• Popcorn trio: sakura sugar, matcha sugar, yuzu (Japanese citrus) salt
• Sakura mochi red bean... thing, I don't know, don't judge me.
• Sakura green tea with sakura mochi and sakura shortbread cookies, all from Muji.
• Bagel with sakura filling & a dried cherry blossom; behind that, sakura an-pan (bread with a bean paste filling): to the right, sakura black tea.
• Homemade ichigo daifuku (strawberries with white bean paste and mochi), with sakura or matcha sugar.
• Also pictured: Sakura wine, sakura salt, sakura sugar, matcha sugar, sakura honey, sakura cream jam, matcha cream jam.

At this point, if anyone is surprised by my compulsive need to take a theme and run with it then they clearly don't know me very well; but I have to admit that even I have reached the point where if I ever type the word 'sakura' again it will be too soon. A couple of weeks ago, when the cherry blossom were in full bloom, and taking a train into Nagasaki meant gliding past window after window of bright pink flowers, like riding through clouds, I could get away with this: the beauty of Japan is that I'm rarely the only person with my camera in my bag (although... my camera is considerably larger than most people's. Most people's children, that is), and taking photos of your food is the norm (the other beauty is that I am not only a normal height here, but I actually have one or two inches over most of the girls that I teach. This whole country is tailored to me! I can reach all the shelves in my kitchen! I FEEL LIKE A GODDESS). But going through these photos? I may have overdone it.

...I'M TOTALLY JUST KIDDING, GUYS.There is no done like overdone.

There is also no popcorn like matcha sugar popcorn. Clear winner. If you're making popcorn tonight - and you should, because we're adults now, and you're completely entitled to have popcorn whenever the hell you want - you should know two things:

1.   Roughly 1/4 - 1/3c. of kernels makes about one serving of popcorn. Totally worth knowing, because I could not find this information anywhere, although admittedly my packet of popcorn kernels was written in Japanese. Stick them in a brown paper bag and microwave for a few minutes, until there's more than about five seconds in between pops. Nom.
2. You should totally melt a spoonful of coconut oil and tip a generous shake of matcha sugar over the top. You don't have matcha sugar? I remember those days.  Um, you can pretty much just blend matcha (green tea powder; don't use regular green tea because that would be weird) and sugar. That's all it is. The main loves of my life are sugar and caffeine, so you can see how this might work for me.

...I swear I eat real food too, mum.

Enjoy your weekend. <3