Tea and Travels

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When December arrives, those of us who are avid holiday bakers have already been planning for weeks. We have our lists of Christmas Cookies, special breads and cakes, holiday gifts from the oven, and our menus for our special family meals for Christmas, Hanukkah and the New Year. We love the anticipation that comes with winter and the Advent Season. We love lighting candles, putting up the tree and filling our homes with the scent of pine, spices and cider. My kitchen is my happy place during this precious time when the world outside is cooler and darker. But I always try to remind myself that the natural world outside, the birds, the holly, the red hibiscus, and elsewhere, the snow, are also part of this magical season. 
 

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I love pouring over my old cookbooks and recipes, just in case I might have overlooked a gem in years past. And I am also eager to find new recipes to add to the holiday festivities. My December, 2017 blog, “Christmas Cookies,” contains a long list of cookies that I have baked every Christmas for decades. This list includes Spritz, Orange Ginger Cookies and Mexican Wedding Cookies, my top three favorites, that I could not dream of omitting from my baking schedule. In 2021, I added a new favorite, Brown Butter Oatmeal Bars, developed by my niece and co-author, Kathleen Pedulla. You can find the recipe in her June, 2021 blog. This heavenly blending of Shortbread and Oatmeal Cookies belongs on every baker’s holiday list, and at every tea party in the coming year.  
 

​This year I’m reminding myself that not every special holiday treat comes out of the oven. I’m remembering the traditional European style steamed puddings, filled with nuts dried fruits and spices, and I’m thinking how lovely custard is, served in little dessert glasses and topped with freshly whipped cream or included in a lavish Christmas Trifle along with jam, fresh fruits, toasted nuts, broken pieces of cookies and left-over pound cake. Our Christmas Tea in the December Calendar section of our Tea Book contains the recipe for Steamed Pumpkin Pudding with Candied Cranberries. The section immediately following the Christmas Tea, entitled “In Defense of Fruitcake,” includes the recipe for Ambrosia, a luscious fruit salad popular for generations on southern American Christmas tables. You can also simply search for Vanilla Custard on our website to find the recipe for this timeless classic. All three of these traditional holiday desserts are made without turning on the oven.
 

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Another category of holiday desserts dear to the hearts of our grandmothers is molded gelatin. I think we all remember eating Jello in bright red and green concoctions at Christmas time. Our inventive grandmothers all had Tupperware gelatin molds shaped like circular wreaths or festive crowns. And along with the Jello, they filled these molds with canned pineapple or cherries, angel flake coconut, mini marshmallows, and even cottage cheese or Coca Cola. Kathleen has shared two updated and a bit more sophisticated gelatin desserts in her blogs, both of which would be perfect additions to the Christmas menu: Dulce de Leche Gelatin Mold with Coffee Pecan Sauce, which appears in her October 2017 blog, and Individual Panna Cottas with Red Gelatin Hearts. The Panna Cottas appear in Kathleen’s February 2019 blog and are intended for Valentine’s Day, but an imaginative cook could easily substitute Christmas cookie cutters in bell or perhaps stocking shapes for the heart cookie cutters. This blog, which features excellent step-by-step photographs showing how to make these delightful individual desserts, also contains a comprehensive glossary telling you everything you ever wanted to know about the various types of dessert that contain gelatin. Is it possible that Kathleen loves gelatin desserts even more than I do?
 

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My all-time favorite gelatin dessert is Spiced Apple Gelatin, which appears in the August Calendar section of our Tea Book in the North American Family Reunion Tea. I found this recipe in the November 1992 edition of Gourmet magazine. This sweet, tart and slightly spicy mixture was shared by the late Laurie Colwin, one of my favorite food writers. I always enjoyed her articles because she wrote in a very personal style and showed her readers how to serve each recipe and combine it with the other elements in the menu. Since this recipe appeared in November, Laurie suggested that it could be substituted for the Cranberry Sauce in the Thanksgiving menu. I discovered that Spiced Apple Gelatin is a versatile creation that could serve as either a condiment with meat or cheese, or as the shining star of the dessert table, perched aloft on a cake pedestal. It is also a timeless and seasonless treat which could be enjoyed with meals or Afternoon Tea at any time of the year, as its primary ingredients, Apple Cider and lemon juice, are available everywhere all year long. I recently made Spiced Apple Gelatin for an autumn family luncheon I helped prepare with Kathleen in her hometown of Watsonville, California, home of Martinelli’s Apple Cider. We served it on the buffet table along with other family favorites, deviled eggs, cheddar and chutney sandwiches, butternut squash soup, spinach and persimmon salad, baked cheesy cauliflower and herbed scones. It fit right in. Spiced Apple Gelatin is my Christmas gift to you.
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Spiced Apple Gelatin
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This delightful dessert contains only five ingredients and is easy to prepare. You will need a 1-quart gelatin ring mold for a lovely wreath-like presentation, but you can also make it in a glass Pyrex bowl. Either way, it will sparkle with golden light. Be sure to make it the night before you intend to serve it, so it will be fully firm when you unmold it onto a cake pedestal or decorative platter. To present it as a Christmas dessert, I suggest you surround it with candied cranberries for a festive effect. Also, the sweet and tart tastes of both the lemon-enhanced apple cider and the sugared cranberries will complement each other. Another approach would be to fill the center with chilled custard or pastry cream, or simply serve the Spiced Apple Gelatin with Dulce de Leche or Rum Raisin ice cream, my two favorite flavors for the holiday season. This recipe makes a large ring of apple gelatin, and you will probably have leftovers. Spiced Apple Gelatin is delicious for breakfast, with heavy cream poured over it and maybe a little granola on top. As a final thought, this creation is also a blessing for people who are allergic to gluten, eggs, dairy products or nuts, as it contains none of these allergens, yet it remains as elegant and tasty as any other holiday dessert.

​Special Equipment: large mixing bowl, lemon zester, citrus juicer, glass measuring cup, fork, medium sized saucepan, rubber spatula, 1 quart (4 cups) gelatin mold, kitchen towel, table knife, attractive serving platter or cake pedestal
 
Makes: approximately 12 servings

​In her September 2023 blog, Kathleen shared a very special recipe for Autumn Fruit Upside Down Cake, offering options for Quince, Apple or Pear Cake. Another delicious, late-ripening fruit is the persimmon, sweet and luscious when the chilly days of November arrive. When we think of November, Thanksgiving is the first image that comes to mind (unless we live in Canada, where Thanksgiving is celebrated on October 9.) As I think about Thanksgiving this year, beautiful orange persimmons enter my imagination. 
 

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As my poem about Persimmon Bread points out, persimmons ripen in late autumn and are not as widely cultivated as a commercial crop as apples and pears, yet they are tasty and versatile, adding color, fragrance and a subtle, tart flavor to both savory and sweet dishes. Persimmons originated in China and are known today by the scientific name, Diospyros kaki, using the Japanese word, kaki for persimmons. The persimmon tree is in fact related to ebony, a tree famous for its elegant dark wood. This fruit is extremely popular in Japan, where it was introduced from China in the Seventh Century. Japanese artists traditionally paint this elegant, light coral colored fruit in compositions evocative of autumn. And the famous Japanese former Samurai and poet, Masaoka Shiki (1807-1902,) wrote numerous haiku extolling his love for this delicious fruit. Indeed, eating persimmons was Shiki’s greatest consolation while he was tragically dying of tuberculosis. 

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In this persimmon-inspired haiku, Shiki compares and contrasts the sharp, sweet experience of biting into a persimmon with the mellow sound of the bell at Horyuji Temple in Nara,
famous for its persimmon orchards. Janine Beichman, the translator and author of the book, Masaoka Shiki, included the following comment about the meaning of this memorable poem, suggesting “…on a more metaphysical level, the mortal moment of one human being biting into a piece of fruit and the broad, eternal expanse of time symbolized by the bell of the ancient temple.”
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Persimmons did not find their way to California and southern Europe until the 1800s. China continues to produce 75percent of the world’s persimmons, and in the United States, California and Florida are the largest producers of this lovely fruit. There are two primary varieties of persimmons, Hachiya and Fuyu, both identified by their Japanese names. Hachiya persimmons are heart shaped with a pointed bottom. They contain large amounts of tannin and should not be eaten until they are fully ripe to avoid digestive problems. Ripe Hachiyas become almost liquid and can easily be pureed to be baked into Persimmon Bread, Persimmon Pudding and Persimmon Cookies. Fuyu persimmons, which resemble a flat tomato, can be eaten raw while they are still firm.
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​There is also an indigenous American persimmon with its own scientific name, Diospyros virginiana, though this strain of persimmon actually originated in Kentucky. American persimmons are much smaller than those of Asian origin and are reputed to be very sweet, but they also cannot be eaten when unripe because of the high tannin content. American persimmons are not grown commercially and are only enjoyed by people who can find them in the wild, primarily in the eastern and midwestern areas of the United States, or who have planted trees on their own property. Many Native Americans living in the eastern United States before the Europeans arrived included persimmons in their diet, drying them and preparing them as puddings and breads.
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At a recent family gathering in Watsonville, California, my co-author and niece Kathleen Pedulla and I created a simple, seasonal Spinach and Persimmon Salad, using local Fuyus. To make this splendid salad at home, combine a box of baby spinach leaves (I took the time to remove the stems) with sliced toasted almonds, small slices of peeled Fuyu persimmons and a generous helping of bleu cheese. Toss these four ingredients with an easy vinaigrette made from vinegar (or lemon juice,) olive oil, salt and pepper, and perhaps a spoonful of mustard. Your family will be delighted by the intriguing savory and sweet impact of this elegant autumn salad, and it might be fun to include it in this year’s Thanksgiving celebration, as it will not require much of your time as you prepare your family’s traditional meal.

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To assist you to reclaim your spirit of gratitude and to plan for your family’s Thanksgiving meal, our website and blogs are here to help. My November 2016 blog features the menu for our family’s traditional Thanksgiving feast and includes the recipes for Cranberry Ginger Sauce, Wild Rice Dressing and Pumpkin Praline Pie. My November 2019 blog, “Festive Fall” offers the recipes for three special additions to the traditional Thanksgiving meal: Mushroom Sage Crostini, Cranberry Curd and Lemon Chess Pie. And as a tonic for that after Thanksgiving exhaustion, our website shares the complete menu for an After Thanksgiving Tea, including cleverly re-purposed leftovers. Check it out in the November calendar section of The Tea Book. But this year, as you may have guessed, I’m sharing the recipe for Persimmon Bread, a glorious addition to the dessert table along with the traditional Pumpkin Pies.

