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Origami Musubi

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Three years ago, I did a post on making spam musubi – traditional style – mounds of rice formed into rectangle cuboids, cooked spam slices on top, and wrapped with slightly wide nori. It would be good but take at least 30 minutes from start to finish, not including the time it took to cook the rice. The minimum yield would be 5 spam musubis, to make it worth the time and effort.

After Jalna’s pal Jenny’s post of “Origami Onigiri” showing how to make spam musubi, I tried it and LOVED it! SO easy, so fast, and I can use whatever rice I still have in the pot instead of making a full batch of rice. Here are my step by steps:

  • Cut a slit halfway up sheet of nori
  • Toast nori for better taste
  • Rice on top with cut below
  • Loaded with innards
  • 1st fold up
  • 2nd fold up
  • Last fold and Ready to eat!
  • Tulip, my preferred “spam” alternate with Vietnamese pickles
  • Alternate fillings – tuna/mayo and takuan, yum!

I hope you give this a try when you are craving a spam (or alternative tuna/mayo) musubi and just want to make one or two. Super fast, super easy, and variations can be whatever you want. These “pockets” allow for messier fillings that behave.

Thanks Jennie and Jalna!

A simple practice to feel better

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Aunty subscribes to a LOT of newsletters and info. Everyday I have updates on ebay searches, financial gurus, Honolulu Star Advertiser headlines, recipes, and more. Most emails go to the junk box because they are junk. Good or important ones are in my inbox. Sometimes I get one that is really really good, and that is what I want to share with you today.

Sacred Science is by Nick Polizzi. He did a documentary on 10 very sick people traveling to the forests of Peru to experience ancient therapies for their various illnesses. Not all were successful, but most were. One of the participants had diabetes and could not stand the dark and primitive conditions they were in because he was afraid of possible snakes so he left early – and even so, his diabetes became normal again.

Nick has continued to learn more and share what he learns and his latest project is on making our bodies and minds whole and healthy – Energy Healing.

For a very limited time, we are given free access to 3 short lessons for the next 3 days as a preview to the complete video course. I am very glad that I took the time to access Day 1’s lesson. Very short, very hands on, very powerful just by shaking out our hands, tapping on specific points, and saying affirmations. I like tapping on specific points that correspond to specific body organs and their functions. This was just what I needed this morning and I feel better after this 9 minute video.

I hope you give this a try, but please act fast before the freebie disappears. Here is the link: https://energyhealing.thesacredscience.com/video-day-1-int97_live/

Be well!

Dragons and Octopus

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I am a confessed Korean drama junkette BUT ever since I binge watched all the episodes and then the movie of Downton Abbey, Korean dramas have been topped and many of the offerings on Netflix do not thrill me like before. Have you watched Downton Abbey? The snobby Mary and the marvelous grandmother, Lady Violet and the plots, scenery, costumes, characters, time setting, etc. make it so deliciously memorable – and it got me spoiled.

So now I watch movies – mostly on Netflix – and they guiltily fill my evenings (actually waste my evenings). This week I found 2 that are outstanding and worth watching.

The first one is “Birth of the Dragon”. It is set in San Francisco with Bruce Lee in 1964 before he really got famous. He fought with a Shaolin kung fu master Wong Jack Man in an epic fight. I did not care for the actor who portrayed Bruce Lee – too smiley, cocky, and punk looking, but perhaps that is how he was in real life. I really liked Wong Jack Man and thought he was cute. Aunty Blossom is portrayed by “China’s Oprah Winfrey” Jin Xing. I google searched her because she looked like the Chinese girlfriend of the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’s ex-husband (see how I watch too much Netflix?). And it turns out that she is transgender. But I digress. The movie was well done and in English. It is based on a true story and fight. Not the typical Kung Fu movie with revenge and corny lines that Uncle used to love. Here is the trailer (isn’t the monk cute?)

The second really good movie that I watched on Netflix was “My Octopus Teacher”. I was surprised that I liked it so much. A movie about a man who finds an octopus in the kelp forest at sea? For real? Actually, it was for real, and SO well done. The photography is beautiful and the octopus stole the show. She was so smart and amazing. I don’t remember if the filmmaker named her but they had a relationship for over a year. I fell in love with that octopus without a name, and as a result, I don’t want to eat tako (octopus in Japanese) anymore. Here’s the trailer. Btw, the trailer doesn’t do it justice. The movie is awesomesauce.

