Here I include sushi restaurant reviews and book reviews, as well as anything else that doesn’t fit into any other category.

Food blogging. It’s mostly written word, complemented by some (hopefully) beautiful photographs of delicious food, with maybe an occasional video or two thrown in the mix. Blogging’s easy. Anyone can do it (lots of people do, and very well at that!)

Then there’s podcasting. Another beast entirely. Wrought with all sorts of challenges and insecurities blogging doesn’t provide. (After all, who doesn’t think it’s really flipping weird, when made to listen to a recording of their own voice?)

Of course, there are also many of the same worries – will anyone show up? Will people like it? Am I just going to sound like an idiot, putting myself out there like this?

So why am I waxing poetic about the differences between blogging and podcasting? Well, I’ve been blogging for five years, two months, and seventeen days. (Not that anyone’s counting.) I’ve gotten that pretty well under my belt, even if we already know that I kind of suck at it (given that I got in… oh, about seven posts last year. Oops.).

But podcasting? Not really something I ever thought I’d do.

Ever.

Pfft. Who, me? Podcast? Yeah, right. I hate my voice! I suck at talking!

But then I was talking to my friend Greg (who is, himself, a podcaster), and he said, “You know, you should do a podcast. Yeah… you’d have a good subject for a podcast.” I came out of that conversation perplexed (I do? What could he possibly be talking about?)… but also intrigued.

After some serious thought (Son can tell you that I was talking about that conversation the rest of the evening), I decided that if I were to do a podcast, it would have to be about Japanese food. Of course. What else could I possibly talk about that would make a good podcast? (I doubt I could make either programming or dance interesting enough by myself to carry an entire podcast… especially with no previous podcasting experience under my belt.)

This was all hypothetical, of course. It’s not like I was actually considering doing a podcast.

But the seed had been planted. I knew I couldn’t do something like this myself (after all, all of my favorite podcasts feature multiple people – Spilled Milk, The Joy the Baker Podcast, The Table Set…) so just days later I asked Rachael Hutchings if she might be at all interested in doing a podcast with me.

(It was a surprise to me too… I asked her on a whim, completely spontaneously, knowing she was the only person I’d want to do a podcast like this with. But once I asked – and she said yes! – there was no turning back!)

In the span of a weekend, I went from never having even considered ever podcasting to seriously discussing putting together a podcast with my new partner in crime. (I’m still not even sure I believe this is all happening.) Two months later, we’ve already recorded several episodes and are ready to launch!

So without further ado, I bring to you the Miso Hungry Podcast!

Rachael and I have gotten together to bring to you a podcast all about Japanese food! So far we have three episodes ready for your listening pleasure: our Introduction, our first whole episode in which we talk about the Japanese New Year, and Episode 2 which is all about Candy!

You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes (and if you feel like it, we definitely appreciate your comments and ratings!)

(And if three episodes aren’t enough for you… we’re also doing a giveaway of Japanese candy over on the Miso Hungry Podcast site!)

Giveaway!

So to celebrate the launch of our podcast, I’m giving away one of these beautiful sushi necklaces from The Frippery Factory shop on Etsy!

All you have to do to enter is go over and check out our podcast, then come back here and leave a comment letting me know what you think, and what you’d like to hear us talk about in the future on the podcast! (One entry per person; you can enter until 11:59pm PST on Monday, January 23rd; winner will be chosen using random.org; anyone can enter – I can have it shipped internationally. If you want to leave a comment but don’t want to enter the giveaway, just let me know in your comment!)

And if you don’t win, or want to buy any of the other SUPER CUTE things she has in her store, the coupon code JAN2012 is good for 15% off throughout Etsy!

What about all those insecurities I talked about at the beginning of the post? Well, they’re still there, of course. (It continues to be seriously weird, listening to my own voice when I’m editing our podcasts.)

But one night, while working into the wee hours on our new podcast, I heard an interview that Carson Daly was doing with Chris Hardwick (The Nerdist), and this quote really resonated with me:

“It’s weird when I think about, that most people listen to the podcast than watch most cable channels. But you know, even if they… even if most of those people went away, we’d still keep doing the show. That’s kind of how I know it’s something I should be doing, because I would do it no matter what.”
-Chris Hardwick, nerdist.com

Even though I still worry no one will listen to the podcast (although it’s turning out far better than I had ever hoped it would), I’ll still do the podcast no matter what… because we have so much fun doing it.