​Persimmon Bread has been part of American culture for many years. During colonial times, only the American persimmon, popular with Native Americans as a high-energy wild fruit that could be gathered and dried, was available. After the importation and cultivation of Asian persimmons to the United States, Americans began to include persimmons in their baking projects during the holiday season when ripe persimmons were available. Persimmons are often exchanged for pumpkin puree in breads, cakes, puddings and cookies. When super-chef James Beard included his recipe for Persimmon Bread in his monumental book, Beard on Bread, published in 1973, every recipe for Persimmon Bread published in the ensuing fifty years seems to be a variation of Beard’s iconic recipe. Beard called for Cognac in his recipe, which has been adapted by contemporary chef and food writer, David Lebovitz, among many others. In his Persimmon Bread recipe, Lebovitz seems to view Cognac as an essential ingredient, although he does offer some substitutes, such as black tea or root beer. Beard’s recipe does not include honey and is surprising flexible about the amount of sugar to include. The recipe I am sharing is another adaptation of Beard’s classic, in which I suggest apple juice instead of Cognac and include honey as well as chopped candied ginger along with the dried fruits and toasted nuts. Beard’s recipe makes two nine-inch loaves, and mine is designed for three 8”x4” loaves, as I like to eat the first loaf sliced with butter when it is still warm from the oven and cool and freeze the other two for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
 

• 3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 2 cups sugar
• ½ cup honey
• 1 cup (2 cubes) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 4 large eggs, at room temperature and slightly beaten
• 2 cups persimmon puree from approximately 4 squishy soft Hachiya persimmons, skins not included (The juicy pulp can easily be scraped out of the peel.) 
• 2 cups toasted chopped almonds
• 1 cup dried sweetened cranberries
• 1 cup chopped pitted dates
• ¼ cup finely chopped candied ginger
• 2/3 cup apple juice (or brewed and cooled rooibos chai tea)
• Cooking spray for the pans

 

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Special Equipment: food processor or blender, extra large mixing bowl, large mixing bowl, glass measuring cup, medium sized mixing bowl, whisk, rubber spatula or wooden spoon, 3 aluminum 8”x4” loaf pans or 2 nine-inch loaf pans, bamboo skewer
 
Makes: Three 8”x4” loaves or two 9” loaves
 
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

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1. Spray the loaf pans with cooking spray and set aside. In a large measuring bowl, prepare and assemble the toasted chopped almonds, chopped candied ginger, cranberries and dates. Stir with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon to combine. Sift the dry ingredients, including the sugar, into an extra-large mixing bowl and set aside. Cut the butter into chunks into a glass measuring cup and microwave at 30-second intervals until melted. Set aside to cool. 
2. In a medium sized mixing bowl, whisk 4 eggs lightly and set aside. Scrape the pulp away from the skin of 4 or more very ripe Hachiya persimmons until you have 2 cups and puree lightly in a food processor or blender. Add the honey until combined.
3. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients in the extra-large bowl with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula. Stir in the cooled butter, eggs, apple juice and persimmon mixture until combined. Then stir in the dried fruits, almonds and candied ginger until well distributed.
4. Pour the batter evenly into the prepared pans and bake in the pre-heated 350-degree oven for approximately 50 minutes for 3 smaller loaves or 1 hour for 2 larger loaves. Test  for doneness by inserting a bamboo skewer into the center of each loaf. 
5. Serve warm with butter or rum raisin ice cream, or cool completely and wrap snugly in plastic wrap, then aluminum foil and freeze. 

 
 

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After ten years on the beach in the ancient Hawaiian village of Kaaawa on Oahu’s windward shore, my husband Wayne and I decided to move to a high-rise apartment in Honolulu. This was a complete change in lifestyle, but we felt it was time to position ourselves nearer to food, entertainment, cultural events, medical care, and even emergency services if needed. We chose Nauru Tower, now thirty years old and one of the first skyscrapers in Honolulu. This model of modern architecture is still clean, well-managed, beautifully landscaped and graced with a large saltwater swimming pool, tennis courts, and picnic and barbecue areas for the residents. Though we lived in Los Gatos, California, a suburb of San Jose, for forty years, neither of us has previously lived in the city center of a large metropolis. 

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​Our heads are still spinning with the number of snack shops, grocery stores, restaurants, and shopping venues right outside as we exit the elevator. Nauru Tower is located next to Ala Moana Shopping Center, once the largest shopping center in the world, still massive and culturally diverse in delightful ways. Every day at lunch time, we can wander over to enjoy Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Hawaiian, Indian, Nepalese, Vegan, Italian, Filipino or any number of other local treats and snacks that we don’t have to make in our own kitchen.
 

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​The closest food source to our apartment is the magical flagship store of the family-owned Foodland chain of local Hawaiian grocery stores, founded in 1948. We are one block away from this comprehensive culinary wonderland, also known as Foodland Farms Ala Moana. Foodland has everything a shopper expects in a good grocery store—a bakery, a deli, dairy products, frozen foods, meats and seafood, flowers, snacks and a pharmacy, but also so much more. Visitors to Foodland Ala Moana are reminded of Harrods of London and Tokyo’s Mitsukoshi, filled with freshly prepared foods, ready to eat on the premises or take home for a gourmet meal with the family. Foodland has an in-house wine bar, R. Field Wine Company, where patrons can enjoy some very fine wines and select from a menu of European-inspired cheeses and charcuterie, including Beef Carpaccio, Bruschetta, Caramelized Onion Soup, Truffle Parmesan Fries, and more familiar items such as Pizza and Spaghetti. Poke, Hawaii’s gift to the world, is also available at the Foodland wine bar. And the staff at R. Field Wine Company will help you assemble a gift basket for a special occasion.
 

​While the wine bar at Foodland is a gourmet delight, Hawaiian and Asian foods are Foodland’s specialty, and Foodland is all about Poke. For those of you who may have forgotten, Poke (pronounced poe-kay,) is cubes of raw, marinated fish and other seafoods such as scallops and octopus, flavored with raw onions, seaweed, sesame seeds and a variety of flavorings, some mild and some spicy. Tofu and other vegan food items can also be prepared poke-style. Foodland’s Poke department is the place to go for the freshest spicy Ahi Tuna Poke or Tako Poke (the Japanese and Hawaiian word for octopus.) If you order a Poke Bowl, your poke will be served on top of steaming hot rice. You can also create your own Bento (lunch box) by adding crispy fried chicken to your poke order. Foodland has a large indoor seating area where you can enjoy your Poke Bowl or Bento on the spot. 
 
At Foodland, Poke is just the beginning. They also serve a wide variety of fresh sushi and musubi (rice balls wrapped in seaweed, eggs, Spam or fish,) and prepared Bentos to eat for lunch or dinner or to take home for family meals and social gatherings. I recently bought a Salmon Teriyaki Bento that also included some edamame (steamed soybeans,) a piece of steamed and flavored Japanese eggplant, a small serving of steamed white rice sprinkled with furikake, some sticky rice with azuki beans, some Japanese style cooked carrots and gobo (burdock root,) and a piece of seasoned kabocha squash. All this for seven dollars! Compared to the thirty-dollar lunches that are typical in Honolulu’s downtown, a Bento from Foodland is a delicious and wholesome bargain. 
 

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Foodland is the gateway to Ala Moana Center, where many additional restaurants, snack shops and treats await. The Makai Market Food Court offers an affordable adventure in pan-Asian and Polynesian food, and frankly puts most other shopping center food courts, filled with chain burger joints, to shame. One of our favorites is the Curry House Coco Ichibanya, where Japanese style spicy curry is served over hot rice with pickles for a simple and healthy meal. The choices include Chicken Katsu Curry, Pork Cutlet Curry, Kalbi Curry, Veggie Curry, and a startling number of other options at about nine dollars per serving. 

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​Since Halloween is on its way, and parents no longer allow their children to accept homemade treats and snacks from strangers, Ala Moana is the place to find luscious local treats that you and your grownup friends will also enjoy. Big Island Candies and the Honolulu Cookie Company both have stores at Ala Moana, and both specialize in Macadamia Nut Shortbread, the most popular cookies in Hawaii. They sell individually wrapped cookies and beautifully packaged gift boxes. Big Island Candies, based on the Big Island of Hawaii, with its flagship store in Hilo, offers a variety of specialized candies and cookies using unique local ingredients. Chocolate Dipped Macadamia Nut Shortbread is a popular item, but Big Island Candies also sells Chocolate Covered Peanut Butter Brownies, Taro Shortbread that contains Purple Sweet Potatoes, Coco Dusted Chocolate Almonds and Hawaiian Red Chili Toffee.
 
The Honolulu Cookie Company is famous for their pineapple shaped Macadamia Shortbread Cookies, baked in Honolulu. We bring gift boxes of these with us when we return to California to visit our family. Like Big Island Candies, the Honolulu Cookie Company offers an interesting variety. My favorite is Dark Triple Chocolate Macadamia Nut Shortbread, and I also love Dark Chocolate Kona Coffee Shortbread. Other delicious options include Macadamia Nut Shortbread Cookies that contain chocolate chips, pineapple or coconut, dipped in either white or dark chocolate.
 

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All of the places I have just recommended for food or snacks are within a two-block walk of our new apartment. If we were to take a right turn out of Nauru Tower instead of a left turn toward Ala Moana, we would find ourselves almost immediately at Ward Village and the adjacent South  Shore Market, two trendy shopping locations also filled with restaurants and snack shops galore, including a staggering number of Asian style Boba Tea shops. Among other dining destinations in this neighborhood are the venerable and elegant Merriman’s, Istanbul, a high-end Turkish restaurant with delicious and wholesome food, the smaller and meticulous Tango Contemporary Café, Scratch Kitchen and Meatery, and a sandwich shop called Fat Cheeks that sells Buttered Lobster Rolls and even Lobster Cheeseburgers. There is also an impressive multi-level Whole Foods Market nearby. With the possible exception of Fat Cheeks, which I admit I have not yet visited, the restaurants I have just mentioned all make every effort to serve the freshest seasonal food possible and to support local Hawaiian farmers and fishermen. 
 
Clearly it will take a while for us to explore every interesting venue and food opportunity within walking distance of our new home. Meanwhile, we are enjoying the trade winds, the blossoming flowers, and even the egrets who venture into the city. And we love looking out our windows. The view from our windows takes in Ala Moana Park, Magic Island, the Honolulu Yacht Harbor and the Pacific Ocean beyond. Every Friday evening at 8:00 PM, a four- minute fireworks display takes place over Waikiki beach. The view from our lanai is perfect. We are in paradise.
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This month my food gift to you is an updated cake version of the traditional Butter Mochi recipe I shared in my September 2019 blog about the Island of Lanai. 
 

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Butter Mochi is one of Hawaii’s most popular desserts. It requires Mochi flour made from sticky rice, which produces a pleasing chewy texture. I use Koda Farms Mochiko Sweet Rice Flour, which comes in a small one-pound box. Butter Mochi is usually made in a rectangular baking pan and cut into little squares like brownies to serve with ice cream or fresh fruit. However, for this Butter Mochi Cake, I adapted a recipe I found in a recent issue of Bon Appetit magazine. This Butter Mochi Cake is loaded with macadamia nuts flavored with pure maple syrup for a festive autumnal pastry that would be a delightful surprise for Halloween or even among the Apple and Pumpkin Pies on your Thanksgiving table.
 

For the Macadamia Nuts:
 

• 8 ounces of macadamia nuts, whole or chopped (approximately 2 cups)
• 2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• Baking spray for the cookie sheet

 

For the Cake:
 

• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and set aside to cool
• 2 large eggs at room temperature
• 1 ½ cups sugar
• ½ teaspoon Kosher salt or Hawaiian sea salt
• 1 can (13.5 ounces) unsweetened coconut milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 2/3 cups Mochiko Sweet Rice Flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• Baking spray for the pan

 

​For Serving:
 
Vanilla, dulce de leche or butter pecan ice cream
Ripe pear, berries or persimmon slices
 
Special Equipment:
 
Rimmed baking sheet, sprayed with baking spray, rubber spatula, medium sized bowl, large mixing bowl, 9” springform pan, parchment, hand-held electric mixer or whisk, bamboo skewer, wire rack, offset spatula, attractive serving platter or cake pedestal, sharp knife
 
Makes:
 
8-12 servings or more. Butter Mochi is very dense and filling.
 
