I love the pucker-your mouth tartness of naengmyeon--cold buckwheat noodles with cucumbers, hard-boiled egg and pickled Asian pears, doused in a chilled vinegar broth. Like craving ice cream when it's snowing out, I do love this during the cold winter months. Thanks to Chungtech for introducing...
Feeling out of the loop can make you feel old. I was feeling that way on Sunday night when I didn't recognize a third of the bands and artists that took the Grammy's stage. I didn't know when Maroon 5 ended and Foster the People began......
As we continue to celebrate the almighty noodle here, I give you one of my most delicious, yet absurdly lazyass recipes in my repertoire: curry udon. I love making Japanese-style curry in the winter, it is so soul-warming, with all the carrots, onions, meat and potatoes....
Spaghetti with asari (clams), shirauo (little white fish) and arugula at Pizzeria Matsuhisa in Denenchofu, Tokyo. Someday, I will open a wafu (Japanese-style) pasta shop in Oakland.
Drunken noodles at SriPraPhai in Woodside, Queens. From Umamiventure #4 in 2007. The savory hot sweetness of the dish still hovers in my memory.
Photo by Irwin Chen.
Happy February, everyone! Umamimart turns 5 years old this month, and I thought it would be fun to celebrate NOODLES! We're all fans of noodles here, and there are pages and pages worth of posts, since 2007 (!), dedicated to the almighty noodle on Umamimart....
I've been obsessed with making this dish for a few months now -- it is really satisfying when you are craving noodles, and so ridiculously easy to make. You can usually find nabeyaki udon on the menus at Japanese restaurants, for $12+. This is so easy to...
As 2011 draws to a close, I am not thinking about the Mayans. Rather, I am trying to decide what I will be eating over the weekend. PRIORITIES, people! I'll be working on Saturday evening (apocalypse be damned!), but I'll have all the accouterments ready to ring...
Chicken noodle soup, whatever the reason maybe, is often eaten when we are sick. I have no idea why. I don't think there's any anti-cold medication in it, nor is it medically proven to cure illnesses whatsoever. I guess it's simply the comfort of its...
Enjoying the early winter so far? I know I am. I'm a cave bear and enjoy spending the long Scandinavian winter evenings in my studio or couch, working, crafting or watching Daria. In fact, since it is so windy, wet and utterly, depressively dark, I feel...
Now, I've always considered myself quite the noodle connoisseur, but I had never heard of the houtou noodle before. Originating in Yamanashi prefecture, Japan, the noodles are like thicker versions of udon, but flat, ribbon-like and looooong. It is served in a miso broth with...
Ramen is all the rage here on both coasts in the US, and it's still going strong in Japan. Strangely though, I didn't eat too much of it during this trip to Japan. Unlike Sam White, the host of our OPENharvest adventure, who had upwards of...
One of my favourite foods is South East Asian cuisine. I confess I wasn't much of a fan of noodles when I was a child living in Bangkok (I know, what was I thinking?), preferring fried rice over anything else. That's...
By the time you read this, Yoko and I will be in Niigata, Japan, a prefecture three hours north of Tokyo, on the west coast, the side of the Japan Sea. It's also directly west of Fukushima City, home of the Daiichi Power Plant. We will...
Ramen, as some of my fellow writers have observed, is totally taking over North America. People are obsessively eating, finding new shops, and eating more. New chains from Japan are opening like once a month here in New York City. Funny thing about ramen is...
I must admit that Washi and I have more-than-healthy appetites and the lunch boxes at the Edible Schoolyard event did not satiate our piggie tendencies. After our pleasant, healthy sandwich meal, we decided to check out the latest the Financial District had...
One of the surprising things about London is that you can get very good, cheap Thai food in pubs. My friends and I call them Thai pubs, but they're just normal pubs serving Thai food cooked by Thai chefs instead of...
PREFACE Summer Slurp Series, Pt. 1: Nikumiso Udon Summer Slurp Series, Pt. 2: Hiyashi Chuka (Cold Ramen) The one (and only) thing that I miss about the disgustingly humid temperatures in Tokyo is the arrival of cold noodle...