日報

"Give your dreams limbs."
These words were something like a company motto at my previous job,
or at least, they were highly valued,
and I still hold them dear.

After quitting my salaryman job
and opening this "kikkake" (opportunity/きっかけ) as an independent venture,
they've become even more important to me.

To achieve your dreams, taking action is crucial.
There's so much you only realize once you take action.
Through action, you understand how distant your dreams are.
Without action, you won't reach your dreams.
Even with action, there's no guarantee you'll reach them,
but at least you take that first step and start giving them "limbs."

Starting kikkake, I've once again realized the importance of "limbs."
In fact, I even think "limbs" are more important than the dream itself.

My dream is for kikkake to become
a stepping stone for all of you,
to make your lives just a little bit better.
I hope to grow it little by little.
That's what I'm thinking.

There's one thing I'm not good at in cooking.
That's "whisking eggs."

When I make tamagoyaki, I don't whisk them much, so it's still okay, but when I make tamago kake gohan, I'm terribly clumsy at whisking the egg.

My hand gets tired while whisking with chopsticks, and by the time I'm done, I'm out of breath. I often have to take breaks.

I've even bought egg whisks, but I haven't found one that I thought was great, so I always end up whisking with chopsticks and getting out of breath.

Then, one day, I happened to ask someone to beat an egg for me, and I was surprised when they brought it back without whisking it much at all.

I don't like it when the firm part of the egg white, commonly known as "durun," remains, so I used to whisk until the durun was gone.
So, maybe I was just getting tired because I was whisking more than other people, and I wasn't actually clumsy.

Nevertheless, even after that, when I whisk eggs, I continue to whisk until the durun is gone.
In the end, I still get out of breath, so nothing has really changed, and the things I'm not good at remain things I'm not good at.

Someone brought up the topic of whether to eat the strawberry on a shortcake first or last, for the first time in a while. By the way, I'm "team eat the strawberry first."

I'm not sure if it's due to the old drama "Strawberry on the Shortcake" or if it was a classic question even before that, but whenever I'm asked this, I always say I eat it first. Then I get diagnosed as "the type who enjoys the good stuff first."

That's not it. The fresh cream is sweeter than the strawberry, so if I eat the strawberry afterward, it tastes sour. That's why I eat it first. That's all.

In fact, I'm the type to eat the things I dislike first. With bean rice, I eat all the beans first because I don't like them.

When I get these kinds of diagnoses, sometimes I can explain myself, and sometimes it just ends with people thinking I'm "the type who enjoys the good stuff first."

Well, whether you eat the strawberry first or last, it's delicious and makes me happy either way, so it doesn't really matter.

I think there are probably many reasons why I came to love cooking, but the one that immediately comes to mind is that watching Italian chef Tomomi Ogura's YouTube channel played a big part.

I discovered his channel when I was searching for pasta recipes. I was drawn to his logical and simple pasta dishes, and when I tried making them myself, they were delicious, which made it even more enjoyable.

From then on, I was just a fan, buying the ingredients and cooking utensils that Ogura-san introduced and following his exact steps. As a result, I grew to love making pasta, and now I can experiment and make various kinds of pasta on my own, and I think I've gotten better at it than before.

Looking back to that time, I never imagined that I would be doing YouTube myself, or that I would be launching an online shop.

I hope that "kikkake," which I'm running now thanks to various "kikkake" (きっかけ, triggers/opportunities), can become a "kikkake" for those who watch it to become interested in something. With that thought in mind, I want to introduce tableware and cooking utensils while I cook.

Even now, I still love a good substantial dish. However, there was a time when I used to make and eat only simple things, without giving it much thought.

When making ramen, I would even make and eat plain ramen with absolutely no toppings, thinking, "I'm eating noodles, so I don't need any toppings."

But as I got older, I started thinking more about the toppings and presentation, like, "A soft-boiled egg is essential, definitely soft-boiled," "I want this kind of char siu," and "It needs a bit more color, so let's add some green onions." As a result, I feel like cooking has become more enjoyable.

I'm not sure why the more you do something, the more you want to try the next step, but the next time I make ramen, I'm thinking of trying to make my own menma.

Cooking is a lot of fun. I can cook whatever I like just for myself, or I can enjoy cooking while thinking about the people I'm serving.

Sometimes the same dish that turned out well before isn't as tasty this time. I'm not sure what was different - the ingredients, the seasonings, the cooking process - or if it's due to my own physical condition. Even when it doesn't turn out well, it's still somehow enjoyable.

Eventually, I realized that presentation is also quite important, and it became fun to start thinking about which dish to serve it in.

And now, it's a lot of fun to convey this enjoyment through YouTube, to introduce well-taken photos on Instagram, and to sell and deliver products I like through my web shop.

I hope to be a catalyst for people to become better at cooking, to improve their plating, and to find joy in the process.