random questions

Posted on November 13, 2007 by mariko

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I am supposed to be researching virtual office products but haven’t had much luck. Has anyone out there tried any? Have any suggestions? What we are looking for is a complete solutions package that will provide video and audio conferencing, a virtual whiteboard for sharing information, chat capabilities, file sharing, and, if possible, voip services (we want a general phone line with extensions) and e-mail addresses. Anyone?
Also, a lucky friend is going to Buenos Aires over the holidays. She wants to visit the “yarn district” but can’t find any information about it. Anyone know where this elusive yarn district is?
Finally, I am currently obsessed with smart phones, for some reason. It’s not like I ever leave the house, so I don’t really need one, but a girl can dream. We have T-Mobile, so I have been looking at the Blackberry Pearl, the Blackberry Curve, and the T-Mobile Dash. Any opinions or thoughts on these crazy gadgets?
Thanks!

Posted in General | 16 Comments

bending the rules

Posted on November 12, 2007 by mariko

I’ve been back not yet a week now, and while I did not suffer from any jetlag, I am suffering from my usual time management issues. The weather has turned pretty icky, so I don’t much feel like doing anything (like running. Uh oh). Anyway, you have all by now read about Amy‘s splendid book signing for her equally splendid book, Bend the Rules Sewing.

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The book signing was held at local fabric shop Bolt, and it was packed. My primary concern was that I had arrived too late for donuts, but as luck would have it, there were plenty.
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My big plan was to take photos of people eating donuts, but it didn’t quite work. Here I tried to force Sam to eat his donut so I could photograph it, but apparently asserting, “EAT THE DONUT! EAT THE DONUT, SAM!” is not particularly encouraging.
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Since Melissa is a tender mother (with a very cute haircut), she did not force Sam to eat his donut until he was safely tucked away in a quiet corner.
Anyway, it was a great time, and I was happy to see a host of bloggers and crafters, including the always stylish Sally, the prolific and productive Susan (whose book, Bead Simple, is available for preorder on amazon), the great crafty organizer and podcaster Diane, and many others. Good times, people, good times.

Posted in sewing | 5 Comments

climb every castle

Posted on October 31, 2007 by mariko

We’re in Osaka now, and yesterday (Halloween!) we went to a nearby castle town called Hikone. The mascot of the town appears to be some cartoon cat wearing what seems to be one of those horned viking hats. Posters and signs emblazoned with this cat were EVERYWHERE.
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It was a really gorgeous day, so we were very fortunate, particularly because we had to climb up a buttload of stairs: there were stone stairs leading up to the castle, and there were these ladder-like crazy stairs inside the castle. It reminded me of the ascent to Yosemite’s half dome, which I never completed, because hello, am I the only person who thinks it’s insane to climb up a giant rock that is completely vertical?
One of the highlights of the castle excursion was the little matcha break we got on the way up to the castle. We purchased this “passport” that allowed us entry into a couple of museums, the castle, the gardens, and a bonus little tea break, which we really needed after all those freakin’ stairs.
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My brother has more detailed information, I think.
My brother and I finally managed to find Yodabashi Camera when we got back into the city. There was one floor labeled the “sweets museum,” which got me pretty juiced, of course. It was a floor of different bakeries and such! The first place I saw was the Mochi Cream place. They sold little manju deals with the standard bean filling along with whipped cream. I got matcha, royal milk tea, black sesame, and cafe au lait. I didn’t take any photos because we scarfed hem down rather quickly. They were quite delicious and flavorful. I especially liked the black sesame and cafe au lait flavors.
I guess that’s it for now. I did try to go bra shopping at Daimaru, but I ended up just fleeing the premises. I figured that I would be able to find bras in this land of, ahem, similarly endowed flatties, but apparently that just translates into padded bras with all kinds of lacy embellishments.
Hope you all are having a good Halloween!

Posted in General | 15 Comments

happy halloween from japan

Posted on October 30, 2007 by mariko

It’s Halloween here in Japan, which does not really mean anything except perhaps there will be fewer pumpkin-flavored treats. Would it surprise you to learn that Baskin Robbins here has tasty ice cream with really interesting flavors?
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And they are festive! Can you see the giant pumpkin caps worn by the enthusiastic employees? We had pumpkin pudding ice cream, and we also won a PRIZE–a Halloween-themed blanket!
And let’s not forget our friends at Beard Papa. They had pumpkin cream puffs!
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Yum. The pumpkin flavor wasn’t as strong as I had hoped, but it was still delicious. I don’t know how they get the exterior of those puffs so delicate and crisp!
Okay, I have to go shower now before my mother kicks my ass (pardon the crude language).

Posted in General | 8 Comments

boo

Posted on October 22, 2007 by mariko

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Halloween is my favorite holiday, but I’m going to miss it this year, because I’m going to Japan! I leave on Wednesday and will be gone for 2 weeks. I might be able to blog a bit during the trip if my brother lets me use the computer (yes, he’s going, too, so it should be an interesting trip!)

Posted in General | 10 Comments

apple festa

Posted on October 21, 2007 by mariko

We finally made it down to the annual apple tasting festival at Portland Nursery this year. It is a very popular event, and we had to wait in line to get to the tasting tables. It was so worth the wait, though.