Any of you who have been reading Sushi Day for a while know that I’m a huge supporter of seafood suppliers, restaurants, and people who sell, use, and educate people about sustainable seafood. (And if you’re new to Sushi Day? Well, now you know!)

By now, most of us have heard about the 8.9 magnitude earthquake in Japan, and the devastating tsunami that followed. I’ve been watching the news all night, and my heart hurts seeing all that’s happened over there. Image from Kyodo News I was in Japan about a year ago, and fell in love with the [...]

For a while now, I’ve been wanting to do a video or two on Sushi Day.

And as I’ve mentioned in years past, New Year’s day is a huge sushi day for the Japanese side of my family.

So Son and I figured, why not combine the two?

Without further ado… our first Sushi Day video! Straight from my itsy bitsy kitchen, on New Year’s morning 2011.

Silly, yes. But aren’t I always? It was definitely a fun little video to put together, even if I was really rushed trying to do a video and roll all twenty rolls of sushi for my family’s New Year’s celebration at the same time.

(That photo was of half of the final result.)

So what did you guys think? Was it awesome… or did it totally suck? Would you like to see any more videos here on Sushi Day? (Or should I not quit my day job? ~_^) And if you would like to see more, what sort of videos would you like to see? …I’m completely open to suggestions. ^_^

As I’ve mentioned in years past, sushi is a big tradition for my family (and many other Japanese families) on New Year’s day. (Gosh, I look so young in that post! No laughing.) I can’t remember a single year that we haven’t had some sort of sushi on New Year’s. And ever since I started Sushi Day four years ago, I’ve been the one to provide the sushi for my family.

So every year, this means buying a bunch of fish for my family. Nowadays, I try to be sustainable as I can. But I know as well as anybody how hard that can be when Japanese supermarkets stock so many types of unsustainable seafood on their shelves.

Because of that, I’m sure you can guess where I plan on buying my New Year’s sashimi this year. You know I’m a huge fan of I Love Blue Sea – I really can’t say enough good things about them. Their fish is fresh and delicious, and the entire experience of buying from them is fantastic.

Ever since getting to know Casson Trenor and going to the Mashiko dinner a year ago, I’ve been wanting to go to the sustainable sushi restaurant that Casson is part-owner of, Tataki.

A couple of weeks ago, Son and I went up to San Francisco for BlogHer Food. Or rather, I went for the conference, and he just tagged along.

Since we had a wedding to go to for a dear friend of mine from high school the next weekend, we decided to make a road trip out of it, and stay up in San Francisco the week between the conference and the wedding. (If you care to see what else we did on our trip, all our (mostly food) photos can be found on my flickr.)

So what to do during that week in San Francisco?

Well, if you’re me, the answer is obvious. There are two things in San Francisco that I’ve been dying to do for months now – eat at Casson Trenor‘s sustainable sushi restaurant, Tataki, (review coming soon!), and meet the guys from I Love Blue Sea (who I would have gotten to meet earlier, at an awesome sushi party that Rachael invited me to, except I just happened to be out of town that weekend.)

So I tweeted Martin, the owner of I Love Blue Sea, and asked if he and the guys would be available to meet with me that week and do an interview. Happily, they were! So here, for your reading pleasure, are the photos that Son took that day, and the interview with the men from I Love Blue Sea.

Congratulations to Katrina and Michelle! Thanks to Random.org, they’re the two winners of the Japan contest. You two will be getting your prizes in the mail soon!

If you’re looking for the Tour de France post, check it out on my other food blog, Fridgg!

On our second to last day in Japan, we visited the Ghibli Museum. You know the Japanese animated films like Totoro, Castle in the Sky, Kiki’s Delivery Service…? Well, Ghibli is the man who did all the art for those movies, and this museum is dedicated to him and his art.

You’re not allowed to take photos inside of the museum, but we did manage to sneak one picture of the robot statue on the roof…