Popeye

So a pretty interesting thing that I learned not to long ago, is that our dear and beloved Popeye and Mario could have turned out all too differently.

For starters, Popeye would have become even more of an iconic figure and still prominent to this very day. And Mario, he would not have ever come to pass the light of the tele screen.

You see what happened way back when (1981) was, after the war and Japan and America came to be on friendlier terms, with America having had a helping hand in rebuilding a lot of Japan and all, some Japanese game makers took this strange idea over to America to try to obtain rights and license for the use of the characters from Popeye in their video game. Well this idea didn't go over so well and rights were not immediately obtained.
So who else should Miyamoto use in his game but some original characters. And thus Jumpman  as well Donkey Kong, were invented. Ok I think we all know that Jumpman just may or may not be the most original name ever. I mean honestly, I think my brother came up with better names for our dog when he was 6. So later this carpenter underwent some layoffs and rehiring, under an akin specific skill set, and ended up finding a new job as a plumber. He was also was gifted with a name change. A name we have all grown to know and love and is known throughout any gaming household. Mario.
Donkey Kong was of course born from the then popular culture reference of King Kong, the 1976 film, and everyone's new found love for apes with Jane Goodall and Planet of the Apes. Ok, those two references were neither new found and hardly contemporary, but they did likely do a lot in fueling the monkey-centric culture enthusiasts as well as science and evolution research. The reason for his very being was largely due to the Japanese video game industry trying to break into the American market. Which, with this very game, Donkey Kong, they succeeded. You can imagine the makers of Popeye kicking themselves now.
With no royalties to pay for the use of the popular characters, Nintendo ended up making much more money they they very likely expected. And on top of that, they even had people pay them royalties as the use of their characters, as they began to become the faces of consumer products and commercialism. Needless to say, where the success followed, so did more games, becoming a much bigger name and franchise than Popeye ever did.

But imagine, if the license had been acquired, and the project went through, we may be very well cheering on a very different protagonist when playing the weekly bout in Super Smash Brothers.

Later, after their first major success, Nintendo did acquire Popeye rights. But the damage was done, they were a success with Jumpman and Donkey Kong to the point where they started having a release every year or every couple of years. They did, however, end up make a Popeye game the year following the Donkey Kong release, but that franchise had its days numbered. It came out with a solitary video game, and a sequel a year later that was mostly for educational purposes(teaching English to Japanese people).

Rub-a-Dub-Dubb!

So I know I already did a little post on onsens, but last night was my first bath house experience.

Bath houses are different from onsens in that there is no natural spring water at a bath house. Onsens thrive off of their projected image that it is a very natural bath and that you are bathing in the earth's very own water pools. However bathhouses on the other hand  are just that, a bathhouse. Sometimes they will have saunas too, and typically more than one type of bath, as they normally have to offer more than you can do at your own home so that they maintain a draw for people to come to the bathhouse.
It is not that I haven't gone for any particular reason. It is just cold out, I have to ride my bike there, it is mostly old biddies, I would get stared at, I have to pay to bath where I have a nice bath at home, I have to bring all my toiletries. I mean there is a whole list of little things always holding me back.
Well last night I decided it was sauna time. And where best to go to a sauna, but a nice bath house.
When I got to the bath house, I could tell immediately it was very old lady-ish/man-ish. Basically the style was pretty outdated and only biddies were the occupants on my side. What makes it outdated? Well the floor was tatami, which in itself is not really enough to make it outdated, after all my new apartment has a room with a tatami floor. But the making up mirror, was lacking in space and efficiency. The hair dryer was from the 60's, all the room decor seemed from around the same era. It was just all plastic and cheap looking and perfect. I mean I am not looking for any fancy place like those marble floored jimjilbangs in Korea. Though I sincerely love those places. Best bathhouses ever. But this place had a real Termae Romae feeling. If you have no seen that movie, put it on you list. Highly amusing. Basically, I was in the exact same situation, a young gaijin in a fairly outdated in function and patronage environment looking to take a bath. I even heard one of the biddies mention that name under giggles as she directed me about the room grabbing baskets for my clothes and toiletries and what not. I think she actually enjoyed herself.

So step one as always was to get naked. Check.
Proceed to baths and hose off and enter sauna.
Recently I read something interesting on the effects the saunas on skin and I was interested in trying it out. Pretty much you wash, but with only water, you enter the sauna and stay for 10 minutes and then you exit and pour cold water over your body starting with the extremities and working inwards. Basically toes to thighs, fingers to pits, and head and then back. You don't want to pour the cold water directly over your heart to start but cool the blood down from the farthest point and work inwards are the blood is pumped back to the heart. Once you have cooled yourself thoroughly, and I do mean thoroughly, you once again enter back into the sauna for another 10 minutes. and repeat a few times.

