How to throw a sushi party

During the Australia Day holiday, we invited Paul's sister and her family and had a sushi party. It's a great way to celebrate our multi-cultural country :-)

Over the last ten years in my life in Australia, I noticed that many Aussies worry about handling raw fish. Of course you should be careful about it, but you don't have to be scared!

Go to a fish shop on the day you're serving. They sometimes have sashimi pre-cut in a pack. If they don't, just ask them if they have sashimi-grade fish. A fish shop won't want to risk food safety, so they should answer honestly.

When you get home, keep the fish refrigerated until you serve. If you find it hard to cut soft raw fish, put it in the freezer for a couple of hours and it will make it easier to cut.

We got salmon sashimi from a fish shop in Chadstone shopping centre this time. Also they had a whole sashimi grade king fish, so we asked them to cut it for us.

Paul's sister has a teen-age girl and I wasn't sure if she liked raw fish, so I prepared other options - teriyaki chicken and tuna mayo.

Prepare nori and sushi rice. You can get sushi seasoning from a local supermarket usually. You cut nori into four pieces so that your guests can make their own sushi rolls in their hand.

I usually prepare heaps of cucumber for garnish. This time I prepared some lettuce for tuna mayo too.

For the two toddlers, I made teriyaki chicken rice.

Everyone enjoyed my sushi party except for little kids. They were distracted too much ;-) but they had a great time too.

I hope you feel more encouraged to have a sushi party now!


With love,
Allie

These are my new favourites!

I have a set of beautiful Gense cutlery which I bought years ago. They look so stylish on my table and always make me happy. But I didn’t have chopsticks that I could love as much as my cutlery. We use chopsticks at our dinner table almost 5 or 6 days a week -except for the times we have steak or pasta!

Whenever I go back to Japan, I looked for chopsticks, but I couldn’t find simple, stylish chopsticks that I could match with my favourite Marimekko/Bison bowls and plates.

When I saw these Japanese traditional colour chopsticks on my favourite Japanese online shop, I was so excited! These are what I've been looking for for a long time.

I found the company that makes these beautiful chopticks and asked if nuno and stitch could be their stockist and they were very happy to have stockist in Australia;-)

This company is based in Obama City, Fukui which is famous for Wakasa lacquered chopsticks. 80% of lacquered chopsticks in Japan are made in this city. Traditionally made lacquered chopsticks are not that easy to handle…you can’t use them in the dishwasher, you can’t leave them in the sink for long , you have to avoid sunlight, heat, moisture… BUT if you look after these chopsticks well, you can use them for a long time. It’s like when you have to look after your silverware carefully.

I wonder if Australian people are interested in beautiful chopsticks...but I hope so! As far as I know, Aussies love cooking Asian food and love entertaining people. They are really good at using chopsticks too! You can get cheap chopsticks from supermarkets, but they don’t look nice at all. Disposable chopsticks are terrible for the environment.

We will have these traditional yet modern Japanese chopsticks in 12 colours at the Japanese Summer Festival at Federation Square on Feb 26th.

They will be sold online after this festival. Come and feel these traditional lacquered chopsticks. I hope you will love them!  

Handy Japanese baby goods!

I think Japanese people are the "laziest hard working" people. They love something handy, so to make things easier, they try their best to make something convenient. Whenever I go to Japan, I check the local pharmacy's baby section to see what's available there and end up buying heaps of handy baby goods.  When I read a Japanese person's blog and found that she's starting a Japanese baby goods online shop in Australia, I thought it was a great idea. As far as I know, Australian people are sometimes a bit lazy too, so they should love these handy Japanese goods!

photo from "Little Snook" This 360 degree tooth brush looks amazing!

Then one day, I got a message from the online shop owner. When you get message from your favourite blogger, it's like you're getting message from a celebrity! It was a lovely surprise. I know how hard it is to start up business in a foreign country, especially when you're a mum with small kids. She has 16 mo boy and works a couple of days a week too. We decided to meet up and exchange some information while our kids made friends.