Beef Barley Soup ala Jalna

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Pal Jalna makes my mouth water and my tastebuds go pitter patter. Her husband, son, nephew, and sister are such good cooks, and so is Jalna. This was one of her latest – Beef Barley soup – which I never had. Neither have my kids. It looked easy and I had everything but the barley (Times and Foodland didn’t have it). I found it at Whole Foods and got my beef shank cut at Foodland – 2 thick slabs with bone.

It seemed strange to cook meat and then add vegetables but NOT potato, but I did it because Jalna did it. Here is her recipe and the video that she watched:

Ingredients for four servings:


1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 pounds beef shank (2 thick slices), seasoned generously with salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 large onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, chopped fine
2 tablespoons tomato paste
4 cups chicken broth, plus more if needed
2/3 cup diced celery
2/3 cup diced carrots 
1 bay leaf
1/4 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/2 cup pearl or naked barley
salt to taste

Salt and pepper beef shank, brown on both sides in stew pot. Remove from pot. Deglaze pot with diced onion, stirring until translucent, then add chopped garlic. Add 2 tablespoons of tomato paste and stir until brownish. Add 4 – 5 cups of chicken broth, diced celery and carrots, bay leaf, and dried rosemary. Put beef shank back into pot, bring to boil, then down to simmer. Simmer for 3 hours.
Remove beef and bones (should fall apart) and set aside. Add 1/2 cup of barley and simmer until barley is cooked (about 45 minutes). Add beef back in to heat up on low for about 5 minutes.
Now enjoy!


So how was it? Winnahs!!! Really ono! Thanks Jalna!!

A favorite 60 year old – Ala Moana Shopping Center!

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A pal from high school sent this video link about the Ala Moana Shopping Center. We used to hang out there, with Liberty House being THE cream of the crop. Carol and Mary was also cream of the crop but they looked down on me – local girl who didn’t look rich. McInerneys was another snobby store and downstairs, Lynn’s had THE best pastrami sandwich on rye with dill pickles as well as delicious Chinese plate lunch choices like Panda’s of today.

I could spend all day there even though I only had $5 in my purse because I did a LOT of window shopping. The current owners are a Canadian company – Brookfield Properties. Over the years, Ala Moana Center has changed. Gone are the old stores that I liked (and didn’t like), but it is still an exciting place to shop and look.

Brookfield has plans to build 5 skyscrapers up to 400 feet high on the property, if they can. The current limit is 150 feet high. I will be watching this and hoping that they don’t get their way. We don’t need more high rises at million dollar price tags. Plant trees instead, please!

Who are you?

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Several posts ago I wrote about a statement I came across by Shelly Wilson. “I am a spiritual being having a human life experience.”

It is a really really hard concept to get because it feels like I am a human being that has spiritual insights, rather than vice versa. And being human really limits what I can do. It also boggles my mind and would take the biggest leap of faith to live as if I were a spiritual being and observe my human behavior and quirks as an experience rather than reality.

However, my friends and family know that I am weird and I subscribe to all kinds of financial, self improvement, health and well being sites. Some very conventional and useful, i.e. cooking with Nagi from recipetineats.com, some controversial, many blog sites of friends and friends of friends. Some are naturopathic, some are strange.

Today, I got an email from Nick Polizzi of Sacred Science about a video series called Inner Alchemy. As a teaser, we get 3 parts for free. The 1st part was the question, “Who Am I?” It is a short 7 minute video with Nick talking about that query. The assignment is to take a few minutes and write down our own answers.

I liked the exercise. Maybe you will too. And that’s my post for today.

The 10 second Rule

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My absolute favorite ice cream is Dave’s Green Tea in the cardboard like tub. Creamy, flavorful, and green with just the right taste of tea. I still remember a dessert from the Wisteria Restaurant – that iconic wonderful Japanese American restaurant with the best nishime, chicken with eggplant and almost everything else they served. The dessert I loved there was a scoop of green tea ice cream topped with lime shaved ice. Super delish!!! However, it is so sad that they packed it all up and closed several years ago.

But I digress. The reason I wrote this post was to share Aunty’s tip on serving ice cream from the freezer. I used to have the kids be in charge of scooping out the ice cream from the containers because it would be so cold – rock hard and very difficult to scoop out – even with the best scoops and dipping it in hot water, etc. They struggled and struggled, and succeeded because their desire to eat ice cream surpassed the effort and muscle they had to put in.