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They had an impressive and large variety of apples for tasting, and it amazed me how different they all tasted (I know that probably sounds idiotic, but you know, apples are apples, and I wasn’t expecting such a huge difference in flavors).
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We wrote down our favorites, which included the Beni Shogun Fuji and the Elstar, and then bought a bunch of apples for .78 cents per pound.
I got a bunch of Granny Smiths to make a tarte tatin. I went on a tarte tatin kick a few years ago but forgot all about it until recently. They are really fun to make, unless you’re a big failure like I am. The caramelizing of the apples appeared to go smoothly:
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And it came out of the oven looking decent, too:
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But I ran into some issues when flipping the tarte out of the pan. I think I maybe overcaramelized the mixture, and it got super sticky and refused to come out of the pan. The crust broke apart in several spots as well.
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Burned blob. It tasted okay, but it was not attractive. I shan’t give up, though! Any tips out there?

Posted in baking | 7 Comments

pink cookies

Posted on October 17, 2007 by mariko

I’ve been trying to get my baking mojo going after the long summer hiatus, and I haven’t been very successful. I tried baking a chocolate cake a couple weeks ago, and it completely fell apart. The other day I tried making a tarte tatin, and, well, it wasn’t pretty (I’ll report on it later this week). I made these pink cookies, though, and while they spread more than I had anticipated (what is it with me and super spreader cookies these days?), they were quite delicious.

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Reader Janis was kind enough to send me this recipe, which apparently originated in The Art of Making Good Cookies by Annette Laslett Ross (I’ve already ordered a copy!). Janis knew about my obsession with pink cookies, and she thought these might be similar to the coveted Rocket Bakery pink cookies. They were indeed really, really tasty, and I will definitely bake them again!
Read on for the recipe …

Continue reading →

Posted in baking | 6 Comments

essential essence

Posted on October 15, 2007 by mariko

Amy is my partner in sugar, and we are all about the sugar capers. She heard about a mysterious “bakery” that offers specialty cakes as well as 68 cent cupcakes, by order only, so of course we had to investigate. The bakery is called Holiday Essence, and for the life of me I cannot remember that name. I tend to call it Essential Holidays or something like that. Anyway, they have tons of mouth-watering flavors. Amy ordered two varieties of cupcakes: pound cake with marionberry buttercream frosting and espresso cake with mocha buttercream frosting. I went to pick them up and nearly got lost.

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It’s a good thing that van was parked in the driveway! The place looks a little crazy when you get close up. There are several outbuildings in the back, a mechanized gate to keep the dogs in, and rows of stainless baking racks under awnings. They were very gracious and sent me off with a box of cupcakes, which I promptly took to Amy’s.
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We had no clue what they were going to look like, but we certainly weren’t expecting anything as festive as these! They went crazy with the Halloween sprinkles, and check out the color of that marionberry frosting! Woohoo! These guys sported A LOT of frosting, but it wasn’t sickeningly sweet, so it wasn’t overwhelming at all. The cupcakes were quite tasty, and we are excited to try more flavors.
As if the cupcakes weren’t enough, Amy placed a secret order from Holiday Essence the same week:
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Check it out! Swedish Princess Cake! I have been a little obsessed with Swedish Princess Cake ever since I ate one from Gayle’s Bakery in Santa Cruz a million years ago. I am not even a big fan of marzipan (the exterior of the cake is marzipan), but these princess cakes are SO BEAUTIFUL and so delicious! They are filled with whipped cream, a very light vanilla cake, raspberry jam, and pastry cream. Super yum. Apparently Holiday Essence is one of the only bakeries in the Pacific Northwest that offers princess cakes. I had to really hold myself back from eating the entire thing. Oh, and the slogan on there? Apparently I am in trouble because I did not tell Amy when it was my birthday (it was in August).

Posted in baking | 22 Comments

caffeinated

Posted on October 11, 2007 by mariko

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My mother works a couple days a week at a local Asian grocery. I saw this bento box there and had been coveting it for a couple months. I just like to stare at those cute little deer. Bonus points to my mother for not rolling her eyes when I bought it.
Today I kind of freaked myself out with too much caffeine. In the morning I had my usual half-caf concoction, but then I went to Blue Gardenia with Melissa and had an americano that was seriously so good and so strong that my eyeballs nearly exploded out of my head. THEN I went to Amy‘s and had two more cups of coffee (though they were small, cute cups). I would talk about the cupcakes that Amy and I had, but I am too lazy to upload the photos, so y’all are just going to have to wait!
Oh, and I am now on ravelry (as supereggplant), though I must confess that I am not on it very often. Today, though, I went on and just trolled for friends and just started adding people to my friend list. If that makes me seem desperate or crazy, well, I HAD A LOT OF CAFFEINE, PEOPLE.
And for you runners out there, athlinks is an addictive site. I don’t really care about my race times or anything (well, obviously, just take a look at my times), but athlinks tracks them all and is, like ravelry, a community. All I’ve done is add race times and look for people to add as friends. I think I’ve only found one, though. Heh. So join up so I can have some more friends!

Posted in General | 10 Comments

chock full o’ something

Posted on October 9, 2007 by mariko

My buddy Megan just got back from a vacation to London, Italy, and Croatia (which looks really gorgeous), and she was kind enough to bring me this:

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Orla Kiely Chocolates! They are made by Irish chocolatier Butlers Chocolates. Oh, there are some delectable flavors in there, including Salt, Double Chocolate, and Earl Grey. Sadly, though, the chocolates did not travel particularly well, and they were all melted and discolored and sad. I am going to eat them anyway, though!

Posted in candy/chocolate | 9 Comments