ISSUE 2 / OCTOBER NOVEMBER 2017
Malia and Jeevika’s Long Distance Newsletter a monthly installment
“cultivate”
Malia’s School Lunch
New Etiquette
Jeevika’s Cafeteria Lunch
Malia In Japan, we start every meal by bringing our hands together and saying itadakimasu, which means “thank you for this meal” or “let’s eat”. After we eat, we bring our hands together again and say gochisosamadeshita. This roughly translates to “what a great meal” and is a form of paying respects to whoever prepared the meal. Japanese cuisine uses a lot of seafood and fish products, but every meal is balanced with rice, soup, veggies, and meat. The food here is so much healthier than in America, and this is reflected in the lifespan of people here. The average lifespan in Japan in 83 compared to that of America, which is 78. Many more people make it over 100 here, and I’m sure that diet has a lot to do with that. Jeevika D.C. has a prominent happy hour and brunch culture. It’s swarming with young professionals who use these late evening and early weekday hours to socialize and network. Some happy hours start at 3:00pm and go on till a bar closes, which makes me think they should rename those hours to “happy half-day”. Besides that, I also find that D.C. actually has more accessible international food than Seattle does. This makes sense, considering that it’s a super transit city that is swarming with embassies and immigrants. I actually haven’t really been to the same restaurant more than twice, which says something about the incredible number of meal options that I have here.
New Tastebuds Malia I’ve always been fond of Japanese snacks, and now that I’m here, I have them at my fingertips. Whenever I’m grocery shopping, I involuntarily end up with one or two bags of candy or snacks in my basket, such as rice crackers or sweet potato crisps. They are just too good. I am also trying a lot of new things in my meals. Recently, I have been cooking with pumpkin. We have a Haagen-Dazs pumpkin flavored mini ice cream that I can’t get enough of. When I go to my favorite cafe, I love getting the hot chocolate, because I drink tea at school so it’s nice to have a change. If I feel like I deserve a treat (which is quite often) I will also get a churro. They are thick churros and covered in a delicious cinnamon sugar topping.
Malia loves the hot chocolate at Loyce
Jeevika As I settle into my new D.C. routine, I’ve noticed my tastebuds crave the same types of food around the same time every week. On Sunday mornings, my roommate and I always find a new fried chicken meal before exploring a museum. (As it turns out, my hungover self always wants to eat fried chicken.) Luckily, D.C. is close enough to Virginia that there’s inklings of Southern fried chicken goodness in several restaurants. For weekday lunches, I always want to eat a fast-casual meal that I can enjoy on the NPR terrace. And, after a night out, I crave the jumbo pizza slices that seem to be so common on the East Coast. Think pizza three times the size of my face. Heavenly.
Jeevika loves jumbo pizza Photo/jenniferkerrigan.com
Wherever I am, I always have in my kitchen:
Malia Green tea (I make some before work every morning) Bananas for oatmeal Tofu Garlic Tomatoes Green onions (I’ve started growing some too from the scraps of old ones) Jeevika Garbanzo beans (to make channa) Pesto Frozen Trader Joe’s gyoza (my go-to snack) Dave’s Bread Sweet potatoes (I love making spicy sweet potato fries for snacking) My trusty Indian spice-box
Malia A food item very unique to very I live is ピオーネ(pione) grapes and muscat grapes. Japan is very well known for their quality in food, and the fruit is no exception. These grapes are pricey, and you usually only find them in the fall, but they taste like nothing I’ve ever had before. The pione grapes are famous throughout Japan and come from the mountains of Niimi. They are about the size of ping pong balls and are traditionally consumed by spitting out the skins and just eating the juicy interior. It is so packed with flavor. One weekend, I was given four bunches of these grapes. A local farmer warned us that if we ate a lot of them, we would get fat because of the high sugar content in these babies. But that doesn’t stop me. Jeevika I’ve seen several “build-your-own-meal” restaurants in D.C. The city is swarming with working professionals, which is why quick and easy-to-make custom rice bowls, wraps, and salads are popular lunch options. Most restaurants focus their build-your-own menus around a specific type of filling, which is usually a seasoned meat or gourmet vegetable. These are basically Chipotle-style restaurants, but with a focus on special cuisines. Cava is a Greek chain, Seoul Food is Korean (they have these awesome sushi burrito wraps), Merzi is Indian fast-casual, and Sweetgreen does delicious salads. Besides these restaurants, D.C. actually also has several great Ethiopian restaurants because it has the largest Ethiopian population in the country. And, Ben’s Chili Bowl has been a cultural institution for ages. Protestors used to meet there during the civil revolution.
