Happy New Year, All. Let the writing commence!
We started this New Year by going straight from the airport to our soon to be new home, which is on a bluff overlooking the ocean and LA. We popped a bottle of champagne, and watched the Sta. Monica fireworks over the marine layer as a foghorn cooed in the distance.
Dean has initiated me in the Japanese New Year’s tradition of eating soups for fortune and health. The first, which is my favorite, is a daishi broth (boiled kombu, soy sauce, and vinegar), with buckwheat soba noodles and pickled ginger. I’m still asleep when the ball drops, but am gently stirred to an upright position to take in a bowl of what is the start to a healthy year.
The following morning, I have a cup of Hawaiian coffee, read Dean’s New Year Inquiry, and eat the second and more infamous soup called Ozoni. The broth (made the night before) is a whole chicken boiled with an entire chopped ginger root. In the morning, you skim off the fat, and cut carrots and daikon in the shape of coins (hello success!), clean up the chicken, get some mochi balls, and garnish with some crisp mizuna – e voila, Buena fortuna in a bowl!
Lastly, before brunch in the sunshine, we posted the Shinto Buddhist totem, Omakase, attracting the good kami (spirits) at the new house. We are anticipating a year full of sharing the goodness of life with our friends and family in the new abode.