menu for July 23, 2022

How do you survive the dog days (Doyo no Ushi no Hi)? Jump in the river (especially Joe!) ? Drink iced tea? Take a nap? . . . It’s so hot and humid here in Georgia, as in Japan, and therefore, our appetites tend to go down and nutritional levels may go down as well so that you may have even less energy.

We call the late summer “Dog Days” the Midsummer Days of the Ox (Doyo no Ushi no Hi) in Japan. Summer Doyo (the midsummer days) is the period of 18 or 19 days before the beginning of fall in the lunar calendar. Within the Doyo every day corresponds to the animals in the Chinese zodiac, and this year the day of the Ox, Ushi No Hi occurs twice during the midsummer days this year. July 23rd (today!) and August 4th, 2022. So we have a custom of eating foods that begin with the same syllable as USHI, or the ox. For example, freshwater eel, or Unagi, is one popular food starting with “u” to sustain ourselves nutritionally through the hot summer days. If I could catch a lot of eel in Etowah river, that would be interesting for a Revival Gardens dinner! Maybe someday..

July 23rd, 2022, midsummer menu at Revival gardens is conceived to sustain ourselves through the heat: