Gyoza Recommendation

Hi! Recently, I've been losing my energy because of the hot weather and lots of assignments... However, I charged the energy yesterday!! Do you wanna know how? The secret energy source is Gyoza. (Chinese Dumpling)

Since I was a child, I often eat dumplings because my family also likes it very much. When I was a junior high student, my family ate dumplings once a week as Dumpling party!!!! haha My parents and my sister and I ate 50 dumplings at one party so each of us ate at least 10 dumplings. ;D

We love it! Untill last year, we did not know which store has delcious dumplings, but last December, we saw a TV show which introduce delicious food and found this store.

"Manchu of Dumpling" Here is a logo.

They have some branches only in Tokyo and Saitama. Some of you might think "Oh, I can not buy them because it is too far from my home!!!" No worries!!! They have online shop! You can buy dumplings online. Here is a web-page of the store.

http://www.mansyu.co.jp/

If you wanna have lots of dumplings and you do not care about packing, I strongly recommend you to buy Dumplings for business. You'll have lots of dumplings and it is a bit cheaper. ;D I also recommend you to clean your freezer up before you order them because they are all frozen. You need some space to put those dumplings. ;)

Dumplings are very easy to cook if you buy them. Just put some sesami oil on a pan and heat them. You can enjoy various flavors if you prepare some sauce. I usually eat them with vinegar and soy sauce. It will be very fun if you invite some friends to your home and have Dumpling party!!!

If you have any question or recommendation about Dumplings, please let me know.

Candy sculpture

Hello, it is getting hot and humid each day... Summer has come eventually. haha During the summer vacation, we have lots of opportunities to go to Matsuri, festival. Matsuri is originally spiritual, religious event in Japan. People carry portable shrine on their sholders and thanked and hoped their harvest. When you go to Matsuri, you can see variety of food wagons both sides of a road. They are selling Takoyaki, Banana covered with chocolate, Okonomiyaki, drinks and so on. They are all nice, but my favorite is Candy sculpture. Do you know what it is?
They are candies which looks like animal or characters. The animals in the picture below are all made from candy.

It's just amazing, isn't it? They have various kind of shape. Some of them are animals really exist, but the others are shaping dragon, superman and famous characters. My favorite picture is the right one which has 4 sculpture and they are frogs and monkey mother and its kid and rabbit. I like their subtle color...

This is a picture of a man who is making candy sculpture. Seems skilled man... eh? I just remembered my childhood memory...

Since I was a child, I really like candy sculpture. When I go to Matsuri, I always buy it. Sometimes I can't find the candy sculpture wagon, but if there is the wagon, I buy. I like candy sculpture because they are all small and cute. Usually I couldn't eat it because of the reason. However, I once asked a man who was making candy sculpture at a festival whether I should eat the candy or not. (I think I was an elementary school student. hehe) Then, the man answered,

"It is very nice to keep the candy in your fridge, girl, but if it is possible, I would love you to eat it because those candies were born to be eaten."
After I got my home, I ate the candy. It was really sweet and I can till remember the taste. haha

Born to be eaten...

It's like a phrase in movie or something, right? haha I think I was a little girl so the man said like that. Now I'm not a girl anymore so I think I know what he really wanted to say. If I keep the candy in fridge, I can see it whenever I like, but one day I might have to throw it away. That may be because the candy become old or something happen, but it is very wasteful so the man might ask me to eat the candy. In order to avoid candy to be thrown. ;)

I think his idea is coming from his love toward candy. (exactly "sweet memory", huh?)

I talked about candy sculpture only in Matsuri, but Candy sculpture is becoming art and one of the Japanese candy sculpture creator made this marvelous candy art below.

It's cluster amaryllis and a peacock. They are really made from candy. I've never seen this size of candy sculpture, but if I had any opportunity, I'd love to!!!!!!

I will put a link of how to make candy sculpture here so if you are interested in, check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQWr57t3BSM&feature=related

Thank you!!

TV ads in Japan

Hi, today was not very hot like last weekend. ;D
Today, I counted TV ads broadcasted on TV per an hour. I've recorded my favorite drama on Sunday so I will write about the drama briefly and report about the commercials.

The drama I am watching is "Marumo-no Okite" (Fuji-TV, channel 8). This is very famous family drama in Japan on Sunday 9:00-10:00 p.m. This is showing audiences about love among family and the kids actor are very cute. Each kids acting a sister and a brother who are both 7 years old and they are now quite famous because of their pretty appearance and actions.

Through this 1 hour drama, I watched total 10 TV ads.

I was expecting that I would see many food ads such as restaurant, fast food and juice during this 1 hour because this drama is very common among family and some kids also watch it. However, I watched only 1 commercial related to food and the product was water includes some mineral and nutrition. It was very surprising. ;( The other commercials were advertising almost about household products, detergents or air freshener.

Most of the things were related to household or sanitary products. I think this is because it is the very time that mothers finished their housework and take rest. In addition, many people already finished their supper and full before 9:00-10:00 p.m so they might not be attracted if they watch ads about food. In order to make ads more attractive, food companies might choose time to advertise their products. 9:00-10:00 p.m is family time, family gathers and watches TV so I watched lots of ads about sanitary or household products.

I also wathced a drama, Korean drama which my MOTHER likes. She begun to have interest to Korean drama quite lately and thanks to it, she learned how to REC TV program. Before she start watching the drama, she even did not know how to turn on the recorder. "What one likes, one will do best." Exactly. Anyway, the drama was about relationship between men and women, soap opera broadcasted during 14:00-15:00 p.m. :( The title of the drama is "Gyakuten-no Jou-ou" (Fuji-TV, channel 8).

I watched total 15 TV ads during 1 hour. The ads related to food was just 3 (KFC, Energy drink and Yorgurt). Other commercials were about insurance, laundry machine, brand bag, cram school, TV show's ad and so on. Again, the number of ads related to food was less than I've expected. I wondered it must be good for super market to advertise their products such as vegetables, meat and dairies because during the time lots and lots of housewives in Japan are watching TV especially soap opera. ;D

I watched TV ads per 1 hour and thought food industry might prefer to advertise their products for young generation, not mother or housewife. I think it is correct, it is efficient way to advertise to people because younger generation is much likely to go to fast food restaurant, eat snacks and drink juice. Mother and housewife much prefer information about household than fast food because households are what they are familiar with.

Through this activity, I realized how media is focus on their purpose to sell their products. People usually do not think why the TV ads they watch are broadcasted on the time, but once they notice the reason, they might start thinking about media. It is very important notice and I wanna share the idea that thinking about media and food from TV ads.

Thank you for reading!!!! ;D