Songline in the key of E flat minor

Slow Cooked Creole Baked Beans

2012-01-31T08:53:00.000-05:00

In looking for a good Creole flavored baked bean recipe, I was disappointed that none of them started with a base of the Holy Trinity, the Cajun and Louisiana Creole variant of mirepoix. I did my research on the hallmarks of good Creole flavors and created this dish.

After all was said and done, it was a lot of work to make a these baked beans in particular. While they did taste different than the baked beans out of a can, it was all subtlety. The thyme was a nice addition to the sweet and a dark flavors of your usual baked beans, while the andouille added a great smoky meaty flavor that didn't overpower.

Slow Cooked Creole Baked Beans

Ingredients:

2 lbs. dried beans (I use 1lb. navy and the other lb. Great Northern)
2 large onions, chopped
1 large bell pepper, chopped
4-6 celery stalks, chopped
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
2-3 Tbsp. butter
½ lb. andouille sausages, cubed
½ cup bourbon
½ cup molasses
½ cup dark brown sugar
1 cup ketchup
2 Tbsp. Creole seasoning blend (see below)
1 Tbsp. dried thyme
1 tsp. dry mustard, or more, to taste
1-2 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1-2 cps water, on reserve
Salt, if needed.

Directions:

In a small bowl, combine all ingredients; store in an airtight container. Sort through the beans, discarding any that are discolored or damaged, rinse them well. Put them in a large bowl or container, cover them by at least 2 inches with cold water, and soak overnight or longer.
Sauté the onions, bell pepper and celery (Holy Trinity) with garlic in with 2 Tbsp. butter until tender, about 7 minutes. Remove from the pan and add to the slow cooker.
Fry the andouille in the remaining pan fat, adding the additional Tbsp butter, if needed, until slightly crisp, about 7 minutes. Deglaze the pan with the bourbon and add the pan’s contents into the slow cooker.
Drain the soaked beans and add to the slow cooker. Follow that with molasses, brown sugar, ketchup , creole seasoning, thyme, mustard and Worcestershire.
Cover and cook on low for 7 to 9 hours (or high for 4 to 5 hours), until beans are tender and flavorful. Check and add a little of the reserved liquid as necessary.
When finished cooking, taste to see if salt is needed and add, if necessary.

In making this again, I may cut the molasses. It was a very strong taste - very rich and almost too earthy and caramel. However I noticed that most of the recipes that I found called for unsulfured molasses. I don't know if I had unsulfured molasses or not; it was tough just to find any molasses when I went food shopping!

Creole Seasoning Mix, adapted from Creole Seasoning Blend at allrecipes.com

Most of my friends swear by Tony Chachere's for their go-to seasoning of choice. It's great; I love it. However, I can't always find it in my local area stores, especially when I've run out and I want to use it immediately. In those cases, I whip up a batch of Creole Seasoning and I know that I'll have some good New Orleans' kick in my food.

Ingredients: (Original recipe yield was 1¼ cups, based on one part = one tablespoon)

1 part dried thyme
1 part black pepper
1 part white pepper
1 part cayenne pepper
1 part sugar
2 parts onion powder
2 parts garlic powder
2 parts dried oregano
2 parts dried basil
3 parts salt
5 parts paprika *

Directions:
1. In a small bowl, combine all ingredients; store in an airtight container.

* I have replaced some of the paprika with other peppers in a ratio of 1:1. (e.g. 1 part Hatch chili pepper, 1 part West African hot pepper and 3 parts paprika, instead of 5 parts paprika.)

myPics: Unnoticed Treasure

2012-01-26T10:50:00.000-05:00

A week ago, my department had its biannual meeting in the Harrison Auditorium of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Before the start, I got to snap off a picture of the beautiful ceiling. It takes a moment like this to make me appreciate where I work and all the access I have to world-class collections. I'll make sure that I stop by for Vaults of Heaven: Visions-of-Byzantium which runs through February 12, 2012.

Char Siu Chicken

2012-01-24T10:34:00.000-05:00

For this week’s recipe, I wanted to try something Chinese and came across char siu, the Chinese version of barbecue. Usually the recipe is made with pork, either loin, pork belly or pork butt. However I had no pork in the house and I didn’t feel like going to the store. However, by luck, I had all the other ingredients. Plus, I did have a stash of chicken quarters and thighs that I thought would be a good substitute for the pork. I went ahead and made the dish with chicken.

Char Siu Chicken, adapted from Cooking Light’s Slow Cooker Char Siu Pork Roast

Ingredients:

Char Siu Chicken served over rice vermicelli

¼ cp soy sauce
¼ cp hoisin sauce
3 Tbsp ketchup
3 Tbsp honey
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp fresh ginger, peeled and grated\
1 tsp dark sesame oil
½ tsp five-spice powder
2 lbs of dark chicken pieces (quarters, thighs and/or drumsticks)
½ cp chicken broth

Directions:

Mix everything but the chicken and the broth in a small bowl and whisk well to make a marinade.
In a large zip top bag, marinate the chicken pieces in the refrigerator at least 2 hours or overnight, turning occasionally.
Place chicken and marinade in the slow cooker; cover and cook on low for 8 hours.
Remove chicken from slow cooker; set aside.
Add the chicken broth to sauce in slow cooker; cover and cook on low for 30 minutes or until sauce thickens. In the meanwhile, remove the skin and bones, then shred chicken with 2 forks.
Return the chicken to the slow cooker and combine; serve hot.

I really enjoyed the rich undertones of the hoisin and honey that permeated into the chicken so that each bit of chicken is like the color of mahogany. The five-spice powder adds a little sweet from the anise and fennel and a good little burn and heat from pepper, and from the clove and cinnamon, I get a little of both. It is a great marriage of protein and fat, sweet and savory, that is the hallmark of Cantonese cuisine.

Not yet named travel entry: Raleigh – cultural and celebration

2012-01-20T15:53:00.000-05:00

No photos were allowed in the exhibition.

For New Year’s Eve, I traveled down to Raleigh again with my favorite traveling companion, Steve, to enjoy the city and the Rembrandt exhibit at the North Carolina Museum of Art. We had picked Raleigh for the holiday, since we enjoyed the trip last year and Rembrandt in America was a big plus. Thankfully, we were able to get into the city a day earlier to explore at a leisurely pace.

Kneeling Angel

Rembrandt in America is the largest collection of Rembrandt paintings ever presented in an American exhibition, the focus of which is the exploration of the collecting history of Rembrandt paintings in America. In addition to the Master’s works, the show also delves into the ideas of authorship and attribution. Several of the pieces in the exhibition were originally thought to be Rembrandts, yet through advanced scholarship, they have been identified as either pieces started by Rembrandt and completed by others in his workshop or the work of his protégés. Though, not works of Rembrandt directly, they still capture the style and traits of the Masters and have made an impact on the history of art collecting in the States.

Roxy Paine, Askew

More than five years in the making, the show is in its last weekend before moving on to the Cleveland Museum of Art, February 19 through May 28. The Raleigh stop at the NCMA is the only East Coast venue for this show. The works have been assembled to include some of the finest paintings residing in American collections. NCMA Curator of Northern European Art Dennis P. Weller serves as a co-curator of this see exhibition, which has been. The show will continue on to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts for the last stop, June 24 through September 16.

After the Rembrandt show, we visited the permanent exhibits at the NCMA, including Egyptian artifacts, Contemporary art, pieces by well known names: Pissarro, Monet, Titian, Raphael, Rubens and Govaert Flinck – a contemporary of Rembrandt, as well as a collection of Rodin sculptures. (More photos from the permanent exhibits below.)

Jan Burger & Donovan Zimmerman of Paperhand PuppetIntervention, Rhea

Fireworks at City Plaza after the Acorn Drop

Later in the evening, we headed to Raleigh’s First Night Celebration. The highlight for us is the Children’s Celebration with features crafts, performances and interactive activities. From the Ferris Wheel to the street food, from the giant Lite Brite Board to the circus acts on the street, the culmination of the celebration is the People's Procession. As a metaphor for the end of the year, the Children's Celebration ends and the evening entertainment begins, this passage of time from afternoon to evening, like from old year to new year, is heralded in through a fun, colorful parade for children of all ages. The NC State University Pipes & Drums leads the parade with music and rhythm from the Capitol and down Salisbury Street into the street fair as folks cheer on the appearance of Rhea, a giant puppet named after the Greek mother of the gods and designed to represent the landscape of North Carolina. The finale of the parade is the giant Acorn drop at City Plaza (for the children who can’t stay awake to usher in the New Year, and the city repeats this at midnight for those who can stay up.)

The combination of amazing cultural activities and vibrant revelry kicks off any New Year with the spirit of hope for the potential and possibilities that lie ahead. Energized by the night, we head off to the get dinner and to the bars to ring in 2012.

Additional photos of the NCMA permanent collection

Aaron Douglas, Harriet Tubman

A bust of Aphrodite

Rajmah

2012-01-17T11:02:00.000-05:00

This week I was looking for something vegan again to try in the slow cooker. I naturally thought of Indian cuisine. After searching “slow cooker Indian recipe”, I found a recipe for a Punjabi dish of curried kidney beans, called rajmah, on Chicago’s ABC 7’s site about The Indian Slow Cooker.

Rajmah is a Punjabi comfort food and not usually something that you would find at a restaurant. This sense of it not being refined enough to serve at a restaurant made the dish intriguing. Added to that is the interesting the story of Anupy Singla, the Indian Slow Cooker, which compelled me to cook this Punjabi entrée. Indian-born and raised in the Philadelphia area, Singla eventually worked her way as a reporter in Chicago – frequently as a correspondent for Chicago-based news on CNN. To conform with her hectic schedule she would work with her mother to adapt many of her favorite Indian dishes for the slow cooker. This became her favorite way to cook. Singla has her own blog, Indian as Apple Pie.

I went ahead and made the rajmah, though I didn’t have many of the spices in whole form so I tinkered with the seasonings. Surprisingly I had some of the "Easy Garam Masala" made up from a past dish. I linked to the recipe for your convenience.

Rajmah

Ingredients:

3 cups, about 1 bag dried red kidney beans, cleaned and washed thoroughly
1 medium yellow or red onion, peeled and roughly chopped
2 medium tomatoes, diced
2 – 3 Tbsp fresh ginger, peeled and chopped or grated
3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped or grated
4 -6 green Thai, serrano, or cayenne chilies, stems removed, chopped
3 whole cloves
½ Tbsp ground cinnamon
1 Tbsp ground cumin
1 Tbsp red chili powder
2 Tbsp salt
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp garam masala from Hundu for "hot mixture" and referring to the intensity and the heat of the spice, garam masala is a blend of ground spices common in North Indian and other South Asian cuisines.
9 cups water
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro

Directions:

Put all the ingredients but the cilantro in slow cooker; cook on high for 11 hours, until the beans break down and become somewhat creamy. (It’s important that it be on high since the toxic compound phytohaemagglutinin is concentrated in red kidney beans and the heat of the high setting breaks down the toxin into non-toxic proteins.)
After cooking, remove and discard the cloves and if the rajmah is not creamy enough, blend about a cup or so of the beans and mix purée thoroughly.
Stir in the cilantro. Serve over a bed of basmati rice.

I did a little twist on the rice, by making a few cups of rice and adding the remaining cilantro chopped. This is a quick flourish that is good for both Indian and Mexican dishes. I serve my chili over cilantroed rice when I have it. Also, like any good “red beans and rice” combo, I do like to add some hot sauce before eating.

Freeform Forum: Am I missing something? #shitIseeatthegym

2012-01-11T09:53:00.001-05:00

I've only posted two #shitISeeAtTheGym on my blog, since I've been more than just lax in going to the gym. However, I've been following the trend on twitter. I figured it would be trending more, especially now with everyone's New Year's Resolutions in full force. It's really be crickets, I haven't seen anyone else use the hashtag since before my first posting.

Therefore, I was excited that yesterday someone tweeted: @itsquinc: #ShitISeeAtTheGym http://t.co/adfaDQhG. However, I'm not sure what he's commenting on. Me, I think that it looks like someone in a demin skirt working out which is odd, but I wondered if I was missing something.

What do you think?

Braciole

2012-01-10T21:12:00.000-05:00

While I had time off during the Christmas break, I spent it working on a braciole recipe for the slow cooker.

In Italian American cuisine, braciole (the word is commonly pronounced /ˌbrä-zhəl/ from the Sicilian dialect) is the name given to thin slices of meat, usually beef, that are prepared as a roulade, a meat slice rolled around a filling then browned and braised. When I first had braciole, they were small individual servings, like the German Rouladen. However in my search for a slow cooker version, I discovered recipes that made a large roulade versus the individual portions. If Giada can do it, then so can I.

The effort that goes into crafting the individual braciole is intense. Therefore, I was excited that most of the recipes called for a big roast sized braciole. Cutting down the directions to a comfortable level of simplicity makes for a delicious meal without the hours of toil and let's the cook enjoy the food.

I played with these two recipes, Bob's Slow Cooker Braciole and Giada's, to get the guidance for the ingredients and cooking times.

Braciole

Ingredients:
•    26 oz. jar marinara sauce
•    1/2 cup dried Italian-style bread crumbs
•    1 garlic clove, minced
•    2/3 cup grated Pecorino Romano
•    1/3 cup grated provolone
•    2 Tbsp. chopped fresh Italian parsley leaves
•    1½ lbs. flank steak, pounded to 1/4 inch
•    Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
•    3 oz. prosciutto
•    2 – 4 Tbsp. vegetable oil
•    1 cup dry white wine

Directions:
1.    Pour the marinara sauce into the slow cooker and set on High to warm.
2.    Combine the bread crumbs, garlic, chesses and parsley in a small bowl.
3.    Sprinkle both sides of the meat with salt and pepper. Lay the flank steak flat on the work surface. Sprinkle the bread crumb mixture evenly over the steak to cover the top evenly. Layer the prosciutto on top of the mixture.
4.    Starting at the short end, roll up the steak like a jelly roll to enclose the filling completely. Using butcher's twine, tie the steak roll to secure, or use toothpicks.
5.    Heat oil in a heavy skillet. Sear the stuffed flank steak in the hot oil until well browned on all sides, about 8 – 10 minutes. Transfer the meat to the warm sauce in the slow cooker.
6.    Deglaze the pan with white wine and add to the slow cooker.
7.    Spoon sauce over meat to cover.
8.    Turn slow cooker to Low; cook meat until very tender, 6 to 8 hours. Remove string/toothpicks before slicing. Serve with marinara.

My Italian-American co-workers really liked the dish when I brought it to work for lunch, so I'm impressed with the adaption that I did between the two recipes. The marinara does thin out during the cooking. Yet like most dishes, the braciole improves the day after cooking and the sauce thickens up with time. I served this with gemelli (or I'd suggest orecchiette) topped with the marinara and a nice side green salad.

myPics: Art and Architecture

2012-01-05T08:58:00.000-05:00

After viewing the "Rembrandt in America" exhibit at the NC Museum of Art, Steve and I went to look at the Museum's permanent collection. I wanted to show how the piece of art commands the far wall on the gallery while catching the sky lights that collect the indirect light from outside. If you look at the doorway, you can see Steve making sure that he got into the picture I was trying to take.

African Peanut Soup

2011-12-27T08:59:00.000-05:00

This past week I wanted to try a vegan dish, perhaps to balance my minor flop earlier. I am an omnivore, but I do appreciate a good vegan recipes that makes me want to eat it. I think I found it.

A warm bowl of peanut soup

This is usually the time of year that I have the foresight to look for vegan dishes to practice before Lent comes along. Also, as Christmas approaches, I start a fictive month called NotPaidSoonEnoughuary, the time between my December and January pay dates. Starting in the summer, with all the cheap, good, seasonal vegetables, I start making soups and meals to freeze for convenience as well as surviving the 41 days between paydays. Until the end of the year, I am always planning to make dishes with leftovers to be set aside to revisit at the end of January. In short, if my dish is a success, I freeze it and I can usually hold off tapping into it before Lent so I don’t always have to cook, killing two birds with one stone.

I went to Stephanie O’Dea’s A Year of Slow Cooking as a guide for a vegan dish, I found her Crockpot African Peanut Soup. I went to my trusty source for African cuisine, The Congo Cookbook, for more information. “Various peanut soups are common throughout Africa. Some are very simple, others more elaborate. They are often eaten as a main course….”The recipes include to some degree the following: chicken stock or broth, onion, bell pepper, garlic, salt, black pepper, cayenne or red pepper, chili peppers, carrots, tomatoes, peanut butter or peanut paste and sometimes an animal protein in the form of chicken, goat or beef. O’Dea’s recipe came from one on All Recipes that started out vegan, through the use of vegetable broth. On the other hand, I would also recommend bulking this up with some chicken tights and shredding the meat when finished cooking.

African Peanut Soup, adapted from Stephanie O’Dea’s Crockpot African Peanut Soup
Ingredients:

Finest West African Hot Pepper

1 large yellow onion, diced
2 red bell peppers, chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
28 oz can of crushed tomatoes, with liquid
6 cps vegetable broth
¼ tsp black pepper
¼ - ½ tsp chili powder
½ cp uncooked brown rice
3/4 cp peanut butter

Directions:

Place all of the ingredients but the peanut butter into the slow cooker; cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours.
Stir in peanut butter, and cook on high for 20-30 minutes, or until fully incorporated.

Serves: 4-6

As you can see, I am fortunate to have some West African chili powder and I put the larger amount (the ½ teaspoon) in and it gives the soup a nice warm spicy kick. However I do find the spice mellows out as the soup remains in the refrigerator and it’s less of an assault on the senses two days later then when first made.

Not yet named travel entry: Lauderdale before Christmas

2011-12-24T10:18:00.000-05:00

Warning, this one is long so I added a lot of pictures to make it go quickly.

A picture of our approach, Jupiter is the white dot in the upper left corner

I jetted off to Fort Lauderdale last weekend for some fun in the sun before the Christmas holiday. I had two free nights from Starwood Hotels and on a whim I picked Florida as the place to use them. I thought that would be nice to get a bit of relaxation before the end of the year holidays completely kicked in.
Friday, I left work a little early for the airport. I breezed through security, got a cup of Peet’s, boarded my flight, miraculously scored a row with an empty middle seat, settled in my flight and lost myself in the pages of a book to pass the time. Finally my attention waned from the book when that captain announced our initial approach to the airport – high visibility, very few clouds, 76°F. It was dusk and I could see the sunset over the clouds in the distance; Jupiter was high and bright in the sky. I remenisced about my last pre-Christmas vacation, a trip to Abu Dhabi, where I tried to get a picture of the Emirates Hotel with Jupiter high in the sky. With a minor jolt from our final approach, I focused out the window to see Miami about 30 miles away south of the airport.

My ocean-view from my hotel room

I took a cab to my hotel, a 6-mile trek that cost about $20 with tip. (I was surprised to see that most of the cabs I took weren’t equipped for credit cards.) I checked into the Sheraton Fort Lauderdale Beach Hotel and got a room in the Marina building (there three different building in the complex) which was across Seabreeze Boulevard (A1A) via a skywalk. The hotel touts a multi-million dollar renovation. Its investment is evident inside; the lobby is a tasteful decorated with wicker and sea shells in cooling colors of teal and sky blue, evocative of the beach just outside. My room was painted in blues and creams; it was spacious with a king-sized bed and offered great views of the ocean and the marina. The sea is brought into the hotel through the halls and rooms with simple beach and water themed art and photography. I found it easy to get settled and quickly changed into shorts to match my vacation mindset.

I decided to get my lay of the land and googled maps of the area and yelp reviews for places to eat. I found Coconuts, up the road. While the reviews ranged from okay to excellent, it seemed like a good enough place to belly up from some grub. The location can’t be beat – sitting on the Intercoastal Waterway. As a solo diner, I was able to get a table on the deck and take in some of the water traffic.