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F

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1. To prepare the macadamia nuts, spray the baking sheet with cooking spray and set aside. Place the macadamia nuts, maple syrup and sugar in a medium sized bowl, and mix thoroughly with a rubber spatula. Pour the mixture evenly over the prepared baking sheet and smooth it out until the nuts are evenly spaced. Bake at 350 degrees F for 6-8 minutes. The syrup will begin to bubble, but the nuts will not be fully toasted. Remove from the oven and set aside to cool.
2. To prepare the cake, spray the 9” springform pan with cooking spray, and cut 2 rounds of parchment to fit the bottom of the pan. Cut additional strips of parchment to fit around the inside of the pan. Spray the parchment pieces with additional cooking spray, and make sure they adhere to the bottom and sides of the pan. Set aside.
3. Place the eggs, sugar and salt in a large mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer or whisk until the mixture is smooth and well incorporated. Add the coconut milk, vanilla and cooled melted butter and whisk well. Add the mochiko flour and baking powder and mix the batter thoroughly until well combined, thick and smooth.
4. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan. Toss the reserved macadamia nut and maple mixture to separate any clumps, and using the rubber spatula, scatter the nuts evenly over the cake batter, covering the top evenly all the way to the edges of the pan. Some of the nuts will sink into the batter.
5. Bake in the pre-heated 350-degree oven until the top is a light golden brown and the cake begins to pull away from the sides of the pan, about 50-55 minutes or until a bamboo skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
6. Place the cake on a wire rack to cool for 15 minutes. Remove the sides of the springform pan, and carefully remove the parchment from the sides of the cake. Carefully turn the cake over onto the cooling rack and remove the parchment from the bottom of the cake. Place an attractive serving platter over the cake and carefully turn the cake right side up onto the platter or cake pedestal. Use an offset spatula to assist with this process if necessary. Allow the cake to cool completely, at least one hour. Slice with a sharp knife and serve with ice cream and fresh fruit or berries as you wish. Mochi Cake can be wrapped in plastic wrap and reserved at room temperature overnight. It can also be refrigerated, but it must come to room temperature before serving.

​September can surprise us. In areas with a traditional four-season climate, such as Canada and the Northern United States, September can bring the first hints of fall with cooler mornings, gentle rain and the initial signs of the glorious and colorful shift soon to take place in the autumn landscape. In recent years, however, the once familiar and gently changing seasons can no longer be counted upon. Summers filled with historic high temperatures, catastrophic downpours, tornadoes, floods and wildfires, have startled us, and in many places, the stubborn heat remains as September claims the dubious honor of being the hottest month of the year.

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Are we capable of looking beyond our own personal comfort, putting our previous views and behaviors in perspective and reflecting on what we can do to mitigate these devastating effects of climate change? I hope so. And depending on where you happen to live, seasonal changes can be minimal or extreme, but it is good to be mindful of the weather beyond our own back yards.
 

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Here in Hawaii, the shifting seasons can be difficult to discern, with only slight changes in rainfall and in the patterns of the tides, waves and marine animal migrations.
 

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However, the tragic wildfire that recently devastated the charming and historic town of Lahaina on the island of Maui was a heartbreaking reminder that hurricane season in Hawaii lasts all summer long. And the ever more present massive storms throughout the world can affect the tides, the wind and the amount or absence of rainfall in far reaching areas. In short, we are all living in one interconnected world.
 

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In California, my former home state, a Mediterranean climate prevailed for centuries with six months of rain from October to April and six months without any rain from late spring through early fall. This predictable climate pattern facilitated the flourishing of grapes, almonds, apricots, citrus fruits, melons, berries, tomatoes and all manner of vegetables. All of that has changed, resulting in wildfires, scorching heat and the devastating effects on water management and crops in America’s most productive agricultural state. I wrote this haiku below only two years ago in September when I returned to Northern California for my sister Margaret’s memorial service before the recent atmospheric rivers and unprecedented high temperatures played havoc with California’s farming traditions. 
 

 
On California Highway 1
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I am guessing that every person who reads this blog has been affected by extreme and unprecedented weather events in recent years. While change is inevitable, such drastic and unexpected changes can cause stress, anxiety and grief.
 

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While all of us have to deal with sorrow and loss at some point in our lives, we can find consolation in quiet moments, in silence and in the lingering beauty of dawn and twilight. And we can reclaim the simplicity in the ordinary rhythms of life. I have always welcomed September as the quiet month when the seasons shift soundlessly, a time of rest and solitude before the busy excitement of the autumn and winter holidays. September is the time to listen to Mozart, whose golden notes and lyrical melodies will never change. A September dusk offers us moments to sit alone and read a few haiku by Yosa Buson, whose poems linger through the centuries:
 

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Or we can take the time to make a few notes in our journal or write one or two haiku of our own.
 

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In September we can also be kind to ourselves and simplify our daily patterns of responsibility. Many of us carry around unnecessary stress, even in the ordinary tasks such as preparing meals for our families. Some of the loveliest meals are also the simplest. Our website and blogs can help you find healthy and easy options that can transform your September meals into relaxing and happy moments with your loved ones. 
 

Take another look at the “Tea Menu Basics” chapter in The Tea Book section of our website. Many of the free recipes in this chapter require no cooking whatsoever yet can be elegantly presented to make even a simple meal memorable.  Sandwiches, for example, can be wonderful if made with fresh, good quality bread and the best late summer ingredients. Cucumber or watercress sandwiches can be tasty and refreshing, and our simple procedure for making Brie and Fig Jam Sandwiches can turn lunch into a gourmet adventure.
 
Breakfast can become a festive event simply by adding fresh strawberries, blackberries raspberries or blueberries, all available in September, to your usual morning cereal. I strongly recommend my recipe for Home Made Almond Granola in my June 2020 blog. This delicious combination of healthy ingredients that requires only half an hour in the oven, makes a big batch that will lift your family’s breakfast out of the doldrums.
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Release your creativity by thinking about the things you really loved when you were a child. I loved fresh cherries and watermelon. Wouldn’t it be fun to channel these childhood memories into a refreshing start or finish to a September meal by serving skewers of ripe watermelon chunks and pitted fresh or frozen cherries to eat like popsicles on a stick? Be sure to offer pretty paper napkins to catch the drips! And don’t forget that another childhood favorite, Peanut Butter and Honey Sandwiches on Whole Grain Bread are not junk food. They are filled with protein and energy. Another happy treat from long ago that requires only two ingredients and no cooking is a good old Root Beer Float. Root Beer and Ginger Beer have been improved and transformed into beverages worthy of a sommelier, and ice cream has moved far beyond chocolate, vanilla or strawberry. Wouldn’t a non-alcoholic Ginger Beer and Dulce de Leche Float be divine? How about a Root Beer and Orange Sorbet Float? Use your imagination or purchase several options and let your family or guests choose. 

​No matter how disturbing the weather or the news may be, we will never give up Afternoon Tea.

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We can temporarily pause the elegance of a traditional tea party complete with freshly baked scones, delicate finger sandwiches, savories and meticulously decorated sweets. Like the old couple in the haiku (yes, I’m describing Wayne and myself,) we can focus instead on a special flavor of tea enjoyed with the simplest of snacks. Brightly colored rooibos and hibiscus tea are among our favorites at the moment. These pleasantly flavored herbal teas don’t even require snacks, but they are enjoyable with a few apple slices, a bunch of grapes or a few toasted almonds. Wayne even drinks rooibos tea with popcorn!
 
I was surprised and delighted recently when my niece, Shana Brenion, sent me a generous supply of Welsh Cakes for my birthday. These traditional tea-time favorites resemble a cross between a mini-scone and a Shortbread Cookie. Shana found these little gems at a Renaissance Fair in Southern California. They are created by The Welsh Baker, a family-owned bakery in Santa Clarita (www.WelshBaker.com,) and they come neatly packaged in little sets of four. Shana was kind enough to send three different flavors, Brandy with Diced Apricots, Currant, and Traditional. All are addictively delicious and require no preparation to perk up your Afternoon Tea-time. Children love them also. Shana’s son Porter, a kindergartener, is a fan. And Giulia, the toddler I babysit when I’m not blogging, writing haiku or traipsing around Japan, recently grabbed a Welsh Cake out of my hand and popped it into her own greedy little gourmet mouth. I let it slide, as I can’t blame anyone for appreciating a tasty snack, especially a baby. 
 

I am grateful to Shana for introducing me to this new go-to treat and recommend a visit to the local end of summer fair or farmers’ market for all of my readers who want to relax and take it easy this September with yummy treats made by somebody else. Shana is not only a thoughtful and caring niece, but she is also a world-class balloon artist with her own Balloon Builders show on Amazon Prime: https://www.amazon.com/Giant-Giraffe-Balloon/dp/B09QGKS4J5/ref=sr_1_3?crid=PY8Y8PNJWFB9&keywords=shana+balloon+builders&qid=1692263938&sprefix=shana+baloon+builders%2Caps%2C321&sr=8-3. If you have children or grandchildren in your household, they will love her performances. On each brief episode, Shana creates a delightfully imaginative balloon animal while sharing interesting and accurate information about the live version of the animal she is featuring. Thanks, Shana!  
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Finally, this September let’s embrace a new trendy snack that has been showing up on breakfast, lunch and dinner menus everywhere: the ridiculously simple Avocado Toast. This new haute cuisine item is basically a piece of toast topped with ripe chopped or smashed avocado with a bit of salt and pepper, maybe a drizzle of olive oil, or perhaps a few other seasonings such as smoked paprika, Sriracha sauce, parsley, sesame seeds or whatever else a local chef may dream up. Wayne and I love Avocado Toast, and we are happy to make it at home, as our gnarly old avocado tree finally produced an avocado that just ripened after months of hanging precariously from a branch. Let’s remind ourselves that avocados do not need to be cooked, and they are easy to handle. Just slice them down the middle and all around through stem and tip, separate the two halves, pop out the pit, and peel each half, as the peel will pull right off, no problem. Avocados are fabulous in guacamole, California Maki Zushi, also known in sushi restaurants as California Roll, and they are great added to any kind of sandwich or even Eggs Benedict. Their mild flavor and smooth, creamy texture invite all kinds of flavorful and crunchy add-ins.
 

​We enjoyed our Avocado Toast at home with Hot and Sour Soup, made by Wayne. We made the simple version on both toasted French rolls and Indian Nan, with just a drizzle of olive oil, freshly ground pepper and Hawaiian sea salt. Next time we might get more creative. I encourage you to let your imaginations soar as we make life easy for ourselves this September.
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​This month we will say a wistful sayonara to our summer interlude in glorious Japan, and this final phase of our visit will take us on a maritime adventure on the French cruise ship, Le Soleal, owned by the Ponant Cruise line of Marseille.  A Ponant cruise ship is like a large yacht, allowing docking in smaller harbors and offering hidden destinations not available to the huge mega-cruise ships that resemble floating resorts
 

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On Le Soleal, we enjoyed the fresh and elegant cuisine created by the French chef, and we were intrigued by the itinerary, which took us from the southern end of Honshu on the Sea of Japan to the islands of Kyushu and Shikoku, even farther to the south. We were delighted to discover that traditional Japanese arts and crafts are not only being preserved in the big cities like Osaka and Tokyo, but are thriving in small, lesser-known locations as well. Along our journey south along the waterways, we were treated to a traditional Japanese dance performance, introduced to Taiko drumming, and welcomed by local children offering us gifts of hand-made paper cranes in the ancient art of Origami, as we disembarked our ship. The old-fashioned art of hospitality is still alive in these more remote and rural areas of Japan, where a small sized cruise ship docking in the local harbor is cause for celebration for the entire community. 
 

