Kurisimasu Kake and Kentucky Chicken
Celebrate the Holidays Japanese-style right here in Fort Lee
Japanese kitchens have no ovens. Roasting chickens or baking cakes is a great delight for Japanese who live in Fort Lee.
But in Japan this year, a National Holiday, marking Emperor Akihito's 80th birthday - is beign celebrated as a 3-day- weekend December 21, 22, 23.
Here in Fort Lee we can get a "taste" of Kurisimasu in Japan, which is usually just an ordinary working day. On the evening of December 25, if we wish,
we can pick up some Kentucky fried chicken - the usual take-home feast for those ovenless kitchens.
We can also pick up one of the fancy whipped-cream Santa decorated Christmas Cakes available at Parisienne Bakery, Sunmerry, in the Borough -or Hamada-ya at Mitsuwa Marketplace in Edgewater, to take home the Japanese equivalent of Christmas sweets.
Let me know what you prefer: one of those fancy Japanese cakes - or fruit cake, stollen, rum cake, and our variety of Christmas sweets from Italy, Poland, France, England.
Of course, if you wait until December 26 in Japan anyway, those pricey ($30 and up) Christmas cakes are sold at half-price!*
*Japanese cultural factoid: young women are expected to marry before age 25 - should they pass that milestone un-wed - they are called "Christmas Cake" like the half-price variety sold on December 26.
