When I arrived at the Denver airport on Tuesday, I waited for my colleague to use the restroom before we got into an Uber. As I waited, I noticed a little stand called Bjorn’s Colorado Honey with all kinds of cute glass bottles of honey in different sizes and colors. I made a note of it on my phone to come back to this stand on Friday. Instead, it was actually an even better experience: after I went through security Friday late morning, I noticed that Bjorn’s Colorado Honey had a full-fledged store right by the area where you enter Concourse C, which is right where all the American Airlines gates were. I got super excited and decided I would check it out.

While at the shop, I got to taste at least 10 different types of locally made honey, ranging from vanilla bean honey, propolis honey (incredible!), and “untouched” honey (they literally don’t touch it after it comes out of the hive, so there are traces of honeycomb and propolis in it!). The propolis honey was particularly interesting to me. I had previously read that it was used by the ancient Egyptians to ward off colds and viruses. Propolis is made by bees from tree and plant resins, and it’s known for its ability to fight against viruses, bacteria, and microbes. It’s also considered a powerful antihistamine. It’s recommended to take a spoonful once a day as a preventative, and to take it three times a day while fighting off a virus/infection. I had never purchased any propolis before but was intrigued, especially since we give honey to Kaia Pookie while she is slightly under the weather. Kids under the age of 3 (or 4?) are not supposed to have any cough medication or decongestants, but honey is recommended for children over the age of 1 to help loosen up any blockages or phlegm. And Kaia loves her morning daily dose of honey, as she’s been a little congested over the last couple of weeks.

Honey was always just honey to me, until I read that a lot of “honey” in the U.S. is fake and companies reduce their costs by adding corn syrups/sugars to theirs. So the only way to know for sure that your honey is legitimate is if it’s certified USDA organic here. Over the years, we’ve purchased a number of incredible honeys, from the endless Australian honeys with unique flavors to the Brightland Hawaiian one (that Kaia was obsessed with) to the Sri Lankan jungle bee one we picked up at the Good Market in Colombo last summer. I think I really got interested in honey and tasting different ones after our December 2015 side trip to Tasmania, where we had generous tastings at a local honey shop of many types, including the very famous leatherwood honey. It made me realize that the honey in the plastic bear squeeze container was just one-noted and bland compared to all these other incredible honeys with multidimensional flavors you could get elsewhere.

So I ended up leaving Denver with four glass jars of honey: propolis, untouched, whipped lavender, and raw whipped. It was a fun and unexpected end to my trip. I didn’t think I was going to buy anything to take home during this trip, but instead, I took home riches made from Colorado bees!

Last year when I was leaving Denver, I did not remember my food options to be that exciting. I got a so-so sandwich on my night flight back to New York, and I was not at all enthused by it. This time, though, I found a spot called La Casita that had a sign for tamales, and I can never say no to a tamale. I don’t eat nearly enough of them, so when I see that they are available, I definitely go for them.

I had the option of red chile pork or green chile cheese. The description said they would be smothered in red or green chile sauce with my choice of beans. I guess I ignored the second part of that description because when the server took the fresh tamales out of the steamer, I was a bit surprised when I realized he was taking them out of the husks for me. Then, he asked me about my choice of sauce (I chose green), and he proceeded to douse the tamales in the green chile sauce, then added my requested black beans to the side.

I was a little sad that he did this because I felt like it would take away from the flavor of the tamales themselves. Their flavor would be masked by the green chile sauce. In California, New York, and Mexico, where I have enjoyed tamales, tamales are usually served in their corn husks with sauces on the side. But I found out subsequently that this is Colorado-style Mexican food: everything is covered in a green chile or red chile sauce, and that’s the way they eat Mexican food here. So, in the end, if that’s what they do in Colorado, and I am eating this food in Colorado, then I will go with it.

I will say: the quality of the tamales was really high. The fillings were delicious. The green chile cheese filling was HOT. The masa was very soft, tender, and well seasoned. The green sauce was good, though I am still a purist and would have preferred the sauce on the side for dipping. And this was cheap airport food: two tamales with sauce and beans didn’t even break $10! I will definitely be back here at La Casita in Concourse C the next time I am going through Denver and flying American.