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On this small ship voyage, we also visited the places where Europeans first interacted with the Japanese in the 1500s, and it was interesting to see the many ways that foreign influence has affected Japanese life while ancient traditions continue to flourish. 
 

​We boarded the ship in Sakaiminato, in western Honshu, a city relatively unknown to most Americans, yet it is the fishing center of Japan, especially famous for tuna and crab, key ingredients in everyday Japanese cuisine, especially sushi and sashimi. We visited a small nearby island, Daikonjima (literally, “Radish Island,”) which is famous for its glorious summer peonies. In the small city of Yasugi on Daikonjima, our destination was The Adachi Museum of Art surrounded by its magnificent and expansive traditional Japanese garden. Though the garden appears to have been in place for centuries, it is only a little more than fifty years old.
 

 
Yasugi is the hometown of the museum’s founder, Zenko Adachi, a local man who made a fortune in real estate in Osaka and gave back to his community by building this tasteful and elegant museum and garden in 1970. The large garden, which includes waterfalls and borrowed distant mountain landscapes, has been ranked the best garden in Japan for the past twenty years.
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The museum’s well-curated collection is gracefully presented in refined, spacious and quiet rooms, featuring Japanese works in various media from the late 1800s through the Twentieth Century. One entire section of the museum is dedicated to the ceramic artist Kitaoji Rosanjin, who owned a restaurant. His pieces are arrestingly beautiful—traditional yet modern. And several of his ceramic creations that were on display were accompanied by photographs of the dish, bowl or plate being used to serve delicious looking Japanese food. Rosanjin clearly understood that the visual presentation of Japanese food is an art form in itself.
 
 I was impressed by the fact that much of the more recent art in Japan, especially the paintings, maintain the traditional aesthetic principles of asymmetrical composition, focus on nature, spontaneity and subtlety, yet convey a modern feeling. The museum also had a tea ceremony room and a Japanese style lunchroom adhering to these same principles of melding modernity with tradition. My husband Wayne and I stopped in the little lunchroom for Japanese tea and red bean and mochi ball soup, just like Wayne’s mother Misae used to make for all of us back home.
 

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In the medieval town of Matsue, only a short distance away from lovely Daikonjima, we visited one of the oldest samurai castles in Japan, still standing in its original wooden construction, having survived fires, earthquakes and wars since it was completed in 1611 by the first daimyo of Matsue, Horio Yoshiharu. Registered as a National Treasure of Japan, this watchtower style hilltop castle in the center of Matsue, is a gem worth exploring. We climbed all the way to the top of this impressive fortification, eight floors up polished wood ladder-like stairways. It was breathtaking to look down at the panoramic view of the city, the surrounding farms, and the cedars, filled with herons.
 

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Le Soleal carried us south to the historic city of Nagasaki on the island of Kyushu, another city on a hill with splendid views.
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The cable car in Nagasaki is called the Ropeway, and it carries visitors to the top of Mount Inasa for an unforgettable view of the city and all the many harbors, rivers and small islands that surround it. Nagasaki was the first Japanese city to welcome European visitors, and the Portuguese were the first to arrive. The explorers Antonio Mota and Francisco Zeimoto landed on the island of Tamegashima in 1543. In 1549, the Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier arrived in Kagoshima, also in southern Kyushu. Japan opened the port of Nagasaki for trade with the Portuguese in 1571 but expelled them in 1639 for unfair trading practices and coercive missionary zeal, both of which were offensive to the samurai system of values. The Dutch, however, were allowed to trade with the Japanese, but only from an artificial island outside the port of Nagasaki. This partnership continued from 1641 to 1854, a few years before Japan’s isolationist policy ended in 1868 with the Meiji Restoration. 
 

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We decided to have lunch at the observatory on top of Mount Inasa. I thought the food was surprisingly good for a tourist destination. We ate something called “Turkish Rice,” an odd name because the food was not Turkish, but apparently it was intended to represent the east-west fusion of Nagasaki cuisine based on the decades of trade with the Portuguese and the Dutch during the Tokugawa period of samurai rule. I was served two curry flavored “samosas” in a green salad, a tasty creamy white onion soup with garden fresh green peas and a vegetarian rice dish tasting a lot like risotto with mushrooms and lots of black pepper. Dessert was a light and airy strawberry cake.
 

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Southern Kyushu is a sub-tropical area very different in climate and vegetation from the more northern region of Honshu where Tokyo is located. Like France and California, Japan is a place where individual towns and regions have their own food specialties, known as terroirs in French. Factors such as climate, terrain and soil or water conditions affect the quality of the foods produced in these regions. Just as Gilroy in California is famous for garlic and Watsonville produces the best strawberries, Kyushu’s warm humid climate produces Japan’s best oranges, yuzu (another citrus fruit,) melons and sweet potatoes. Japanese tourists from the northern areas of the country love to load up on local specialties to take home. While we were in Kyushu, we enjoyed Orange Pound Cake, a European invention adapted for Japanese tastes and beautifully packaged in tiny individual servings to take home. We also delighted in the sweet potato flavored soft-serve ice cream available only in Kyushu. 

 
If you would like to create a lovely dessert for your family reminiscent of both the balmy orange groves of Kyushu and the Portuguese traders who first visited Kyushu in the 1500s, I recommend Bolinhos de Laranja, the luscious little orange cakes featured in my April 2021 blog on this website. 
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After leaving Nagasaki, Le Soliel took us to the lovely tropical island of Kagoshima, the medieval estate of the Shimazu samurai clan, and on by ferry boat to Sakurajima (literally Cherry Blossom Island) to view the active volcano that was smoking the day we were there. Though “shima” or “jima” at the end of a Japanese place name indicates that this place is an island, Sakurajima is no longer an island, as the most recent volcanic eruption in 1914 spewed enough lava to re-attach Sakurajima to Kyushu. The two ferry boats that run for twenty-four hours a day from Kagoshima to Sakurajima are not just there to serve tourists. They are also trained for emergency evacuations, as this volcano could erupt again at any time.
 

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A large amount of black smoke was emanating from the volcano when we were there, and the stairs and pathways leading up to the observation area were all covered with black and powdery soot. There are also lots of hot springs in the area around the volcano, and naturally many onsen, (traditional Japanese hot springs inns.) We were escorted to a place where visitors could soak their feet and lower legs in the hot springs mineral water while sitting on ground-level wooden benches. It was so invigorating, and my feet and skin felt wonderful afterwards.
 

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Our ship sailed away at twilight for Uwajima on the island of Shikoku, nestled in the waterways between the southern tip of Honshu and Kyushu. When we entered Uwajima’s harbor at dawn, the local fishing boats with colorful streamers flying from their masts, followed along beside us to welcome us to their community. Everywhere in Japan, people were kind and hospitable, but on Shikoku, we received more signs of welcome, friendship and gratitude than anywhere else in Japan. Our destination was the town of Yoshida, which the Yoshida samurai clan ruled in the Seventeenth Century. Their descendants still live in the area, and they have created an “Open Air Museum,” called Kuniyasuno Sato, where they have reconstructed the original village with locals dressed in period costumes along the lines of Colonial Williamsburg in Virginia. We received a very gracious welcome with cups of the local mandarin orange juice, which was almost miraculously delicious! The town had moved some of the houses and other buildings from nearby locations and completely renovated them to reclaim their original appearance.
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​The town elder was there to greet us with a little speech in Japanese. He was elegantly dressed like the feudal lord from the 1600s. There was also a master craftsman on the premises, a traditional carpenter who is a designated “living treasure of Japan.” He demonstrated how to plane a cypress board just using a wood and steel hand tool so that the board appeared to be polished or lacquered. Using this amazing technique, none of the houses in the village needed to be painted. Neither did they require nails to assemble the floors and walls. A young man dressed in full samurai armor and regalia, including an authentic helmet and sword, was also part of the “cast of characters,” along with a woman in a charming summer kimono. The entire “village” lined up and waved to us as we boarded the bus back to Le Soleal. 
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Our final stop along the southern waterways was the town of Kurashiki on the southernmost tip of Honshu near the city of Okayama. Kurashiki is a beautiful historic town filled with four-hundred-year-old buildings as well as willow-lined canals reminding us of Venice.
 

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Kurashiki was the home of the Ohara family who became wealthy producing textiles, especially denim and jeans. Fortunately, the Ohara clan shared their wealth with the community through philanthropy by funding and supporting hospitals, research institutes and the arts. Ohara Magosaburo, who lived from 1880 to 1943, was an enthusiastic patron of the arts, including the European artists of his era, especially the Impressionists.  Magosaburo also mentored a local Japanese artist, Kojima Torajiro, who lived from 1881 to 1929. Mr. Ohara funded Kojima’s travels to Europe to study Western art, which strongly influenced his work. Ohara also commissioned Kojima to purchase numerous paintings in Europe and bring them back to Japan, including El Greco’s Annunciation, and works by Courbet, Pissarro, Matisse, Gaugin, Renoir, Modigliani, and a splendid painting of waterlilies which Claude Monet, who loved Japanese art, personally selected to be sent to Japan. Kojima also acquired works of art from Ancient Egypt and the Near East.
 
Upon Kojima’s death in 1930, Ohara founded the Ohara Museum of Art to house and display the artworks that Kojima had collected as well as Kojima’s own works, which are on a par with the finest of the French Impressionists.
 
Ohara chose to construct the museum in the Classical Greek architectural style, as it is a tribute to Western art. Charmingly surrounded by gardens and sited near a canal where baby swans follow their elegant parents through the quiet waters, the Ohara Museum of Art, the oldest museum of Western art in Japan, resembles an ancient Greek temple with its symmetrical marble staircase, classic Ionic columns and triangular pedimented roof. Of all our discoveries in our sojourn among the southern waterways of Japan, the Ohara Museum of Art was the crowning jewel.
 

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Our recent adventures in Japan began in Osaka and the area known as the Kansai. This region of southern Honshu, Japan’s largest and most heavily populated island, comprises the historic and cultural center of the country. The Kansai includes the cities of Osaka, Kobe, Nara and Kyoto. Anyone who is thinking of visiting Japan for the first time should make sure to explore this fascinating area, where trendy modern street food and fun mingle with ancient Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines, castles and traditional arts, crafts and cuisine, still alive in the Kansai.
 

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Our home in the Kansai was the lovely St. Regis Osaka Hotel, where we began every eventful day with a magnificent Japanese breakfast, served on a wooden tray with individual items in small portions artfully arranged in local ceramic dishes of various colors and shapes. With some variety from day to day, the Japanese breakfast at the St. Regis included a traditional savory egg custard called chawan mushi, sashimi (ultra-fresh raw fish with wasabi, and soy sauce,) baked cod, Japanese pickles, rolled egg omelet, rice and nori (dried seaweed.) A sumptuous breakfast buffet, featuring fresh fruit and juices, Western style egg and meat dishes, a full English breakfast and French pastries was also available for all guests. Additional Japanese breakfast items from the buffet could be added to the traditional breakfast tray. Among these items were gobo (matchstick slices of seasoned burdock root,) natto (fermented soybeans,) and onsen eggs, (soft boiled eggs with soy sauce traditionally cooked in the boiling waters of Japanese hot springs spas.)