This bath house in particular I am fond of, even though I had never been before, on the outside of their doors, they would always list the bath of the day. And I just think it is pretty neat that they change the flavors every day or so. Last nights stew was blueberry. It was a violent shade of  violet, the kind where your skin looks a healthy shade of magenta when you look at it from above the water. So after my final sauna repetition, I showered off my sweat and entered into the blueberry bath. Now that is not something you type everyday. It's smell was a bit off from blueberries, but I suppose it was close enough. And just so you know, when they say blueberry bath, they don't mean real blue berries. It is likely a packet or mixture for the stew that they pour in there to simulate the effects and color of blue berries. Come on. It can't be real blue berries. It was only 300yen to get in. Now Ryokans, I am pretty sure some of them will have real flowers, teas, or yuzu floating around in their baths, but then again you pay more like 15000yen to get in to one of those if not more.

But the blueberry bath was actually not what was most special, it is only what I thought would be most special. What was most interesting was the electrocution bath next to it. You think I'm joking don't you?I was chilling in the blueberry stew and as I usually do, I test the water of the bath next to mine. I like to plan and test things in preparation for the next stew I would like to get into. Immediately upon placing my fingertips in the water, I felt this buzzing sensation. Like when you go to some sciencey store that is geared towards kids and they have that big electric glass ball where if you keep your hands on it for long enough your hair will stand on end.I probed further. and put up to my wrist in. I felt this jerking sensation. I pulled my hand out. Nothing. Back in the blueberry bath. Nothing. Back into the neighboring pool. Electrifying. Ok interest piqued. Yeah it doesn't take much. Just something mildly dangerous. So I get out. Unsure of the protocol, I use cold water to rid myself of the blueberry dashi so I don't contaminate the next pool, meanwhile cooling myself down. I make my way back to the electrocution pool. I sit at the edge and ease my toes into it. Not so bad. I go to my knee. My leg starts compulsively jerking around in the water. My whole body is shaking with the reaction. I am still in control of my body and senses. It is not like I am really being electrocuted, just merely like someone hooked up some electrodes to my knee and set them to high. I get curious about my thighs. There are not reflex point there. I slip the one leg in further. And tense. The current still has my leg shaking but to a much lesser degree. Now it is like a first date leg jitters and I discover is I put more concentration into maintaining the stillness of my leg, it still less and I am effected less. Let me give you more of an explanation of the currents effect on my leg. When applied to my calf, the current makes it spasm in rhythm to its pulses which are often and frequent. Maybe less than a second apart. This current at that location feels like I could easily be cramping up soon and have the worst charlie horse of my life. So what do I do, of course? Go in further. Duh, no brainer. I get brave and put both legs in and watch them spasm uncontrollably a bit longer before I decide to ease myself in more. I touch bottom. I am standing towards the side where the currents have less power. I slowly make my way between the fields. And pain. Such bright hot pain. I have not ever really felt that way before. Vision going hazy just a bit. My back, which has been hurting for a while is not actually spasming, but something inside is highly displeased with my action. Vision regained, I most back to the side. Think about it and try my other side. Fine. Until that one location on my right side. So either there is an organ there that dislikes what I do to it or that part of my back is a lot more distressed than I thought. Meanwhile. I am standing nearly wholely between the two fields. It makes my stomach feel a little funny. So I stand still and lean against one of the walls of the bath with my arms outside and my body standing inside. I was admiring how if I merely slip my elbow into just a bit of the water my arm will go haywire. Flopping all around. I must have seemed like such a child to the biddies there, who were doing their best to ignore my antics. Of course when my elbow was not in the water, my arm would still involuntary jerk a bit. It was a bit grotesque to see the skin jumping back and forth as it is strained and relaxed, my whole arm slightly twitching because the rest of my body is in the pool. I experiment further. I sink a bit. My shoulders are in the water. Shoulders are always a weak point. My heart is submerged. I can feel it start to speed up. Like I am having a serious adrenaline rush. And then decide that this bath is certainly not for the elderly. I notice an underwater tiled bench and think who is crazy enough to even try to relax in this bath. The current is way too high to attempt sitting. I rise up deciding that for my first time, heart submerging is not the best idea and reemerge a bit. I only decide to stay in a bit longer before making my way out  and to go into the final bath. A normal hot water bath. Normalcy. After removing myself from it. I feel light headed. Very much so. Hazy vision again. I closed my eyes and regained balance and composure. I can't have these biddies laughing at me for falling on the floor now. So note to self. Upon exiting that bath. Exit slowly. And don't faint. That would be embarrassing. And I have had quite enough of that.
So besides the electrocution bath, the only other baths were a very normal bath with normal hot water and the cold bath where I had been splashing myself with cold water and cooling down. Nicely normal. Apart from the baths and the sauna, the walls are lined with faucets and shower heads for washing up. I finish up, shower, and leave.

