Not only is the food good, but the chefs there are particularly skilled at entertaining you while preparing your meal. It is the one restaurant we can go to where Kai does not make a fuss about using his phone as the chefs are always doing something interesting.
One of the most difficult tricks that our chef performed was tossing a raw egg up in the air with his spatula, catching it with the spatula, and repeating many times before finally cracking the egg in half onto the griddle as it came down for the final time.
A staple at these types of restaurants is tossing small pieces of food, broccoli in this case, at the patrons to catch with their mouths.
Kai came close to catching it a couple of times, while my wife got hers on the first try!
Another favorite is lighting the stack of onions on fire...
And then turning it into a steam engine and having everyone go "Choo Choo" as the chef pushes it across the griddle.
Of course, no matter how entertaining a place is, it wouldn't be worthwhile if the food wasn't good. We all had steak combos - I had it with scallops, Kai had it with shrimp, and my wife had lobster. All of it was very tasty!
All in all, we really enjoyed it!
We came home to complete the evening with birthday cake.
And to give Mom her cards and presents. Kai loves to draw and made a card with many characters.
He also gave Mom a present that he bought with money he had saved from his allowance and from what he received as gifts. Giving gifts is not yet something that comes naturally to Kai so I had to prompt him to do so and help him select the present.
Last weekend, he and I went onto Amazon to shop for something he could give to Mom.
He started out by typing "gifts under $10." I suggested that he should think of something that Mom would like rather than to search based on how much he wanted to spend.
Next he searched for "dog gifts." That was a step in the right direction but the search resulted in items for dogs, not people, and I didn't think my wife needed any more of those.
I prompted Kai to think of other aspects of his mother.
"Well, she's always stressed out." Ah, now we're getting somewhere. I suggested he search "stress relief."
Eventually we came upon a selection of aromatherapy sleep masks which I thought my wife would like as she has been having difficulty sleeping. There was a nice one for around $18.
It was more than Kai wanted to spend.
He wanted to get the $9 one which wasn't as nice.
I reminded him of how much Mom does for him. I encouraged him to be generous. I spoke to him about how generous others in our family are to him and how much money he has saved up as a result.
Okay, I goaded him.
And eventually he agreed to buy the more expensive one.
Later in the day, he came to me and said, "Dad, I need to be more generous. I'll try to work on that."
When my wife opened the present, she loved the gift and expressed great joy.
I know Kai saw how happy he had made his mother. Hopefully that made him feel happy, too.
With the knowledge of the pleasure to be had from giving...you also get pleasure from receiving a genuine smile. Kai is learning how to multiply his pleasure in life through giving. His life shall be happier from now on.
ReplyDeleteA very good lesson to learn for everyone.
Yes, we hope to keep reinforcing the pleasure to be had from giving. I know you believe in a positive spiral, and I would like this to be a part of that for Kai. Do nice things for others and you will be happier, too.
Delete~Yuji