Hey there! My name is Misa O,Donnell, and I’m the brains behind the blog, Shoyu My Love.
My Story
I was born and raised in Noda, a suburb of Tokyo, Japan.
When I was a kid, I have always loved being around kitchen watching, listening, smelling and feeling of the food is getting ready to the table. I was wondering around and asking a same question every day, “what’s dinner?”.
My mom cooked many dishes filled with a table. She made a bento every morning for my high school days. My dad’s cooking was special on weekend. He did yakiniku BBQ party outside, and made ramen noodle from scratch. My grandma often took myself and my cousin to restaurants in Tokyo and treated us many kinds of foods we usually couldn’t have at home.
After I graduated from a university in Tokyo, I moved to Seattle. In the first year of living here, I met my husband. He grilled the perfect steak and made the most delicious cocktail for me. He also took me to a local ice cream shop, amazing local restaurants and bars. With him, I was super excited to explore the new cuisine, ingredients, and culinary culture that I had never seen before.
At the same time, I was desperately seeking foods I grown up, so I started cooking the dishes I was missing. I gradually started using local vegetables I have never cooked before. I was thinking all day about food, what food I can cook for my husband, what goes well with a dish I already know how to cook, and what is in season, which restaurants we want to try next…
One day, my husband suggested me to the idea of going to a culinary school. I thought “yes, because I am thinking about food all day anyways!”.
I went to the Seattle Culinary Academy. In the school and working as a cook in a catering company in Seattle, I got really inspired by Pacific Northwest cuisine—local fresh produce, sustainable farms and restaurants, and beautiful incorporation of Asian influence and Western culinary techniques.
About Shoyu My Love
My hometown, Noda is the home of “Shoyu” (soy sauce) production and a major edamame (soy bean) farming area. There is a big soy sauce factory by the gym where I played kendo (Japanese martial arts) as a kid. I could actually smell the soy sauce by the factory. The soy sauce is the essential part of Japanese cuisine and the smell of it instantly brings me back to my hometown.
The recipes here are a record of dishes I enjoy cooking for my husband and myself here in Seattle—they are from something comfort remembering my home like classic Japanese foods to more modern dishes inspired by culinary culture in Seattle and places in the world I explored with my husband.
Having delicious food together is a way to share your love. I would like to “shoyu (show you)” “my love” of the joy of homemade cooking and share tasty moments with those who love cooking!
I’m so glad you stopped by Shoyu My Love, and hope you’ll continue to come back and hang out.
Cheers,
Misa O’Donnell