Sorry, I already hopped in for a nap before I took a picture

I had ordered the conch fritters and the rib special. The conch fritters were fine, though I have to admit that they were light on the conch. The dough was a little sweet with a hint of corn and they were fried a good golden brown. The rib special was a 10oz of pork ribs, in a dry rub of salt, pepper, dried rosemary, oregano and thyme, grilled to fall-off-the-bone perfection and drizzled with a balsamic vinegar reduction. The two dishes complimented each other well, from the light, sweet and chewy appetizer to the rich, succulent pork with good acid finish. I partnered my meal with a Monk in the Trunk Organic Amber Ale. It was a nice malty, spicy smelling beer and had a mild spice flavor, with a little bit of earthiness from the yeast. The beer changed in sweetness first bite of the fritter. All in all, it was a fine meal. Yet, the location brings Coconuts to the forefront for me; it was a delight to dine by the water.

A tour boat on the Intercoastal Waterway decked out for the Holidays

After dinner, I looked for a watering hole. Again I used the internet to find a bar and learn bus system, but I learned that they end around 10 or so. Crestfallen, I decide to tackle the one thing that had been bugging me since I decide to visit Fort Lauderdale - the street naming and number system. After reviewing the maps for the buses, I noticed that the city is laid out as a grid; the intersection of Broward Boulevard (x-axis) and Andrews Avenue (y-axis) serves as the zero-point. All numbered streets and courts go east to west and all numbered avenues and terraces go north to south. Each numbered street gets a directional (SE, SW, NE, NW) based on their direction from Broward and Andrews. However the named streets get a cardinal directional depending on which axis they intersect. This seems to be the general model for most of Broward County.

Art, downtown

With that piece of information unlocked, I choose to go to the Cubby Hole, the closest bar to the hotel. I took a cab and a $14 ride to a quiet stretch of US Route 1. The bar is in a strip mall and I tried the door. It was locked, and it took me some effort to figure out that the entrance was off the parking lot in the back. I entered; it was a typical-looking neighborhood dive bar - the smell of stale smoke lingered in the air. Yet, the music was fun. I looked for a seat, ordered a beer and tried to take in the atmosphere. However, I couldn't figured anything out because my bartenders were good, friendly fellows. Recognizing that I wasn't from here, they introduced themselves. I like when I can pony up to the bar and chat with the bartenders, I can learn a lot about a place doing that. One of them, John, asked me if I had been to Wilton Manors; he described it as their Castro. As the night drew on, the music got more fun. I had 1/2 a beer more than I should and agreed with the bartenders that the bars don't need to be open until 3am on the weekend in Fort Lauderdale. With that said, I ended up closing down the bar, promising to be back, and getting a cab back to my hotel, but I was armed with the idea to check out Wilton Manors.

Nurmi Isles

The next morning started too early for me. I thought that I had made my hotel room impervious to light however there was a sliver under the door that was oozing sunshine. It was made worse when the occupants of the room across from me would exit, the sunlight from their open room assaulted my door and burst through that little crack that aimed for my face. Then this attack was punctuated by the slamming of their door. Yet, I lazily stayed in bed for as long as I could, but, eventually, I would need to do things - visit the bathroom, drink water, crave coffee and eat. To bide my time, I ran to the lobby and got a big chocolate chip muffin. The sweet treat stopped my stomach from growling and that was the reason for getting it in the first place.

Las Olas Isles

I looked up venues to go that night and Bill's Filling Station got some good reviews. It seemed like it would be more my speed and less likely a dance-a-teria. With my evening places confirmed, I finally figured out the bus system in Broward County to plan the rest of my stay. However, the bus system didn’t have me figured out. I made it to the bus stop to take a ride to downtown and I waited, sitting on the bus stop bench. I wondered if I had missed the bus since I can tend to be late. I looked down on my phone to check the schedule while still sitting on the bench when the bus, on time, sped past me. Annoyed, I decided to walk and I scratched off a hike in Hugh Taylor Birch State Park from my list.I strolled up A1A to Las Olas; turned left and walked.

Sophy Curson, Fort Lauderdale and Philadelphia

Eventually I knew that I would run into the Stranahan House, an important building on the National Register of Historic Places, which roughly sits on the intersection of SE 6th Avenue and Las Olas. It’s been herald as the birthplace of Fort Lauderdale. Yet, I was on a walk and took in the sights. Spanish for the waves, Las Olas runs from the beach to the center of town. After crossing a drawbridge, I walked through the Idlewyld, Seven Isles, Las Olas Isles, Colee Hammoock and Beverly Heights neighborhoods. The road is interlaced with canals and waterfront homes. Boats were docked by houses like cars in driveways. By the Beverly Heights neighborhood, the canals and boats give way to the commercial area which is alive with bars, clubs, bridal stores, shops, boutiques, art galleries, restaurants and hotels in a clash of culture like South Street meeting Rittenhouse Square.

One of the Stranahan House's Christmas Trees

I made it to my destination, the Stranahan House. This unassuming structure served as the second trading post built by Frank Stranahan and today is the oldest building in Fort Lauderdale. Its history is, for the most part, as only slightly older than the city, which celebrates its centennial this year.Not too much in known about Frank but he was originally from Ohio, outside of Youngstown. In 1893, he heard word through acquaintances that there was a need for a ferry operator for the New River crossing to connect Lantana to Lemon City, now North Miami in 1893. The location on both the river and the new road, which eventually became US Route 1, created an epicenter of active.

The Stranahan House

The New River was a source of commerce for the city. Seminoles from the Everglades would travel down to the New River Settlement to trade their pelts, feathers and native crafts and art for sewing machines, canned goods and tobacco. The Native Americans’ goods were in such high demand since women’s fashion at turn of the century was very lavish, utilizing fur and feathers. At the same time, the original journey between Lantana and Lemon City was a $10 stagecoach ride that took two days. Travelers camped overnight in wooden-floored tents. It was a wise decision to move the trading post from up the river to the current location. Stranahan acquired the surrounding land, over 10 acres for around a $1 an acre. The confluence of people and the ample acreage of the homestead contributed to Stranaham's early success.

The New River from the Stranahan House

During its history, the building also served as the town hall and post office before it became his home in 1906 when he completed the renovations of the existing structure for his wife, Ivy, whom he married six years prior. Mrs. Stranahan was Fort Lauderdale's first teacher; she was a Florida native, born in North Florida who moved with her family to Lemon City trying to avoid the frost line. Ahead of her time, Mrs. Stranahan was a vegetarian, practiced yoga and provide for the less fortunate – including funding the first African-American school in town.

In the late 1920’s, the Great Depression hit as well as two hurricanes, the 1926 Miami Hurricane and the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane. These disasters, coupled with Frank’s diagnosis and treatment for prostate cancer, pushed him to take his own life. After Frank’s death Ivy Stranahan kept the house, but rented out the first floor to a restaurant known as the Pioneer House to make ends meet. Mrs. Stranaham died in 1971 and the Seventh-Day Adventist Church sold it to the Fort Lauderdale Historical Society in 1979. In 1981, a non-profit corporation set up to preserve and maintain the house for all to visit.

A pink house in the Tarpon River neighborhood

After my tour, I strolled throughout the downtown area and returned to my hotel via bus. Finally I was getting the hang of it and by the end of the trek, I had logged over 4 miles of walking. I picked up a cubano sandwich and a Key West salad at a cafe on A1A. The cubano was simply delicious; it could have been because I was famished. Though I attribute it to the spicy and honey mustard slathered over a pile of thinly sliced ham and thick slices of pork, pressed together and bound by gooey melted Swiss cheese lined with sweet, crunchy, tart pickles. The mayonnaise-dressed salad would be saved for dinner since I was going back to the hotel for a disco nap.

Fort Lauderdale Centennial decorations

Refreshed from my siesta, I enjoyed the crab meat and shrimp salad with celery and green onions and filled me up for the night on the town. I showered, dressed and noticed that I had gotten a little sun kissed from my long walk. I was happy to have a slight healthy glow. I finished dressing and headed to Wilton Drive via the bus. I saw a lot of the city and its Holiday decorations, seemingly out of place - snowflakes and snowmen, but I was charmed. I made it to the Drive and headed toward Bill's Filling Station. While not as over the top as the Castro, I understood what John meant by his comments the last night. It is the area's gay ghetto.

I was really on A1A

I entered Bill's and was surprised at the low density of the crowd; there were only two scores of folks. It was 11pm on a Saturday night and the bars are open until 3pm on the weekend. There was a raffle going on from some charity, so volunteers were asking the patrons for donations.There was a lesbian cover band, dressed mostly in stereotypical attire – flannels and sports jerseys – though the bass player was more forward dressing; she simply wore black. I heard them playing Melissa Etheridge, Adele and Green Day. While I appreciated their rendition of "Come To My Window," no-one can sing like Adele but Adele. After a $5 bottle of Miller Lite, I used my iPhone to find what other places lay around.

George's Alibi, or Alibi for short, read like the aforementioned dance-a-teria that I feared, but a different site gave it a more favorable review. It was also in a strip mall, but it took a huge footprint of the mall, complete with outdoor seating for dinner and for smoking. I walked in to find it cavernous. I walked to the far side of the main bar and the bartender smiled to ask me what I'd like. Nothing too special was on tap, except there was Yuengling. I paid my $4.75 for the pint and enjoyed the crowd and music. Two beers later, I noticed someone I knew. Steve from Atlanta had moved to Fort Lauderdale and landed a gig as security for the bar. We caught up and I realized that I was having fun, yet by 12:30 the crowd thinned. I hailed a cab and headed back to the Cubby HoleI to finish the night with my newly minted bartender friends.

The beach, taken in HDR

I cabbed it back to the hotel after closing the bar down again only to fall quickly asleep. Yet again, the sunshine pummeled me awake and, though I fought it, I succumbed to its power. I took the opportunity to get to the beach and enjoy the sun, the warmth, the sand and the sea. I knew it would only be a matter of hours before I boarded back on a plane coming home. I would be ready for Christmas. I didn't know that I was going to be greeted by 34°F weather when I got home.

For a more complete album of the trip, visit here.

myPics: Not a Creature Was Stirring

2011-12-22T10:31:00.000-05:00

I love to see presents under a tree which glows bright with Christmas lights. It brings me right into the holiday spirit. I must confess that I was going to stage a plate of cookies and milk for this picture, but I got too lazy.

Merry Christmas!

Trimlestown Roast Sirloin

2011-12-20T09:01:00.000-05:00

About 10 Saint Patrick Days ago, I stumbled across this recipe when I was looking for some non corned beef and cabbage meal to make. I goggled Irish recipes and dug a few links deep to find a hearty recipe. I didn’t want to land on the usual shepherd’s pie. Lo and behold, I found the Trimlestown Roast Sirloin recipe.

I couldn’t find any story behind the roast. I looked to see if it was an active city or a town or a village; it’s a road in the Dublin area by the Co. Dublin/Co. Meath boarder (in the Co. Fingal area.) I searched for any historic figures. There is a Baron Trimlestown, of Trimlestown in the County of Meath (maybe that’s why the road is named what it’s named since it’s a stone’s throw from Co. Meath.) This title was created in 1461 probably by Edward IV (if not by Henry VI) for Sir Robert Barnewall. Today, the title is held by Raymond Charles Barnewall, 21st Baron Trimlestown. As of now, there is no known heir to the barony so on Barnewall’s death, it will become dormant.

I’d like to think that this was a meal that the early barons would enjoy from the cattle of their land. In addition to adding simply wine the chef wanted to add some local flavor and spirit to the pot and added a shot of whiskey while cooking. This wine and whiskey braised beef must have become so identified with the barony that barony eponymously game its name to the dish. I have no proof of this at all, though.

Without any history to back it up, I assumed that this recipe was Irish enough to be a tasty dish for the holiday. I found it simple to make and the results were outstanding. I figure that it would make a great slow cooker recipe; take a roast and braise in wine and whiskey then hours later there would be a tasty meal.
It was an appetizing meal but not as good as the original recipe. One major disappointment was the lack of the sauce, the pièce de résistance of the entire dish. I looked up ways to make gravy with the slow-cooker but they weren’t successful.   When I conceived this trail, I asserted the stipulation only to use a slow cooker when I cook. Perhaps, I will break down and use addition pots as this experiment continues since the roux-thicken sauce is just that good.

The roast needed to be served with the braising liquid, since there was no sauce, to remain tender; without it the roast felt a little dry on the palate. Also the delicious burnt crust of meat didn’t form on the top of the roast since it was in the slow cooker covered. However, this was a good meal but not as good as the original. I would recommend this as good pot roast recipe with a little kick; good for a lazy wintry day.
However for a “special occasion” I would spend the time and energy on the original.

Trimlestown Roast Sirloin, adapted from the traditional recipe. (Use this recipe for "special occasions" )
Ingredients:
4 lb. Sirloin roast
salt and pepper, to taste
1 garlic clove, minced or ½ tsp garlic powder (optional)
1 shot whiskey
1 cp. & 1 shot red wine
more salt and pepper, to taste

Directions:
1.    Wipe meat, season with salt, pepper and garlic, cover the beef with the seasonings and refrigerate overnight to flavor.
2.    Place roast in slow cooker; pour whiskey and wine over roast.
3.    Cover and cook on low 6-7 hours.
4.    Remove roast to rest on platter.
5.    Serve with the braising liquid.

Note: feel free to add potatoes, onions, carrots, mushrooms and other vegetables in the beginning of the cooking for a one pot meal.

myPic: A Neo-Romanesque Christmas

2011-12-15T11:29:00.000-05:00

While I was in LA, I wanted to go on a tour of some buildings on the National Registry of Historic Places. I thought that I had included the Bradbury Building in blog. However it also was one the buildings I wanted to see. I took this photo of the elevator, decked out for the holidays.

Molha

2011-12-13T08:37:00.000-05:00

About two years ago I had a chance to go to the Azores. Steve was sent there for a stint and I had an open invitation to visit. However the $1000 price tag and the lack of frequent flying opportunities (It’s just SATA that goes to Terceira directly from the US and the only Alliance airline is TAP) made it difficult to come to fruition.

Like most of my travel knowledge, what I know about the Azores was solidified during my youth. When I was 13, Prince Andrew and Fergie honeymooned in the Azores and I went to my encyclopedia to learn about the islands. To simply explain the Azores to you, they are Portugal’s Hawaiʻi. While more subtropical then tropical, the islands lie southwest of the Portuguese mainland and tourism is one of the main industries. Plus, volcanic activity left its impact on the island.

The Azores sit on the crossroads of three tectonic plates. Named the Azores Triple Junction, this is where the North American, the Eurasian and the African Plates meet. The western islands of Corvo and Flores are located in the North American Plate, while the remaining islands are located within the boundary that divides the other two plates. This geographic dispersion drives the forces which give Azorean cuisine such variety. Rich farmland and a dependence on the sea also influence the assortment of dishes throughout the archipelago.

The stew and pot looking all vermelho (photo in HDR)

Though I missed a chance to go to the Azores, Steve brought me back a nice Azorean cookbook. I have been a little intimidated to try any of the recipes since I don’t know enough about the cuisine to know if I’ve cooked it right. Plus, I’ve only been to a handful of Portuguese and Azorean restaurants in the States, and mostly in Boston area. This November, I happened upon Snack Bar / O Senhor Ramos in Cambridge with a positive write up on yelp. I entered and read “Portuguese Specialties” on the menu board. Not knowing what anything was, I ordered Frango No Churrasco. My server asked me if I wanted half or a whole chicken. I didn’t even know that was an option.

Anxiously I awaited my dish; I didn’t know what I was getting except that it was a half of a chicken. After 10 minutes, my server brought me the dish. It was a half chicken grilled in pieces covered in a red sauce, like the hot sauce and butter mixture of Buffalo chicken, over saffron rice. It was on the bone, tender, simple, tangy and hot due to the sauce. I ate it up, leaving nothing on the bone. I thought that it was great, and when I got to share my experience with Steve, he confirmed that was a dish that he had often in the Azores.

So, armed with the confidence that I liked Azorean cuisine and my new meme to cook with a crock pot once a week, I sought out a dish to make. I discovered Crock Pot Azorean Spiced Beef Stew on Stephanie O’Dea’s site, which chronicles her commitment to use her slow cooker daily for a year in 2008. In turn, she would get inspiration for her dishes from other bloggers. Notably the inspiration for her recipe came from Molha: Azorean spiced beef stew adapted by Sean Timberlake, a San Francisco based dot-com product manager-cum-blogger-cum-foodie, from a recipe in Azorean Cuisine by Zita Lima.

Molha

So I give you my take on Stehpanie’s version of Sean’s adaption of "Molha à la mode de Pico" by Zita Lima:

Molha /moˈʎa/
Ingredients:
2 lbs chuck, cut into bite-size cubes
5-6 garlic cloves, crushed or minced
1 Tbsp red pepper flakes
2 Tbsp Kosher salt
1 large onion, chopped
3-4 garlic cloves, chopped
1 6 oz can tomato paste
3 cps white wine
1 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 bay leaf

Directions:

The night prior, combine the cubed chuck, garlic, red pepper and salt; mix to cover the beef with the seasonings and refrigerate overnight to flavor.
The next day, add onion and garlic to the bottom of the slow cooker then add the beef mixture; top with paste and wine.
Stir in the remaining seasonings, floating the bay leaf.
Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours.
Molha is served traditionally with boiled potatoes

Serves: 4-6

I wanted to add my mark to the recipe; I made it last week with that I thought was chopped up Serrano pepper in lieu of the red pepper flakes since, per Sean’s blog, the original recipes calls for piri piri chilis. I found my stew lacking heat – I don’t know if I used a mild chili that looked like Serrano or if I needed to add more, but I think that I’ll follow the tried-and-true red pepper flakes until I can figure out what fresh chili would work.

I didn't have any starch like the traditional boiled potatoes or buttered noodles like Sean had to serve with my molha. I had to settled for pasta. It actually looks like a ragù over my penne.

Outside of that, I really enjoyed this dish. The stew was thick and the cubed beef fell apart easily when I pressed it with a wooden spoon. Also, there’s an interesting balance of flavor between the rich, succulent taste of the beef and the fruity light note of white wine; I enjoyed the newness of this pairing. In addition, the delicate flavor of the tomatoes was enhanced by the sweet profile of the cinnamon. The cumin added a hint of something smoky. I loved the combination. In short, if I had to pitch it like a movie, I would say, "Think a mole-influenced chili con carne."

Bom apetite!

Wish List: City Island

2011-12-12T11:34:00.001-05:00

Usually when I’m in an airport first thing in the morning on Monday, it’s because I’m heading out early for a day trip somewhere. Today, however, I’m still in transit, connecting from a red eye out of Southern California to Philadelphia. Thinking about my recent visit to the LA metro area, I want to go somewhere where I don’t have to drive at all.

The traffic in all throughout the region was hellish. Even my beloved US 101 Songline was more like a parking lot than a freeway. It reinforces why I love cities with great public transportation.

City Island Nautical Museum, image courtesy of Wikipedia

When I turn the phrase “city with great public transportation” I immediately think of New York, our most populated city in the US. While the traffic can be as nightmarish as Los Angeles (have you ever tried to get into the city through the Lincoln Tunnel at 4:30 in the afternoon?) the subway and bus system as well as the taxis of NYC eliminate my stress of needing to drive.

New York is a megapolis – a super city. However just off to the side of this almost unmanageable mass of humanity and skyscrapers lies a relative peaceful, New-England-like oasis: City Island. In Long Island Sound, this charming island with only one way in and out redefines living in the city.

Sea Shore Restaurant & Marina

If you have heard of City Island, it may because of the movie starring Andy García, Julianna Margulies and Alan Arkin. However my love affair started when I had noticed it on a map many years ago. It seems to be in my DNA to appreciate and gravitate toward all of the quirky or superlative places on the earth: the most Western point in Ireland, the most Southern point in California, the most unlike New York City in New York. This simply named island stood out to me and I have been curious about it since.

About 2 years ago, I had seen an article on one of the travel sites that I follow about the charm of New England without leaving New York. When I finally read the name of the location, I was excited to see there were others who wanted to explore the off-the-beaten-path places in the word and that someone penned an article about the spot. City Island isn’t a tourist destination. It’s nowhere near as densely population as Manhattan and it’s sparse with famous attractions. There was only one place for lodging on the island, Le Refuge Inn Bed and Breakfast, which, according to latest google search, is closed.

A house on City Island

City Island provides a slice of life that’s more in tune with the rest of America than NYC; City Island Avenue serves as the island’s Main Street. While the subway doesn’t go to City Island, a bus does. However, bus schedule is limited since the island is a residential area of the city and not a destination like Ellis Island. For me, though, that’s the adventure – just being reliant on public transportation and exploring an area on foot makes the island alluring. It’s like exploring Astoria, Park Slope or Washington Heights for the first time.