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This magnificent medieval castle was built in 1583 by the famous Samurai war lord, Hideyoshi Toyotomi. The castle has been destroyed and rebuilt many times throughout history. The first time we visited Osaka Castle years ago, I noticed a discreet little sign in English noting that the current castle is entirely reconstructed due to a fire in1945. I took this as a polite way of saying that Osaka Castle was bombed by the Americans shortly before the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended the Second World War. The moat and some of the massive stone wall fortifications of the original castle are still intact, and this architectural gem with its gilded roof sits on a hill in the center of Osaka, surrounded by a lovely park and garden, including flowering peach, plum and cherry trees and azaleas, which were in bloom when we visited. The beautiful pond and waterfall are a favorite spot for wedding photos for newlyweds.
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Another of Osaka’s historic treasures is the National Bunraku Theater, where the medieval Japanese Puppet dramas are still alive. Japanese puppet drama is a poetic literary form which originated in Osaka in 1680. It evolved as a form of low-cost entertainment for working class adults, and like Shakespearean drama, which was also popular entertainment for ordinary people, Japanese puppet drama produced some of the finest literature in the culture. Japanese puppet drama uses highly realistic puppets, a master puppeteer who remains on stage dressed in black and simply fades into the background as the puppets come to life, a chanter who narrates and speaks for the puppets in various voices, and a shamisen player who provides musical accompaniment.

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Wayne and I were delighted by Osaka’s quirky mix of ancient and modern, blended in a vibrant and complex cultural web. There are yakuza, Japanese gangsters who don’t carry guns, in Osaka, as well as elegant geisha, young women who receive years of rigorous training in music, dance and dignified comportment as companions for men at social functions. We were fortunate to observe a lovely geisha dance performance while we were in Osaka. We also enjoyed a delightful tour of The Osaka Aquarium, the largest aquarium in the world. The concierge at the St. Regis Hotel arranged for us to have a private guided tour behind the scenes, at an additional cost. It was well worth it! Two young women escorted us through the inner workings of the giant tank containing two huge whale sharks as well as hammerhead sharks, manta rays and hundreds of other Pacific Ocean species. We got to watch right from the top edge of the tank as two young divers, each with a bucket of krill and chopped shrimp, dived in and hand fed the two massive sharks. Both of the whale sharks were accidentally caught by Japanese fishermen and will be returned to the ocean when they get bigger, although they are both already huge. Their backs had a beautiful spotted pattern like a kimono. It was an unforgettable privilege to see these glorious creatures so close.
 

 
We loved all the displays at the Osaka Aquarium, especially the river otters, the seals, penguins and coral reef habitats. It was fun as well as educational on our guided tour to chat with the divers after the shark feedings, (Wayne and I both speak a little Japanese,) visit the kitchen and the giant freezers where a busy staff was preparing food for all the various marine animals—including vegetables and dead mice for the river otters and meatballs for the giant sun fish.
 
We took another walking tour that evening to explore Osaka’s famous street food and after-hours entertainment. Osaka is the self-proclaimed foodie capital of Japan, a well-deserved honor as we discovered. We saw young people standing in long lines to purchase tako-yaki, the most popular street food “invented” in Osaka. Tako-yaki might be translated as octopus dumplings. This is finger food purchased from street vendors, and it must be eaten while it is still warm—fried balls of chopped octopus and dough, soft, savory and delicious, but certainly not gourmet cuisine. Kushi-yaki is another local Osaka favorite and the ultimate tasty junk food, generating even more long lines than the octopus dumplings. Kushi-yaki is essentially balls of Panko breadcrumbs with various fillings such as shrimp, oysters or other sea foods (remember Osaka is a port city!) and served on a stick like a salty lollipop. 
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Kushi-yaki is the perfect snack for young people strolling around in the evening looking for fun. Fun in Osaka might include drinking a few beers and shooting arrows at an archery range, (what could possibly go wrong?) or shooting air rifles at boxes of cookies, which are the prizes for anyone who can knock them over. People of all ages in Osaka also enjoy playing vintage game machines from the 1970s. We also saw elderly gentlemen gambling on games of go, the Japanese version of chess, using guerilla warfare strategies rather than the European-style front line military techniques on which chess is based.
 
Regardless of the type of trendy or traditional entertainment that goes on in Osaka, food is necessary. Osaka is the go-to city for sushi, ramen noodles, sashimi, and another Osaka original, okonomi-yaki, a fried egg and cabbage omelet that can also include anything else that happens to be in your refrigerator. Osaka is also proud to be the city where the rotating sushi bar (some designed as little train cars on a revolving track, each car carrying one or two pieces of sushi,) was invented.

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While Osaka is fun city, the other and smaller cities in the Kansai, especially Nara and Kyoto, are better known for their ancient and beautiful Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines. These two cities are the guardians of Japan’s glorious past, filled with art, literature and elegance.
 

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The Shinto religion in Japan pre-dates historic records. It is not based on theology or a set of moral teachings. Instead, Shintoism is a world view that emphasizes the sacredness of the passing seasons and all aspects of the natural world. In Shinto, trees are sacred, as are mountains, rivers and all plants and animals. Spirits, known as kami live in every element in nature, even in rocks and volcanoes. Shinto shrines, which can be identified by tall wooden entrance gates called Torii, are everywhere throughout Japan, and because of Shinto’s historic reverence for life and nature, Japan remains a place that values gardens, pure air and water, and children are taught to respect the environment. The Japanese emphasis on cleanliness grows out of this tradition of respect for the world around us.
 
Buddhism was introduced to Japan from Korea and China around the year 552 of the Current Era. This philosophy originated in the Sixth Century BC through the teachings of the historic Buddha, Prince Siddhartha, who was born in Nepal, and whose message of loving kindness, spiritual discipline and control of the ego quickly spread throughout India, China, Korea and Southeast Asia. Today there are 300 million Buddhists in the world.
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Buddhism found a comfortable home in Japan, and Buddhism and Shintoism have co-existed in Japan harmoniously for centuries. It is a common practice today for weddings and the presentation of newborn babies to take place at Shinto shrines and funerals to be held at Buddhist temples. Buddhism first thrived in Nara, which became the first capital of Japan in 768, and then Kyoto, Japan’s capital during the glorious Heian Period from 794-1192. Every visitor to Japan should spend some quiet time experiencing the ancient Todai-ji Temple in Nara and the breathtaking Kinkaku-ji Temple in Kyoto.
 
The Todai-ji Temple in Nara, also called the Daibutsu (the Big Buddha) is the largest bronze statue in Japan. A charming deer park surrounds the temple where the enormous statue of the Budddha resides. The lovely spring day when we visited, there were lots of deer everywhere and children hand feeding them “deer biscuits” that were available in the many shops and snack stands surrounding the temple. Since Todai-ji is one of the most famous Buddhist temples in the world, many visitors were there, and a sense of quiet reverence pervaded the atmosphere. The huge bronze incense burner at the entrance to the temple was going strong, sending smoke blessings over all of us as we entered the Great Hall and looked up to the Big Buddha with his giant gold halo and his Bodhisattva (Buddhist Saints) guardians in two corners of the cavernous structure.
 
Wayne said that he remembered coming to see the Great Buddha with his parents as a child and how much he loved feeding the deer. Today the deer were in molting mode, shifting from their winter coats to their summer coats, with tufts of fur coming off their backs, and the children seemed to be having as much fun feeding them as Wayne did, all those years ago.
 
There is a beautiful Shinto shrine, the Kasura Taisha, in the same park as the Todai-ji Temple. The shrine was established in 768 and remains a lovely place where a deep reverence for nature is everywhere apparent. When we visited, the stone lanterns in the garden area were covered with moss, and wisteria petals were falling onto the moss. A one-thousand-yea-old cedar tree stands near the entrance to the shrine, and an eight-hundred-year-old wisteria was in bloom, though the petals were falling. There were lots of deer at the Kasura Taisha also, and there was a snack shop where we bought the shrine’s signature snack—wisteria flavored soft-serve ice cream, a lovely lavender color and a pleasant subtle flavor.
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The next day, a beautiful spring day in Kyoto, we visited the Kinkaku-ji Temple. This masterpiece of architectural elegance was constructed in three stories in the traditional Japanese palace style, and in 1397 it became the retirement villa of the Shogun, Ashikaga Yoshimitsu. Upon his death in 1408, this mountain palace became a Zen Buddhist Temple, the top two floors of which are entirely covered in gold leaf. It is also a UNESCO World heritage site.
 

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The gracious city of Kyoto is filled with many other lovely Buddhist Temples, including the glorious Kiyomizu, as well as gardens and traditional wooden houses. A quiet serenity pervades this clean and ancient city. The culinary art of the Kaiseki meal, a leisurely form of dining that includes a sequence of small individual dishes served artistically on masterfully produced ceramic ware, is still alive in Kyoto. So is the art of the Geisha. Kyoto is one of my favorite cities in the world. If I could only visit one city in Japan, it would be Kyoto.
 
As we say goodbye for now to the Kansai, the old and new in fun-loving Osaka, historic Nara and gracious Kyoto, I am happy to share with you the recipe for a simple treat served at traditional Japanese hot-springs spas, the Onsen Egg. As I mentioned, we enjoyed Onsen Eggs at the breakfast buffets of both the Shangri-La Hotel in Tokyo and the St. Regis in Osaka, and Wayne makes them for us at home in his sous vide cooking pot. Next month we will conclude our adventures in Japan with a cruise southern islands and waterways. For now, itadakimasu! Enjoy your food!
 

​In Japan, a hot springs spa is called an onsen, and tamago is the Japanese word for egg, both singular and plural. Since many of the natural hot springs in Japan have water that is hot enough to cook eggs, chefs at the traditional country inns called ryokan, boiled the eggs for the guests’ breakfasts in the waters of the hot springs. An Onsen Egg is essentially a soft-boiled egg cooked in its shell, resulting in a creamy yolk and delicate soft whites. These eggs are served in a subtle sauce made of dashi, which is Japanese fish broth, soy sauce, sugar and mirin, a slightly sweet rice wine used primarily for cooking. Onsen Eggs are wonderful for breakfast and can also be added to ramen noodles and a variety of rice dishes, including donburi, which is a bowl of hot rice topped with fish, chicken, eggs or other seasonings. Onsen Eggs are also elegant appetizers at any meal and combine well with a variety of international cuisines.

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4 large eggs
 
For the sauce:

• 2 tablespoons mirin
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• ½ cup soy sauce
• ¾ cup dashi (Japanese fish broth available in Asian markets in packets)

 
Thinly sliced green onions for garnish
 
Special equipment:
sous vide cooking pot or medium sized cooking pot, small cooking pot, cooking thermometer, 4 small attractive bowls for serving
 
Makes: 4 servings
 
Make the sauce:

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1. In a small cooking pot, bring the mirin to a simmer. Add the sugar and stir to dissolve. Add the soy sauce and bring the mixture to a simmer, not a hard boil. Set the mixture aside to cool.
2. Prepare ¾ cup of hot dashi following the instructions on the package. (Simply add a packet of dried dashi to the designated amount of hot water.)
3. Add ¼ cup of the soy sauce mixture to the ¾ cup of dashi. Reserve the remaining soy sauce mixture and refrigerate both as you prepare the eggs.

 
Prepare the Eggs.

I have been blogging now for seven years, and the title of my monthly blog is “Tea and Travels.” The corona virus brought my travel adventures to a complete stop during two of those years, but I am always happy to write about Afternoon Tea and to celebrate the seasons as they come and go, guiding the little details of our daily lives.
 