I wanted to ask her a lot about her interesting products but we ended up chatting about all sorts of different things. I always liked her Japanese blog because her writing was always positive. It is really nice to see someone with good vibes. It was a shame that I had to admit I was a bit lazy with my business, using Nico as my excuse, but I got good energy from her, so I will try my best again ;-)

Are you interested in Japanese handy baby goods? Check her online shop "Little Snook".  If you like her products, please share this with your friends! Word of mouth is really important for new small businesses. I hope her new shop will be loved by many Australian people for a long time!

With love,
Allie

Kids-friendly Japan Trip- Mount Takao

If you're visiting just Tokyo and still want to enjoy beautiful Japanese nature, Mt Takao is where you should visit. It's only about 40mins by train from central Tokyo. You don't need any hiking gear, you can even go there with a toddler in a stroller (if you wish, with baby in a pram too!)

Can you find Paul in this photo?

This is where I used to go with my kinder and school for excursions. A cable car will take you to the halfway point of the mountain, where you can enjoy some attractions, a monkey park, a botanical garden, lookout and Yakuoin Temple. From there, you can walk up to the summit, but you can also stop there and go back. Of course you can climb the mountain from the bottom too-you'd better prepare proper clothes and shoes for this though. There are many routes to go up to the summit and you can choose which one depending on your hiking experience. It's a mountain that even school kids can climb so I'd say it's a"kids-friendly" place.

Since it got three stars in the Michelin guide book, it became really popular for international tourists. My mum told us that we would have to wait for a cable car for long time especially in autum leaves season..

But the day we went was quite foggy and had light showers, (well the forecast was fine!) so there were not many tourists and no long queues for the cable car. The only thing we got disappointed was that we couldn't see the view from the mountain (you can usually see the city) but we really enjoyed the fresh air in the rain.

We had rice cakes near the monkey park and it was really yummy!

Nico really enjoyed seeing many monkeys.

Lovely walk in light rain.

At Yakuoin temple

We didn't go to the summit so it took us only about two hours to go up and come back. We had Italian lunch near the train station.

Hopefully we can go there again when the weather is better next time. We're looking forward to climbing the mountain with Nico too when he gets 5 or 6:-)


with love,

Allie

Kids-friendly Japan Trip - Kodomo no kuni (Kids world)

I can't recommend this place enough. Nico, my parents, Paul and I really enjoyed this theme park called Kodomo no kuni. But it's not like Disney Land where you have to spend heaps of money for the entry, food and souvenirs. This park was founded in commemoration of the Royal Marriage of Prince Akihito and Princess Michiko (the present Emperor) and focused on developing kids' sound mind and body.

They don't have a big roller coaster but they have a 110m-roller slide!

My favourite American-Japanese artist Isamu Noguchi was involved in the project of making this park and they have his "Octetra" and a special slide he designed too!

You can enjoy nature walk in this 250 acre park but they also have little trains going around the park. You can rent a bike too.

Mini steam locomotive

Farm (they are making soft serve there!)

Lots of play equipment

Lunch time..

I went to this place many times with my school and I still remember I had lots of fun there, but didn't realize that it's such a great and special place until I became an adult and went back there with my own kid.

It's not easy access from central Tokyo but I'm sure your kids will love this place! 

Kodomo no kuni

Website: http://www.kodomonokuni.org/english/
Open hours    9:30-16:30
Closed on Wednesday (NYE and New Year's Day)
Entry fee: Adults 600yen
                 School kids 200yen
                 0-2yo Free!

Kids-friendly Japan trip- Rainy day activities

(My Japan trip report is still going..I will try to finish it quickly but please be patient! )

This trip was focused on my parents, so I didn't really tell many of my friends that we were coming, but we couldn't miss a chance to catch up with my close friend Yuri. I did some research for the places where kids can enjoy themselves and picked this place called "Asobono".  It's an indoor play centre. The day we caught up was raining hard so it was good that we picked an indoor place to meet. However, because of the weather, Asobono was super busy with many kids and families. It was a weekday but we had to wait about 30mins to get in and we also couldn't get an all-day ticket, which was cheaper. (When it's busy, they limit the number of all day tickets to sell). 

many kids and parents

where is Nico?