It’s a wish of mine to get there next year, and I hope to share my visit with you. However, there is a certain irony that, in the getaway destination where I want to go, most of the residents use and need cars to get along. Yet this is the place I think when the traffic in LA got to me and I needed a place to get away from the automobile.

Images, excepted where noted, are courtesy of Nabe Wise.

Freeform Forum: Santorum, Food Stamps and Obesity

2011-12-09T08:46:00.000-05:00

If you don’t know, I can’t stand Rick Santorum. He is just too partisan and too intense for me to stomach. He is too polarizing and I find him plainly despicable.

In Iowa, he recently made the outrageous promise to reduce significantly federal funding for food stamps under the premise that the nation’s increasing obesity rates make the program unnecessary. Igor Volsky, Health Care and LGBT Editor for ThinkProgress.org, notes in his piece, "Santorum: We Don’t Need Food Stamps Because Obesity Rates Are So High" that Santorum calls the food stamp program one of the fastest growing programs in Washington. Volsky highlights that cost of the program has increased because more Americans are out of work and wages are down and disputes the connection between the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), a.k.a. food stamps, and the rates of obesity in Americans.

In the column, Volsky comments that the Department of Agriculture has data that shows that around 33.5 million of the 48 million people who rely on food stamps last year had no earned income. That means over 11% of the US population benefits from SNAP because they earned no income this year. Yet, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that one-third of U.S. adults is obese, which comes out to 81.7 million American adults.

Let’s go ahead and assume that Rick becomes President and he enacts the elimination of the food stamp program and use his logic – based on his supposition that food stamps cause obesity, there will still be 33 million obese Americans adults not in SNAP. Over 10% of the population will remain obese. Nice work, Rick. You've stopped feeding the hungry and you left us with one in ten Americans seriously overweight.

If you want to go after government spending and to address American obesity, one of the more constructive ways to deal with the issue is to retool agricultural subsidies. Feed grains (mostly corn) get around 2.8 billion dollars a year in subsidies, which over a 1/3 of the farming monies from the government.

Critics of the farm subsidies note that the artificially low prices resulting from subsidies create unhealthy incentives for consumers, and this is where our obesity issue comes in. HFCS and corn syrup in general are cheaper, benefiting from the corn and feed grains subsidies and this leads to high-sugar food being less expensive and more affordable. To folks on fixed incomes or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the cheaper cheese food product which happens to have HFCS in it will win over the real organic cheese.

How about we tell Congress to use that farm subsidy to encourage the growth of organic fruits and vegetables? And I don’t mean pizza, in which the cheese food product, bread and tomato sauce at least all have added HFCS; I mean tomatoes, green beans, broccoli and more. We are still the bread basket to the world, so I’m not saying that we shouldn’t grow grains and maize (how worldly) or support our farmers. However we should encourage that our farmers are growing appropriate food for us and the world.

In perspective, food stamps do cost the government over 6 times more than the grain subsidies. (However, SNAP cost just shy of twice as much as the total amount of all farm subsidies.) Yet both are insignificant percentages of the $1.2 trillion that the congressional "super committee" was supposed to cut from the budget (grain subsidies are .23% and food stamps are 1.4%). I don’t think that we’ll cut the budget on eliminating one of the programs only. However it’s a way to use our tax money "to promote the general Welfare", which is why we have a government in the first place.

As stated above 11% of Americans were not collecting any income last year. The average rate of unemployment last year was about 9.65%. I’m sure the unemployment numbers factor into the 11% on income-less Americans. The unemployed are looking for jobs, but aren’t getting them since they don’t exist. Keeping our citizens dutifully employed and healthfully fed is promoting the general Welfare.

I find it irresponsible that Rick makes such a bold and unintelligent promise to the voters of Iowa. In summary, Volsky makes his argument against Rick’s promise acknowledging that

"Food prices have also gone up, adding additional costs. In fact, the food stamp program has been critical for reducing poverty and pumping money into local economies during the down economy, so cutting it now would not only take food out of peoples’ mouths (regardless of whether they are obese or not) and could slow down the recovery."

Yet another reason for me to tell Rick to sit the eff down, lie in a pasture and fade from the limelight. Let the actual level-headed presidential hopefuls work the political stages.

myPics: The Dream of Sharjah Dunes

2011-12-08T08:52:00.000-05:00

This week, as year ago, I was in the UAE visiting my friend, Eileen, and her family. My lovely hosts took me and some of their friends dune bashing in the desert of Sharjah, the emirate immediately north of Dubai. It's like a roller coaster ride, but in a beat up Range Rover.

A few times our young driver stopped so we would take some pictures of the desert landscape. While there were a caravan of Range Rovers, we were able to stop on the other side of dunes to make us feel like we were the only ones there. The sane was a beautiful vermilion and, like other desert locales, its color shifted as the sun started to set.

I hope when you look into this photo that you feel a little lost and yet in awe, and you can almost feel the arrival of the cold evening that was falling when I took this photo.

Not yet named food entry: Kelaguen and finadene (Guam)

2011-12-07T08:32:00.000-05:00

I was wondering if I had exhausted all of my favorite treats from around the world and feared that I wouldn’t be able to write another “Not yet named food entry.” In the middle of my panic, it hit me out of the blue, I should write about kelaguen or rather kelaguen mannok, chicken kelaguen, to be exact.

During my time playing for and serving on the board of the Philadelphia Gryphons, I became very good friends with a former classmate and colleague, Joe. Joe is Guamanian or, as we lovingly teased, Guamish. He came to Philadelphia somewhat on a lark. A Penn alumnus in Hagåtña had mentioned that Joe should apply to Penn. It was a good school; if it was good enough for the alumnus, it was good enough for Joe. Only applying to two Universities – Penn and the University of Guam, Joe got into Penn and he headed to Philadelphia. Little did he know that he was going to school a lot of us about our territory in the Pacific.

A view of Hagåtña, the capital of Guam - image courtesy of Wikipedia

As Joe and I grew into the roles of captain and president of our team and club, we spent a lot of time working together on the behind the scenes. As part of our club’s board, we all worked together to establish budgets, develop best practices, schedule games, plan player recruitment, fundraise, create an identity and more. Many of the hours were spend in Joe’s ample apartment around his living room during meals.

During this time, Joe’s sister come to live for a spell and their mother would send care packages from Guam. I remember Joe being very excited that a mailing of titiyas had come in. From the Spanish, torillas, these are flour flatbreads made with coconut milk. Joe asked the few of us working if we wanted to try some authentic Guamanian food. We were game.

Titiyas

He went into his refrigerator and pulled out a heavy bowl of white, crumbly something and a mason jar of soy sauce with onions floating in it. “This is kelaguen and finadene,” he said and topped a titiyas with some kelaguen from the bowl and poured a little finadene over the pile of kelaguen. He folded it and ate it like a taco. We followed suit and I fell in love.

Kelaguen is a Chamorro specialty that can be made with cooked chicken or raw shrimp, fish or beef. The pickling marinade of lemon juice, fresh coconut, green onions, salt and hot chilis is the hallmark of the kelaguen. Like ceviche, the marinade denatures the raw meat into a chemically “cooked” protein. The dish is served cold or at room temperature and eaten on its own, over rice, or wrapped in a warm titiyas, like Joe shared with us.

Chicken kelaguen on a titiyas

Chicken kelaguen is made with shredded and then minced chicken, while with the raw meats a finely minced meat would do. Lemon juice, fresh coconut, green onions, salt and hot chilis are mixed with the meat and left to marinade. Like all marinades, it works within an hour to flavor, but the best flavor comes out when it’s left overnight.

The chicken presents all of the flavors at once – sweet with the creamy and nutty hint of coconut, pungent with the sharp grassy bite and burn of the onions, tart with the sour and bight acid from the lemon and spicy from the slow crescendo of heat from the chili. The chicken itself is tender from the treatment and if it was cooked more traditionally there will be a smoky, almost caramel note from the roasting. I ended up being on kelaguen kick for weeks, until I got too tired from making it all the time.

There is no one recipe for kelaguen; the recipes varies slightly from village to village and between families. The best thing I can suggest is go to the blog, “The Scent of Green Bananas: Food from the Guambat” and read her post on chicken kelaguen. Then play with it and find the seasoning proportions that work for your taste buds, a.k.a. how hot do you like it?

Finadene

One flavor that I didn’t mention was the finadene, the condiment (or Guamdiment) of choice. The proportions of this salty, spicy, sour accompaniment vary as much as kelaguen’s does. Also, finadene can be added on top of rice, barbecued meats, grilled fish and more; its acid cuts through food to heighten its flavor. It delivers a megadose umami.

Finadene is present in many Guamanian households and most of them make their own. Again, I’m going to refer to The Scent of Green Bananas for her recipe, but a basic finadene consists of soy sauce, lemon juice, vinegar, chopped white onion and fresh chilis, which are left to mingle in the refrigerator for at least a day. Variations include lime juice, green onions, lemon slices, cherry tomatoes and sugar for example.

Once you have finadene, you can do anything culinarily. In addition to being a great condiment, finadene and an oil of your choice makes an outstanding marinade. Minus the need for patience, finadene is simpler to make than kelaguen, too. I think I know what I'll be dishing up during the Christmas break.

I'm hungry just looking at this

Images, except where noted, courtesy of The Scent of Green Bananas: Food from the Guambat.

Around the World in a Pot

2011-12-06T10:24:00.001-05:00

My roommate and I had our annual Christmas party this year, and outside of the neighbor calling at 1:30am to see if the party would 2:00am because she could hear everything in her apartment, it was a wonderful night.

One of the many dishes that we had was my take on Cocktail Meatballs (a.k.a. Grape Jelly Meatballs.) Prior to my friend Ryan’s birthday party in San Diego about 2 years ago, I never really had heard of treating meatballs this way. Apparently I’ve been obviously to meat and jam combinations all my life; my friend, Denise, has invited me over to her parent’s for Night in Venice annually for the last 20 years and I enjoyed the Cocktail Kielbasa (a.k.a. Raspberry Kielbasa). Yet I never noticed the similarity between the recipes. It wasn’t until I asked, “What’s in the sauce, sesame seeds?” that I learned it was raspberry preserves.

A crock pot of Cocktail Meatballs

For an easy and hearty appetizer, I simply use a 4 quart slow cooker on high and add two 1½ pound bags of frozen, pre-made meatballs; a jar of jam, jelly or preserves (this party I used Ikea’s Lingonberry jam, Sylt Lingon); Dr Pepper, about a jam jar's worth; Bourbon, about a 1/3 of the jam jar; and Sriracha, to taste (if you don’t know all about wonderful Sriracha, check out The Oatmeal’s what’s-not-to-love description.) I start it about 3 hours before the party and turn to warm when the first guests arrive.

This kindled my want to use my crock pot more. My mom had made a few dishes while I was young. There is something excited about throwing items into a pot first thing in the morning, then turning it on and letting it do its thing until you come home from work.

Straight from the Oatmeal, Sriracha

In addition to just trying to use my crock pot more, I wanted to be adventuresome in my cooking. As you probably know, I'm in a bookclub that values good eating and good drinking along with the good read and great discussions. As part of our "thing," we pick themes for our bookclub potlucks. Sometimes, they are based on the setting - Indian food for The Splendor of Silence byIndu Sundaresan, and other times they are based on an idea - "Bake whatcha momma made ya" (your favorite dish your mom made growing up) for The Red Tent by Anita Diamant. I love these themes because sometimes we pick a cuisine that I know how to make well and sometimes we all have to learn how to make something new. For example, I learned how to make Tomato Bredie (about 5/6 of the way down on the page), a delicious South African lamb stew when I chose Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee.

I want to try to cook dishes with flavors from all around the world in my crock pot, of course. I've been wondering when I could use my crock pot since I've been traveling a bit and I'm not always home. Ironic, I know, when will I have enough time to do something easy like use my slow cooker? With my traveling schedule, it looks like Monday night (for preparations) and Tuesday morning (for setting and forgetting) end up as the right time to try some world cooking in a crock pot. As you may have guessed, I am cooking something today - my first foray is a molha, an Azorean spiced beef stew. I'll update you all next week.

Wish List: What to do in SoCal?

2011-12-05T12:29:00.001-05:00

I’ll be traveling to Southern California this weekend for work. Since I have a red eye home, I hope to be able to go to Got Kosher on Sunday and get some more of the pretzel challah that didn’t survive the trip to San Diego last time. Yet, I still haven’t decided either I’ll stay in LA or Anaheim (I have reservations at hotels in both cities.)

The majority of time working will be in Anaheim and to get an affordable flight, I’m taking United/Continental in and out of John Wayne Airport. The Airport is an hour from the LA hotel, in good traffic. The event, a reception and game, is at the Honda Center, but the tickets for the game are up in Westwood. Once I am finished with my responsibilities, will the convenience of being close to the work event be outweighed by the ease of being close to downtown LA?

Gamble House in Pasadena, CA

So I googled “LA travel blog” to help me decide. I foundThe Los Angeles Consortium forOnline Travel on ChristopherElliott's The 11 best new travel blogs of 2011. Christopher calls this site “easily the best new regional travel blogs to come along in a long time. It’s from a consortium of well-known LA area travel writers, including Jennifer Miner. You can tell that these folks love LA!”

I jumped into reading some of the entries and read Noah Albert’s entry about Art Deco Buildings in Los Angeles. From the 20’s to the 40’s the population of Los Angeles tripled and to match this growth in population new buildings were erected in the Art Deco style. Albert continues his entry focusing on two specific Art Deco structures, the Eastern Columbia and The Wiltern. these are two places that are his favorites, and one of the reason why is “when the light is right, the turquoise terra cotta covering both these structures looks just like blue-green magic.”

The Sunset Tower, West Hollywood, CA

Ah, architecture! The LA area is known for its art deco style, as well as its earlier arts and crafts movement, which is a personal favorite. I will take in the wonders. I think I’ve just decided that I’ll stay in LA.

Hopefully, I can sneak a peek and head out to the Gamble House in Pasadena, California on Friday. This outstanding example of American Arts and Crafts style architecture is also a favorite location of my dear friend, Rosie. Designed by Charles and Henry Greene in 1908 for David and Mary Gamble of the Procter & Gamble Company, the house is a National Historic Landmark.

The Edward Alexander Kelley Hackett House, Los Angeles, CA.

Inspired by Hollywood and Albert’s entry, I think that I’ll go check out the Sunset Tower. This hotel, is which has host many an Oscar and Golden Globes party, is located on the Sunset Strip. Architect Leland A. Bryant designed the building in 1929 and it opened in 1931. Also on the National Registry, the Sunset Tower is considered one of the finest examples of Art Deco architecture in the Los Angeles area.

Also in my searches, I found the Edward Alexander Kelley Hackett House is a historic Craftsman-style house in the Pico-Union neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. Built in 1901, the house is known for its well-preserved Craftsman architecture. After viewing the house, I can stay in the Pico-Union area, a Salvadoran and Guatemalan immigrant community, and get something tasty for lunch.

Any other suggestions for great architecture in Los Angeles?

Images courtesy of Wikipedia.

myPics: Haul out the holly

2011-12-01T08:48:00.000-05:00

I love the holidays. I still believe that if you have a good Halloween then you're set until Mardi Gras! Yuletide is the biggest high point for me during this Holiday period. I'm a strong advocate of decorating for Christmas immediately after Thanksgiving and keeping it up until Epiphany.

Here's a detail of the tree in the apartment during the day.

This year the tree is decked out in a wintry theme of gold, silver, white and cerulean. Icicles and faceted jems spread glow in the daylight and in the tree lights as well. The shiny balls reflect the shine and create a festive look that's reminiscent of the delightful chill of a good hibernal night.

Not yet named food entry: Cranberry Ricotta Tart

2011-11-30T09:45:00.000-05:00

I can't remember when I first made this dessert; I would say that it was over 10 years ago. I can't remember where I found the recipe; I think that I what I was watching was a long forgotten show on the Food Network. I do remember that it was an episode about cooking with cheese, and the original recipe was for making 6 individual Cranberry-Ricotta Tarts with toasted Almond Crust. I do remember going on line for the recipe with the foresight to copy and paste into a word document since I have never found it on line since.

Folks starting to enjoy the tart

I go into more detail about the history of this dish earlier in my blog, Musing on how traditions get to be. According to that post it’s now been about 11 years since I’ve been making the Cranberry Ricotta Tart. Also, I’ve gone back to calling it a tart since a torte is a cake.

Aunt Florence's attempts to keep the tart for herself

I am sharing a Ryan family tradition that over a decade old. I hope you make it and enjoy it. As I mention in my other blog post, I don't have to come to dinner, but that's no excuse for the tart not being there.

*******

Cranberry Ricotta Tart

½ cp apple brandy, such as Calvados (or your choice of liquor - other brandies, Irish Whiskey or Bourbon are some of my favorites)
2/3 cp dried cranberries
2 cps almonds meal, lightly toasted if desired
6 Tbsp packed dark brown sugar
¼ cp (½ stick) unsalted butter, melted
2 cp fresh whole milk ricotta, drained if necessary
½ cup white cane sugar
2 eggs
½ tsp vanilla extract
2 Tbsp all-purpose flour

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F; slowly heat the brandy and pour it over the cranberries in a heatproof bowl. Let the cranberries soak for 20 minutes and then drain.

Combine the almonds, brown sugar and melted butter and mix until the butter is incorporated into the mixture. Place a 10-inch spring form pan on a baking sheet, and fill with almond mixture evenly pressing the crust firmly against the sides and bottoms. Set aside.

Combine ricotta, sugar, eggs, vanilla and flour; stir vigorously until the mixture is very creamy.

Sprinkling the cranberries

Sprinkle the cranberries into the crust and pour the cheese mixture just until it reaches the top of the crust. Bake the tarts in a preheated 325 degree oven for 45 minutes, or until the cheese is golden brown.

Let cool completely before serving.

Yield: 1 (10-inch) tart

I always try to find three nice looking cranberries or pieces thereof to reserve for topping the tart in the center. It's just my thing to do.

Finished product, artistic angle

Wish List: Fort Lauderdale

2011-11-28T09:21:00.000-05:00

My hotel chain of choice is Starwood and I am a member of the Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) program. Earlierthis year, SPG ran the SPG Getaway Freepromotion. It entailed earning one freeResort Night Award for every three eligible stays at over 1,000 hotels acrossall their brands from May 1 through July 31.

During that time, I stayed a total of 8 nights – splitbetween work and leisure – at the following hotels: Aloft Houston by theGalleria; Sheraton Syracuse University Hotel; Sheraton Reston Hotel; FourPoints by Sheraton San Diego; Sheraton Mission Valley San Diego and Palace Hotel, San Francisco (one of my favorites!) These six stays earned me two award nights at over 200 of Starwood's resorts; I should have squeezed a night in a Philly Starwood to get 3 nights!

Sheraton Fort Lauderdale Beach Hotel, beach view, image courtesy of Starwood

The West Coast and Southwest choices were out of thequestion since the airfare would be prohibitively high. The majority of theEast Coast choices were in charming, secluded locations – ideal for a resort,but not for an urban fellow like me. This left either Virginia or Florida as my viable options. I was going to cash in the reward for twonights at Virginia Beach during my visit to Hampton Roads for Steve’s retirementceremony, but he needed Bonnie and me to stay at his house to help withlogistics. So I didn't have to use my nights in Virginia. Of the Florida locations, Miami and Fort Lauderdale seemed to be the most carfree positive. I called the Miami resortsfirst and they had no availability, but the Sheraton Fort Lauderdale Beach Hotel could accommodate me. Theonly weekend that I had free was December 16-18 and there was a slot in the hotel then, so I booked.

Then I bit the bullet to search for airfare and found asurprisingly reasonable scheduled flight to and from Fort Lauderdale for$191.40. I snatched it up without any hesitation since it was non-stop on US Airways. I will favor the Star Alliance for my status. Resort: booked, flight: ticketed; now,I’m vacationing for a weekend in the sun the weekend before Christmas.