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This year, after a four-year delay, our dream of returning to Japan came true at last. My husband Wayne grew up in Japan, and I first visited Japan many years ago when I took our son David and Wayne’s sister Joyce to Japan when they were teenagers on a summer tour that included climbing Mt. Fuji.
 

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We did not climb Mt. Fuji this spring, but we climbed a lot of stairs and winding paths on this most recent trip to Japan, visiting temples, shrines, castles, and navigating our way through countless train stations and hilly gardens. Though we traveled on planes, boats and trains, Japan is still best experienced by simply walking.
 

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In every corner of Japan, the seasons of the year are evident at every glance, even in huge cities filled with gray skyscrapers, like Tokyo, where I wrote this haiku in a lovely old garden, right in the middle of the city. Our trip was planned for late spring moving into summer, and of course we were hoping to see Japan’s famous cherry blossoms. But as it turned out, climate change affects cherry blossoms along with everything else, and Japan’s cherry trees bloomed a week early and had completely disappeared by the time we arrived.
 

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The joy of travel is in embracing the unexpected and celebrating every beautiful moment we meet. Let’s start in Tokyo, Japan’s most famous and largest city. We were fortunate to stay in the Shangri-La Hotel, one of the most beautiful hotels in the world. Like many of Japan’s treasures, it is unobtrusively hidden away with no fancy exterior giving the slightest hint of the elegance within. The Shangri-La Hotel sits on the twenty-fourth floor of a tall, sleek and modern business tower adjacent to the massive Tokyo Train Station.
 

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The ginkgo tree, one of the longest-living tree species on earth, is the symbol for the city of Tokyo. It is viewed throughout Asia as a sacred tree whose presence will bring positive energy of all kinds, including peace, hope, love, resilience, good health and long life. Historically, the ginkgo tree has been used for medicinal purposes and has appeared in art and literature as an icon for these many positive aspects. Ginkgo trees grow to enormous sizes, and their lovely green fan-shaped leaves turn a glorious golden color in the autumn. They can live for three thousand years. The streets of Tokyo are lined with ginkgo trees, and it is not surprising that the Shangri-La Hotel, famous for its sparkling chandeliers, had some of them designed as luminous ginkgo leaves.
 

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Tokyo is an enormous city of more than thirteen million people, and its wider metropolitan area, the largest in the world, includes thirty-seven million people. Tokyo has evolved from an obscure fishing village called Edo, to the headquarters of the Tokugawa Shogunate, from which the Samurai clans controlled the entire country for seven hundred years, to the modern metropolis it is today, the location of Japan’s, central government, its economic powerhouse, and the home of the Emperor of Japan. The current Emperor Naruhito and his family reside in the Imperial Palace, formerly the location of Edo Castle, in the center of Tokyo, surrounded by a moat and a huge protective stone wall. The Japanese Monarchy is among the oldest in the world, dating back to around the Third Century of the Current Era.
 

​One of Tokyo’s most enigmatic charms is the fact that is an ultra-modern city on the cutting edge of science and technology and simultaneously a traditional culture, respecting Japan’s ancient Shinto values, art and aesthetics. The most famous places in Tokyo reflect this dichotomy. Three of Japan’s most iconic destinations, all places that first-time visitors to Tokyo would want to explore are:
 
                        The Imperial Palace East Gardens
                        The Meiji Shrine
                        Ueno Park
 
These three vibrant pillars of history and beauty are not tourist traps. They are part of Tokyo’s daily life, reflecting Japan’s reverence for the past and its continuing commitment to decorum, elegance and artistic excellence. And all are free to the public.
 

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The Imperial Palace is not open to the public. As I mentioned, it is the home of the current Emperor of Japan and his family, and it is protected by ancient stone walls and a moat surrounded by graceful and elegant ginkgo trees. However, the Imperial Palace East Garden is open to anyone who wants to visit. Guests are welcome to walk in or out with or without a guide to show them the glories of this exquisite example of Japanese garden design. Depending on the season of the year, guests will be enchanted by cherry blossoms, plum blossoms, purple iris, blue hydrangeas, bamboo, roses and many other plants, including trees and orchards.
 
The Imperial Palace East Garden is also an historical gem. It is built around the ruins of old Edo Castle, established by the Tokugawa Shoguns in the 1600s. While only the stones from the castle’s foundation remain, guests can view original moats, entrance gates and guard towers, now surrounded by glorious trees and flowers.
 

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The Meiji Shrine, also in central Tokyo, appears to be an ancient old-growth forest with its expansive self-sustaining canopy of broad-leafed evergreens including camphor, oak, pines and other conifers surrounding this enormous complex of gardens and pathways, impressive wooden torii gates and its majestic central shrine. In fact, the Meiji Shrine is only a little more than one hundred years old. It was created in 1920 to honor Emperor Meiji and his wife, Empress Shoken, who died in 1912 and 1914. The Meiji Restoration took place in 1868 and brought about a transforming change in Japanese life and culture. Emperor Meiji was the central figure in this historic revival, ending feudalism and centuries of Samurai rule along with Japan’s policy of isolationism. When Emperor Meiji returned to Tokyo, and built the new Imperial Palace, he also opened the country up to trade, travel, education, economic expansion and industrialization. The people of Tokyo wanted to honor him by creating a sacred forest in the ancient Shinto tradition as Japan made its transition into the modern world.
 
Today, this Shinto Shrine is a vibrant place of beauty and serenity where visitors and the general public are welcome to offer daily prayers. Weddings often take place at the Meiji Shrine, and parents brings their babies there for blessings for a long and happy life. The Imperial Palace East Garden and the Meiji Shrine are both conveniently located near train stations, making them easily available to all of Tokyo’s citizens and visitors.
 

 
Ueno Park is another of Tokyo’s treasures. Like the Imperial Palace Gardens and the Meiji Shrine, Ueno Park is a deep, green and fragrant magic forest in the midst of one of the most densely populated cities on Earth. Ueno Park has its own train station, as it is even more diverse in the delights it offers. There is something for everyone at Ueno Park. Established in 1873, shortly after the Meiji Restoration, it is one of the oldest parks in Japan. The park’s central showcase, the Tokyo National Museum, was built in 1872 at a time when the Japanese were discovering the glories of European and American museums, libraries, public squares and concert halls. Ueno Park has all of these, elegantly constructed and arranged among 8,800 trees, including 800 cherry trees, which fill the park with delicate blossoms every spring. The park is also a sanctuary for wildlife, as ducks, egrets and cormorants flock to Shinobazu Pond, graced with lotus beds and marshlands, and other birds nest in the tree canopy. For children and families, Ueno Park Zoo is a journey of discovery repeated many times through a life span and from generation to generation.
 

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Tokyo is filled with hidden gems in addition to the three famous destinations I have described. Visitors who want to embark on self-directed treasure hunts might want to seek out the Rikugien Gardens, built for a Samurai lord in 1702, with its tea house, constructed of acacia wood, still standing, or the famous old Koganji Temple (also called Togenuki-Jizo,) an active Buddhist temple, where Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy, is still revered for her healing powers. The Namiyoke Inari Shinto shrine near the old Tsukiji Fish Market is a charming little spot dedicated to protecting this waterfront neighborhood from high waves and tsunamis. The community surrounding this shrine hosts a colorful street festival each year in June, and this little shrine continues to be a quiet place where locals can stop by and offer their daily prayers.
 

​All of these places, famous or secluded, share the same Japanese vision of reality, the same aesthetic values, and the same reverence for nature as a sacred and eternal element in which human beings are humble participants, not rulers. All of these are quiet places, not places of loud, commercial entertainment, dominance and competition, but refuges of beauty, silence, learning and serenity. Wayne and I are grateful for the time we spent in this great city, and as a parting gift to my readers who share my love for Afternoon Tea, I am happy to share Wayne’s photos of the tea experience we enjoyed on our first day in Tokyo. It took place at the elegant, serene and quiet Shangri-La Hotel, and it happened that they were serving a matcha (powdered green tea)-themed tea, presented on elegant, western-style porcelain, like an English Afternoon Tea. This memorable blending of east and west featured the three traditional courses of savories, scones and sweets, but most of the delicate food items being served were Japanese, and in each course at least one item included matcha as a central ingredient. We enjoyed Matcha Scones, tea sandwiches on Matcha Bread, and an imaginative dessert called “Matcha Cappuccino,” actually a matcha flavored mousse with foam on top.

 
Finally, since we are still reflecting on our magical respite in Tokyo, and I am hoping next month to introduce you to Osaka and the ancient cities of Nara and Kyoto, it is my pleasure to share with you another east-west treat from the Japanese New Year’s Afternoon Tea from the calendar section of the Tea Book on this website.
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Green Tea (Matcha) Madeleines
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​​Like the Black Sesame Seed Shortbread Cookies, these Green Tea Madeleines are not Japanese. However, they do reflect the Japanese passion for all things French, from the Impressionist Painters to fine French pastries. And matcha (powdered green tea) has been used in the Japanese Tea Ceremony for centuries. We think these green madeleines will make a visually attractive and very tasty addition to the Japanese New Year’s Buffet.
 
For the Madeleines:
¼ cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted and cooled, plus more to butter the pans
2/3 cup flour, plus more for dusting the pans
2 teaspoons matcha (Japanese powdered green tea)
2 eggs, at room temperature
1/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt
½ teaspoon vanilla
grated zest of 1 lemon
 
For the topping:
½ cup  powdered sugar
½ teaspoon matcha
 
Preheat oven to 400° F (after Step 4)
 
Special equipment: sieve, medium sized bowl, hand held electric mixer, large mixing bowl, rubber spatula, plastic wrap, 2 madeleine pans, wire racks, parchment, decorative serving tray 
 
Makes: 2 dozen madeleines

1. Grease 2 madeleine pans with melted butter and dust them with flour, tapping out any excess. Chill the pans in the freezer until ready to bake.

 Using a sieve, sift the flour and matcha together into a medium sized bowl and set aside. Beat the eggs with the sugar, salt and vanilla in a large mixing bowl with an electric mixer on high speed for about 5 minutes. 

1. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold the flour mixture into the egg mixture until combined and no flour is visible. Drizzle the melted butter over the batter, sprinkle the lemon zest over, and carefully fold them into the batter.

 

1. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 hour and up to 24 hours. 

 

1. Preheat the oven to 400° F and position two oven racks in the top quarter and middle of the oven. Remove the madeleine pans from the freezer and the batter from the refrigerator. 

 

1. Spoon the batter into the prepared pans, filling each mold about three-quarters full. Bake for about 9 minutes, rotating the pans from upper to lower and front to back about halfway through the baking time. Immediately turn the madeleines out onto a wire rack to cool.

 

1. For the topping, sift ½ cup of powdered sugar and ½ teaspoon matcha together into a medium sized bowl. While the madeleines are still warm, place them on a sheet of parchment on a flat surface. Return the powdered sugar and matcha mixture to the sieve and sift it over the warm madeleines. Serve immediately, or place on a decorative serving tray and keep, uncovered, at room temperature, until ready to serve. Cover loosely with plastic wrap if the madeleines need to sit more than 1 hour before serving.

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May is a busy and joyful month with lovely weather and flowers everywhere. In America and Canada, Mother’s Day will be celebrated on Sunday, May 14, and in Mexico on Wednesday, May 10. This year the historic Coronation of King Charles III will take place in Westminster Abbey on Saturday, May 6. These happy events provide us with opportunities for festive brunches, lunches, afternoon tea parties and family reunions. 
 

