Tamagoyaki Attempt #3

Last night my mommy in law made her shoyu chicken wings, which are really good, but really high in points. The taste outweighed my points conservation though, so I packed 2 of them to eat for today’s lunch. That would have been awesome except I forgot it on her kitchen counter! Very typical of me.

So anyway, I had to come up with something from scratch again, which I seem to be doing rather often. Unfortunately, I am nowhere near as fast as the Queen of Speed bentos over at Lunch in a Box. In fact, considering the time it takes me to do these, I’m the polar opposite. I don’t consider that a good thing. Okay, so I decided to try some tamagoyaki again with my expensive ass tamagoyaki pan from the local Japanese ripoff store, Shirokiya. I’d seen a cool video on YouTube and that woman’s recipe included potato starch to make it roll nicer. Well, I forgot to buy potato starch last time I was at the market, so I ended up trying Biggie’s recipe. She’s got a super awesome tutorial here.

I read that and thought, well hey now, that’s precisely what I needed, a “Tamagoyaki for Dummies” page with pictures. My first attempt came out ok, I’d done it in a frying pan and it tasted good. My second attempt was frustrating because I wasn’t aware of the oiling I was supposed to do with a regular pan. I was hoping my third would land me with a standard recipe I’d use all the time. So I started things going and went out to pick (at 11 pm) green onions from my little potted stalks. (I’m running out!!)

I’ve mentioned before that I’m cursed when it comes to cooking eggs. This time was no exception. I followed the tutorial exactly and was getting so upset because the darned eggs were so soft and jelly like that every time I folded it over, it would simply crack and I had 3 layers of egg instead of a rolled egg. It took me a good 40 minutes to finally cook the stupid thing and shockingly, AMAZINGLY, it came out fine. Seriously, what a lot of stress. At least now I know that no matter how much I screw it up, it’ll turn out okay as long as I can make it though the entire omelet without chucking it in a furious rage.

I put in more of the leftover brown fried rice. Although it has taste and the chicken is good, the ham stars I had them with previously were really good so this time I added ham flowers with a little cheese center cut out with a straw. In the middle is some microwaved pipi kaula. On the right side is half a boiled egg (though I forgot to pack soy sauce) and two wedges of above-mentioned tamagoyaki. On the left side I put some veggies: three cucumber slices, some carrot chopped into little triangles, and a grape tomato.

My cousin informed me yesterday that when I get to Kona, something totally frakin’ amazing will be waiting for me: FOOD FROM Y’S LUNCH SHOP. OMG OMG OMG! To give some background, my parents used to run the family floral shop in downtown Hilo and it was right next door to this holy shrine of good food called Y’s Lunch Shop. Whenever I go home and I want okazuya, my mom will take me to Hilo Lunch Shop or something across from the tennis stadium and I’m sorry, but it’s just not the same. My old time favorites from Y’s:

• Spam musubi!!
• Fried fish!!
• Fishcake (thin little circles, lol)
• Fried chicken!! (to die for, no joke)
• Egg (I used to just call it “egg”, obviously I now know it’s “tamagoyaki”)
• the tiny potato fritters!! (10 cents each back then)
• Okinawan Donut (or as my husband will curtly correct me, “It’s called andagi.”)

Once in a blue moon Mrs. Miyamoto would cook this pork tofu dish. Broke da mouth just thinking about it. I was lucky enough to eat the food when she was still cooking it, but the recipes are still the same so the only thing that would be missing is the love that she obviously put into her dishes. Needless to say, my mouth is watering over it already. I haven’t eaten there in at least 8-10 years or something crazy like that. The only problem with Y’s was that they were only open whenever they felt like opening. I remember all too well the many times I ran out the front door of Kodani Florist and was greeted with their door, closed. It’s probably better now, but since my aunty always refers to “calling Y’s to see if they open” I’m guessing not much has changed schedule wise. Hahaha!