Fort Lauderdale skyline, image courtesy Wikipedia

I have only been in Fort Lauderdale briefly in 2003 and itwas just a brief skirting of the city. Ihad lunch at a restaurant on S. Atlantic Avenue and I drove past some of thecanals. It reminded me of Venice Beachin Los Angeles. However that’s all Ireally remember; don’t have a blank slate but it’s enough of a palimpsest thatI can put new experiences down and they will be my only memories of the town.

I’m must reiterate – I'm excited to be in Florida again in the beginning of thewintry season. I was in Orlando inDecember 2009 and it was a treat to be in warm weather in a month that I’musually bundled up in. Also being atDisney probably helped keep the energy up, but there was something deviouslyexciting about Christmas decorations being staged in a climate of 70 degreeweather – actually, like being in AbuDhabi and Dubai in December. It’s like cheating Death, this cheating Cold.

Stranahan House, image courtesy Stranahan House via facebook

Obviously, I will have access to the beach since I’ll bestaying the Sheraton Fort Lauderdale BeachHotel and I can imagine a few hours of solace in the sun and with the sandbetween my toes. For energy, I can head to S. Atlantic Avenue and Las Olas Boulevard to take in the boutiques,restaurants and people-watching. For attractions, the Stranahan House, theoldest building in the city and county, comes with high marks and there’salways Hugh Taylor Birch State Park with the possibilities of biking, inlineskating, kayaking, canoeing and segway tours, as well as taking a good oldfashioned hike.

The food in Fort Lauderdale sounds inviting; the dining experience has been described as casualchic. Being so close to Miami and the Caribbean,I am confident the Cuban cuisine will be out of this world and that I will findtreasures like Puertoriqueño, Jamaican and Indian restaurants. I am going to yelpto find an intimate café or an al fresco waterfront eatery where I can enjoy phenomenaldish crafted with seafood straight from the sea and local fruits and vegetables.

Christmas lights in South Flordia, image courtesy of Fort Lauderdale Christmas Lights

I'm going to make this trip my brief respite during the hectic time that is the holiday season. From work to family, my time between now and New Year's Eve is full and devoted to others. So a few days of R&R will be good for my soul, so I can jump into the wonderful chaos that the Holidays bring.

myPics: Flawless Fall

2011-11-24T11:21:00.000-05:00

When I was up in Cambridge for the Penn/Harvard tailgate, I had a wonderful view of Boston and the Charles River. I felt for the quintessential American autumnal holiday that a classic view of changing leaves in the home state of the "first" Thanksgiving would be the best way to wish my friends and readers a wonderful and loving Thanksgiving.

Let me leave you with this:
As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.
- John Fitzgerald Kennedy

...I just hate travelers: Passengers in the TSA Lines

2011-11-22T17:27:00.001-05:00

One thing about the Philadelphia airport that sours me on traveling is going through the TSA security lines. I have no problem with the scanning itself to make sure that we are secure for flight. It’s both the security guards who stand at the entrance to the long queue shoot and, of course, my fellow passengers.

My first beef is with these security folks; I assume they are not an official part of the TSA due to their dress and lack of TSA accessories. They seem to be airport-employed agents who obliviously tell you which line to get into: Expert, Casual or Family/Medical Liquids. I’ve been cattle-shooted (or is it cattle-shot) into the Family line several times, and not because it’s empty. Sometimes, it is the shortest line and I’m sent there to alleviate the back up. However, it doesn’t actually speed my time through security.

What Kind of Traveler Are You? icons, images courtesy of TSA

This leads to my grievances with my fellow passengers. Though I just mentioned being sent to the Family/Medical Liquids line, it doesn’t mean that I find those traveling with little children or have a lot of medicines to be the biggest offenders. They just need more time and I understand that. However, it perplexes me how many casual travelers or mislabeled experts don’t know how to go through the TSA lines. These are the people who get under my skin.

While TSA procedures appear to change at whim, you can still prepare for the security lines. When going through a full body scanner, you must have completely empty pockets – not a stitch of fabric or a scrap of paper. So empty your pockets, period. Prepare for going through a full body scanner even though you can have items in your pocket for a metal detector and it starts to make the process better.

An example of a full body scanner, image courtesy of Smarter Travel

I feel that if you can afford an airline ticket, then you can afford an internet connection. If you have an internet connection, you have the means to google “what to and not to pack in carry on” and know ahead of time that sharp objects, some sports equipment (including baseball bats and spear guns), firearms, explosives, and flammable items are not allowed on planes. I’ve traveled with colleagues – event planners – who have absentmindedly thrown screwdrivers, knifes and wrenches in their carry on bag. They had to explain themselves to the TSA officials. In most instances, they’ve lost their tools. However, one determined person wasn’t going to let the TSA confiscate her husband’s favorite wrench that she borrowed without his knowledge. She took her carry on back to the ticket counter and checked it. While checking bags isn’t the goal of carry on luggage, sometimes, if I have the means to check, I do check my luggage. It does help that I’m silver on Continental (soon to be United solely).

Also if you can afford an airline ticket, I would assume that you can afford a TV and you have heard about 2006 transatlantic aircraft plot which changed traveling policy including the restriction of liquids to be carried on a plane from outside the “sterile” area. The 3-1-1 rule limits each and every passenger to one quart-sized zip-top bag of liquid toiletries of no more than 3.4 ounces each. You have to finish your soda, coffee or your expensive Starbucks trente iced sugar-high, caramel-packed latte-ccino, even if you only have a swallow left. Those are the rules. I’ve thrown out perfectly good unopened Fiji water bottles and Gatorade, as well.

A practical and comfy outfit (please note my sarcasm), image courtesy of Freakjet.com

As long as you’re not googling “what to and not to pack in carry on” and the 3-1-1 rule, don’t google “whatto wear for TSA security line.” I am amazed by the outfits that I see, like the Juicy and Pink hoodies that barely cover anything, but need to be taking off for scanning, to the killer feet-tall laced-up boots that take a week to put on and off. Men aren’t immune from wearing the wrong things; every piece of jewelry needs to be taken off your body. While, gone are the days of dressing up for flying, people still need to dress appropriately for screening. I try to make sure that I have slip on shoes, too, when I travel. So skip the jewelry and keep your pockets empty. Wear a jacket that's easy to remove and put back on since that will have to go through the x-ray. While you’re at it, make sure that your coat has ample pockets for stuffing with last minute items. You can put your mobile phone in that pocket and run it through the x-ray machines without hassle.

As I continue my rant, everyone should learn how to pack. In addition to learning how to place items in a suitcase for the best protection of the items, everyone should learn to pack fewer items in a suitcase. I do have a secret ire for those cute little old grandmas who stuff their luggage with lead and can’t actually move it. I’ve hurt my back before helping these folks before. The last time, I helped and got hurt, I quipped “What the hell do you have in there?” She sassed me for cussing at her and then told me it was her oxygen. I don’t know how she got it through. No more helping little old ladies. Yet, I ideally travel with two items; my carry on luggage and my messenger bag. I stuff my carry on with my clothes and shoes and everything that I don’t need on the plane. My messenger bag also holds my laptop and my toiletries (the two items that I need to remove for inspection for the TSA) and everything that I might want to access during my flight.

Storing bags in the overhead bin, image courtesy of Plane Sassy

However, getting ready for TSA screening should being before you leave your house in addition to packing right and dressing right. Before I leave my apartment, I put my keys in my messenger bag since I’m not going to need them until I return. I also pack my loose change (if they are a bunch of quarters, if not, that can stay home), my watch, wallet (without my id) and other loose items in to my bag. I only keep my phone, my id, credit card and my boarding pass (if it’s not on my phone) in my pockets before security. Plus, if I don’t really need my belt to hold up my pants, it’s in the bag, too. As I said before, this is the bag that holds my laptop and my toiletries, so I can get things in and out of it easily.

When it’s a good day at the Philadelphia airport, getting through airport security is a breeze. It’s a well-oiled machine of people who know what to do and how to do it. When it’s not, I’m cranky and I put hexes on everyone. However, my sour mood is short lived if I have enough time to run over to Peet’s coffee on the terminal D&E connector and get a cup of joe.

A great cup of joe, image courtesy of Peet's

Thanks to Smarter Travel’s blog, Today in Travel, for the 10Tips for Sailing Through Airport Security, which reminded me of the bad TSA line behavior that I saw yesterday traveling to and from Rochester, NY.

myPics: The Garden

2011-11-17T08:57:00.000-05:00

Well the Boston Garden... Friday night, I worked an alumni event at the Boston Beer Works on Canal Street and I walked back to my hotel in Cambridge. I had to pass the Boston Garden (TD Garden - they have the naming rights) en route. The large illuminated sign caught my eye.

It's bold and alluring. This was a better angle to get a clear, interesting picture than the dead-on example below.

Not yet named food entry: Vanilla Seltzer (New England)

2011-11-16T16:36:00.001-05:00

One of my newest treats is seltzer water. Not just any seltzer water, but Polar Seltzer with Vanilla. It is an intriguing beverage that starts with strong smell of vanilla before the salty taste of carbonation hits your palate and is follow up with sweet notes that compliment the aroma. I love it ice cold on its own and I have used it as a mixer.

I was introduced to this new flavor in seltzer during a visit to Connecticut about two years ago. My dear friend, Julie, had offered us something to drink and rattled off about 5 flavored seltzers – one of which was vanilla. I was intrigued, but cautious. She offered me a sip of hers and from the first scent of vanilla, I was hooked. Later during my visit, I hit the area Stop and Shop and purchased 6 liters of vanilla for my drive back to Philadelphia.

The difficulty of this new treat is that it is not readily available in my neck of the woods. Polar Beverages are distributed mainly in New England and Upstate New York, with additional limited available in Metro New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and in 13 other states. This limited availability means that there is no vanilla seltzer in Philadelphia. Giant, notably, carries Polar Seltzer but I have yet to see more than plain, lemon, lime and a handful of other flavors in stock.

A dramatization of my checking in with duffel bags full of seltzer, image courtesy of The Malones Down Under

Now when I travel to New England, I try to pick up more whether I’m driving or flying. Now that I have silver status on Continental, it’s less of a hardship to pack a duffle bag of vanilla seltzer to bring home. The ticketing agents and cabbies, however, are none too pleased.

Vanilla seltzer isn’t the only delight that Polar Beverages make. They also make a Diet Birch Beer which is clear and locals call white birch beer. There is also a Diet Double Fudge, which is really amazing – diet chocolate soda! This last trip to Boston, I discovered a Banana flavored seltzer, which I was pleased with. Finally, I read a tweet from @PolarSeltzer yesterday that Polar is introducing holidayfavors: Eggnog, Candy Cane, Pumpkin Spice and Granny Smith Apple. I wish I had known that before I left!

Though it’s a little bit of a trek, I am proud to buy from America’slargest independent soft-drink bottler, which was founded in 1882 in Worcester, MA. (It’s like supporting Yuengling.) In 1901, the Crowley family purchased the company from its founder and Polar has been owned and operated by four generations, now. I’m excited that one of my favorites comes from an American family-owned shop and that I can support one of the things that makes America great.

Plus, vanilla seltzer rocks!

Images, except where notes, courtesy of Polar Beverages.

Wish List: Saint Pierre and Miquelon

2011-11-14T12:38:00.000-05:00

Just over 10 miles off the coast of Newfoundland lies the last slice of Nouvelle-France, the former French colony in North America. The French jurisdiction which once spanned over 2 million square miles has been reduced to just over 90 in the form of the collectivité territoriale (territorial collectivity) of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon. The archipelago of eight islands, located in the entrance of Fortune Bay, strongly celebrates its Basque, Breton and Norman roots as a sea fairing land.

A view of Saint-Pierre, the capital of Saint Pierre and Miquelon

The inhabitants of Saint Pierre and Miquelon are French. They have French citizenship and vote in national elections. The collectivity is represented in France’s National Assembly with both a senator and a deputy (similar in role to a US Representative). The euro is the currency. Though over 4,000 miles from the closest continental French city, Saint Pierre and Miquelon is France's oldest remaining overseas territory as well as its closest and smallest territory. In short, it is France.

The Cathedral in Saint-Pierre

The Saint-Pierrais and Miquelonnais total around 7,000, most of who were born in the collectivity but a rising number have come from continental France. The rich culture of the people helps them to live, survive and thrive in this barren land. The climate is very damp and windy making winters are harsh and long and the spring foggy and cool. However, late summer and early fall are sunny. Due to the conditions, the growing season is challenging but they do produce some vegetables, poultry, cattle, sheep, pigs and, of course, fish. The local cuisine is heavily based on seafood including lobster, snow crab, cod, mussels and many cod-based dishes, as well as some of the hearty flora like cloudberries and blueberries. Liquors based on or flavored with cloudberries and blueberries flourish.

Les Drapeaux: the flag of France (above) and the unofficial local flag featuring Cartier's ship, Grande Hermine, and cantons (top to bottom) representing the Basques, Bretons and Normans.

Getting there is pricey, but you do have your choice of flying or ferrying. There isn’t a hotel chain to be found on the archipelago, but there are clusters of houses painted in a riot of colors, nestled in which are cozy bed and breakfasts and hôtels. It’s a far-fling destination not too bothered by the urban conveniences. However, that, for me is where all the charm lies. That as the enticing fact that France is only 800 miles North East of Boston. (Or slightly under 1,100 miles from Philadelphia – France is closer to us then New Orleans!)

Images are © Marc A. Cormier – www.st-pierre-et-miquelon.com and are available through flickr. I also encourage you to become a fan of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon on facebook.

myPics: A Detail of Washington, DC, at Night

2011-11-10T08:14:00.000-05:00

I spend last week in Virginia and made the trip to DC as well. I played an evening tourist, visiting the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the National World War II Memorial. I was memorized by the grandeur of the memorial, in scope and in style.

This is a detail of the Freedom Wall is on the west side of the memorial. The wall has 4,048 gold stars, each representing 100 Americans who died in the war. In front of the wall lies the message "Here we mark the price of freedom."

myPics: Fogless in Fog City

2011-10-27T08:54:00.000-04:00

My last myPics entry was an example of using a different angle for taking a picture of a popular objet d'art in Dublin as mentioned in a Budget Travel article. Again, in the same story, San Francisco’s Union Square ranked higher on the list and I have an recent example of, what I’d like to believe to be, a not so hackneyed shot of that landmark.

I like that the picture isn't prefect. The monument to Admiral George Dewey's victory at the Battle of Manila Bay isn't solo in the photo, though it is in mostly in the center, but the Hyatt adds an interruption to the intense blue sky and parallels the monument.

Not yet named food entry: Sweetzels Spiced Wafers (Philadelphia, PA)

2011-10-26T08:39:00.000-04:00

As fall shines through with its cool weather and vibrant hues ranging from arboreal tan to brilliant orange, from stunning yellow to fiery red, I open up my palate to non-chocolate flavors. Any other time of year, I will not even consider a dessert if it’s not chocolate. However the season makes me crave spicy flavors and autumn fruits, sweetened with sugar or honey or molasses to satisfy my sweet tooth.

A box of the spice wafers, image courtesy of PaGeneralStore.com - follow to order some

Since I was a little boy, Sweetzels Spiced Wafers have always played a part in my fall. A local Philadelphia tradition pushing over 100 years now, the Spiced Wafers are the company’s revival of a colonial Spice and Molasses Cookie recipe. My maternal grandmother would have boxes of them for our enjoyment, serving them with milk or, on the rare but fun occasion, apple cider.

The cookies are crisp with a slight hint of chewiness from the molasses that develops after the first bite. The wonderful spicy burn from the ginger yields quickly to the sweet and piquant flavors of cinnamon and cloves. I would dare to guess that there is nutmeg and allspice as well in these crunchy dark mahogany disks to make these cookies so irresistible in the fall. They are the paradigm of fall flavors – the time of year when sweet and savory are begging to be seasoned similarly.

Ice cream sandwiches, image courtesy of Let the Feasty Begin blog - follow for more recipes

I do enjoy them plain, right now of the box. However more often than not, I’ll repeat how my grandmother served them to me and my brother, with milk or more decadently with cider. If I’m feeling gluttonous and industrious, I will get some ice cream that has softened – vanilla (always a good quality pairing) or pumpkin (my other soft spot for the fall) – and make mini ice cream sandwiches. The best way to make them, if you have the patience, is to make them ahead of time and let the refreeze for a while. The ice cream permeates into the wafer slightly and makes it more giving when you bite into it, because if you don’t wait (and I know from experience) the wafer shatters and it a bit messier to eat. (Not that that’s a problem!)

Wish List: Killington, VT

2011-10-24T15:55:00.003-04:00

I’m not a skier. When I head up to the Poconos for a ski trip, I sign up for the lessons and the lift ticket package. I re-learn everything that I have about skiing and then I’m sent to the slopes. I ski for about two or three hours, and I return battered, bruised and tired. It’s a lot of fun, but exhausted.

A snow slope

So, why would I want to go a ski resort town without being a skier this February? Because I’ll be heading up with friends and there’s more to skiing to Killington. Plus I love to après ski.

Potential lodging

I was looking for activities to do in Vermont during the winter. There are many outdoor options that don’t involve any skis. I don’t know if I will end up doing this, but I could ice fish in Vermont. Lake trout and northern pike are two of the many fish that inhabit the state’s frozen lakes. Local guides are available for hire and can help to rent an ice shanty and to get bait and tackle for a day of ice fishing.

An unexpected waterfall

The Vermont countryside is some of the best on the East Coast. To explore the splendor up close, I can travel through the scenery via a snowmobile. Snowmobile tours are offered through the Calvin Coolidge State Forest Park System and deliver winding trails and stunning panoramic views of the Green Mountain. The combination of thrill and being outdoors would be an exciting mix for the cold. On the other hand I can opt for a slower pace to explore the outdoors. Snowshoeing is a great outside activity to take advantage of in the winter. As a 180 from snowmobiling, snowshoeing would provide a relaxing and intimate way to discover snow covered Vermont.

A frozen river

I plan on having an exciting trip to Killington and exhausting myself on all the fun that the winterscape has to offer. If I don’t have to rent any skis, it will be a great coup!

Images are courtesy of TripAdvisor.

Freeform Forum: Why is the Songline in e-flat minor?

2011-10-21T08:56:00.000-04:00

When I came back from Australia in 2005, I was profoundly changed. I had wanted to go there since I was seven, thanks to good marketing from the Australian Tourism Board. 25 years later, I made it there and the country lived up to my probably-unrealistic expectations. This is what was so profound; whatever I imagined and whatever I hoped for, Australia delivered.

In January of 2006, I had added writing more to my list of New Year's Resolutions. So I decided to blog. Yet, I needed a name and a concept. Being so moved by Australia, I continued to do my research into the country, culture, colonization and Aborigines. I was impressed that Aboriginal beliefs are the longest, continuous belief system in the history of man. One tenet of this is the songline, a path across the land or sky that which marks the route of a creator-being during his creation process. The way to connect with a songline is to go on walkabout to find and travel along that route that is personally meaningful to you. I understood it as correlating with our idea of déjà vu but not exactly déjà vu. Yet it explains the connection or the feeling that I get when I travel... that I've been there before... or I already feel that I fit in and know where I am... or there's something outside of me that moves me forward.

I wanted to show respect to the Aboriginal belief system of Dreamtime and acknowledge that I related to the idea of songlines. I took the concepts in and I made them into something more relatable for Americans. That’s where the idea of adding a key signature to the title of my blog came into play.

I didn’t have a key signature in mind when I started. Yet one day, I was at my folks’ house and I sat at the piano and started to play chords. I paid attention to both the sound on the chord and the feel of the chord as I played – the shape of my hand and the sensation of the keys against my fingertips.

The C-major chord was a bright sound but uninteresting in form. I moved on to minor chords and quickly landed on the e-flat minor key. It was mysterious in tone and fascinating in form. It was the first chord that I tried that used all the ebony keys. I kept playing it. I liked it. It became the key signature I wanted to add into the title of my blog.

It turns out that e-flat minor is a rare key in orchestral music, used mostly to modulate. It is encountered in piano pieces with most of those pieces being written by Russian composers. In more popular music versus classical, the key is often employed by jazz or blues artists since the key used all the black keys allowing for an easily playable blues scale.