Back to the changing room, there is a short row of sinks for face washing and teeth brushing and whatever else you felt too uncomfortable to do in the bath. Drying, and dressing, I participate in the all too typical after sauna and bath affair of drinking a nice cold glass of milk coffee out of the fridge. Most every place will have a fridge full of beverages for whatever you desire(beer, milk, cider, soda, coffee, juice), they also might have hard boiled eggs. For whatever reason, hard boiled eggs are commonly found and eaten at these places. Hair dryers are also found at these places, and the nicer places, these will be free, but at this one it was all of 10 yen per minute. Not bad.
Now for the bike ride home with the new falling snow. Best thing about these places is they make you nice and warm for hours to come.
Needless to say, I'm going back next week.


THERMAE ROMAE trailer with English Subtitles

Study Time

I have been extraordinarily bad with my blog lately.

I am actually studying to take the JLPT 3 in July. I am not really starting to study now, but I am more seriously starting as of now (like 4-5 hours a day - whenever I am not in class). I have had no formal training, classes, or anything. Pretty much the only thing I have going for me is that I took Chinese years ago and some of the kanji is similar. Oh and I live in Japan. I guess that is a pretty big influence on me as well.
Well in any case, I have been devoting the time I would normally take to write in here or put pictures up or promote it into studying lately. I will of course keep you updated with my progress and results as it happens, but for now I thought I would share some awesome learning sites for everyone who is learning more or less anything.

First I would like to recommend Memrise a pretty good site for pretty much anything you want to learn, but especially languages. I really like their JLPT section featured by JLPT Boot Camp. This site is really awesome because it has a strong focus on long term memory. You first start out and learn your words through a series of multiple choice and typing from memory as well as a repetitive vocalization of the word. And then you progress into testing yourself hours later on how well you can recall the words. And then you are tested again at different intervals depending on how well you remember the words. Like if you remember a word every time, the intervals would seem something like 4 hours, 12 hours, 2 days, 4 days, 7 days...etc but if you forget at 7 days, and you quiz yourself, the next interval might be set at 4 days so as to prompt your memory sooner and ingrain that long term recall. Pretty neat right? Not enough for you? They also have a little side scoreboard that lets you track your progress through the week, month, and all of time versus the other users. It would be a lie if I told you I wasn't secretly competitive about it...

Next I would like to recommend Study Blue this is another type of flashcard site that track your progress for individual cards and a deck as a whole. You can either make your own flash cards or search and practice with someone else's pre-made deck. An additional bonus is that when you make your own it will prompt you with several pre-made selections for the definition side if you should choose. This is quite handy because there is a mobile app for it as well. So you can study on your computer as well as on your phone. It is pretty nifty in that it saves where ever you happen to stop, so you can resume your study session from where you ended it. Even from your phone to computer.

Anki is one that I have, but I have not used yet as I have been so busy with memrise that I just have not found my way there yet, but I have been told that it is a site much like memrise and will focus on long term memory storage. I will probably start using it more once I have completed all my memrise flashcards. It also has a mobile app that you have to pay for (thus deterring me).

Next is the JLPTbootcamp. I originally found their stuff through the Memrise site and have yet to really explore their site, but I can tell you that I have their podcasts on my computer.

Lastly is Japanesepod101 I even got a premium account with them, not that you need it. But I have their stuff on my phone as well and it is perfect to listen to on the way to and from work in the morning. It is a really nice way to remember certain things and make yourself feel better about knowing them. I really like the format that they have done things in, both English and Japanese. The Japanese is not fast and is spoken in a really neutral way so that it is nice and easy to understand. Also they have some pretty good tips for the JLPT in their podcasts.