Years ago, a friend went to Japan for a holiday and came back. I asked him how his trip was and if he had gotten his matcha-everything fix. He beamed and said he loved his trip (because how could he not?). But to answer my matcha question, while matcha was clearly delicious (and increasing in popularity here in the States in literally every food and beverage type imaginable then), he told me that his food prediction was that the future was hojicha, not matcha! Matcha would soon be old hat, and the future IS hojicha!

Fast forward to the present day, and I still see very little to no hojicha-flavored anything here in New York, with the exception of a handful of Asian/Japanese spots as well as bubble tea cafes. Matcha is still ubiquitous even at non-Asian eateries and cafes. And we have a 2-year-old girl who is nicknamed “Hoji” after “hojicha” thanks to Chris’s unconventional name preferences. So while hojicha is not necessarily the future for food in the U.S. just yet, I did notice quite a number of hojicha flavored things during this trip in Japan.

Hojicha was always a top option for tea everywhere we went. At the fancy tea cafe Nakamura Tokichi, where we went for our last sit-down meal while in Tokyo, the welcome, complimentary pot of tea had premium whole leaf hojicha in a high-end tea bag meant to be re-steeped multiple times. They had various hojicha desserts, including a hojicha float and hojicha jelly (which we ordered!). And as a final farewell from Japan on our Japan Airlines flight back to New York, the last dessert I had in flight was a beautiful, silky smooth hojicha milk custard.

We love hojicha everything and would welcome hojicha as a mainstream flavor here in New York. But I’m not sure even New York is quite ready for it yet.

Chris’s cousin and her husband have been living in Chiba, just outside Tokyo, for the last six months while studying a ministry course at a local university. As their time is coming to an end, they are trying to give away as many of their temporary dorm items as possible, while also buying as much “omiyage” as possible.

“Omiyage” is a Japanese word for “souvenirs” or “gifts,” for when you return back to your home after travels. This practice seems to span a number of cultures. The couple of times I went to China and and Vietnam, I was also expected to bring home gifts for all family members.

The Japanese take the practice of “omiyage,” and gift giving in general, pretty seriously. Gift giving is a way to show gratitude to those you care about or are indebted to, and also a way to display appreciation for those you love and respect. In general, gifting money is not something the Japanese do (I guess they’re not as green-hungry as the Chinese, haha), so the act of giving actual things is of utmost importance and a sign of respect/love. Granted, I’ll admit ignorance and say that I have not visited every Asian country, but from what I have observed in my last almost 38 years is that when the Japanese give gifts, they give gifts. All gift items need to be displayed beautifully (for when you are in the process of choosing what to buy while in the endless Japanese department stores or food halls), wrapped and packaged beautifully, and presented just so. This is probably why the gift boxes for food items, for example, is so detailed and beautiful: while shopping, not only do you typically see a model of what the contents in a box are on display, but if it is a cookie or cake that you are buying, they even show you a very accurate model of what the inside (the innards!!) of the cake/cookie look like when cut in half! Now, if that isn’t precision, then I do not know what is!

On Saturday, our last day in Japan, we spent a few hours in Ginza, a popular shopping district in Tokyo. There, we visited a food basement, where I perused and got googly-eyed over endless delicious Japanese snacks and treats, as well as Japanese teas. I knew I wanted to purchase some tea as gifts and for myself. So I went to two different tea stands, had tastings, and enjoyed tea banter with my English/broken Japanese and the friendly salesperson’s Japanese/broken English, along with the helpful technological assistance of language translation mobile apps. Other than obvious words I would know, such as the major Japanese tea types (matcha, hojicha, gyokuro, sencha), as I was getting ready to pay, I also recognized yet another Japanese word: omiyage! She was asking me which of the items I purchased would be gifts. I quickly told her, and she rushed to very carefully wrap one of the boxes, creasing each edge, and taped the sides so meticulously. Not only this, but she also included extra handled gift bags so that once I got home, I could even present the gorgeously wrapped box in a handled bag with the a design matching the wrapping paper for the boxed gift. The next tea shop I went to did exactly that again, except they gave me even MORE handled bags and gifting pouches to ensure that if I changed my mind about which items to give as gifts, I could still beautifully present an omiyage to a loved or respected person.

Well, that is service and gift culture to the max. Environmentalists may argue that this is all wasteful and contributes to the needless destruction of trees and forests, that it adds to our ever growing climate change problem. But I would say that the gifting culture of Japan could build bridges and create relationships for those of us still remaining in a burning world.