So I googled "e-flat minor" and found this, by a Russian composer - Alexei Vladimirovich Stanchinsky. It’s an amazing piece and you can follow along with the sheet music in the video.

I hear and feel melancholy, spirituality and the great and deep feeling that Gary Goldschneider, the author of The Secret Language of Birthdays: Personology Profiles for Each Day of the Year, noticed as the traits of compositions in that key.

Of course, I dug a little deeper and found that Madonna's "Secret" was also written in the key of e-flat minor.

It took me a while to warm up to "Secret" but as I listened to the entire album and more singles were released this song became a favorite.

"Happiness [does lie] in your own hands."

myPics: Old and New

2011-10-20T09:37:00.000-04:00

I was reading a Budget Travel article, 25 Most Photographed Places on Earth, that sites the work of Cornell researchers who "analyzed 35 million Flickr photos and discovered that we all shoot the same places—from the same angles."

In reading the piece, I quickly learned that Dublin was on the list, but surprisingly I had a new - and not clichéd - angle for Ireland's most photographed place.

The GPO and the Spire, Dublin, Ireland

Budget Travel counts down the top 25 locations and give tips from the magazine's photo editors for ways to shake up things in taking the world's most photodocumented sites.

myPics: A Scene from the Red Line

2011-10-13T16:08:00.002-04:00

Monday, I ran up to Boston for an event that evening. While I was running to a meeting, I spotted this obviously die-hard Bruins fan heading to an afternoon game on the Red Line. Unfortunately, I found out that evening that the Bruins lost that game.

Wish List: Hikes

2011-10-10T06:39:00.001-04:00

I'm in the airport this morning, waiting on my flight with a crew delay. So I thought that I would try to jot a wish list entry via my mobile.

Returning from Ireland, I watched a travel show as part of Continental's in flight entertainment. The show was about hiking the Larapinta Trail in Northern Territory, Australia. The trek was amazing; starting outside of Alice Springs, the trail heads westward following the Larapinta River. The name comes from the local aboriginal language for salty river. At one point along the hike, the host and her guide sampled the river water to show thai it was indeed salty. The location of the trail was based on John McDouall Stuart's travels across Australia from the south to the north. Even today, the trail demonstrates the hardships that Stuart came up against while trying to open up the interior of the continent.

While I'm not ready to go off and hike that particular trail right now, I'd like to add more hikes into my weekends. There are many pages on line of local easy trails to hike along. There are a few in Delaware that interest me and I'll probable end up doing one before the end of fall. Then I can work my way up to Yosemite and Australia.

Any good suggestions for your favorite trails?

Some links for additional information:

Larapinta Trail: http://www.australia.com/itineraries/nt_larapinta_trail.aspx
Sample of trails in DE: http://www.destateparks.com/activities/Trails/locations/fort-dupont/index.asp
John McDouall Stuart: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McDouall_Stuart

Image is courtesy of http://worldislandparadise.com/backpacker-zone/standley-chasm-australia via my iPhone

myPics: Lion, Westport House

2011-10-06T17:11:00.000-04:00

This lion guards the entrance to Westport House, stately home of the Marquess of Sligo in Westport, Co. Mayo.

Founded on one of the residences of pirate chieftain Gráinne Ní Mháille (Grace O'Malley), the manor house was built under the auspices of her great-great grandson-in-law.

Not yet named food entry: Tuscan Bean Soup

2011-10-05T11:39:00.000-04:00

A former co-worker has a recipe for a black bean soup that is fantastic. The soup is rich, flavorful, slightly spicy and great for fall. I would make it all the time and in big batches to freeze for later.

However last fall, my grocery store would run out of black beans often. I wanted that rich, bean based soup for the cooler, crisper weather. Without black beans, I could not have black bean soup. I decided to make a different soup with other beans to get my soup fix.

I am usually well stocked with beans – mostly black, red kidney and cannellini beans. I wasn’t too sure about a red bean soup, but cannellini beans seemed like a great base for the soup. I always think of cannellini as a staple of Central Italy cuisine. I’ve had many Tuscan dishes featuring the bean including many a Tuscan bean dip, an appetizing Italian answer to hummus. I took out my cans of cannellini and went straight to the internet, searching “herbs and spices of Tuscan cuisine.”

Learning about the taste of Tuscany, I looked at the soup recipe and removed the Latin inspired essence of the dish like cumin and chili and added Italian flavors plus some of my own personal elements to make this soup mine. I can’t speak to the accuracy; I don’t know if there are any Tuscan soups that use these ingredients or taste this way. However, I love this soup. The silky texture and slightly nutty flavor of the beans marries with the sweetness of the fennel seeds and the mild heat of the red pepper flakes. The tender onions and bell pepper give way with each bite while the parsley give the soup a verdant note rounding out the earthy dried herbs and the acid of lemon finishes the soup and keeps me wanting more.

*******

Tuscan Bean Soup
•    3 Tbsp olive oil
•    1 medium white or yellow onion, diced
•    1 tsp salt
•    2 tsp ground black pepper
•    4 cloves of garlic, minced
•    4 green onions, thinly sliced
•    1 tsp fennel seed
•    1 tsp red pepper flakes
•    2 tsp dried basil, or to taste
•    1 tsp dried thyme, or to taste
•    1 tsp dried marjoram, or to taste
•    4 cups vegetable broth
•    4 bay leaves
•    1 medium yellow bell pepper, chopped
•    4 15oz cans cannellini beans
•    2 Tbsp lemon juice (about ½ a lemon)
•    3 Tbsp fresh parsley, chopped, plus more for garnish

Heat a soup pot over medium heat; add 2 tablespoons of oil to the pot and heat through. Add most of the onion, salt and black pepper to the soup pot, saving the remainder (about a quarter of them) for later in the process. Sauté until tender, about 5 to 8 minutes.

Add the garlic, green onions, fennel seeds, red pepper flakes, basil, thyme and marjoram to the soup pot and cook until the aroma is released, about 1 minute more. The garlic will start to smell floral and the fennel seeds will smell sweet.

Add the stock to the soup pot and bring to a boil. While the stock comes to a boil, sauté the reserved onion, salt and black pepper with the yellow bell pepper in the remaining 1 tablespoon of oil.

When the stock boils and the bell pepper is tender, add about ½ to 1 cup of boiling stock to the bell peppers mixture and simmer. Meanwhile, add the beans to the soup pot and simmer on low heat, uncovered, for 20 minutes.

After simmering, remove the soup from heat and remove the bay leaves.

Purée half of the soup from the soup pot until smooth, and add the bean purée back to the soup and add the pepper mixture to the pot; stir to combine. Simmer the soup 5 minutes more, then stir in lemon juice and parsley. Taste, and adjust the seasoning as needed.

*******

The biggest personal touch to this soup is not puréeing the pepper in the mix; it turns the soup a little too yellow for my aesthetics. The beauty lies in the soup’s rich ivory color. It makes the pepper and parsley stand out in the dish. Its simplicity in hue parallels its straightforwardness as a wonderful meal.

Enjoy.

Wish List: Italy

2011-10-03T15:40:00.000-04:00

I have a friend who lives in the Middle East and I was fortunate enough to get to visit her last year. While I was able to make the trek there, not all of my friends have that flexibility. It’s a long time to get there and return – almost 21 hours there and almost a full day back via Frankfurt. It’s a culture shock too. For those reasons, I’ve been working on a plan to get us to get together somewhere in Europe so that others can join up for the vacation.

Il Ponte dei Sospiri (The Bridge of Sighs) in Venice, so named since my Iberian choices were overruled

Spain and Portugal lie roughly along the half way point between the nearly 7,000 miles between Philadelphia and Abu Dhabi. So I propose that, looking into ideas for Lisbon or Barcelona. However, I’m overridden and my posse calls for Italy.

Il Torre di Pisa - in Italian, it's just a tower

Outside of the distance being a little askew (about 2,700 miles from AUH and 4,300 from PHL to Rome), Italy could be the ideal location. I just don’t know what we’ll do. Do we stay in one city, like Rome, and see the sights? Do we rent a villa in Italy, like a co-worker’s family did? Do we travel across the countryside from town to town to see a bit of it all?

La Basilica Papale di San Pietro (St. Peter's Basilica), visible from Italy but is in the Holy See

I don’t have a clue as to what we’d like to do. However the plan is to go in mid- to late April. (Right now, that seems to be the best time for our schedules.) Yet, I have a lot of research to do. I need to learn Italian history. I need to be familiar with the different styles of cuisine. I must bone up on my Italian wines, since I’m really a new world grape fan. One thing is for sure, we will have a blast when we get to go.

Any ideas or tips? Feel free to tweet me or post your suggestions on blogger or facebook.

Images are courtesy of TripAdvisor.

myPics: "On Silent Haunches"

2011-09-29T11:37:00.000-04:00

I always think of Carl Sandburg's "Fog" when I visit San Francisco.

Here is a picture I took last week on the fog approaching the city from the vantage point of Crissy Field. You can see Coit Tower, Nob Hill and the Transamerica Pyramid off in the distance, waiting for the encroaching fog.

For a reference, this is how thick the impending fog was as it pours through the Golden Gate.

myPics: Caisleán na Blarnan

2011-09-22T10:38:00.003-04:00

Irish for Blarney Castle, Caisleán na Blarnan is the partial ruin attraction in Co. Cork.

With some accessible rooms and battlements, this building houses the noted Blarney Stone found among the machicolations of the castle. (Machicolations are floor openings in the upper levels of a battlement, through which objects are dropped on attackers at the base of a defensive wall.) This is why prior to the safeguards at the castle, kissing the Blarney Stone was performed with real risk to life and limb, as those wanting to make the kiss were held by the ankles and dangled upside down from the height to reach the stone.

Not yet named food entry: Irish Stout Porters (Ireland)

2011-09-21T20:11:00.001-04:00

I’m back from Ireland and I am pleased to report that I was able to sample my Irish Food Trinity. I started on day two at Abrakebabra with my chips and curry and went until my second to last day to get the brown bread ice cream at Gogarty’s. In the middle, I enjoy many pints of Guinness, Smithwick’s, Bulmers (Cider) and the odd European beer. The majority of my drinks were one of the three well-known Irish Stout Porters – Guinness, Murphy’s and Beamish.

I lauded Guinness before leaving for Ireland and I finally got to visit the Guinness Storehouse in St. James’s Gate to learn more about the brew. First, it is truly red. The malted barley is roasted a deep brown to bring out the flavor through the burnt sugars. This roasting is responsible for the deep ruby red color that Guinness actually is. If you don’t believe, take a glassful of Guinness (or some of you will just take mine) and hold it up to the light and see that it’s a very deep red.

Getting schooled on Guinness draught pouring

Then, I learned how to pour a legitimate pint of Guinness. Nitrogen gas gives us the cream-like head and it takes 119.5 seconds at minimum to pour the perfect draught. You pour the beer into a pint glass ¾ of the way full, and then wait for the Guinness surge to finish. This tumbling of nitrogen and carbon dioxide takes a tan looking pour and settles into the start of the iconic black beer with creamy head that we all know. After the surge has settled, you top off the pint to make the head.

The Irish stout porter tasted even more surprisingly light in my mouth than I remembered. The mouth feel was light and airy for a liquid, not abrasive like a carbonated soft drink. In Ireland, Guinness had more sweet favors like malt, chocolate and caramel without the usual peaty, bitter aftertaste that I recall from Stateside Guinness. The more pungent flavors of molasses and burnt sugar are lacking, too.

Said Murphy's in honor of my friend, Murph

I didn’t seek out any tours of remaining 2 famous stouts’ facilities, but I’m going to assume that the creation and the pouring of the beers are similar to Guinness. Therefore in honor of my friend, Murph, I made sure that I had a Murphy’s Irish Stout, the main competitor of Guinness. The drink has a similar mouth feel to Guinness; it was a rolling liquid with a hint of thickness. This beer has more of a nutty flavor with a slight hint of mocha. Unlike Guinness, there is no bitter aftertaste.

Finishing out the troika of Irish Stout, I made sure that I had a Beamish in Courtney’s in Killarney. Beamish is the pride and joy of Cork. (Ironically, though, the Beamish & Crawford brewery, the originator of the beer, closed in 2009 and now Beamish is brewed at the nearby Heineken Brewery, which was previously a Murphy's Brewery.) Do not go to Ireland’s largest county and expect Guinness. Meanwhile, this beer is the lightest stout in mouth feel and taste. While Beamish is malty, dark and chocolaty, it is not as intense as the other two brews. The beer’s consistency still rolls yet it’s light and covers the palate rather than fill the mouth.

The Quays, a site of many Murphy's and Guinness downed

When in Cork, I will always order a Beamish! On the rest of the island, it will be a tough decision between Murphy’s and Guinness.

myPics: From the Ring of Kerry

2011-09-15T09:20:00.011-04:00

I wanted to post a picture of my trip so far. Somewhere on the Ring of Kelly, which trails around the Iveragh Peninsula, we pulled over to snap this picture of the visit. I can't remember where we were, but this Co. Kerry to me.

Wish List: Giant’s Causeway

2011-09-06T11:14:00.000-04:00

I’m not going to the North this trip which is why I feel perfectly fine with putting Giant’s Causeway on today’s Wish List.

First, I know that my schedule is off. Long weekends always mess up with my calendar. Though I know it’s Monday but it feels like Sunday, I never get over that it’s Tuesday and it feels like a Monday. When Saturday comes around, I tend to think I’m late for work. This is a long introduction to say that I know I’ve scheduled Wish List on Mondays, but it’s late this week. I’m not planning on trying to stick to my writing topics until I return from Éire.

Many of the hexagonal basalt columns at Giant's Causeway

The Giant’s Causeway is an area of mostly hexagonal basalt columns from the aftermath of an ancient volcanic eruption located just northeast of Bushmills, County Antrim. (Yes, near NI’s favorite whiskey distiller.) This site has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The legend of Giant’s Causeway focuses on Fionn mac Cumhaill, (Finn MacCool) a mythical hunter-warrior of Irish mythology who also appears in Scottish and Manx myths. His tales (Fenian Cycle) are a separate series of stories from Cú Chulainn’s. (Ulster Cycle.)

Close up of the columns

The warrior, Fionn, had a Scottish counterpart named, Benandonner. The bravado between the two men set up a rivalry from hurtling insults, socks and barbs across the channel between Ireland and Scotland. The anger between the two grew to a head after a threat from the Scottish giant that if Benadonner could get a hand on Fionn, Fionn would never be able to fight again. Fionn was so enraged that he built the causeway within a week’s time to connect the two lands so that Benadonner, who couldn’t swim, would be able to reach Fionn and fight.

Driven by pride, Benandonner crossed over since he had something to prove. However, Fionn was exhausted from building and needed to rest. There are different tales of what happen next, so I’ll pick and choose pieces to finish the story.

Fionn was exhausted and fell asleep to rest before he would fight; his wife, Oonagh, helped him to trick Benandonner. Oonagh covered Fionn with a blanket to disguise him as their baby while the Scottish giant approached. Upon arrival, Benadonner asked for Fionn. Oonagh said that he was away but would return. Oonagh entertained the guest with tea and cakes in which she slipped some rocks. As Benadonner ate, he broke his teeth on what he thought were miserably hard cakes. He noticed that Oonagh’s son, upon waking, was given the same food (but without rocks) and was eating them with ease. Curious, he approached the baby and saw his enormity. Against better judgment reached out to stoke the baby’s head. Fionn bit Benadonner’s finger, and Benadonner realize that if this massive child could eat stone-hard cakes and violently bite a man’s finger, there was no telling how big his father would be and what he would be capable of doing in a fight. With the fear settling in, Benadonner ran, leaving Oonagh’s hospitality and tearing up the causeway in his wake.

The Pipe Organ formation at Giant's Causeway

In Scotland, there is a formation, Fingal’s Cave on the island of Staff which is made from the same ancient lava flow. This time, the basalt columns construct the basis of the cave. The isle of Ulva also shows proof of this lava which had traversed between the two land masses. This legend matches up with the geologic history to the British Isles.

The Irish tales are very rich fables, with many different plots, characters or even competing stories – like Perrault or the Bros. Grimm say, for our faerie tales – that the Irish told to explain their world.

Next time I go to Ireland, I’m going to have to head North: Co. Sligo, Co. Donegal, Co. Derry, Co. Antrim and Belfast to enjoy the other side of the Isle.

Images are courtesy of Wikipedia.

myPics: Art through the Trees

2011-09-01T09:46:00.001-04:00

Walking home last night, I noticed how busy campus seems. Students are officially back and today it the first major wave of move-in, the Class of 2015 move-in. In my heighten sense, I noticed a piece of art on campus that I have overlooked.

"Black Forest," Robinson Fredenthal (American, 1940 - 2009). It's an imposing black sculpture featuring triangles to encourage the observer to view from different angles. The multiple vantage points of the piece hope to inspire interest and lively discussion.

"Black Forest" on Penn's Campus

I did a little research on Fredenthal for this entry. He was born in Claremont, New Hampshire in 1940 and earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1963 and a Bachelor of Architecture in 1967 from Penn. This piece is one of the artist's many studies of cubes and of what happens when he stands them on their corners, cuts through them with planes, rotates and stacks them. I took the photo using my iPhone's HDR, High dynamic range imaging, which accentuates the different between the bright and dark zones in the picture.

Not yet named food entry: Irish Food Trinity

2011-08-31T09:07:00.077-04:00

When I first visited Ireland around 12 years ago, I was under the impression that I would land at the airport, head to the hostel and seek out a delicious authentic Irish stew and some offal dish, like steak and kidney pie. The first opportunity that my companion and I had to eat, we found a restaurant that offered the said “authentic” Irish stew. It was gross; a thin, weak broth covering fatty and tough bits of beef with minimal vegetables. If something that should be flavorful and thick, filling and fragrant was so repulsive, I couldn’t imagine what a steak and kidney pie would taste like. I made the quick decision to avoid it.

This doesn't represent what the bad Irish stew looked like

After a bad meal in what we discovered to be a tourist trap, we asked our front desk clerk at our hostel for suggestions. Our clerk apologized for the unsatisfying meal and gave us leads for better places to eat. With those tips, we found that Irish food was good and tasty. Irish chefs have a great craft and work very hard to make fantastic meals. Outside of the traditional fare, Ireland also offered us great options in Italian, French, California, Mongolian and more.

Now reminiscing before my return to Ireland, I’m looking forward to sampling three favorite Irish treats: brown bread ice cream, chips and curry, and Guinness.

Schooled on the local tourist traps, our hotel clerk encouraged us to go to Temple Bar, Dublin's cultural quarter. The area has preserved its medieval street pattern including many narrow cobblestone streets. Wondering though, we found a charming yellow building that houses the Oliver St. John Gogarty Bar & Restaurant. There is where I came across brown bread ice cream; the thick egg-laced vanilla ice cream blended with brown bread caramelized in butter and brown sugar. The custard-like constancy pairs well with the nutty and sweet nuggets of the bread. It was so good that when I returned to Dublin from my trek around Ireland, I headed to Oliver St. John Gogarty to have a light meal and the great dessert again.

Chips and curry, courtesy of Smeggy's

Drinking was our night time activity, but in moderation. Yet, several late nights ended up with us looking for chips and curry. I joked that chips and curry serves the Irish like a cheesesteaks serve Philadelphians after a good night out at the bars. The best chips and curry are thin cut fries, fried in peanut oil usually, that are crispy outside and tender on the inside. The soft potato inside sops up the rich curry sauce, a warm pungent gravy with hints of heat from chilis and black pepper, smoke from cumin, floral notes from coriander and cardamom, and sweet flavors of cinnamon and clove that reach over the lightly salty and savory base. There were enough Pakistani and Indian shops that were open after midnight to feed our new craving, but we were lucky enough to discovery Abrakebabra, Ireland’s Premier Fastfood Chain, early on in our trip. With our find, we could at least get a consistently well-favored curry for our fries. (Which by the way, we originally found after our first meal at Oliver St. John Gogarty after asking the security guard for chips and curry and following his directions of guh doun t’uh shtreet, make uh luhft, t’en uh rauht, guh doun fuh’ uh bit’ an uht’s t’air.)