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My co-author and niece, Kathleen and I recently participated in a spontaneously organized family reunion inspired by a somber event, the death of my husband’s last aunt whose name I have shared for the past sixty years—Rose Higashi. You can read about Auntie Rose in my June, 2022 blog, as we visited her last year on our way to London when she was one-hundred years old. 
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When a person who is more than one-hundred years old dies, the memorial service is likely to be a celebration of that person’s long and meaningful life rather than a cause for weeping and grief. This was the case with Auntie Rose, a joyful extrovert who lived a dignified and enthusiastic life of devotion to her family and her community. She lived most of her adult life in Gardena, an old Japanese American community surrounded by Los Angeles. To attend her funeral, Wayne and I would need to fly from Honolulu to Los Angeles. However, it occurred to us that we could fly to San Jose instead, visit our relatives there, then take a good old fashioned road trip to Southern California for the memorial service.
 

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Both sides of the family pitched in to make these happy events possible. Wayne’s sister Joyce offered to host this fifteen-person gathering in the patio of her lovely home in San Jose, and Kathleen rounded up my late sister Margaret’s family, who live in Watsonville, less than fifty miles to the south on the gorgeous California coast. It was wonderful to see my brother-in-law Rudy again along with my nieces and nephews! Kathleen also brought the desserts, including a stunning fresh Raspberry Flan Bundt Cake with berries from the family farm of Tiffany, her brother Peter’s wife. You can read all about this beautiful spring pastry in Kathleen’s blog this month, as she has shared the recipe along with a gorgeous photograph. My brother and his family also joined us along with our son David, all of whom live nearby. What a joy!
 

​After the rainiest winter in California history with snow covering even the foothills of normally temperate Santa Clara County, the spring weather was glorious, and Joyce’s garden was filled with new leaves and flowers, adding to our joy in seeing one another again. Since our time in San Jose was limited, we decided not to prepare the food ourselves, other than the desserts. (I baked a batch of Mexican Wedding Cookies the day before our flight and packed them in my suitcase.) San Jose is famous for authentic and outstanding Mexican food, and we chose a local restaurant, Adelita’s Taqueria, that specializes in family meals and is located near Joyce’s home.

​Corn Chips with Guacamole and Salsa Fresca
Spicy Pickled Carrots and Jalapenos
Make Your Own Tacos Al Pastor with Grated Cheese and Special Sour Cream
Mexican Rice and Black Beans
Chicken Enchiladas with Red Sauce
Fresh Mushroom Enchiladas with Green Sauce
 
Desserts
 
Kathleen’s Raspberry Flan Bundt Cake 
Kathleen’s Improvised Chocolate Trifle
Rose’s Mexican Wedding Cookies
 
Beverages
 
Mexican Beer: Modelo Dark and Light, Tecate
Mexican Sodas: Pineapple, Lemon, Coca-Cola Made in Mexico
Bottled Water
Coffee

Kathleen’s Improvised Chocolate Trifle was fabulous, even though she claimed that she just threw it together with ingredients from the family kitchen in Watsonville. She was kind enough to share her creative process with me, and I am happy to share it with you at the end of this blog.
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The next morning our road trip began. We rented a large six-person van to transport us comfortably through glowing green and golden California. Our group included Wayne and I and our son David, Joyce and Wayne’s brother Steven and his wife Patrice, who also live in San Jose.
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The lakes, reservoirs and riverbeds throughout the state were filled with an abundance of water, and all the winter rain created a flourishing crop of California poppies, the State Flower. We saw poppies everywhere along Highway 101.

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A charming respite along our journey was lunch at the Downtown City Park in Paso Robles, the Central Valley’s new wine and restaurant destination, rivaling the more famous Napa Valley to the north. But we weren’t looking for a restaurant. We found a picnic table in the bandstand gazebo and devoured the leftovers from the previous day’s Mexican buffet. The guacamole was still fresh and delicious, and the mushroom and green chili enchiladas were still divine. We even enjoyed the raspberry cake, the last of the Mexican wedding cookies and the chocolate trifle, kept chilled in Joyce’s cooler.
 
Our road trip concluded in the charming town of Ojai, near Santa Barbara, where Wayne’s other sister, Kathy Manion and her family have lived for decades. Kathy and her husband Keith graduated from UC Santa Barbara and settled in this lovely place, graced with orange groves, olive trees and even more golden poppies.
 

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The Manions, along with their daughter Shana and her family, greeted us with a classic California post-Easter dinner of local cheeses and fruit, ham, deviled eggs and a luscious sweet potato and black bean enchilada casserole. Dessert was home-made apple pie and a hearty vegan apple cake made with eight local apples by Shana’s in-laws, Michael and Mary Lou Sharp, whom we were delighted to meet for the first time. It was magical to relax with family in the back yard under a one-hundred-year-old California live oak, watching the squirrels and celebrating the end of California’s long drought. Kathy and Keith hosted me and Wayne for the night, and our four remaining travel companions headed out for the two-hour drive to their Air B and B in Gardena in anticipation of tomorrow’s memorial service.
 

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We said goodbye to dear Auntie Rose in a dignified memorial service organized by her son Don, who was also her care giver. Don wrote her Personal History and a heartfelt elegiac Personal Reflection about his mother, Wayne’s Auntie Rose, but did not feel able to read them at the service. He asked me and Joyce to read these tributes to the assembled family members and friends who were present to honor Rose, and we felt privileged to do so.
 

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In the Japanese tradition, everyone present was invited to join the family for a full meal in a restaurant, in this case, Cherrystones in Gardena, a Pacific Rim restaurant where we enjoyed a pan-Asian feast of teriyaki beef and chicken, Chinese chicken salad, Hawaiian macaroni salad, kimchee, stir-fried soba noodles and fresh broccoli Japanese style. At the end of the meal, Don and his brother Doug quietly invited just the cousins over to the family home for an informal visit with chocolate cake and tea. When we arrived at the modest house where Auntie Rose spent the last seventy years of her life, an aura of gratitude and peace permeated the air. This group of siblings and cousins, who had known each other all their lives and played together as children, found their happy place in this tidy home which had not changed in decades. There was instant relaxation and comfort after the formality of the funeral, as we chatted together about memories of happy times in the Higashi family and hopes for the days ahead. Wayne and I were thankful to spend such precious time with both of our families.
 

​If your family is planning a reunion this spring, this website is here to help. In the calendar section of The Tea Book, we offer four different detailed menus in our August Family Reunion Tea—A North American Family Tea, which includes one of my favorite cakes, Triple Espresso Cake, An Eastern Mediterranean Family Tea, featuring one of the world’s best pastries, Baklava, A Kosher Family Tea with Kathleen’s fabulous Cheesecake, and a Scandinavian Family menu loaded with Butter Cookies. And if you enjoyed our California road trip, our California Tea menu in the World of Tea Parties section of the Tea Book is filled with authentic California cuisine, including Queen of California Cake, highlighting two of the golden state’s favorite agricultural products—apricots and almonds. And if you think your family would enjoy the Mexican Wedding Cookies that traveled with me to our family reunion, you will find them in our October Mexican Tea menu celebrating our ancestors. Finally, I hope your family will enjoy Kathleen’s Improvised Chocolate Trifle as much as we did.
 

Kathleen’s Improvised Chocolate Trifle
 

​A Trifle is a decorative layered dessert served in a glass bowl to reveal the various ingredients that have been assembled for the diners’ delight. Our website contains several different Trifle recipes for various seasons and events. Kathleen’s decision to create a Chocolate Trifle for our recent California family reunion Mexican lunch was a nod to the birthplace of chocolate—Mexico, and a complement to the menu of savory Mexican dishes we enjoyed before dessert.
 
Trifle originated in England as a dessert composed of leftovers and items from the pantry such as yesterday’s cake, cookies, nuts, fruits and jam layered with custard or whipped cream. In the spirit of improvisation, we will not use a recipe, but you will need to make some Chocolate Custard to glue your Trifle together. You can find the recipe for Vanilla Custard in my May 2020 Blog, and to make the chocolate version, you can simply add half a cup of Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa to the flour required to thicken the pudding. When the custard is completely cooked and thickened, just add half a cup of semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips along with the butter and stir until the butter and chips have melted into the pudding. Chill the custard covered with plastic wrap until you are ready to assemble your Chocolate Trifle.
 
Kathleen’s Chocolate Trifle was an innovative combination of a British style trifle and the Italian version, Tiramisu, which includes coffee and sweetened mascarpone or cream cheese. To put your trifle together, you will need to round up some chocolate cake, either baked from a cake mix or bought in a grocery store or bakery. You will also need at least one cup of very strong coffee or espresso, sweetened with powdered sugar, about eight ounces of cream cheese or mascarpone, some Kalua, if you want your trifle to have a little kick, and some chocolate cookies. Pepperidge Farms has some nice crispy chocolate cookies, but you can use Oreos or other chocolate wafers if you can find them.
 
To assemble your luscious Chocolate Trifle, brew and sweeten the coffee, and also sweeten the cream cheese. Use about half a cup of powdered sugar and beat the cream cheese with a whisk or an electric mixer. Start by cutting the cake into pieces and fitting them into the bottom of a large decorative glass bowl. Then dampen the cake with the coffee and Kalua. Add a layer of chocolate custard and break up several of the cookies and scatter them over the custard. Create a second layer in the same way. Then carefully spread the sweetened cream cheese over the second layer of cake, coffee, custard and cookies. Finish with a third layer in the same order as the first two, allowing some of the cookie pieces to decorate the top. Refrigerate your masterpiece until you are ready to serve it.
 

