon Radish

YojiSan

Kon'nichiwa everybody!
I am speaking a traditional Japanese greeting, and, even though I do not know much about the Japanese language, I do know about the food.  One of my favorite species of foods is the silent and spicy creature called Sushi.  YojiSan Sushi a great new restaurant from the restaurant group Drago.  My parents and I go to another sushi restaurant called Shu, and the same main chef there now has his own restaurant.  We thought that we should come by and visit him at his new place.  The architecture was very different from the dark and relaxing interior of Shu, it was filled with light and a bright red light adorned the center of the room.  We sat at the bar, and waved at Yoji.  My parents trust Yoji completely and wanted to do Omakase, as they always do, even though I never do it.  Today, I decided to be daring and agreed to Omakase as long as there were NO truffles included.  That was one of the best decisions I have ever made in my short life span.  Here is a picture of Yoji holding my business card.

Soon, he whipped up the first course of many.  This was a scallop inside its shell with pears, avocado and tomato.  Underneath the shell was a bed of blue salt, that, after a taste and a few questions I discovered that is was not edible.  On to the good part!  I have never tried scallop before, because I did not like the look of it.  I did not even INTEND to eat scallop, I didn't know it was on the plate, I thought it was only fresh veggies.  I soon found out that the chewy stuff that melted in your mouth like butter, that was only a tiny bit salty was scallop.  It was one of the best types of fish I had ever tasted and with the vegetables it tasted crunchy and groovy with many different flavors.

The next course was albacore, wrapped around watercress with sesame seeds.  The sauce was like a ponzu-yuzu mix.  The toasted almonds on the side gave the fish a crunchy and burnt taste.  My preference would be to not have the almonds, but they were soon drowned out by the delicate fish.  The dish tasted deliciously sour and the fish made it chewy and sometimes you got a little bit of fish taste.  The watercress was crunchy and crackled when you chomped down on it.

Next was a plate of three sushi tacos!  The first was filled with pieces of juicy Kobe beef and avocado, the taco tasted sweet and savory, the sweet sauce that the beef was soaked in made it taste candied and the avocado made it taste cool, cold cool.  The second was cod with jalapeno and cucumber, it tasted gushy and spicy when the jalapeno hit my tongue.  I was fried, literally, but not fried enough not to eat my favorite of the three.  SPICY TUNA AVOCADO!  The spicy tuna was stuck together, the way I like it, and the avocado was also mooshy.  The overall affect was moosh, and that was yummy!

Here comes my FAVORITE!!!!!  It was crab tempura, fried, with a sweet lemon sauce and crunchy cucumber base.  The crab tasted crunchy, fried, and sweet on the outside, but on the inside there was a fleshy sweetness too.  The lemony sweet sauce complimented the fish completely.  I basically liked it because it was sweet.

The last course was uni, sea urchin, which I have never eaten or ever want to eat.  My mother convinced me to force it down my throat.  It tasted like the sea, and it made me feel sick.

Lastly was dessert, this was my favorite.  Think about it....
warm dough on the outside and cold ice cream on the inside.

MOCHI MOCHI MOCHI MOCHI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bringing Up Bunny

Hi everyone,

I have added a new pet to our family, a bunny.  She was my science project, and I decided to keep her,  my partner and I named her Cruella.  For those of you who might not know, rabbits do what they do best, pee and poop.  So, after some research, I decided to give her a bath.  Those of you who are reading and have your mouths hanging open and are quite confused and wondering "who would wash a bunny?" please close your mouths and listen.  First, I took apart her travel case and placed it in front of her hutch.  Then got the hose and dribbled a little bit of water into it, only up to her feet.  I strategically opened the door and grabbed her.  She clawed and made strange snuffling noises and tried to get back into the comfort of her bed.  Once she calmed down I put her into the water and washed her feet.  I had only intended to get her feet wet but I actually got her entire body wet, so I got a bottle of our dog's shampoo and cleaned her fur too. 

                                   

This was very cute and she seemed to like it.  After that I put her on top of her house and plugged in a mini hairdryer.  When I turned it on, she freaked out and bit my finger. Biting my finger is a habit she has whenever she is about to start licking it.  And yes, close your mouths again, bunnies do enjoy licking people. Holding her tightly, she allowed me to turn her into a puffball of white fur. She looked like a million dollars.

                                        

For any of you out there who need me hairdressing services, please comment on my blog.   After giving her a bath, I had many scratches and a big case of C.O.  C.O. is cuteness overload, and I had to lie down.

  But, I didn't lie down for long because the voice page rang through the house, "Dinner is served. Come to the table. Can you hear me?" and from the background, "Hang up mom, hit the red button."  Grandma said, "What red button?" And the rest was cut off, but I raced into the kitchen, to be greeted by a delectable smell.

Dad ushered me to my seat and placed a steaming plate of Dover sole, and risotto in front of me.  I cut a small slice, I'm quite neurotic about the possibility of bones, and took a bite.  Thankfully, no bones.  The light and meaty flesh of the fish was complimented by the olive oil and lemon-parsley sauce.  Overall it tasted great and there were enthusiastic "mmmmms" from around the table.  The risotto was infused with Parmesan Saffron, and tasted creamy and fresh.  The Caesar salad dressing was a little thin, but nothing can't be fixed by adding dark green romain lettuce.  Everyone likes the light green lettuce but I enjoy the darker green leaves.  Finally, best for last, there were baby artichokes, grilled to perfection by my grandma!  No kidding, my dad.

That's all everyone!

Bye bye!

Watermelon Radish