Happy Almost Thanksgiving...

30 minutes until Thanksgiving!

I've definitely begun to celebrate...

I went to Ike's, since the brosky arrived this morning, and yum, I've missed it so much. Here are some snapshots of what I ate:

Dashi ikura-- one of my favorites since I was a wee little one. Ike marinates ikura (salmon roe) in a special sauce (probably dashi and shoyu based...) and it turns out incredibly. Not fishy at all, and each little egg pops in your mouth! It's a lot of fun to eat :) I don't know of any other sushi place that prepares their salmon roe like this (which is sad). Usually, it's sticky and fishy and not plump... the marinated version becomes the complete opposite of all of those descriptors.

Toro-- take a look at this. So incredibly oily and delicious. It's so fatty that each segment actually separates from each other. I've never seen toro like this at any other sushi place.

Uni sashimi-- sea urchin. Each little piece looks like a yellow tongue... which makes it seem super unappetizing, but when I eat it, I forget all about how strange it looks (and what it actually is...), and focus on the creaminess of it. Mmm.

Seared salmon-- Fresh from the grill, you have to eat it as soon as he delivers it to your sushi block. He lets the salmon touch the grill for just a second to give it an incredible smoky flavor, coats it in a shoyu-like sauce (not very salty, but just slightly there), tops it with green onion, and delivers it. So incredible.

Can't get enough of that.

We had more sushi than that, but those are definitely the highlights. I also don't want to bore you with 230948038 pictures of sushi (although, who is truly bored by that...? You? then get off this blog!-- no joke.

But, truth be told, those are the only ones we took a picture of. Everything else went from block to mouth pretty quickly.)

When I got back, I took a bath!! It feels so good to be so warm from the core (and not because of a fever). I just sort of sat in the bath and zoned out for a bit, which is not something I normally get to do.

I then set about to making my Halahbuhji's birthday cake!

Let me remind you (from the menus posted earlier today), it's an almond birthday cake with a sherry-lemon buttercream frosting. I only made the first part (the almond cake).

Here's how it went!

Easy peasy! Here's me mixing in the sour cream/eggs/vanilla into the butter/sour cream/cake flour/baking soda and powder/pulverized almonds/etc. That is also a picture of my beautiful baby (my red mixer).

Here's the batter in the pans...

Here's the baked version of the above picture! They seem very light (thanks, cake flour!) and I expect that they'll be really moist, thanks to the cup of sour cream. The almonds should give it a nice texture (and nuttiness, duh), so I hope it turns out well and keeps for tomorrow... I'm a little unsure of how to do the frosting. Apparently, for buttercreams, you have to whisk egg whites over heat ... yikes. And how NOT to get them to turn into scrambled eggs will take a small miracle, so let's hope for a Thanksgiving Halahbuhji's birthday miracle! Yum, layer cakes...

Then, while the cakes were in the oven and cooling, I made my special cranberry sauce!

Here are the berries simmering in sugar and water...

And here's the finished product! You may be able to see the secret I add to the sauce... but no direct comment from me on what it is.

That's setting to cool on the countertop before I stick it in the fridge.

Also, it's supposed to be 81 degrees tomorrow.

THIS IS NOT PROPER THANKSGIVING WEATHER!!!

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Have a lovely day, and eat your hearts out!