To go back to New York, we went to Haneda this time instead of Narita. It was a much shorter and cheaper journey to get there, and once we did, we went through security and immigration and ended up at the Japan Airlines First Class lounge for a quick meal and shower before getting on our flight.

There were some fun things we liked at the lounge, including the automated wet towel dispenser, which when you press it, it dispenses a cold, tightly coiled wet towel for you to use to wipe your hands or face. This was especially helpful cleaning Pookster up after her very messy pasta meal.

The second fun thing that I enjoyed was the automated beer dispenser. A number of different local Japanese beers were available on tap, so once you placed your beer glass in the glass holder and pressed the appropriate dispensing button, the machine would tip your glass ever so slightly (and securely), fill it with beer to just the right level, without any over foaming/head on top, and then tilt it back down so that you could retrieve the glass. It was the perfect pour!

These cute little perks and privileges were fun to enjoy in our last few hours in Japan. It only made me want to come back sooner!

Tempura is one of those things that most people love, and it’s for obvious reasons: it is DEEP FRIED food. It’s a common Japanese dish that is usually made up of different types of seafood and vegetables that have been coated in a light, thin batter, then deep fried. If you get cheap tempura, you can expect the batter to be heavier, and if you get heavenly, delicious tempura, you can expect that the batter is super thin, yet results in a crunchy, crispy exterior coating. And the oil will be barely detectable.

Since tempura is common, it’s typically at any Japanese restaurant you will go to, assuming they do not just specialize in one thing (e.g. sushi, onigiri, ramen, katsu). But finding really notable, drool-worthy tempura is a bit of a challenge pretty much anywhere outside of Japan. Years ago, when I discovered a Japanese restaurant that specializes in tempura that opened here in New York, Chris scoffed at it when I told him it had one Michelin star.

“Tempura is so easy to fuck up,” he retorted. “Why would I have questionable tempura here (in New York City) and pay a lot of money for it when I can just fly to Japan and KNOW that it’s going to be good?”

And so, I suppose that’s what we did. We flew to Japan. And this time, we would eat tempura. So, tempura at Tempura Hisago it was for our last dinner on our second Japan trip together. Chris’s cousin and her husband dined with us, and we got a set menu, which included assorted seafood and veggie tempura, red miso soup, a rice bowl, various pickled vegetables (tsukemono), salad, your choice of alcoholic beverage, and a yuzu sorbet at the end. Once you place your order, all the food is made to order. There are chefs in the back of the restaurant that you can watch who are frying all your tempura right there. You can hear the sizzle of the oil, though somehow you cannot smell it. And when they bring the tempura over to you, it’s super hot and fresh. The tempura is served lined by parchment paper on plates, and when you remove the pieces, the tempura is so well drained that there is barely any oil remaining at all! The tempura was perfect: super lightly battered, with every bite nice and crispy. The seafood was cooked well with no rubberiness, and the vegetables were soft and tender.

And the value was excellent, as well: for all that food, which certainly made all of us full, we spent about $20 USD/person. We will miss this quality at these price levels.

Today was our last full day in Tokyo, and I wanted to make sure I got in as many Hokkaido milk products as possible. Since about ten years ago, I kept stumbling upon articles and food references that would always say how delicious and superior Hokkaido milk was to the average milk. It started with a Hokkaido milk candy. Then, it became about the Hokkaido soft cream ice cream, then about the freaking milk itself. It has now ballooned into constant social media posts I get bombarded with regarding Hokkaido ice cream, Hokkaido milk cream cheese cakes and tarts… you name it, and I’ve likely already heard of it.

Granted, I already knew that American milk, overall, was inferior: the majority of cows in the U.S. eat grain (read: not natural) and have little time outside to graze (I think this also goes without saying, but again, not natural), whereas a happy cow would have vast amounts of land to graze and eat grass and insects, which is what nature intended. Because of this, I immediately noticed the taste difference in milk we’d drink in Australia or New Zealand (always grass fed cows) vs. in the U.S. Something about the milk just tasted brighter, fresher, and creamier. It’s hard to describe until you have it for yourself. Hokkaido is the second largest main island of Japan, a nation of islands. With only about 5.2 million people, Hokkaido is also one of Japan’s less populated main islands (compare that to the island of Honshu, home of Tokyo, Osaka, and Hiroshima, which has a population of of about 104 million people). Hokkaido is characterized by a cooler, more rugged climate, vast plains, and extensive forests. As such, it is the perfect place for cows to have vast amounts of fresh air and land to happily graze on. And happy cows always produce delicious milk, which makes for happy dairy consumers such as myself.

