brownies and rusk

my mom used to bring these home all the time. i got them as a birthday gift from my step-mom/dad's friend sachiko. i love this rusk. it's really light and not too crunchy and perfectly sweet. i wish it came with larger portions, though.



last night i ate dinner at my dad's house. i've been promising him desserts for a while. he thinks of me as a really great baker (i think i kind of am, too). so i made a trip to the grocer and made these from scratch.



mac nut brownies
(recipe from hilaire walden's "the great big cookie book")

ingredients:
1 and 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, unsalted
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
pinch of salt
6 oz white chocolate
6 oz semi-sweet or dark chocolate
6 oz milk chocolate
1 and 1/2 cup unsalted macadamia nuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9in. springform pan (a regular circular 9in cake or pie pan will do). Sift flour, baking powder, and salt into a bowl. In a small saucepan, heat the butter, sugar, and white chocolate until it's smooth. Cool, then mix in eggs, vanilla extract, and the sifted mixture into the pot. Then stir in the chocolate chips. Pour into baking pan, making sure the mixture is level.

Bake this for 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Sprinkle the milk chocolate on top and bake for another minute. Take it out of the oven and with the back of a spoon, spread the milk chocolate evenly. Sprinkle macadamia nuts and then press it into the chocolate. Let it cool. With a knife, run around the edges of the pan to loosen.

anyway. the brownies are AMAZING. shocked at how good of a job i did. :)

i love omiyage

so the best part about being japanese is that my people have some sickening obsession with bringing back gifts from our adventures abroad. unfortunately, i don't have a ton of friends frequenting the motherland (japan) nor relatives that come visit me here in hawaii that often. but luckily, my mom has made friends with a new vendor for her company (she works in the tourism industry) and he is constantly flying back and forth. my mom asked me what i wanted from tokyo. my answer? this.

http://www.tokyobanana.jp/

my first encounter with a tokyo banana was in the fall of 2006. i was working at a restaurant in waikiki and one of my coworker's parents were in town. she brought some food gifts for everyone and was handing them out in the back office. i picked it up and said "what is this? a twinkie?" and everyone started laughing. "what, you've never seen a tokyo banana before?" i shrugged, ripped the plastic wrapper off and shoved the soft cake into my mouth.

oh. my. god. it's the softest sponge you'll ever EVER eat with this light, creamy (but not too much so) banana flavored filling. i know people are always skeptical when it comes to banana flavored things... apparently it's a hard flavor to replicate. but trust me, there is something just jaw-dropping amazing about this. i am in love.

a quick google search seems to show that most people have mixed reactions about my favorite little cake of all time. to them i say screw you. more fucking tokyo banana for me. i should also mention there is a choco-tokyo banana! except it looks like a poop because it's brown. still good! they also have a bunch of other amazing things. wafer-like cookies, strawberry banna, etc etc. the list goes on.

anyway back to my mom and this super awesome faceless nameless guy. hey, man, thanks so much. this is the third box he's brought back for me and well? to be honest? i think you might be a god or deity or something. thank you so much for your generosity. i owe you so much.

now excuse me while i gorge myself in what is so holy and right.