New Comfort Malia I really miss sandwiches. Like french dips and sandwiches from Potbelly. These are one of the few things I just can’t find here. Usually, I’m inspired to make sandwiches for myself. I also try making things that I used to take for granted back home, like pretzels, gnocchi, steamed buns, pad thai, and pho. The grocery stores here are well-stocked and have a fair amount of ingredients I can use to try these international recipes at home. I do really miss the convenience of just hopping in my car and picking up takeout from a restaurant once in awhile. Plus, my town is very small, so we only have Japanese-style restaurants here. In the city, you can find more international options, but the lack of diversity in food options is one major thing I am slowly getting used to. Malia’s bento dinner
Jeevika A lot of the food that I miss in D.C. is specific to the University District in Seattle, which is a hub I never had to leave. The neighborhood catered to students, so it definitely had it’s Starbucks and Chipotle joints, but it actually also has a rich history of pre-gentrified mom-and-pop owned restaurants all within a few blocks. I miss the pho places. I miss the late-night gyro shops. I miss Burger Hut, the popular Indian-Pakistani food joint where all the desi kids ended up after a night out. I miss the cafes that I could just walk to whenever I needed to leave the house. I live in a residential neighborhood now and I don’t know the city very well, so I’m still learning to eat in D.C. without the student perks of having everything located within a few blocks. Mostly, I miss going grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s and cooking weekly dinners with you. Jeevika did find one coffee shop by the office
New Recipes
Malia When I first moved to into my apartment, I wanted to introduce myself to my neighbor. I rang her doorbell, and as is customary in Japan, I also presented my neighbor with a small gift. Some marionberry jam from Oregon. She was a little surprised, but she really appreciated it. A couple hours later my doorbell rang. It was my neighbor, and in her hands was a tupperware of nikujaga. Nikujaga is a hearty fall stew with beef or pork, potatoes, onions and konnyaku (potato jelly noodles) all simmering in a sweet soy sauce broth. I later asked for the recipe and she drew an adorable easy-toread recipe for me. Since then, my neighbor and I have met up a few times to have dinner parties and teach each other new recipes. Just last week, I taught her how to make gyoza. I miss making the fried rice we would make with all of our left over veggies of the week. We would throw in a meat (usually sausage) and add delicious veggies and spices. Finishing it off with soy sauce and sesame oil. It’s hard to find spicy italian sausage here, so chicken or ham is my substitute. To make the meal more Japanese, I’d have to make it a lot more simple and less spicy. Japanese fried rice is made with white rice, though we usually used brown. What goes into the fried rice is only egg, green onion, and oil. These with some salt and pepper can make Japanese fried rice one of my favorite things to order.
Nikujaga
Jeevika It took me a while to get back into a routine of meal-prepping and home-cooking after I moved, and when I got mugged in D.C., that also threw me off my game. I ended up relying a lot on comfort food. My aunt, who lives in Virginia, packed several boxes of Indian food for me during my first weekend here. She also cooked for me when I was recovering from the mugging, and having family around to comfort me and feed me the type of food my mom would make is something I really cherish. Rajma, aloo sabji, matar paneer, daal -- she served me all the good stuff that I just can’t find at restaurants, nor cook for myself.
In D.C., I make my own version of the fried rice we used to make together. I always have some chicken in my freezer that I keep marinated in yogurt and spices, so I add that to my fried rice along with mushrooms, greens, and basmati rice. I make the meal extra spicy using my Indian spices. I don’t even really add much soy sauce anymore, and definitely no sesame oil. Instead, I flavor the rice in its own meat juices, turning the dish into a biryani-fusion meal. I also love topping off the rice with fried onion, and prepping fried gyoza on the side. I guess we both found ways to keep the fried rice a part of our regular meals!
Indian pesto pasta
Malia’s oatmeal
Malia For breakfast, I try and eat as much as I can even though I don’t have much of an appetite in the mornings. My throat is often dry because the air is dry here. This morning, I made oatmeal and topped it with a banana, a tablespoon of peanut butter, some cinnamon, and a drizzle of honey. I also made my regular cup of green tea to wake me up. For lunch, I ate with my kids and we had rice, miso soup, fried squid, and a carrot bamboo salad. Before I came to Japan, I would get nowhere near seafood, except for fish. But children here are taught to eat everything on their plate with no complaints. I have been doing this as well to avoid being chastised by my students. And surprisingly, I can now eat shrimp and squid without gagging. Tonight, I am eating a beef and green pepper stir fry along with a cabbage and ham stir fry and some miso soup. I’m also going to be sipping some plum wine, which I am obsessed with.
Jeevika’s oatmeal
Jeevika I’m notorious for skipping breakfast and punishing myself for it by eating candy at my desk (which there’s a lot of at the moment, because of Halloween.) Some days I do try to be good, though, and I grab a bowl of Honey-&-Oats cereal or some toast before heading to work. Today, I brought a packet of instant oatmeal and topped it with a banana for breakfast. I ate it at my desk while working on my morning tasks. As soon as I step into the NPR building, I fillup my NPR Kanteen with the free coffee from the cafeteria downstairs, and I get refills throughout the day. Most days, I pack a lunch for work as part of my meal-prep plan on Sundays, but if I haven’t had a chance to cook I’ll buy lunch at the cafeteria downstairs. I snack on free-food around NPR all day, and for dinner, I usually make a grilled cheese or salad at home. Tonight, I’m actually going to dinner with my friends to Cava Messe, which is a sit-down version of the fast-casual Cava joint! You know I’m ordering the fried chicken sliders.
learn more at jeevikav.com and maliaimayama.myportfolio.com