Guinness and Brown Bread (before crumbled into ice cream)

Rounding out the troika is Guinness, the beer of Ireland (or at least Dublin… Don’t ask for one in Cork; that’s Beamish territory!) I can’t wait to get my hands on a pint of the world's most famous stout. I can imaging it now. I order my beer and wait for the bartender to properly pour my glass. The black brew with red tones is served to me in a pint glass and its creamy head forms by bubbles that seem to be floating downward. I bring the Guinness to my lips. The surprisingly light mouth feel in spite of the dark color washes over my palate and eludes to hints of malt, molasses, coffee, chocolate and burnt caramel with a dry, almost peaty aftertaste. After my first big sip, I relish the first shallow and place my pint down. I fill out my fantasy from my memories from my last trip and I spy the bar and take in the patrons’ actions and shake my head, since these young adults are ordering their favorite imported beer, Budweiser.

It's a shame that they waste their euros and calories on that. Oh, I never had an offal dish either.

Images, except where noted, are courtesy of Wikipedia.

Hurricane or Hype?

2011-08-30T14:43:00.005-04:00

Last night, Piers Morgan focused some time on his show about the Hurricane Irene coverage, asking the pithy sound bite: Hurricane or Hype? The crux of this question centered on whether or not the media’s coverage and government’s reaction was too much. I made my opinion about this topic in the middle of the storm.

While news anchors are prone to sensationalism, the coverage and reactions were apropos for a storm of this magnitude. While I am one of the first people to criticize weathermen for their inaccurate predictions – which is usually about a snow storm that doesn’t cancel school the next day, I do understand that they are reporting on predictions. Meteorologists use complicated weather models to make educated guesses about the tracks of storms. By nature, to predict is to estimate or calculate in advance; there is nothing certain about it.

Hurricane Irene's path

Looking back on two storms that have wove their way into the collective memory, I think that we’ve improved on our coverage. There have been lessons to learn after each storm, but there is always more to learn.

Hurricane Andrew in 1992 taught us some serious lessons about reporting. The media’s attention was on Miami, the most overdue city for a hurricane, but the destruction was south of the Gateway to the Americas. This monster storm leveled Homestead, FL. Yet before this fact was known, reports celebrated that Miami dodged a bullet. It wasn’t until the storm had moved into the Gulf of Mexico that information about the damage in South Florida started to come to light. The media had focused on the big city in harm’s way, but neglected the actual location of landfall. This storm was the costliest Atlantic hurricane in U.S. history until 2005.

Andrew making landfall

As you know, the costliest U.S. hurricane is 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. While Andrew did serve as a wakeup call, we took very long to act on it. I remember as late as early 2005 watching shows about the Hurricane preparedness of New Orleans which highlighted the vulnerable position that the Crescent City lies between the Mississippi and Lake Pontchartrain. Originally the site of Native American portages between the two bodies of water, the Big Easy rises up from below sea-level to be one of the great American cities. This time, the media was focused on the eye of this storm and not only the largest possible target city. When Karina made her third and final landfall on the Louisiana-Mississippi border, east of this great American city, there was a huge sense of relief that the storm didn’t deadhead into the city. Yet it was the wind, rain and storm surge that followed, coming from the western portions of the storm, which broke the levees and caused the cataclysmic devastation. The failure of the levees remains a huge black eye on United States Army Corps of Engineers.

Prior to Katrina that year, Hurricane Cindy hit Louisiana and caused New Orleans’ largest blackout since Hurricane Betsy in 1965 but that storm was touted to be bigger and more destructive than it was. While Katrina’s hit was impending, Mayor Nagin did order the first ever mandatory evacuation of the city. Unfortunately, many ignored it or waited until it was too late. Those who survived admit that they had become nonchalant about hurricane threats since storms had missed the city for decades.

Hurricane Katrina is a defining moment of our American history. The loss was eminence; it is the costliest U.S. hurricane. In the aftermath, people felt that the government didn’t do enough for our citizens and to this day many New Orleanians still suffer from Katrina's long lasting effects.

Katrina making its second landfall (first landfall was in Florida)

This leads me to this past week. As Katrina serves as one of our American tragedies with over 1,800 dead, her scope was small compared to Irene’s enormous projected danger zone. There were an estimated 65 million people who were in Irene’s path this last week in the U.S. mainland alone, not including Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, Jamaica and Canada. This storm was notable, like Katrina, in making three landfalls, first around Atlantic Beach, NC, the second in New Jersey by the Little Egg Inlet and the last in Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York. This made Irene the first hurricane since Agnes in 1972 to make landfall directly in New York City.

While the storm ended up being less destructive than predicted for most of the 65 million people, our fellow country men and women in North Carolina, upstate New York and Vermont have suffered greatly. Since North Carolina took the first brunt of the storm and Irene stalled over the Pamlico Sound, the storm lost the wind punch that could have shattered New York upon its direct hit. Yet Irene was still a rainmaker and most of the East Coast was under a flood watch or warning during the storm’s lifespan. Many small towns in the New England area have been flooded off the map. The ruin left behind is unfortunately record breaking.

Irene over North Carolina

Most of the coverage seemed to highlight New York and New Jersey during Sunday. However the storm hit North Carolina on Saturday and the coverage came in from Atlantic Beach, Nags Head and Virginia Beach then. As Irene trekked up the New York – Connecticut border, the reports followed her track.

No one could truly predict Irene’s behavior when she made her multiple landfalls. I think that stations were being responsible in reporting how bad the damage could be and demonstrating how vicious her wake was. I’m glad that our elected officials handled the situation with gravitas and mandated evacuations. I don’t fault and I support the EMS manager in New Jersey who warned those who didn’t heed the order to “take a 3x5 card, use indelible ink and write your name, Social Security Number, Date of Birthday, next of kin, way to reach them on the card. Then place the card in your left shoe, not a flip flop or a sandal, so we can identify you whenever we find your body.” Those who couldn’t leave on their own accord were offered assistant to get out of harm’s way. Those who choose to stay behind are selfish, and they make matters worse in endangering the brave men and women who are then charged with saving them when they do find themselves in trouble.

Flooding in Brattleboro, VT, courtesy of CNN iReports

Finally, to those who think Irene was blown out of proportion, shut up. Instead, pray for the 37 victims and their families. Thank your God that you didn’t suffer in wake of the storm and pony up some relief to our follow Americans who were devastated by the Hurricane. And who knows, we may all get pummeled by Katia.

To help, visit www.cnn.com/impact.

Images, except where noted, are courtesy of Wikipedia.

Wish List: Where the Streets Have No Name

2011-08-29T19:11:00.000-04:00

After the waterlogged weekend that we had on the East Coast, I’d like to take a trip to the desert. Seeing the Schuylkill flooded carrying debris and speeding out to the Delaware made me long for someplace dry and arid. For me one of the more famous and accessible desert is the two-desert Joshua Tree National Park.

An eponymous Joshua Tree

I’ve been to Joshua Tree in the winter of 2006. It was an ambitious day trip that I took with my friend, Denise. I had a red eye flight to take back to Philadelphia so we left early in the morning to make the 2 ½ hour trek out to Twentynine Pines.

A rock formation along Park Boulevard

Clichédly, we queued up the U2 as we got onto California Route 62 and followed the sign to the Park. The entrances from 62 put you into the Mojave Desert, the habitat of the Joshua Tree. The name sake of the park was named by Mormon settlers because the shape that reminded them of a Biblical story of Joshua praying with his hand up in the air.

Ecologically, this park is unique for the meeting of the two deserts. We entered the park through the Mojave Desert, which is generally the higher, drier, and slightly cooler of the two. The landscape features bare rock hills peppered with loose boulders and sparsely vegetated flatland. To our east is the other desert – the Colorado Desert, part of the larger Sonoran Desert, which features scrub and cactus.

View from Ryan Mountain

The park offers a lot to see. In our foray, we drove through the Mojave, taking in the vast land and pointing out many of the Joshua Trees. We spied down several of the trails that intersected the main roads, but we knew that our time was short. We headed to climb Ryan Mountain and catch a glimpse of the Colorado Desert. In the distance, there looked a like a noticeable different between the flora around us and what was off in the east. However, time was short and I would need to return to Los Angeles, get my bags and return the rental car before my flight. We descended back to the car and I knew that I would plan to return

Another Joshua Tree with San Gorgonio Mountain, Southern California’s highest peak, in the background

From the NPS site, short visits of a ½ a day or less should involve the main park roads with many pullouts for wayside exhibits to learn more about Joshua Tree. On a clear day, the NPS suggests the Keys View which vista looks beyond the Salton Sea to Mexico. For a full day, there is time to discover the Park on foot, either on one of the guided tours or on a solitary backcountry hike. Also the park has nine campgrounds for an over-night visit and for the most adventuresome, backcountry camping is permitted. For me, my ideal visit would be a day in park from opening to close and a comfortable night in Palm Springs.

Images are courtesy of Trip Advisor.

Earthquake - a Wikipedia article

2011-08-23T15:37:00.001-04:00

Today the east coast felt a noticeable earthquake from North Carolina to Ontario. According to government sources, the quake was centered near Mineral, VA about 40 northwest of Richmond. Through twitter and the iPhone, my colleagues and I were able to confirm what we felt in a matter of minutes from the safety of outside our building.

What remains funny to me is the development of the Wikipedia article from its anonymous contributors.

At the end of the Impact section: "Barack Obama transformed into a robot"

This inaccuracy was noted and edited out, probably multiple times before I refreshed to read the updated version.

Casualties: 9001 squirrels

That's a lot of dead squirrels. I have a difficult time believing that many rodents died; they seem to be able to sense an upcoming disaster and tend to act accordingly.

A more credible version

It seems that after several iterations, the anonymous authors and editors have been able to cite the appropriate stories to bring credibility to the article. For the latest version, visit the page directly at 2011 Virginia earthquake. It's amazing how fast social media works.

Wish List: Ottawa, ON

2011-08-22T15:03:00.009-04:00

There are so many places in Canada that I’d like to see. Having only been to Toronto, Montréal, Vancouver and Calgary, for example, are on my list. Yet, I’d like to visit the capital next.

Ottawa is in nestled in the Ottawa River Valley in eastern Southern Ontario, bordering on Québec. This location has made the National Capital Region of Ottawa and Gatineau a bilingual area with a diverse population. Home to the National Government, the city is a mixture of formalistic and functional architecture with a good helping of Romantic and Picturesque styles, too.

Central Block, Parliament Hill

Like our capital, Washington, DC, history is rich in this planned city that Queen Victoria chose as the capital for the Province of Canada (comprised of parts of modern day Ontario and Quebec) on December 31, 1857. The city is the site of the northern terminus of the Rideau Canal, the oldest continuously operated canal system in North America and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The canal was opened in 1832 as a precaution in case of additional war with the United States.

After the War of 1812, British forces learned that the US has planned to invade the confusingly named colony of Upper Canada* via the St. Lawrence. The British built the canal to keep commerce and communications open between Montréal and the British naval base in Kingston, ON. Today, the Canal is also famous as being one of the largest fresh water skating rinks in the winter.

The Canadian Museum of Civilization

As a Commonwealth Nation, they honour (wink) the British monarch as their sovereign. In June 1959 Canada accepted ten heraldic statues, The Queen's Beasts, that Ministry of Works commissioned for Queen Elizabeth II to depict her genealogy for her conoration. Being cast in plaster, the statues could not left in the open air and they were shipped between Hampton Court Palace, Windsor Castle and, finally, storage. The British Government decided to offer them to the Commonwealth Governments and Canada, being the senior nation, was offered them first. The beasts now reside at the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Gatineau. I don’t know if they display them or not, but I would love to visit for a public showing of these statues. There are replicas of The Queen's Beasts on display at Kew Gardens, if I can’t see the originals in Canada.

The Queen's Beast - The Unicorn of Scotland, courtesy of Call to Arms...

Beyond the Queen’s Beasts, the Canadian Museum of Civilization serves to collect, study, preserve, and present material objects that illuminate the human history of Canada and the cultural diversity of its people. The building, reminiscent of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in design and architecture,is Canada’s most popular and most-visited museum.

Across the river from the Museum stands Parliament Hill, where Gothic revival buildings, including the commanding Centre Block, serve as the home of the Parliament of Canada and the center of Canadian politics. Though Ottawa is the capital for the Confederation, Pierre Trudeau worked to increase the number of more federal workers based in the Quebec side of National Capital Region. To the end, the Central tower of the Terrasses de la Chaudière is now the area’s tallest building.

On the Rideau Canal

In writing this blog entry, I realize that there are many parallels between Washington, DC, and Ottawa, including that the largest buildings are outside of the city proper. They share in being deliberately established between the boundary of two different demographic types, (i.e. the more agricultural south and the more Industrial north for the US and the Anglophonic Upper Canada and Francophone Lower Canada). As I love Washington for its history and its cache of American identity, I know that I will be charmed by Ottawa’s share of Canadiana.

Images, except where noted, are courtesy of Trip Advisor.

* Upper Canada was the southern portion of Ontario, while Lower Canada was southern portion of Quebec and region of Labrador. Therefore Upper Canada is South-southeast of Lower Canada. The naming convention came from the direction of the Saint Lawrence, as Upper Canada was further along the waters of the river. In 1841, these two colonies became the Province of Canada.

myPics: Byzantine in the Poconos

2011-08-18T09:34:00.006-04:00

During this muggy summer when Philadelphia's temperature hit the century mark, my cousin and I fled for the Poconos to a day of respite from the oppressive heat. We visited the town of Jim Thorpe and spent the day exploring the Carbon County borough. After a leisurely visit, we decided to take an as relaxed drive home via US 209 South to PA 309 South. We were only the road for about 15 minutes when we saw the golden domes of this Church poke up through the cluster of homes in the town of Lansford.

We drove around to find the best way to access the church, finding all the one way streets in the direction other than we wanted. Eventually, we stopped in front of the St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Church and were able to the snap a picture of the building, avoiding all the overhead electrical wires. This is the fruit of our labor.

Not yet named food entry: Not Your Usual Mojito (Philadelphia)

2011-08-17T10:46:00.000-04:00

According to the Bourbon Blog, yesterday was National Rum Day. In honor of the wonderful day (for the Rum AND Madonna’s birthday), I wanted to share with you an intense mojito from the Rum Bar in Philadelphia.

My friend, Necie, and I decided to go hit a bar to meet up and swap the book for our upcoming bookclub. It was Monday and I knew that Rum Bar had ½ price mojito special then. We studied the extensive menu of drinks, and I chose the chili coriander mojito.

Instead of mint, this mojito was muddled with cilantro (a.k.a. coriander) leaves in a chili pepper infused rum. It was innocent looking, but this drink packed a punch. The flavor starts sweet and citrusy from the simple syrup and lime juice as the bouquet of the cilantro grows – the fresh, green, bright taste. Finally the peppery taste joins and intensifies in heat, leaving a warm burn in the back of the throat that slowly dissipates, but does come to an end. It was a concentrated, intriguing drink for the night.

An innocuous looking mojito

I toned the heat down with my second drink, a West African Booty. The lure of a drink flavored with grains of paradise, a West African spice that is reminiscent of ginger, was too much to resist. (Not to mention getting to order a drink with the word "booty" in it. Remember it's a rum bar - lots of pirate and sailor references here.) Unfortunately, the heat from the gingery grains of paradise didn't match up with the heat from the chili. Next time, I'll save the potent chili coriander mojito for last.

Rum Bar is located at 2005 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA.

Logo courtesy of Rum Bar.

It Feels Like Home

2011-08-16T13:29:00.001-04:00

In honor of Madonna's birthday, I wanted to share my favorite songs of hers - a top ten list.

10) “Dress You Up” In the height of her “Boy Toy” phase, Madonna shows off her 80’s fashion flare, dancing and performing in this concert footage video for her final single from Like a Virgin. This was the first time that a Madonna song really stuck with me. I enjoyed "Borderline" and "Like a Virgin," however this was her first pop song from her collection that aged well and is still a great song today.

9) “Causing a Commotion” I remember being 14 and dancing around in my room to this song when it first came out in the late summer of 1987. I got a radio that previous Christmas including the big bulky headset earphones who pads surrounded your ears, and I would listen to the radio when going asleep. Even in twilight dream like state before passing out completely, I would perk up when I heard the song and jump out of bed and dance. Of course, this was much to my parents’ chagrin, since they wanted me asleep.

8) “Oh Father” This song is a troubling and moving ballad about personal lose and deep sadness that always haunted me. Then add to that David Fincher’s brilliant video with the images of the mother’s lips sown up, the perils spilling on the floors and a little girl’s shadow being cast from an adult Madonna.

7) “Fever” The only cover on my list, “Fever” was an inspired add to Erotica’s song list. While in the final stages of production for a different unreleased song, Madonna suddenly started singing the lyrics to "Fever" over the top of it. She liked the way it sounded so much that she recorded it and the rest is history.

6) "Amazing" I follow up the only cover on my list with the only unreleased song on this list. The song from Music was one of the first songs leaked on the web as well as Warner Bros. wanted "Amazing" as the fourth single, but Madonna felt the catchiness and sound of "Amazing" was too similar to "Beautiful Stranger" and she thwarted Warner Bros. attempt to release it. I like the hypnotic sound of the song and its lyrics talking about a giddy infatuation. “It’s amazing what a boy can do, I cannot help myself.”

5) "Nothing Fails" This powerful love song with a gospel element harkens to one of Madonna’s most influential album, Like a Prayer. This song was not a released as a single from American Life. However it was treated as an EP in Australia and therefore made it onto the ARIA, Australian Recording Industry Association, charts as a dance album. The song is an infectious love song that crescendos into a redeeming chorus that makes the non-religious want to pray.

4) "Miles Away" Perhaps this song is the other side of the "Nothing Fails" coins. When distance seems to improve the relationship, you are miles away from each other when you’re standing right there. The song has all the hallmarks of Justin Timberlake’s production with vocal percussion in the intro that brings the listener into a melancholy song that touches on the pain and heartache of losing your love in downtempo electronic style.

The Troika of Madonna: These three songs are tied as my favorite Madonna song of all time. Since I can’t rank them, I will order them in reverse order of their release.

(tied) 1) "Don't Tell Me" Madonna’s brother-in-law, Joe Henry, was prodded by his wife, Melanie Ciccone, to send the demo for his song “Stop” to Madonna because Melanie thought that her sister would like the song. Madonna enthusiastically worked on the song with Mirwais to create the string and progressive electronic dance music song that inspired the cowboy-themed video. Upon hearing Madonna’s version of the song, Joe was rather shocked that not one word of the lyrics was altered.

(tied) 1)"Ray of Light" This song is Madonna’s defining moment. After working on Evita and being slammed for Dita-personaed Erotica and the hodge podge of collaborators on Bedtime Stories, Madonna created her second extremely personal and biographical studio album. Based on Curtiss Maldoon’s "Sepheryn,” “Ray of Light” heralded Madonna’s first significant Grammy and still works to get me out on the dance floor.

(tied) 1)"Like a Prayer" This eponymous single from Madonna’s first extremely personal and biographical studio album establishes Madonna as the icon for the 90’s and beyond. Mixing religion fervor and sexual themes, she creates audio ecstasy for the listener that is mirrored in her controversial video. The like "Nothing Fails," "Like a Prayer" embraces the crescendo of a triumphant chorus to punctuate the joyful rapture of being redeemed by love when you only but ask.

"Ray of Light" and "Like a Prayer" both touch on the idea of “feeling like home.” The sensation of knowing that everything is alright is one of mankind’s most important spiritual needs. I don’t think it’s any accident that these two songs and their album have had the impact on Madonna and popular culture that they have. Whether or not they started out as original song or others’ lyrics, the songs have become to express an individual’s journey from being incomplete to whole. When someone is fortunate enough to feel that inner peace that they are complete and at one with their standing in life, the relief is amazing.

As an honorable mention, I wanted to add along the version of "Like a Prayer" from the Sticky and Sweet Tour. It is a little more broody that the original, containing elements of "Feels Like Home" by Meck. This sample darkens the tone of the ecstasy and underscores the inward and sometimes turbulent trek of getting to where "it feels like home."

Happy Birthday, Madonna. Thank you for your music.