One day, without any kids to help, I wanted to have just a bit of wonderful green tea ice cream. I stuck our best scooper in the tub and couldn’t even make a dent because it was rock hard cold. Hmmm. I could wait but then I might forget it and it the whole thing would melt. I could put it in the refrigerator and return in about an hour but I wanted it right then and there.

So, I stuck the container in the microwave and heated it for 10 seconds. And by golly, the ice cream soften up enough to easily scoop it into my bowl and was perfect!

Why 10 seconds? I dunno. Maybe 8 will work, maybe 12 will work. In any case, because of that I am eating more than I should. However, somehow, life is even more wonderful when eating something as delicious and refreshing as a scoop of ice cream. That must count for something, right?

How to make Black Garlic

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Black Garlic is the latest addition to my daily arsenal. Yasumi Gojo of Healing Seitai gave me a few heads of black garlic and asked me to try them. Her husband made them in an old rice cooker and she was sharing it with her clients. Some of them reported better blood pressure and better health. Pal Ryuko who is in the beginning stages of Parkinson’s says it makes her feel stronger. I think that it is making my grey hair black again!

I began to eat one clove a day in the morning and increased to 3 cloves a day. I do like the taste of garlic and the only difficult part of it is peeling the paper off – but it is easy enough to do.

Yasumi taught me how to make this great health supplement with a rice cooker, and I now make my own black garlic with a lot of extra to share.

The recipe

  • Peel off most of the paper from each head of garlic (actually, this step is not necessary). I use the Christopher Ranch bag of raw garlic from Costco because it is grown in California. I can fit about 18 heads of garlic in the 5 cup rice cooker.
  • Lay down a layer of wooden chopsticks or popsicle sticks on the bottom of the rice pot so the garlic is not resting on metal. Cover the sticks with a paper towel, then pile in the garlic heads. Try to keep the garlic away from the side of the pot so it doesn’t burn. Cover the pile of garlic with another paper towel.
  • Close the lid, plug in the rice cooker, and set it on “warm”. Leave the rice cooker on warm for 10 days. The smell is quite strong during the first few days so I keep it in the garage. Unplug the cooker and remove the bulbs when cool enough to handle.
  • Line the bottom with wooden sticks
  • Cover with a paper towel
  • Add the cloves of garlic – try not to let it touch metal..
  • Cover with another paper towel.
  • Cook on the warm setting for 10 days
  • Ta Dah! Black garlic!

And that’s it! I store the blackened bulbs in a bowl on my kitchen counter and peel and eat 3 cloves every morning. When my supply starts to get small, I start a new batch in the rice cooker. Actually, I am constantly making batches of black garlic because I like to share with others who are interested and may have some issues that it could help, just as Yasumi Gojo shared with me.

Costco also sells black garlic. I like the bottle it comes in, and each bulb has only one round clove in it! However, it is rather pricey and it is also from China. Pal Wandaful said she looked up “black garlic from China” and didn’t like how sketchy their practices are with bleach and questionable fertilizers.

I think that I am having more benefits from taking black garlic than my hair getting darker, but I can’t say for sure. It is a natural remedy that has and entourage effect. I just learned about that while researching the benefits of CBD and cannabis. It is the effect on one’s body that doesn’t just treat one thing. It treats everything.

And for that, I am more than willing to have garlic breath in the morning until I brush my teeth. And since we still wear face masks, nobody really notices anyway.

Google Ad Sensing

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It is hard not to notice, but Honolulu Aunty now has ads on her website. Sorry if it offends my readers – I will make them less obtrusive in the next few days.

I used to have Google Adsense installed in my old website format and then I disconnected from it when I had error problems. That didn’t correct my error problems (still working on the comment error that pops up) with this new WordPress theme that I recently installed. Websites are like gardens – needing constant weeding and transplanting.

The way Adsense works is that I get fractions of pennies when people visit, and if anyone clicks on an ad, I get pennies. Then, after I get 7000 pennies, Google sends me a check for $70. Woohoo! Granted, it takes me about 2 years to make enough pennies to get paid.

Last I checked, I had $69.12 accrued in the account – not enough to get paid, but it was just sitting there after 3 years. So, I had to ask my techie son how to get back in the game of getting pennies again, for it is quite a thrill to get paid without doing much. My monthly social security checks are like that. And I do love and appreciate them.

Mahalo for putting up with Aunty. One of these days I will really retire and not check on my Ameritrade account, the price of bitcoin, or do real estate research. One of these days, but not soon.