They had many sections which we could enjoy - a huge ball pool, toy trains, wooden toys, kitchen toys and so on. Except for the ball pool section, it was a bit like bigger version of someone's home, where kids can play with toys that aren't theirs, so I wasn't quite sure if it's worth paying and waiting to get in this play centre. 

love father and son time;-)

this is Nico's favourite type of toy

little kids friendly space

If you're visiting from overseas though, it might be interesting to see Japanese toys. Especially their "pla rail' (plastic train set) collection, which was massive! The good thing is that both of Yuri's kids and Nico enjoyed it so much that they didn't want to leave. 

pla rail

For me, it was really really nice to see Nico and Yuri's kids were playing together and laughing together. When we were studying at uni together, I didn't really imagine this would happen. I'm also happy that our friendship has been lasting so long, even though we're in different countries.

Yuri and Me and kids

After the play centre, we went to a cafe which was specializing Japanese sweets. 

They became friends!

Match crepe cake!

It wasn't easy for us to walk in the heavy rain with kids from the station to the play centre (it was only about 150m) and the centre to the cafe (which was about 50m), but we had a really lovely day. Of course Nico slept in the train all the way back home:-) 


with love
Allie

Kids-friendly Japan Trip - Hakone trip 1 Ryokan

When we planned this Japan trip, we thought we wanted to go on a little trip. A "little trip during your trip" might sound strange, but it's like visiting Phillip Island while you're visiting Melbourne.

 For people living in Tokyo, the easiest one night trip option is always Hakone. Hakone is in Kanagawa prefecture, which is south of Tokyo prefecture. From central Tokyo, there are express trains called "Romance Cars" to take you there and just within an hour, you get to a place where you can enjoy all the lovely mountains, rivers, a big lake with Mt Fuji view and soothing onsen (hot springs) .

view from our ryokan

 My dad wanted to go there with us, so my mum and I did a lot of research for ryokan (Japanese style hotel). We didn't want to spend too much money but wanted somewhere that offered good food and a kid-friendly environment. Ryokans usually offer two meals - dinner and breakfast - so when you choose a hotel with good rooms but bad food, it affects your whole trip! After some research, we booked "Aura Tachibana". They have two types of rooms, western style room with a bed and Japanese style room with Tatami mat and futon - we booked the Japanese style rooms which were much cheaper.

 Usually in a Japanese style room, they keep futon in a cupboard, so kids can run around in a big space. The only thing you need to be careful with kids is shouji and fusuma - washi paper screen sliding doors. But even if your kids accidentally run into them and tear them, it doesn't cost much for hotels to fix them (because they are paper! ) and also harmless for your kids compared with glass doors.

While you're having dinner in a common dining room (some ryokans let you have dinner in your room), staff come to your room and put your futon out, ready for you to sleep. With a futon, we didn't have to worry about Nico falling from a bed!

 Aura Tachibana was in Hakone Yumoto where the Romance cars arrive. It's a bit busier than other parts of Hakone, but the volcano around Mt Fuji has become more active from last year and some parts are closed for tourists, so my dad wanted to stay somewhere easy to evacuate in case of emergency. It's 15 mins walk from the station, but they'll come to pick you up from the station by a little bus.

we walked around the ryokan and fond a nice temple

 They had a lovely lounge where you can read cool books and magazines and have coffee/alcohol. With Nico, we couldn't really use that place, but they also have a lovely balcony space, so we took Nico there.

 We went there on a weekday, so there weren't that many guests. When we went to their public hot spring bath after dinner, no one was there in both ladies bath and gentleman's bath (well Paul told me about gentleman's bath ) so we enjoyed a huge bath just by ourselves. Paul worried that he might have had to have a bath with my dad, but my dad went to the bath before dinner, so it was ok;-)

Dinner and breakfast were very lovely. Dinner was course-style and took a while so Nico got bored (his meal came soon but he had to wait for us) so one of us had to take him out to a balcony and play with him in turns, but it was good that there was a space for that.

common dining area

lovely dinner- wagyu beef!!

we liked all the presentation
 

breakfast

Some people go to the bath in the morning too to make the most of it - a trip to Hakone usually has the whole of relaxing in the hot springs, but Paul and I chose to relax in our room. Our stay at the ryokan was really great and even with a busy little boy we could have a relaxing time. Japan trips with kids wouldn't be easy, but if you want to have some relaxing time, I do recommend this little Hakone trip.

Paul having a relaxing time

 Next time I will write about what we did in Hakone.

With love,
Allie