I have also been using the Genki book. Well I have two books. One is the Genki book(s) and the other is a pretty good book called JBridge. It might be some kind of Cambridge knock off? Well either way, it is a pretty good book, but it requires more effort as more is required of you. You really have to study what they want you to do. Both books have CDs to test you listening as well as reading and writing. Genki is nicer in that it really takes the time to explain the grammatical points to you in English. I think Genki is a bit slow, but that might be due since I started on the other one and then decided I needed a little more help before I continued it. It is said that after you finish the Genki series you should be ready for the JLPT 3. Well let's hope that is true!

I will update and post more as I find them and decide upon their usefulness

Be my バレンタイン!

So as most of you might know, Valentines Day in Japan is totally the opposite of Valentines Day in America. Girls give the chocolate and guys get the chocolate. But worry not girls! Your day will come. Only it is a month later.

This year I decided to outdo myself from previous years (hah! past-me has got nothing on me!), and I gave all my teachers little gift bags of American candies. Starburst, Jolly Ranchers, Lollipops, Twizzlers and some Gummi Bears. Yeah not all totally American, but who cares, candy is candy. So I have bought their love for a day. This practice is common with their little omiyage gift giving every time they go somewhere, I always get little rice cracker presents from whatever prefecture it was influenced by whatever the city specialty is, and trust me, every city has a specialty. Perhaps next year I will make myself even more loved and give everyone some hand made chocolates...but that gets expensive...

Speaking of handmade chocolates, it is totally the norm for girls to stay up all hours the night before Valentines making chocolates for the boys whom they wish to woo. So like any other girl, I got all my preparations and got down to it. Something you may or may not know about me, is that I actually really like baking and dessert making. I also really enjoy making chocolates. I am always looking for new recipes to try.
Now as far as your preparations can go, the local dollar store can take you a long way. I am talking about some serious Daiso action (Flet's didn't really have what I wanted/needed). There you can get decorative pens, loads of decorative boxes for putting your chocolate in, foils, mould, the chocolate itself, confectioneries for topping, and a load of assortments for making your Valentines day treats the best. And then, where to go next? I just hit up the local grocery store. I got a few bags of 120g chocolate in some different flavors: strawberry, white and milk, they have dark, but I am not fond. I don't care how healthy you say it is. So here is what I ended up with:

• 2 silicon moulds for making a chocolate shell (makes 2 chocolates each) I would also like to add that I went back and bought 4 more later!
• 1 silicon mould of small girly shapes (for decorative toppings)
• 2 bags of white chocolate
• 3 bags of milk chocolate
• 1 bag of strawberry chocolate
• 2 small bags of small strawberry chocolate pearls
• 1 edible shiny decorating balls
• 2 white chocolate decorating pens
• 1 decorative tin (to hide in his lunch box) 
• 1 decorative box (for everything else)

aforementioned mould

Yeah it is a lot. And that isn't even all of it. I actually went on a crazy run last night looking for more of the silicon moulds. Those things are awesome, they save me so much mess and trouble. So I went to 3 Daiso's and was bolting in as the 'goodbye song' was playing scanning for the moulds. I finally found them and I recall them locking the doors on me as I was in the store. I think they were pretty tired from all the days business and had that look to them as they rang me up. You know which one. So I bought 4 more and now I could make 12 chocolates at a time.
It was really a perfect system, the moulds with their chocolate would be cooling in the fridge and as each finished I would fill it, seal it, put more chocolate in the mould and then the next would be ready to fill. Not a moments rest.

So the recipes...
I made cinnamin, raspberry, and peanut butter, and the day is not quite over so I am toying with making either a pink grapefruit with strawberry coating or an apple, or maybe even a cinnamin apple!


Cinnamon White Chocolate Truffle
So first, my pride and joy of the experiment, is the cinnamon. This is an original recipe I made up through the combined powers of my love for white chocolate and its dirty affair with cinnamon. Here are the ingredients

• white chocolate 240g
• cinnamon 1tbsp
• butter 2tbsp
• whipping cream 100ml

So first I divided the chocolate in 2 and  broke 120 grams of it up in a bowl. I am not sure if this matters, but I used a plastic bowl from Ikea which I would normally say is a bad idea (at least for melting chocolate). 

Next I set to pouring the cream into a saucepan and slowly heating it while adding the cinnamon to it. As for the cinnamon, I literally used a table spoon. Like one you eat your peas with. They do measurements differently here in Japan and I had to improvise a bit, after all that has to be the reason it is called a tablespoon...right??

Once the concoction is simmering and the cinnamon is well ingrained in the mixture, I poured it over the chopped chocolate. 

I had thought that this would settle it and the chocolate would melt. Not so. So I took the bowl and set it over a vat of boiling water to melt it. 