 
Orange trees produce not just delicate white blossoms, but also a complex, heady fragrance that is both sweetly floral and refreshingly herbal. The place to enjoy orange blossoms is Spain, where many believe the best oranges in the world are grown. The cities of Seville and Valencia are destinations for viewing aromatic orange blossoms. Spain is a wonderful country to visit in spring, and orange blossoms are only one of the many reasons. For our purposes, one of the best reasons to visit Spain is the food. Wayne and I have visited Spain on three separate occasions, and every time we ate fabulous food, enjoyed Spain’s rich culture, appreciated the elegant grace and dignity of the Spanish people and left feeling that there was so much more to learn and eat.
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It was in Madrid that we discovered Spanish Almond Cake, Pastel de Almendras, which is featured in my February, 2022 blog. This simple, light and deeply flavorful cake has become Wayne’s favorite, and I bake it now every year for his birthday. Spanish Almond Cake would also be an excellent choice for your family for Easter. It contains ground toasted almonds, almond extract and lightly whipped egg whites in the batter. Almonds are a key ingredient in many Spanish dishes, both sweet and savory, as almond orchards are plentiful in Spain, and almond blossoms add beauty to the Spanish countryside in spring. If you have an opportunity to visit Madrid, as we did, be sure to tour the Prado Museum, a world class art collection, featuring Spanish artists such as Velazquez, Goya, El Greco, Murillo, Picasso and many other distinguished European artists, including Hieronymus Bosch, Rembrandt and Raphael. The dark, moody and soulful style of the Spanish painters will give you a glimpse into the ancient and complex culture of Spain.
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My favorite of all the many Spanish cathedrals is Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, also a World Heritage Site. Completed in 1211 in both the Romanesque and Gothic styles, this beautiful cathedral, dedicated to St. James the Apostle, and considered to be his burial place, was one of the major places of pilgrimage throughout the Middle Ages. Chaucer mentions this famous church in The Canterbury Tales, written in the late 1300s.One of the characters in Chaucer’s lively narrative about a group of pilgrims, the Wife of Bath,
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​When we visited Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, we were amazed by the worlds’ largest thurible, (incense burner,) which hangs from the ceiling by a rope. During services, it is filled with incense, lighted and the rope is then pulled by four adult acolytes, lifting the thurible up and swinging it on a wide arc from side to side, filling the enormous interior of the church with smoke and the sweet scent of incense. Called the Botafumeiro, which means “smoke expeller” in Galician, this magnificent piece of metal work, crafted in the Baroque style of silverplated brass and bronze, was installed in 1604 and is still used on special occasions such as Good Friday.
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In contrast to Spain’s many Romanesque, Gothic and Baroque churches, the much newer Basilica de la Sagrada Familia (Holy Family,) in Barcelona was consecrated only in 2010, well over a hundred years after construction began in 1882. Still incomplete, this unique example of Catalan Modernism, Art Nouveau and Late Spanish Gothic architecture is well worth a visit. Antoni Gaudi was the original architect, and his vision is like no other. The soaring spires of this church include bright colors and organic, plant-like shapes and symbolic elements seen nowhere else on Earth. Barcelona is the city of Gaudi, and several other buildings in Gaudi’s iconic style can be viewed in this exciting city. Several factors have slowed the completion of Sagrada Familia, including the death of Gaudi in 1926, currently the only person buried in the crypt of the Basilica, the Spanish Civil War of 1936, and the recent Covid Outbreak. We have visited Sagrada Familia twice over the years, and it was heartwarming to see that progress is still taking place.
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Short and sweet February is gone, and long, energetic March is here! March is the month when the Earth turns green again, with the first crocuses pushing through the snow, new leaves emerging on the trees and deep green grass returning to the once frozen ground. Our favorite green herbs and vegetables arrive in March also, and many of them remain throughout the summer. And as Hopkins points out in the first eight lines of his exuberant sonnet, birds return and sing again!
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The second and final document attributed to Patrick is Letter to Coroticus, a statement of moral outrage accusing Coroticus, probably a British Roman living in Ireland or Britain, of capturing some of Patrick’s Irish converts into slavery. This theme was no doubt close to Patrick’s heart, having been the victim of slave raiding himself. Patrick’s primary achievements as a missionary to Ireland included baptizing thousands of converts to Christianity and establishing churches, monasteries and schools. Historians also believe that Patrick brought Christianity to the Picts and Anglo Saxons of Britain and Scotland. Patrick did in fact, use the shamrock, the national flower of Ireland, as a teaching tool to help explain the theological concept of the Trinity to the Irish. However, scientists have confirmed that the legend giving Patrick credit for chasing the snakes out of Ireland has no basis in fact. Geologists have proven that Ireland’s environment has never been hospitable to snakes and no snakes have ever lived in post glacial Ireland.
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When Patrick arrived in Ireland as a teenaged slave, he entered an ancient culture filled with powerful spiritual energy and a deep reverence for the numinous natural world and all the plants and animals that inhabit it. To this day, the Irish imagination is alive and well, and Ireland remains a country that appreciates and encourages creative expression in poetry, music, dance and many other art forms and crafts. Today, the Guinness Storehouse is the number one tourist destination in Ireland, and Waterford Crystal and Belleek Pottery are famous throughout the world. In Patrick’s day, Irish poetry was exclusively oral, but his missionary efforts helped to bring new life to Irish literature as a written art form. As the late Irish poet, Thomas Kinsella, editor of The New Oxford Book of Irish Verse pointed out in the introduction, “Christianity, from its beginnings in Ireland, worked intimately with poetry, and it was due largely to Christian literacy that so much of early Ireland’s non-Christian literature survived.” Kinsella himself, a major figure in contemporary Irish poetry, died in Dublin in 2021 at the age of 93. I love his little poem, “Wyncote, Pennsylvania: A Gloss,” as it gives us a glimpse into the Irish imagination and its enduring reverence for the natural world:
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St. Patrick’s legacy lives on in the United States and Canada, and indeed the whole world. Patrick died on March 17, probably in 461, though some scholars argue that he lived until 492, to the age of 120! What we do know is that Patrick is one of the Patron Saints of Ireland and his Feast Day is celebrated in all kinds of unexpected places with raucous Irish dancing, singing, fiddle playing, bagpiping, poetry, parades with marching bands, feasting and copious mounts of drinking, mostly Irish whiskey and Guinness Extra Stout. There are even polite St. Patrick’s Day celebrations involving Afternoon Tea!
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Irish immigrants to the United States began celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in Boston in 1737, and the first St. Patrick’s Day parade in the U.S. took place in New York City in 1766. Approximately 25 percent of Americans have some Irish ancestry, including more than fifteen of our Presidents. Of course, we know that Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy came from Irish American families, but Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter, both George HW and George W Bush, Barak Obama and Joe Biden also have some Irish ancestry. At 34.5 million, the Irish American population is seven times larger than the population of Ireland, which is only 4.68 million people. Here in America, many families of Irish ancestry are keeping not only Irish art and culture alive, but also Irish food.

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Irish food is delightfully healthy as well as tasty and memorable. Irish cuisine includes a wide variety of vegetables, herbs and fruits, including the first green vegetables that arrive in March. A study conducted in the European Union found that the Irish eat a wider variety of vegetables and fruits in their daily meals than any other country in the EU. The Irish are famous for potatoes and cabbage and for special preparations such as Colcannon, a mix of mashed potatoes and cabbage, and Champ, which is mashed potatoes mixed with whole milk, butter and green onions. But it might be surprising to learn that Ireland’s number one vegetable is the humble carrot! And Ireland’s favorite fruit is raspberries! Almost every imaginable vegetable finds its way into Irish food, including fresh green peas, onions, leeks, chives, wild garlic, watercress, parsley, tarragon, celery, turnips, parsnips, kale, dill, chervil, cucumbers, cauliflower and all kinds of greens. While raspberries are hugely popular with the Irish, so are strawberries and apples. I was amazed by the number of times I was served Apple Pie as a visitor in Ireland.


Kathleen and I have provided you with an introduction to Irish food on our website and in our blogs. We encourage you to review our St. Patrick’s Day Irish Tea in the March calendar section of the Tea Book. Several of the items in the menu of our St. Patrick’s Day Tea have characteristically Irish names, which, like Colcannon and Champ give a non-Irish reader no clue as to what this food item might be. Barm Brack, for example, is a tea bread intended to be served with Irish butter. It contains raisins and fruits soaked in strong Irish Breakfast Tea. Parkins are little gingerbread oat cakes. This menu also features the recipe for my sister Margaret Murdock’s Irish Soda Bread, a staple of Irish cuisine.


For an example of a simple but fresh and elegant daily Irish lunch, you will find the recipes for Irish Brown Bread and Irish Vegetable Soup, containing both potatoes and carrots, in my March 2021 Blog. Two Irish desserts from previous March blogs would be perfect for your St. Patrick’s Day party this year—Brown Sugar Oatmeal Cake in my March 2022 blog and Buttermilk Irish Whiskey Apple Pie in Kathleen’s March 2021 blog. For the adventurous among you, I am happy to share the recipe for Irish American St. Patrick’s Day Cake, an over-the-top chocolate layer cake that contains both Guinness Irish Stout and Bailey’s Irish Cream. I doubt that St. Patrick ever tasted chocolate, but I think he would love this cake!

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This rich, double chocolate cake has little to do with Irish cooking other than the inclusion of three ingredients produced in Ireland, Guinness Irish Stout Beer, Bailey’s Irish Cream Liqueur and Kerrygold Butter. However, Americans have embraced St. Patrick’s Day and are ready to party every March 17. I think your guests will appreciate this luscious chocolate cake, iced with buttery Bailey’s butter cream and topped with bittersweet chocolate ganache. Although this suggestion may sound odd, for those of you who prefer to stay away from alcohol in your cooking, you could try substituting Dr. Pepper for both the Guinness and the Bailey’s. Just make sure to use Irish butter in the cake batter, the icing and the ganache topping. I recommend Kerrygold. You will need to buy a pound of butter.
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For the Cake Layers:

• 1 cup Guinness Irish Stout Beer (from an 11.4-ounce bottle)
• 1 cup unsalted Kerrygold Irish butter (2 sticks) cut into pieces
• ¾ cup unsweetened Hershey’s Special Dark chocolate cocoa powder
• 2 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2/3 cup sour cream, at room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
• ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
• Baking spray with flour for the pans

For the Irish Cream Icing
 

• 3 cups powdered sugar
• ½ cup (1 stick) Kerrygold butter, at room temperature
• 3 tablespoons Bailey’s Irish Cream Liqueur 
• Green food coloring gel (optional)

For the Ganache Topping
 

• 8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, such as Ghirardelli’s, chopped into small pieces
• 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 2 tablespoons Kerrygold butter at room temperature.

Special Equipment:

2 (9-inch) cake pans, parchment paper, medium saucepan, whisk, 2 large mixing bowls, hand-held electric mixer, flour sifter or sieve, rubber spatula, 2 wire cooling racks, medium sized mixing bowl, quart sized glass measuring cup, bamboo skewers, 10-11-inch rimmed decorative platter, cake pedestal
 
Serves:
12-16
 
Preheat the Oven to 350 degrees F
 

1. Spray 2 (9-inch) cake pans with cooking spray with flour. Cut 2 rounds of parchment to fit the bottoms of the pans. Add a parchment round to each pan and spray again. Set aside. Pour the beer into a saucepan and add the butter. Bring the mixture to a simmer over medium-low heat. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the dark cocoa powder until the mixture is smooth and no lumps appear. Set aside to cool.
2. In a large mixing bowl, using a hand-held electric mixer, beat the eggs, sour cream and vanilla extract until smooth. Stir in the cooled beer mixture and beat briefly at low speed to form a smooth, thick liquid. In another large mixing bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt. Pour the beer mixture into the flour mixture and gently combine with a rubber spatula until no flour is visible.
3. Pour the batter into the prepared pans. Bake in the pre-heated 350-degree oven until a bamboo skewer inserted in the center comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Cool on wire racks for 10-15 minutes. Invert the cakes onto the wire racks, removing the parchment paper, and finish cooling.
4. To prepare the icing, combine the powdered sugar, butter and Irish Cream in a medium sized mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer until a smooth and spreadable icing forms. Add a few drops of green food coloring if desired and beat until the icing is a uniform green color. Spread half of the icing evenly over the top of each cake. Place one cake layer, icing facing upward, on a decorative platter. Stack the other cake, also icing side up, on top of the first cake to form a round layer cake, adjusting to make sure that the sides are evenly aligned. Refrigerate the cake while you prepare the Ganache Topping. If you are the least bit nervous about the icing slipping and the cakes becoming misaligned, just insert a bamboo skewer into the middle of the cake and cut it off with scissors so it is not visible.
5. Place the chopped bittersweet chocolate, heavy cream and butter in a quart sized glass measuring cup and microwave at 30 second intervals, stirring with a rubber spatula between intervals until all the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth. This process will take about 1 ½ minutes. Allow the ganache to cool for about 15 minutes until the ganache is pourable but not too thin or runny.
6. Remove the layer cake from the refrigerator and pour the Ganache Topping slowly and carefully over the top of the cake, covering the entire top and allowing it to drip attractively over the sides of the cake. Some of the ganache may drip onto the platter. Refrigerate the cake before serving to firm up the icing and ganache topping but allow the cake to stand for about 15 minutes to come to room temperature before slicing. To create a more dramatic effect, place the platter on a cake pedestal before serving. Refrigerate any leftovers.

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