Just Grapes with Plain Yogurt

I came home really late tonight (around 11:30 pm !?) and never had a chance to eat at all since 2 pm for lunch today. Now it's too late eat any heavy meal, so I've decided to eat just some grapes with plain yogurt.

Saba with Brown Rice

As I've mentioned, we had a sushi/sashimi party yesterday. We brought tons of fishes for this party, so there were some leftovers. Even though we gave most of them to our friends who joined us, there were still some fishes left. So I brought some saba (Mackerel) home with me.

Yes the dinner tonight is something with saba. I went to Wholefoods to buy some spinach (you definitely need some green to break down the oil that comes from the fish) and some grapes for the leftover yogurt.

I'd cooked brown rice mixed with 18 different types of grains a week ago, made it like balls wrapped and frozen them. So I took one of the chunks and heat it up with small dried shrimps and an egg. While cooking saba, I boiled water and put some spinach. I ate spinach with some sprinkles of katsuo bushi (dried bonito fish flake) and put some ponzu. Once everything was ready to eat, I washed some grapes and put yogurt on them.

This was my dinner tonight. It's very healthy, isn't it?

Sushi/Sashimi Party

It was a wonderful Sushi/Sashimi party we held with all our friends to show our appreciation for their continuous and loving supports today. Fortunately we have a friend who is a professional sushi chef, so he cut all fishes we provided, made some sushi out of them, and decorated everything very beautifully. It's an art on each dish.

What we ate were: Of course Toro (BLUEFIN TUNA), Shiro Maguro (ALBACORE), Maguro (TUNA), GREEN MUSSEL, Unagi (EEL), Masago (CAPELIN ROE), Ikura (SALMON ROE), Hotate (SCALLOP), Ebi (SHRIMP), Tako (OCTOPUS), Izumi-dai (TILAPIA), Tobiko (FLY FISH ROE), Hamachi (YELLOWTAIL), and TUNA GROUND.

Additionally our friend and I made some Inari Sushi and the other friends brought a lot of fruits and deserts. We were all laughing and eating almost everything for hours and hours.

My business partner and I were so blessed to have such fun and lovely friends who had shared this beautiful moment with us.

Thurkey Day

Thanksgiving day is one of the biggest holidays for people in the States. I know there are several friends of mine who get together with families and celebrate this holiday more than Christmas. Unlike me, lots of my friends love to cook, so they start preparing from the day before or definitely from the early morning. I'm sure they have their own special recipe for cooking turkey. To the readers, do you have the BEST recipe you are proud of??

Hiyayakko (Chilled Tofu)

Well, I wasn't really hungry and didn't feel like I wanted to eat any big heavy meal after running over a mile. Luckily I had a pack of tofu that I bought a few days ago to eat on that day but I didn't and some very fresh wakame (seaweed) that I got from Hokkaido, Japan. Yes, my lovely dinner for the last night was hiyayakko (chilled tofu) with wakame on the side.

Preparation:

Rinse tofu, a) wrap it with a sheet of kitchen paper, b) put it on a cutting board and c) a slightly heavy dish on top of the wrapped tofu, and wait for 10~15 minutes. d) Cut it however the size is, put some katsuo bushi (sliced smoked skipjack tuna) and sliced green onion on top of hiyayakko. I added some sesame seeds on top of everything last night. Place some wakame on the side, put e) some ponzu shoyu and now ready to eat!!


Reasons/Tips:

a) Wrapping tofu with a sheet of kitchen paper is my idea. I just don't like the mess the water would be all on the kitchen counter.

b) You can use a shallow bowl instead of a cutting board to keep the water coming from tofu in the dish and you don't have to waste a kitchen paper to keep the water in.

c) Placing a dish or another small cutting board as best on top of tofu is for hiyayakko, you want to take out water from tofu; otherwise the tofu is too watery. (You don't have to do it if you cook. This applies only for hiyayakko.)

d) I've recently preferred cutting smaller pieces, so that it's easy to eat. But typically it's much bigger size, like maybe just 4~5 cuts. But in this case, you have to cut it by yourself when you eat. It's too much messy for me:(

e) Some people prefer regular shoyu (soy source) instead of ponzu. I use ponzu is because it's might lighter and it contains vinegar, so it's much healthier.

Carbohydrate food and changing the diet

I've been trying to avoid any carbohydrate food such as rice (especially white rice), noodle, pasta, and bread. All those are my favorite. The reason I've been "trying" to avoid them is because the food contains starch. I still don't know exactly why starch is so bad to our bodies yet, but one of my friends told me to reduce the amount of consuming the starch when I had the issue with acne on my face. I'd started increasing the amount of fruits and more pure greens while reducing carbs, then all the acne was gone. So whatever the reason was my friend told me was right. It worked. I assume, though, that the starch changes to suger while duygesting and if you don't do enough exercise, all suger from the starch stays in the body. So no matter if I don't eat snacks that contain high suger, I'd still consume it from food. Also I think the starch clogs everything that causes the problems.

It's very interesting discovery for me. Now whenever I see pimples on my face, I look back at what I'd been eating for the last few days and change the diet immediately. Acne is coming from the inside of your body. Check with your diet and start cleansing the inside of your body by eating lots of fruits and pure fresh greens. I bet it works!!

My Ultimate Snack

I've been recently hooked on with the "snack" with grapes on top of yogurt. awww.... it's so yummy~. I eat this dish after the dinner or during the meal when I'm hungry. In this case, I can avoid eating junk food and eat something healthy. You should try it but make sure you choose PLAIN yogurt. Mine is organic grapes and plain whole mike yogurt, but it doesn't have to be grapes. The season is getting over, so I have to see what fruits would be good with this particular yogurt. I finished all grapes now, so I gotta go to Wholefoods to buy some more fruits!

More healthy food at www.MistLifestyle.com

Sashimi for lunch

I had a lunch with my friends, one of whom is a sushi chef. He prepares sushi for his family every week and the lunch was made by the leftover from the last night his family left. It's an assembled dish with white rice, miso soup, natto (fermented soy beans) that were prepared by the other friend, cucumbers, tuna, tilapia, saba (mackerel) and abocade that were brought by him, the sushi chef. What great dishes I could have for lunch!! We had such fun time talking and eating the delicious food.

Do you eat Sashimi? Come visit the site @www.mistlifestyle.com

To Begin with...

I've been trying to eat as healthy food as possible such as vegetables, fresh greens and fruits. But the tricky is once I go out for dinner, I tend to consume more carbs, which I'm trying to avoid unless I exercise as twice or three times as I do now! The good thing is that I don't feel to crave for fast food, junk food, snacks, coke and sodas, alcohol, and recently meat.

Because I've been lately going out a lot and eating dinner outside, which is so unbalanced nutrition, I try to eat just vegetables and fruits if I can stay home for dinner.

The other night, I went to a Wholefoods nearby my home and bought spinach, some grapes, and plain yogurt. I boiled water and put the whole bunch of spinach in it. Once it got soft, I took it out and washed it with cold water. i cut it in one inch each and ate with Japanese Katsuo Bushi (dried bonito flake) and a little bit of soy source. On the side, there was a full of grapes in a bowl on top of plain yogurt.

I was just happy with this simple dish for a night. I should stay at home more, so I can eat healthier and better food.

Do you like Japanese food? Go to www.mistlifestyle.com

Living A Healthy Life

It is easy to say but difficult to take an action to live a healthy life. But my passion is always there; staying healthy myself and help people to be healthier. This is a part of the reasons my business partner and I have established this company. We hope it grows to keep spreading a word to as many people as we can that being healthy is the most important to do in your life.