Wish List: Before They’re Gone

2011-08-15T12:37:00.004-04:00

I subscribe to several travel e-mail magazines, including Budget Travel. I enjoy their articles and I get the newsletter about twice a week. This past Thursday, I noticed a link in the newsletter, "10 Natural Wonders to See Before They Disappear," and read along in wonder. The article lists natural wonders which are threatened with non-existence within the century and includes suggestions for tour operator at each destination to take advantage of the amazing features of each destination.

Surprisingly, I have been to one of the locations on the list, the Dead Sea. When I was a freshman at Penn, I had the opportunity to travel to Israel in 1992. During my trip with the Penn Glee Club, we spent a day in Ein Gedi and played in the therapeutic waters of the Dead Sea. I never dreamed to get to the highest spot on earth, but I have made it to the lowest. The group took the prerequisite pictures of us floating, reading newspapers and magazines as if in a recliner. I was unfortunate and got the salt water in my eyes and it burned something awful. The water was salty that my vision clouded and I couldn’t see through the white haze. I carried on to get some of my peers to escort me to the public showers in order to rinse my eyes out. After ten minutes, I was able see and go back and enjoy myself. And none too soon, in last forty years, the Dead Sea has lost a third of its area and sunk about 80 feet. The water has been diverted from its only source – the Jordan River – to quench the thirsts of Israel, Jordan and Syria and this need will continue stress the endorheic lake.

The Dead Sea

Having visited the Australia’s Great Barrier Reef and been amazed with the multitude of marine life there, I want to go and see the world’s second largest reef system. The Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System stretches about 600 miles from Mexico to Honduras and runs through Belize as the country’s famous marine ecosystem. In a addition to this amazing phenomenon, Belize is the only Central American country with English as the official language which makes travel simpler for someone living in the Anglosphere.

Great Blue Hole

The Belize Barrier Reef is endangered due to coral bleaching, the whitening of corals due to the stress-induced loss of their symbiotic organisms. The stressors are but not limited to pollution, global warming, storms or bacterial fluctuations. Once stressed, the organisms can take weeks to months to return to the coral during which time the coral remain susceptible to disease. In the last two decades, Belize Barrier Reef has been affected by two mass-bleaching events in 1995 and in 1997 to 1998.

According to scientists, over 40% of the coral reef has been damaged due to these two major traumatic events. While the ecosystem begins repairing the damage, the healing process is very slow and chances of recovery are already low. The major threat is continuous bleaching of the coral which means the reef will have little to no chance of recovery.

A beautiful islet in the "Carib Sea"

So before man and nature destroy some of God’s amazing works, I’ll have to myself to myself to the Land of the Gods.

Images courtesy of Budget Travel.

Freeform Forum: Dropping Weights #shitIseeatthegym

2011-08-12T16:23:00.000-04:00

While I was on the elliptical on last week and getting lost listening to my work-out mix (which is eerily similar to my-getting-ready-to-go-out mix), I heard this thunderous thump from above. No one else on the ellipticals or treadmills near me budged but it startled me. It continued throughout my entire run on the machine and it took me midway through my cardio routine that it was the sound of weight trainers dropping their weights on the floor.

My usual location in my gym for cardio is the first floor room which has dramatically high ceilings about 1½ stories tall. Though none of that buffered the heavy thump that weights make when they’re dropped. It’s not that I haven’t heard weights dropped before; I just forgot how irritating it is.

It happened again this week, but I had changed venues in the gym and went to the third floor with a mixed cardio and weight room and this time someone in the room was dropping weights. To top it off, he was grunting when he dropped the weights, like he was asserting his virility. It was me and no one else; I couldn’t care less about his virility.

"Do not drop weights, bars or dumbbells on the door" - the second to last policy
Sorry it's a little bury, the floor was shaking from the dude dropping his weights
(or that I was still on the elliptical when I took this)

This is a big pet peeve of mine.

There are two reasons that I bring this up at all:

1) Why the hell do you, Mr. Weight Dropper, do that? And

2) Knock it the eff off! You’re annoying, Mr. Weight Dropper. I wanna just drop kick you through the goal posts of life for that bs!

I don’t care if you are deadlifting the weight of 40 neutron stars, you’re nothing bust an ass when you drop your weight. If you can’t hold it for a few seconds longer after your full set, you shouldn’t be lifting it in the first place.

While I'm here, quit the grunting too. It just sounds so caveman and everyone in the gym talks about you when you do it.

myPics: Red Rocks in Winter

2011-08-11T08:54:00.001-04:00

A friend updated her status on facebook Monday night, "....Just sold a ticket to the sold out showing of Jurassic Park at Red Rocks tonight for face value...." and I stopped reading. I didn't need to know anything else but I was missing a showing of Jurassic Park at Red Rocks! I moped but I decided to use that status update as inspiration for my latest myPics.

In the middle of this brutally muggy summer, the image of snow always cools me down. There is something majestic and thrilling about a distinct rock formation against a bright blue sky.

Not yet named food entry: Snacking from Sea to Shining Sea

2011-08-10T09:42:00.023-04:00

One of the perks of traveling is trying regional foods. Barbeque differs throughout the South, and the North has different styles of pizza. However, I’m not focusing on food trends in this entry, (like a Chicago hot dog or New England Claw Chowder), I’m talking about the regional food products: your pre-packaged, pick-up-at-the-store snacks. Once, in Alamogordo, NM, I sampled chili and lime flavored roasted lima beans (spicy and tart), akin to a package of peanuts. In Pennsylvania, the area around York is home to Bickel Snacks (good, crunchy hard pretzels) and Middleburg is the land of Middleswarth Potato Chips (light in feel, not very greasy and substantial potato taste). Even giants in the food markets have regional varieties, Frito Lays has more spicy versions of their products in Latino markets, including more chili and lime flavored treats.

There is a regional supermarket, H-E-B, that serves Texas and Mexico, and has a great line of namesake brand products. One of these is the supermarket’s Texas Tasters – delicious buttery snack crackers in the shape of Texas. Outside of the novelty of state-shaped food, these little buggers are yummy. They are light and crispy, buttery and salty. In flavors like Buttery, Salsa, White Cheddar, Jalapeno Cheese and Smoky Bacon & Cheddar, they are by far the best food that I can easily carry out of Texas. And I do, boxes of them, when I visit the Lone Star State.

Texas-shaped snack crackers - what an awesome idea

I must make the disclaimer that these awesome snack crackers are made in Canada – which is amusing. It’s probably because they are small crackers - about 2 centimeters… err… ¾ inch big. Remember everything’s bigger in Texas, so that’s probably why there are made in Canada. All kidding aside, that doesn’t stop them from being a fun Texas-themed munchie or stop me from showering a bowl of chili with them when I have them. I wonder if they would ever consider a saltine-sized Texas-shaped cracker. I dream…

As a side note, I found a recipe for Texas Citrus Salsa on the H-E-B website, that I’m going to try and wanted to share with you.

Image courtesy of the lovely Laura A.

Wish List: Far Flung Places of the Commonwealth

2011-08-08T11:46:00.001-04:00

I am a history fan. I wouldn’t say that I’m a buff, per se, but I like history. I will spend my weekends relaxing in front of the TV watching all of the History Channel and History International shows. History is a source of great entertainment for me. One big piece of world history that I enjoy is British history and the history of its many colonies (US, Australia, the former Empire and the Commonwealth now, for example.) During Empire’s reign, the British traveled around the world and left their mark even on many of the most remote islands on the globe. These far flung places are places that I would love to see.

This wish list is really a pipe dream. There are limited modes of transportation to these British Overseas Territories, either via boat or in the case of the latest one, via military transport or cargo ship.

Pitcairn Island; Pitcairn Islands.

Pitcairn Island is the only inhabited island in the four island chain. The remote Pacific island chain is most famously known for the home of the descendants of the HMS Bounty mutineers and their Tahitians consorts. All residents of the island can trace their ancestors to these men and women, even though, occasionally new people will arrive and join the island.

Adamstown, the only settlement and the capital of the Pitcairn Islands

Fletcher Christian led the mutiny against William Bligh, former sailing master for Captain James Cook and future governor of New South Wales, and his alleged cruelty as their captain on their voyage to Tahiti for breadfruit. Bligh and his loyal crew were set afloat by the mutineers for an arduous 47-day to Timor in the Dutch East Indies, now the split between East Timor and Indonesia. The mutineers eventually headed to Pitcairn Island after trying to settle in Tahiti, where they subsequently scuttled the HMS Bounty in what is now called Bounty Bay.

Today there are under 50 people on Pitcairn.

Tristan da Cunha; Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha

Tristan da Cunha is the most remote inhabited archipelago in the world, lying 1,750 miles from the nearest land, South Africa. (This distance is more than the flight from Philadelphia to Denver.)

Edinburgh of the Seven Seas, the capital of Tristan da Cunha is named after Queen Victoria's son

First sighted in 1506 by Portuguese explorer Tristão da Cunha, the island was named after himself. The archipelago wasn’t surveyed until 1767 by the French. In December 1810, an American, from Salem, MA, declared the land his until his death in 1812. The US used the islands as a base during the War of 1812, but the UK formally annexed the islands in 1816 as a measure to keep the French from staging any rescue operation to free Napoleon Bonaparte from Saint Helena, 1,510 miles north. (This distance is as long as the flight from Philadelphia to Denver.)

Today there are 275 people on Tristan da Cunha.

Diego Garcia; British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT)

Diego Garcia was discovered by the Spanish explorer Diego García de Moguer in the 16th century, but was settled as a French colony in 1793. (What’s up with folks naming thing after themselves?) In 1814, it and the rest of the Chagos Archipelago were ceded to the United Kingdom in the Treaty of Paris. This treaty ended the Napoleonic Wars, and this is the same time frame that Napoleon was in prison in Saint Helena. Eventually the archipelago was governed by the colony of Mauritius and in 1965, the United Kingdom purchased the archipelago from Mauritius, declaring them to be a separate British Overseas Territory along with the islands of Aldabra, Farquhar and Desroches from the Seychelles to build a military base.

A former copra plantation on Diego Garcia

There is controversy surrounding the island, most notably that displacement in 1971 of the local people, the Chagossians, to build Diego Garcia as a joint British and American military base. Secondarily, Mauritius claims the right to the islands.

Today there are around 4000 military personnel and civilian contractors on Diego Garcia.

The biggest draw for me for the BIOT is that it has the coolest flag of any British dependency.

As cool as Maryland's, British Columbia's and Newfoundland and Labrador's Flags

Though they have the smallest population, the Pitcairn Islands are the most feasible to be a destination for the determined traveler since 80% of their economy is based in tourism and there is a ferry between Tahiti and Pitcairn for tourists.

Images courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.

Freeform Forum: I agree with Christie on this

2011-08-05T13:10:00.003-04:00

I tweeted this news story today: Chris Christie slams fearmongering over Sharia law. (IrishWombat: gives kudos to Gov. Christie for supporting a Muslim judge: http://owl.li/5W4Dz. Wish others in #Republican party would believe similarly.) In essence, Gov. Christie lambasts conservative critics about his nominee for New Jersey’s Superior Court. Sohail Mohammed, Christie’s appointee, is an American attorney who offered legal aid to New Jersey residents who were suspected after the September 11th attacks. These suspects were found innocent of any crimes.

The opponents of the nomination have issued factless warnings that the judge would base his rulings on Islamic law. This is false supposition got Gov. Christie furious. He calls out the opponents as “crazy” for their misleading statements.

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

According to the article, there are many several Republicans and GOP president candidates that stir up fear that Muslims will force Americans to live under Sharia law, including:

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum recently called it "an existential threat" to the United States; former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty shut down a program in his state that would allow practicing Muslims to pay for mortgages without violating their religious teachings against borrowing with interest; businessman Herman Cain said he would require Muslims to take an extra loyalty oath to serve in his administration; and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich called for a federal law to ban Sharia from U.S. courts.

First, let me commend Christie on his support of Sohail Mohammed. I believe that Mohammed was nominated for his competencies and his record which was probably tested and honed during his work with innocent NJ residents suspected of terrorist activities after the worst attack on American soil in history. In addition, it looks to me that Christie knows his Constitution which states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Additionally, he must has faith in Mohammed to know and follow the Constitution when he’s serving as Judge.

The first four verses of al-‘Alaq (The Clot), the 96th chapter (surah) of the Qur'an.*

So why aren’t those above-named Republicans aware of this phrase from the Bill of Rights? There are so many different arguments against these folks, but two stick out strongly. Rick Santorum, a Roman Catholic, aggressively pushes his religious based beliefs into his policies, and Newt Gingrich’s federal law to ban Sharia is unconstitutional since that would be both be prohibiting the free exercise of religion and establishing every other religion above Islam. Obviously, to the Republicans above, we should have a separation of church and state, except for those good solid Christian family values which should be law of the land.

The United States has been the greatest nation on Earth because it has grown to appreciate diversity. We didn’t start out that way, remember when non-whites were three fifths of a person? Yet we learn from our inadequacies and realize that the differences flesh out our shortcomings to make our strengths. There has been so much fear and oppression dumped on our newest immigrants who don’t look like the status quo. Yet, they are our future; they can provide American with the willing workers and the brain power to continue our trail blazing role in the world. However, remember the Irish and NINA? The Irish are white, pasty white even, and Irish immigrants were treated like second class citizens during 19th century. Bigotry and bias might actually be colorblind, but cruelty and fear can be forever. The US has a history of this arrogant ignorance, and we need to overcome it.

Personally, there are some aspects of Sharia law with which I don’t agree and would not want to be ruled under it. My beliefs are still dictated by my religious upbringing, but I don’t feel that my religious upbringing gives me a moral superiority over anyone else. I need to follow the letter of the law, and if I disagree there are channels for my voice including “petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” (Oh, there’s that pesky First Amendment again.)

The Gutenberg Bible

However, let’s go on a limb and go down the route of Christianity being the moral compass. I quote from the Bible, featuring Jesus:

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Matthew 22:36-40 (New International Version)

So the source of Christianity’s beliefs, Jesus, says that, equally, one of the two greatest laws is to “love your neighbor” (black, Jew, gentile, Muslim, gay, single mother, mixed-raced, deaf, straight, transgendered, white, Asian, etc.) “as yourself” and not bullying the Dickens out of anyone for being different. Digging a little deeper, the source of Jesus’ quote is Leviticus 19:18, which states “‘do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.” I don’t think Jesus would stand for anyone of us excluding anybody from the phrase “anyone among your people.” He means everyone when He quotes Leviticus.

Hm, I just used the Bible to support the nomination of the Muslim judge. I’m glad Christie stuck his neck out on this one.

Images courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.

* translation of the verses:
In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful
96:1 Read in the name of your Lord , Who created-
96:2 Created man, out of a (mere) clot of congealed blood:
96:3 Proclaim! And thy Lord is Most Bountiful,-
96:4 He Who taught (the use of) the pen.

myPics: Yosemite at Dusk

2011-08-04T09:28:00.016-04:00

Last August, I went to Yosemite for one of my dearest friend’s wedding. A group of us stayed at private cabins only accessible via the park, just 20 miles from the valley floor. The wonder trip consisted of hiking, observing nature, drinking white wine in a hot tub night while looking at the Big Dipper through the opening in the redwood canopy and celebrating our friend’s very happy day.

During one of our nights, we made a last minute decision to go to Glacier Point to catch the sunset. At the summit, I started to take photos in the opposite direction of sunset to catch the light reflecting off the iconic features of Yosemite. This is when I caught a few shots of the light on Half Dome standing guard over the valley, like this one.

Not yet named food entry: Laissez le café rouler

2011-08-03T11:56:00.005-04:00

Nothing brings back great memories like the smell of something good and I would have to say that most people I know love the smell of coffee. The bright, earthy and nutty smell immediately hits the olfactory nerve and tells the body that caffeine is near, even if you don’t like the drink. For some, it brings back the mornings when someone brewed coffee for them while still in bed, waking up after a restful sleep. For others, it’s the memories of coming over for Sunday brunch already to eat and rehash the fun of the weekend. Still others have other happy occasions, like Christmas or Easter morning, come to mind when they smell coffee.

For me, though, there is a particular coffee blend that stimulates great memories, the mix of coffee with chicory that is the hallmark of coffee in New Orleans. The brew has, in addition to the bright, earthy and nutty scents, notes of chocolate and wood from the chicory, the root of the familiar the Belgian endive and radicchio. This very strong brew brings me back to my only trip to New Orleans.

The Gold Standard of New Orleans Coffee

During a pre-Katrina trek to Louisiana during a road trip from Philadelphia, I traveled with a group to the Crescent City for Spring Break. In our five days, we packed a lot of sites into our trip. We went to the Jackson Square and the Audubon Zoo, visited the campuses of Tulane and Loyola, crossed the Mississippi, road St. Charles streetcar, heard jazz at Preservation Hall and looked for Anne Rice’s house. (We think we found it.)

We bar-hopped throughout Bourbon Street, taking our to-go cups with us. We hit Pat O’Brien’s, the Tropical Isle, Krazy Korner and more. We drank drinks like Hurricane, Zombie and Cyclone. We found Ryan's Irish Pub on the corner of Decatur and Bienville, where I made them card me on my 21st birthday (That was back when LA still had 18 as the drinking age, but the bartender realized the significance and we got a round for free.)

Bourbon Street at night

We ate, too. We ate oysters at the Oyster Bar named Desire. We dined on muffulettas (a huge, round, flattened sandwich stuffed with an olive relish and layers of spicy cured Italian meats, provolone and Swiss cheese) and po’boys (like our Philadelphia hoagies but more often with fried seafood than deli meats.) Unfortunately it was Lent when we visited so we missed Mardi Gras, therefore we missed the King Cake. Even stopping in supermarkets or corner stores, we found many New Orleans, Creole and Southern treats that weren’t e available to us anywhere else to try.

It was the late night runs to Café du Monde that cemented the correlation of scent of coffee with great memories. We made our nights in the city relatively early ones; we usually were finished with the bars by 1:00 am. Before the trek back to our hotel, we would head to the French Market for the Café du Monde coffee stand. We would order beignets and café au lait, made from the New Orleans blend of coffee and chicory. I usually take my coffee black, but the adage of “When in Rome...” was my guide.

Café du Monde at the French Market

The coffee’s scent lingers in the air around the French Market as a magical detectable perfume over the sweet, fried smell of the beignets. This lured us in for our post-Midnight snack. As I devoured my hot, sweet, puffy beignets, I mused over the hot café au lait. A good brew is thicker than tea or even premium coffees and then the milk adds a sweetness and an additionally richer texture to the coffee. The divergent flavors - bright, earthy and nutty of the coffee, the chocolaty and woodsy of the chicory – marries with the milk’s contribution of sweet, creamy and rich to make a wonderful hot beverage.

The origins of my beloved coffee start in the mid-1700 when the Dutch started to roast chicory and grind it to use as a coffee substitute. By 1806, Napoleon attempted to make France self-sufficient which included eliminating any dependence on imports, including coffee. In lieu of coffee, chicory was used as a complete substitute during this time. However, the economic system did not last more than a few years and coffee was imported again. Yet the French continued to use chicory to blend with their coffee and this practice traveled to the French-influenced city of New Orleans, where thankfully today, this blend is the normal style of coffee.

Café du Monde's flagship is located at 800 Decatur Street, New Orleans, LA. Coffee can be purchased from the on-line site and in select supermarkets.

Images, except Gold Standard of New Orleans Coffee, courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.

Wish List: Ireland

2011-08-01T08:58:00.011-04:00

This is a little bit of a cheat since I’m leaving for Ireland in thirty-eight days, but I have always wished to return. Twelve years ago, I got the opportunity to visit Ireland with one of my best friends, Laura, and the trip was definitely life-defining. We traveled throughout the Republic and Northern Ireland, hitting Dublin, Cork, Dingle, Limerick, Galway, back to Dublin, Enniskillen, Belfast and again to Dublin.

A bucolic view of Ireland

While there, I wrote nine e-mails about my visit to friends and family. This was the time before blogs or smart phones. Digital cameras were gaining popularity, but still most pictures were taken on film and printed (and also scanned onto a CD at the photo processor’s.)

In one of my several attempted to design a webpage and to keep a travelogue, I posted my e-mails, including all typos, misspellings and missing words on my cuchulainn.net site. I went back to visit them to see what had impressed me about Ireland and what I wanted to share with my folks while I was still there.

Ha-penny Bridge, Dublin, Ireland.

