Well, the "blue moon" was a bust around here. You couldn't see a thing, because the sky was so overcast.
It was snowing gently, though, and very pretty, even without the moon. Earlier today, the snowfall was heavy and made the roads treacherous, but tonight, it was just enough to make everything look like a Christmas card.
My mom sent me mochi (sticky rice cakes) to make ozoni. Ozoni is a soup traditionally eaten first thing New Year's morning. Like many foods in Hawaii, it was borrowed from the Japanese. It wasn't really a custom in our house, but I like it, so she sent me some mochi.
Nowadays, a lot of people buy prepared mochi (often dried blocks that you can just boil or microwave). But in the old days, people used to cook special rice, pound it by hand, and shape it into cakes. It was a lot of work, so families, communities, or church groups would get together a few days before New Year's and make a huge batch. By New Year's day, the rice cakes would be hard and drying out; boiling them in soup made them soft and edible again. So I suspect ozoni was just a way to use up stale mochi. It's supposed to be good luck to eat it first thing New Year's morning. I figure the way things are going, I can use all the luck I can get. ;-)
Happy New Year!