Our Hokkaido milk-themed food crawl started with the famous Hokkaido milk lady stand at the Akihabara train station, between platforms 5-6. To access this point, you’d either need a frequent train card or already be inside the train station itself. So once we got off our train from Ebisu, Chris and Pookster waited for me downstairs while I went up to platforms 5-6. I easily found the milk stand: it was run by a smiley, friendly Japanese lady who spoke just enough broken English so that we could communicate with each other. It was cute, humble, simple stand: while she had some ready made sandwiches and snacks, along with an array of packaged treats, milk was clearly her dominant item being sold. Her glass case was lined with various types of milk, most of which I could not read. But some were obvious based on the photos: lesser/low fat, apple-flavored, peach-flavored, etc. What I did not realize until I asked for Hokkaido milk and bought it from her was that she sells milk the old-school way: once you order and pay, she takes out a single-serve glass bottle, pops off the top with her can opener, and hands the glass over to you. You’re expected to drink the glass of milk right then and there, enjoy it, then hand the empty glass back to her for recycling (or, perhaps even sterilization and reuse, because why not?!). While I savored my single glass of cold Hokkaido milk, I marveled at all the people who rushed over to buy their glass, chugged their milk, handed it back to her, and then rushed onto an arriving train on the same platform. I would expect that this was an everyday or every-week ritual for a lot of people, and many of these people buying and chugging her milk were likely regulars who had a relationship with her who she knew. I thought it was really sweet to have a relationship with a milk person, and I wondered if she did know the inner workings of any of their lives at all.

I asked the milk lady if there were any takeaway options. She indicated that she usually doesn’t sell them, but she did have a small number in her fridge for a 10 JPY upcharge. She also tried to sell me on the apple Hokkaido milk, but I insisted on the original. So I picked up one to bring down for Pookster and Chris to share. Chris got in a few sips, but it was Pookster who really enjoyed this milk: it was truly love at first sip! She had this huge smile after slurping through the straw and got so upset when it was time to discard the bottle! I had only wished we had recorded her reaction to her first and only taste of pure Hokkaido milk.

We then proceeded to two other places for Hokkaido milk products: Cow Cow Kitchen, which makes what they call “milk pies,” which are cow head-shaped pastries that are essentially a cross between a croissant and a cream puff, filled to the brim with a delicious, thick Hokkaido milk custard; we also went to Azabu Sabo Hokkaido Milk Ice Cream just steps away, all at Akihabara Station. Today, we got lucky, as the special limited edition rotating flavor was pistachio (it’s like they knew I was coming!). Given Chris’s cousin and her wife were with us, we got to buy more and got a full box of six to share! We got three of the original milk custard and three of the pistachio. The pastry just shatters in your mouth upon the first bite, just like the perfect croissant. And the model “milk pie” was not lying at all: it really was filled very generously with custard. The milk custard was sweet (but not too sweet!), super creamy and milky, with a hint of a vanilla flavor. The custard was a bit on the thin side, but I couldn’t get enough of it. And as if that wasn’t enough of a treat, the pistachio one perhaps may have been even more impressive: the filling was a very pale green color (probably a hint that the coloring is JUST from toasted pistachios and no artificial green coloring, and it had just the right amount of nut in it to tell you that the flavor was most definitely sweet, toasty pistachio nuts! The custard was a bit thicker than the milk custard, and it just sang in your mouth!

Azabu Sabo Hokkaido Milk Ice Cream was also a treat. They had a number of flavors that we would never find at the average U.S. ice cream shop, even the Asian ones, such as cassis (black currant! YUM!), super matcha, genmaicha (roasted rice with green tea), and of course, their classic Hokkaido milk ice cream. We got a double cup with two flavors, the Hokkaido milk and the genmaicha. The genmaicha tasted exactly like genmaicha tea – roasty, slightly sweet, with a slight bitterness at the end from the green tea. And the Hokkaido milk was super creamy and almost vanilla-like. I will miss access to these rare flavors when we go back home. Chinatown may have matcha or green tea ice cream, but SUPER matcha or genmaicha — no way!

I would love to go to Hokkaido next and indulge in all things Hokkaido, and definitely get my further fill of Hokkaido milk products!