International Tea Time

The day after I arrived in Japan, my host-mom's friends came over for a visit after lunch. And since we have tea time between lunch and dinner I was obliged to make an appearance, which was kind of nerve-wracking because I could not for the life of me remember their names.

So instead of the usual rice crackers and cookies for tea time, we had international tea time! One of the ladies brought over these traditional spring Japanese sweets.



It was daifuku stuffed with anko, which is basically sweet red bean paste wrapped in a rice cake. And on top of it was a cherry blossom! And it was salted...ick. They told me that it was supposed to contrast with the sweetness and that it was really good. Usually I don't really like anko or mochi all that much, but this one was pretty good. However, the cherry blossom was icky. It was really, really salty and kinda gross. But the rest of it was delicious.

Then the other lady had brought some sweets back from Egypt with her.



Apparently she'd just gotten back from a trip there. It was really good, too! It was some kind of sweet outside with nuts on the inside.

And then my host-mom pulled out a Thai sweet.



While I was back in Texas my host-parents had gone to Thailand to visit one of their old home-stay students. My host-mom said it was a bit like cotton candy. It looks like thin pieces of frayed rope, but it did melt in your mouth like cotton candy! ^^ Very tasty!

And then we also had strawberries and pineapple. All in all, a very sweet tea time.



And then I noticed that morning that the tree outside of the den was no longer bare! The way the sunlight was shining through them I thought it might have been snow, but it had blossomed. Apparently it's a plum tree.



Beautiful, huh?