Ōmisoka (大晦日) - Kagami mochi and noodles

The second most important day in Japan is the last day of the year, following New Year's day as the most important. It comes with the belief like most of us Filipinos do. Welcoming the new year with a clean house, a clean personality and there's abundant food at the table. It is also the busiest day around here. :D Cleaning up not just the houses but stores, school and everything. Hanging out the tatami mats, 

Above is "Kagami-mochi". It's made of mochi (Japanese rice cake) layered into 2 or 3 levels. There's a "mikan" (Mandarin orange) on top of 2 layers of mochi, used as a symbol of prosperity. There are also variations of kagami-mochi wth other figures on top.

Kagami mochi is actually a decorative item, but nowadays, they are edible. And this reminds me of Tikoy during Chinese new year...

(My girls posing with the cake.)

After cleaning, we'd have dinner. Around 11:00 pm on Ōmisoka at home, we gather for one last time in the old year to have a bowl of toshikoshi-soba (年越しそば) or toshikoshi-udon (年越しうどん) together—a tradition based on people's association of eating the long noodles with “crossing over from one year to the next,” which is the meaning of toshi-koshi. Much like how we believe pansit is.....While the noodles are often eaten plain, or with chopped scallions, we and some other people top them with tempura. :)

(My daughter with spinach caught in camera.)

---Foodtripping with---

Happy anniversary to all FTF participants!