Slowly stirring it, I added the butter and continued to stir until everything was consistent. I then covered it directly (as in right on top of the ganache layer) in cling wrap and let it set at room temp for 4 hours. 

Meanwhile, I took those little moulds I told you about and filled them with the remaining white chocolate 120g (heated in a metal bowl over the large vat of boiling water) and pressed down their insert in so that they formed a nice shell and set them in the fridge. Now those only take about 20-30 to solidify. 

Warning and advice:

1. 120g of chocolate will only make about a dozen truffle shells, but you will still have a bunch of left over ganache for more. 

2. When warming the chocolate, it is really important to pay attention to the texture of the chocolate. If it starts to get oddly lump or hardening a bit, it means it is burning, and will not taste as good. Trust me on the taste. And once you burn it a bit, you tend to burn it a lot. I don't know how chocolate does it, but once you mix in a little burnt chocolate, it all seems to want to burn and go bad. And yes, I did burn a little bit last night, but no where near the amount as before, so what I did to salvage it, was to press the chocolate into the small decorative mould for mini chocolate toppings. 

So after you are entirely ready with your moulds and the ganache you made earlier (the cinnamon stuff), you can hand rolls the ganache into little balls and place it in the mould and stick the two shells together to make a nice neat little truffle. I really cant express how much I like these moulds. They make filled truffles so easy and really more importantly so pretty. 

And then when you are all done. Decorate.

Raspberry Truffles

I think I make this one almost all the time. It is pretty much a signature now haha!

• 1 jar of raspberry preserves
• 500g chocolate
• 100ml whipping cream
• Butter (if desired)

Heat the whipping cream (Japan does not have easily accessible heavy cream, so I make do) and add half (or one forth if the jar is really big. Everything in Japan is small) the jar of preserves to it stir until emulsified. 

Pour over 200g of chopped chocolate.

Heat if necessary until chocolate is melted. Heat it in a bowl held over a pot of boiling water. 

If you wish to add butter now, please do so and stir until melted.

I put this one in the fridge to set for a few hours until hardish. Disclaimer: mine never hardened all too well, so I moved it to the freezer and decided to screw it because the mixture was delicious and I wanted it in truffles.

I made the chocolate shells with the rest of the chocolate, heated in a similar fashion, and let those in the fridge for a good half hour. 

When I, and the 'ganache' (let's face it, it wasn't, but what it was, was delicious so it wasn't going to waste), were ready, I used a spoon to scoop some out filling and would lightly with the tips of my finger tips, try to ball it a little and push it gently into the shells. If you handle it too much with your hands it goes everywhere, you hands are messy, and the chocolate is too warmed. And it makes handling the rest of the filling and chocolate just too difficult. So this part is done with minimal touching. I cap the half shell and make it a whole, seal it and set it in the fridge. 

I say seal it, meaning you can use some molten chocolate, or really, nothing. The shell will stay in place either way. If you seal it with molten chocolate, it ensure none of your filling will leak out and it will look more professional, but if you get lazy, you can just push the two together and be done. Also another really good way, which is probably the cleanest and neatest and looks the best, is by using the decorating pen. Just heat the chocolate decorating pen until the chocolate inside is liquid and then cut the tip and squeeze some out around the edges of your shell halves.

Set the finished product in the fridge until you declare it decorating time. 

Peanut butter
The lazy man's (woman's) recipe. I did these last at night. I was extremely tired. And I decided that Reeses, they have been doing this for years. They know their stuff. So I pretty much only made shells and put some of JIFs crunchy peanut butter inside. in any case.

• ~120g milk chocolate
• a tub of JIF

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler (metal bowl over pot of boiling water)
Pour the molten chocolate in the moulds
Cool
Add peanut butter and close the shell
...its real difficult. I know

The Sad Stuff

Kind of real post here.

When you go away, you need to know that things will happen. Unchangeable things. People will die. Pets will die. Your parents will move and your childhood home will belong to someone else. Yeah, the backyard fort too. 

You might even feel that somehow this might all be tied to you in someway. You feel responsible for for it and might try to move back. Perhaps you are right. In one of my cases I had a love bird who was pretty young, only 3 years old. And barely that. My sad news of his death came last November. I didn't even get to see him at Christmas. And his death was pretty sudden too. He lacked for no food and no drink and was entertained by another nearby bird. He showed no signs of sickness, but was one day irrevocably dead. I have been gone for years now, but that didn't stop my dream that I was going to go back and pick up things where I last left them. My bird would love me and cuddle me again, my dog would not be an old lady, Gwen would still hate me and the world. Well at least the last one would still be true for now. And perhaps if I was indeed home, it would not have happened, perhaps Goose died from lack of emotional attachment. Who knows really. You can't go back and change it sadly. But moving back now? After the fact? That won't change anything. 

Another sad story was just before my first year ended abroad. It was July 4th and I was in Korea, my grandfather died. Good Ole Granddad, a world war two vet and a model train enthusiast and probably one of the people that convinced me to see the world, had been having lots and lots of trouble lately. He had been suffering cardiac arrests, strokes, arthritis  and I think even his last stroke was so bad it left him in a terrible state where it was hard for him to do much besides sleep. He wasn't really expected to make it too long but I still had hope that he could make it until I saw him one last time. That didn't happen. But our goodbye was perfect and memorable and he was still fully functioning and I am sure he would want me to remember him that way. Being home instead of in Korea would never have changed his condition, but it might have eased his burden a small bit, he wouldn't have to stress and worry about the only adventurous grandchild to go out into the world alone and forget her sword. But either way, it was his time soon. You can only struggle for so long. 

Now my greatest fear is something happening to my wonderful cook of a grandmother. The one who makes me the worlds best cheesecakes every time I visit. The one who would entertain me for days upon days so my parents could get the Christmas shopping done. The only one I have left. I am lucky though that she seems to be in perfect health, weak at the joints, but fine otherwise. Christmas' are still the event of the year. 

The last one I mentioned about parents moving from your childhood home, that hasn't happen yet, and in fact it isn't really even my childhood home, but the one I identify with most (also it is seriously awesome), but they tell me it will happen. They tell me it will happen before I make it back home permanently even. Just another shoe waiting to drop.

And now what has happened to make me write this post. My dog has cancer.

 You might think oh but you still have have time to go home and see her one last time. Sadly I don't. Her cancer is terminal and  it is so rapid that in less than one week it has began and swelled to such a size that for a normal vet to call it inoperable. We will take her to a specialist soon and see what they say, but the future looks pretty grim. It had probably first started with this cell mass that we saw back in November and had removed and then in December, she was coned the entire month. She then had a cracked tooth in mid January which we had to get pulled. And after that, my parents came to visit me in Japan, unfortunately, when they got back at the end of January, just a few days later, the tell tale lump was waiting for them. And it is additionally really sad since we had a vet assistant coming and feeding her and walking her every day since she was on drugs for the tooth while my parents were gone. Since it was noticed it was quintupled in size and spread from her neck to an area just behind her ears. Her time is short and my parents and brother are doing their best to make sure that it is the best possible for her. 

Going abroad you have a choice. You have the choice to leave it all behind and be selfish, experience culture, mentally grow in exponential proportions, and let us not forget, have the adventure of a lifetime. But things will change. People move on, pet move on, your friends will move, your parents. When you go back it will almost be like starting over. You need to properly grieve for everything, miss them, and love them, but not regret anything. So going abroad is not for the weak of will, or overly emotional. But I can promise you, living abroad is not something I have once regretted. 

Zenzai

One of my favorite winter treats is zenzai.

It is a really simple sweet soup dessert. It pretty much consists mostly of a liquidy red bean soup. I know I know...red bean yeah yeah gross. Normally I am not the biggest fan either, they are actually just a bit too sweet for me. But for some reason this soup is less sweet than the bread. So as I was saying, it pretty much only consists of this liquid red bean stuff and some mochi. Really simple right? Of course you have to warm up and cook the mochi first before you add it to the soup, but over all, not a big deal.
And the BEST part about it? It is really REALLY easy to make. You can simply buy dried mochi and a can of the red bean stuff. You have to give the mochi its texture back, so you cook it a little in some water giving it its moisture and possibly then microwave or pan fry it for quickness if you prefer. And then you heat up the red bean canned deliciousness, add the mochi and BAM. done. fantasticness....I want some...

There are actually two different forms of zenzai that I have encountered and one is more watery and one is a thicker soup where the beans are more frequent and crushed and the watery one, the beans are left more whole. Both are really delicious.

You can actually eat this in the summer as well. I am pretty sure China first trademarked that (as well as the whole zenzai food tradition). You simply put the red bean paste over ice and add some sweetened condensed milk for some nice summer flavor, and any other suitable flavoring. They eat this pretty much all over Asia from what I can tell. China, Korea, Japan, and I honestly would swear I had something all too similar to the summer variation when I was traveling SE Asia as well.