My observations about Ireland amused me. I mention that Laura and I would stop mid-conversation and saying that the people “look so effing Irish” and that an Irish Bar in Ireland looks like any other Irish Bar in the world, including a few that I’ve seen in France and Japan. I was disillusioned crossing into Northern Ireland from the Republic, since it was more anti-climactic than crossing into Delaware from Pennsylvania; I didn’t even remember since a sign saying anything like, “Welcome to the UK.”

As for the cities, Dublin reminded me of Boston; Cork, Manayunk; and Belfast, New York but smaller and more colonial. I was thrilled to visit the Dublin’s General Post Office (GPO) to see the statue of Cuchulainn as a memorial for Easter Uprising, but I was disappointed by its small stature. I was humored by how still superstitious the Irish are, since the Y2K bug was a very big topic there. In Enniskillen, I walked around town and happened upon a Pound Store (just like a Dollar Store, except things cost a £,) it tickled me.

Belfast City Hall

One of the things that I won’t be getting to do this time in Ireland is visit Belfast or any of Northern Ireland. We simply don’t have the time to stay longer to do so. However, I did get to Belfast when I was there in 1999, where I stayed with Laura’s friend, who drove us through Catholic and Protestant Belfast. We went past the Peace Lines – walls built around Catholic sections of Belfast that look more like No Man’s Land barriers than Peace Lines. I was taken aback by the Murals, particularly one featuring the Cuchulainn statue from the GPO and a Northern Irish British solider with symbols of Ulster and the Union Jack, claiming Cuchulainn as the North’s protector, too.

The Mural in West Belfast

In my last e-mail from the island of Ireland, I stated “I will miss this little island and I will have to return.” I have missed Ireland, its people and its culture; visiting really left a mark on me. I can’t begin to explain how elated I am that I get to return.

If you are interested, feel free to read my error-ridden e-mails from Ireland in 1999.

All images courtesy of TripAdvisor, except for the Mural in West Belfast - courtesy of Big E's Belfast Taxi Tours.

Not yet named travel entry: Staycation.

2011-07-30T08:52:00.005-04:00

I was supposed to go to Boston this April to watch my cousin run the Boston Marathon. Yet, due to my Uncle’s wedding the group who were going to go decide to put all of our resources into the California trip. Luckily, my cousin made good time and qualified for next year’s Boston Marathon with his time this year.

North Portal façade

Instead of returning my vacation days back to my pool, I decided to keep them and be a tourist in my own town. I took a tour of Philadelphia City Hall, one of the many fascinating points of interest in my hometown that I never visited. The $10 tour, which is volunteer-led, took me and the group around and throughout the building on a two hour tour including the statuary, architectural elements, Mayor’s reception room, tower, Supreme Court chambers and a six-person elevator ride to the observation platform immediately below the William Penn statue.

One of the four corners of the Earth capitals

My volunteer, Mike, moved to Philadelphia from Trenton, NJ, after retirement. Loving the city, he decided to find a meaningful way to volunteer during the day and is a well-versed docent. I’ll admit the facts and figures that he shared were overwhelming, so I’ll share with you those that stuck with me.

The original chandelier in the Mayor's Reception Room.

My Top Ten Takeaways:

Philadelphia City Hall is the nation’s largest municipal building (548 feet tall).
The clock faces are larger than Westminster’s Clock Tower.
Its architectural style is French Second Empire.
There are over 250 relief and freestanding sculptures, all created by Alexander Milne Calder, including William Penn at the top.
The four corners of the world is a dominant theme of the building; there are four pediments representing such through the four races of Philadelphia’s inhabitants of the city: African, Asian, European and Native American and the column capitals supporting the tower echo this motif.

Supreme Court Chamber

The William Penn statue is the tallest atop any building in the world.
Construction of City Hall started 1871 and lasted thirty years; by its completion in 1901, the style wasn’t en vogue anymore, and the citizens of Philadelphia disliked it and wanted to raze it.
The clocks were visible from a great distance and were so accurate that people used the clocks to set their watches and clocks; each evening at 8:57 pm, the clock tower light were turned off to give people three minutes to set their watches before the lights went on again at 9:00pm.
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is a traveling court – meaning it meets in additional cities outside of the Capital; for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania the Court meets in Harrisburg, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.
The only word incorporated into the façade of the building is Justice, above the Moses Keystone of the South Portal entrance.

Looking up at William Penn from the observation deck

After the tour, I headed to nearby Reading Terminal and got some lunch. My day in the city – my own city – was a success. I recommend to anyone to go out and be a tourist in your own town.

The view South on Broad Street.

For additional pictures of Philadelphia City Hall, visit my facebook album: City Hall, Philadelphia, PA, April 2011.

Freeform Forum: Salads.

2011-07-29T16:41:00.001-04:00

I’m watching what I’m eating and working out in order to get ready for a trip to Ireland. I’m using LoseIt.com to help me monitor what I eat and improve my eating habits. Since it’s summer, I hate cooking, so I usually do a lot of salads since vegetables are plentiful.

A fresh summer salad

I’m bringing this all up because I have a peculiar rule of thumb for making a salad. Loosely said, I won’t eat a salad unless it has three ingredients. That’s how I define a salad compared to Merriam -Webster’s definition:

Any of various usually cold dishes: as a: raw greens (as lettuce) often combined with other vegetables and toppings and served especially with dressing b: small pieces of food (as pasta, meat, fruit, or vegetables) usually mixed with a dressing (as mayonnaise) or set in gelatin.

However, I’m specific. Three different greens (say romaine, arugula and spinach) mixed together, does not a salad make. Forgetting the whole genre of salads mixed with a dressing or set in gelatin, I wondered what the standard for a salad is. I went to my trusty web-resource, Wikipedia, and looked up salad. Wow!

A green salad with crunchy onions and carrots

According to the Wikipedia article on salad, a salad can be served at any time in a meal as an appetizer, a side salad, a main course salad, a palate-cleansing salad or a dessert salad. I had never thought of a palate-cleansing salad before, but, then maybe that’s the “European” thing. You know, when you have a salad after an entrée and you say, “That it’s the way they do it in Europe,” to save face from forgetting that you made a salad to have at the beginning of dinner.

Then there are the types of salad: green, vegetable, bound, main course, fruit and dessert. Green, vegetable and fruit are pretty obvious – named for their components. A Main course salad is usually greens plus a protein. This is one of my favorite go to meals. Nothing as simple and healthful as adding a good serving of protein to a salad. Love many different options, like nuts, cheese, tuna, leftover chicken or leftover steak. Sometimes on a weight-training day, I'll add two (steak and blue cheese, chicken and almonds, cheddar and sunflower seeds) to increase my protein.

Then there were the two that I didn't really consider. It took me a while to get bound, but they are like macaroni, pasta and potato salads, bound by mayonnaise, for example. The dessert salads, I never thought of them.

A good old-fashioned Midwestern Cookie Salad

There’s a whole world of dessert salad – out there to blow everyone’s good eating habits. Per Wikipedia, “dessert salads rarely include leafy greens and are often sweet. Common variants are made with gelatin or whipped cream (oftentimes with the brand products Jell-O and / or Cool Whip.)” I thought that it was a little cheeky of the writer to tell me that dessert salads are often sweet.

According to the article the Midwest has the lion’s share of dessert salads, including jello salad, pistachio salad, ambrosia, snickers salad, glorified rice and cookie salad. I looked them all up and they seem more like no-bake puddings than salads, but many folks would consider them as such. I just call them rich.

A colorful and healthful salad.

At the end of my culinary investigation when I think of a salad, I think of a mixture of at least three different vegetables and/or fruit, where a combination of greens is considered as only one of the components. If I want to make it an entree, then I add a good serving ot two of protein. Boring, maybe, but the research was fun. In the long term, this oddball peculiarity for me works out, since I end up eating three of my suggested five to seven daily servings of fruits and vegetables in one sitting.

Images courtesy of nokhoog_buchachon / FreeDigitalPhotos.net, Piyachok Thawornmat / FreeDigitalPhotos.net, Wikipedia and scottchan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net, respectively.

myPics: A Study in Variation - Greece

2011-07-28T09:34:00.023-04:00

I would say that an iconic image of Greece is the image of the two blue domed churches in Oia on Santorini. When I was on Mykonos, this church caught my eye and it left such an impact on me that I made it my Holiday card for 2010. (Don't worry if you didn't get one, I didn't send them out.)

The variation of red instead of the stereotypical blue resonated with me as a wonderful new bend on my own feelings toward Greece. From this trip, my pics from Mykonos are the ones that say Greece to me. I hope to share more on the Thursdays that follow.

Not yet named food entry: On a Mission for ice cream

2011-07-27T10:37:00.002-04:00

I need to give a shout out to my friend, Denise, who told me about her favorite ice cream place in the Mission over three years ago.

Like every red-blooded American, I love ice cream. I’ve been known even to down a pint for dinner – not necessarily healthy, but damn right satisfying. So when my friend, Denise, moved back into the area, she made sure that I knew of Humphry Slocombe for I would be ready to visit on my next trip to San Francisco.

“You need to try the olive oil ice cream, and if they have it, the foie gras,” she mused.

“Really, Foie gras? Sounds rich.”

“Oh, it is.”

A sample of Humphry Slocombe's twitter feed - usually menu announcements

It’s not accurate or fair to say that Humphry Slocombe makes odd or weird flavors of ice cream. There’s thought and whimsy in these flavor profiles. Some of the flavors focus on rich savories in a sweet base, like foie gras, prosciutto or even balsamic caramel. Others pair heat with cool dairy, like peanut butter curry or strawberry candied jalapeño. Yet others just sound fun, like Harvey Milk & honey or the Harry Potter-inspired Butterbeer. People appreciate complex favors in their desserts.

Every time I return to San Francisco, getting ice cream from Humphry Slocombe is on the short list of things to do. Outside of visiting with my friends and getting my beloved burrito, it’s really the only other mandatory to-do list item. It’s always a highlight on my trip.

I tend to stay in the Financial District or SoMa. When I get the craving for Humphry Slocombe, I walk to my closest BART station, Powell or Montgomery Street, and head down to 24th Street Mission. The trip, though about 5 minutes, feels like an eternity.

I take the escalator to the surface at the northeast corner of 24th and Mission and bask in the life on the street. The McDonalds on the southeast corner is plastered with Spanish decals promoting the latest fast food treat and I check my El Farolito to see if there is a line or not. Latinos and hipsters cross the street and barely notice that I’m a tourist. Eastward, I head toward Harrison, listening to my iPhone set on repeat. The neighborhood is vibrant and the appropriate background for loud pop music.

Eastward on 24th.

A 48 Quintara-24th Street passes and I wax nostalgic on my first time traveling to San Francisco as an adult. Over ten years ago, I had boarded the 48 bus at Caltrain’s 22nd Street Station a few miles away to make the trip into the Mission to stay with my friend, Denise. The area has changed but it has retained its soul. The Bay View Bank building is now the US Bank building, but it’s still an out-of-place, 10 story building, standing out like a sore thumb from the busy foot traffic on Mission. 24th street is lined with bodegas, dives, clothing outlets, an Irish bar, taquerías, a laundromat, cafés, pawn shops and colorful Mexican themed murals. I’m so engrossed in taking the atmosphere in that I barely notice the simple blue and white sign, the harbinger of Harrison Street and ice cream to come.

The very first time I went to Humphry Slocombe, there was no line. I walked in and studied the menu. I knew that I could ask for samples, but I was going to dive in, head first. Unfortunately, there was no Foie Gras on the menu, but there was the McEvoy Olive Oil. Wanting another flavor, I honed in on Secret Breakfast, not really knowing what its secret was.

The Line at Humphry Slocombe

McEvoy Olive Oil tasted like chilled, thickened cake batter with very strong floral notes. The richness of this ice cream was not lost on me. I worked through the flavor slowly to savor dense, slick sweetness of the oil, fortified by the olive’s perfume. Then, I hit the Secret Breakfast. The bourbon taste is strong and, being one of my favorite liquors, it was welcome surprise. In fact, I was surprised that I didn’t smell any of the bourbon before tasting it. It is that prevalent. The cream and sugar bring out the rich vanilla and burnt caramel notes in the liquor and the crunch of the cornflakes always brought me back to the moment after drifting off in a bourbon daydream.

It was love at first taste and I continue to love the dairy chemistry at Humphry Slocombe. I do try to have a new flavor or two when I return, but Secret Breakfast is a difficult love to avoid. Some of the more memorable flavors I have tried are:

Peanut Butter Curry. The rich taste of peanut butter with the handful of different heats from the complexity and the spice of curry.
Balsamic Caramel: The tart, astringent, viscous and bold taste of balsamic vinegar with the notes of burnt sugar and salt of gooey caramel.
"Oh Hell Yes": The tart and rich flavor of cream cheese ice cream mixed with strawberry and blueberry preserves and decadently large chunks of shortbread pie crust.
Salt and Pepper: (I cheat on Secret Breakfast with Salt and Pepper.) This flavor is about dichotomy, playing with our traditional tabletop condiments. The crunchy and salty bits of sea salt contrast with a smooth, sweet base. It makes me want to mix salt and sugar together and put in the salt shaker. At the same time, I can’t help but enjoy the different fires from peppercorns and red pepper that balance the cool temperature of this ice cream.

I tell my friends, co-workers, people on the street who mention that they plan to go to San Francisco. I’ve taken city residents, family members and boyfriends to Humphry Slocombe because the ice cream is so good and there’s so much thought put into it. In 2010, I was thrilled since I was going to San Francisco twice. After I went in May with my cousin, I chatted up Humphry Slocombe with my good travel companion who was going to be traveling with me to San Francisco in August.

A tweeted menu pic.

About a month before we headed out, we were planning some of our vacation ideas via e-mail when he started sending me links of San Francisco places.

“By the way, is this your ice cream shop in San Francisco?” he asked, including the link to an article.

“Why, yes, it is,” I e-mailed back in quick fire secession.

“It made the NY Times and it sounds as wonderful as you say it is.”

Humphry Slocombe is located at 2790 Harrison Street, San Francisco, CA.

The image, A tweeted menu pic, courtesy of @humphryslocombe via twitpic.

Wish List: Philly Bookclub’s European Vacation.

2011-07-25T09:13:00.035-04:00

Two Saturdays ago, we had our monthly meeting of Bookclub. The book was The Splendor of Silence by Indu Sundaresan. It was a rich tale about two cultures clashing, two people meeting and the lifetime they shared in four days and its repercussions. So our theme was Indian food and the specialty drink was a gimlet. (There were vodka gimlets available for those who didn’t want gin.)

After we thoroughly talked about the book, someone in the group mentioned going on vacation en masse in Europe. This idea expounds on our proposed weekend in Washington, DC, when we read Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol. We would read the book for bookclub and instead of meeting we would spend a day in DC at some of the sites in the book chatting about the novel – a fun idea.

The Capitol Rotunda, Washington, DC

If going to DC would be a fun idea, going to Europe would be fantastic. At length, we discussed in detail whether or not we all could travel with each other. We came to the conclusion that we could and, now, the plan is to find a villa. We settled on renting in August in the Mediterranean areas of Europe: Barcelona, Italy, Grecian Islands, etc.

Casa Bacardi near Barcelona

Except for Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, we couldn’t name another book that we read which took place in Mediterranean Europe. Therefore, we will focus area on locating something in Catalonia, yet our final decision will be based on what we can afford as a group. We are staying open to the idea that we could end up in Greece, the Dalmatian coast, Bari or elsewhere for that matter. If we go somewhere else than Barcelona, we have about a full year to pick a book or two to read that’s set in the area where we’ll holiday.

View from the Villa Aris on Koufoni, Greece

The vacation, however, will be simple. We will get a villa for a week and we will use that as our headquarters for the stay. We will take turns cooking meals from the local meats, eggs and produce and enjoy the nights drinking local wine. For two or three days, we will plan some side trips from the villa based on our bookclub reads. Outside of our book-themed day trips and evening meals, we will be flexible to do anything that we want or to do nothing else at all. Perhaps we take a day-trip to a neighboring county or we spend the days lounge in the villa reading our future bookclub novels. Once we’re in Europe, we’re all free to stay longer and create our own adventures, but we are looking forward to a fun, literary vacation on the continent.

Images courtesy of Wikipedia (Capitol Rotunda), RentVillas.com (Casa Bacardi) and HomeAway (Villa Aris).

Not yet named travel entry: Mission San Diego de Alcalá

2011-07-23T16:24:00.000-04:00

What is now the city of San Diego started out as Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo’s San Miguel, named when he sailed into San Diego Bay on September 28, 1542. The Portuguese explorer claimed the land for Spain, but Spain ignored the area for sixty years and all proof of Cabrillo’s claim had weathered away. Sebastián Vizcaíno made landfall in San Diego Bay as well, and he renamed the area after San Diego de Alcalá on November 10, 1602.

It would be another 167 years before the Spanish returned to San Diego. (Sounds like the Spanish modus operandi.) During the entire Spanish conquistador period, Spain had been establishing missions to convert the natives in New Spain to Catholicism in order to colonize the lands. Yet, it took the movements of Russia eyeing up the western coast of North America with Peter I the Great asking Vitus Bering to command an expedition of the Kamchatka peninsula and the subsequent discovery of additional lands east of Siberia across the now eponymously-named Bering Strait.

Detail from the Stations of the Cross Mosaic

To secure Spain's claim to the entire Pacific Coast by right of discovery, King Philip V felt missions were necessary in Alta California. In 1769 Junípero Serra led an expedition from Baja California to found the mission at San Diego and presidio at Monterey. Both the Presidio and the Mission of San Diego became the first European settlement in what is now the state of California.

The site of the Presidio and the original Mission is in what is now San Diego’s Presidio Park. No historical structures remain in Presidio Park today, but a fenced-off area encloses the foundations of the chapel, walls, and other historical sites. Mission moved about five miles upriver at its current location in 1773. The Presidio was gradually abandoned since need for military protection disappeared and people settled in Old Town at the foot of the hill from the Presidio. It lay in ruins by 1835.

The flower garden

If San Diego is the birthplace of California, then Junípero Serra is California’s father. Father Serra was a Majorcan Franciscan friar who founded the mission chain in Alta California, including Mission San Buenaventura, Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa, and perhaps the most famous of them all Mission San Francisco de Asís (Mission Dolores). During his lifetime, he was witness to the American Revolutionary War and he notably took up a collection from his mission parishes throughout California. The total money collected amounted to roughly $137 and it was sent to General George Washington.

My aunt and uncle has asked someone in one of the stores about the Mission to find out when it might close. We rushed to the Mission from our visit to Old Town San Diego since the Church was only open until 5:00pm. We followed the signs on the Kumeyaay Freeway to the exit and after some creative navigation found ourselves in front of an unassuming building. While it had the traditional Spanish architecture, it was a smaller façade than I had anticipated.

The fountain

When we entered into the Mission grounds and I saw the large patio with a fountain, I realized the scope of this property. Like many of the Missions, the plaza was surrounded by solid and massive walls that were broad and undecorated. I wondered around and found the arched corridors that lead to the school area and a statuary garden.

Pieta

I joined my family in the flower garden and moved into the church. After the move to the current location, the Mission struggled against native attacks and was destroyed in 1775 by fire. Though it was one of the poorer Missions in the system, Blessed Father Serra returned to oversee the rebuilding and brought prosperity back to the area. However, with Mexican Independence and U.S. acquisition, the Mission was neglected. Finally, in 1931, the Church was restored to its current look. Today it is an active Catholic Parish in the Diocese of San Diego.

To honor the historic role that this first Mission held in the history of California and the US, Pope Paul VI designated Mission San Diego de Alcalá as a Minor Basilica in 1976, which includes in its privileges granted, the permit to display a tintinnabulum and an umbraculum.

The altar of the church - the umbraculum is the red and yellow piece hanging on the left.

I appreciate when these original historic sites are able to be used for their original purpose. The US doesn’t have the length of history that the UK, France or China have, but we do have a collective breadth of history. I’m proud when we do preserve our history for future generation to use and to value. When we partake in our over two century old history, we continue to define ourselves as Americans.

My cousin and I

Freeform Forum: ...I just hate travelers: Getting Out of Your Seat

2011-07-22T13:29:00.003-04:00

When I finally got into Union Station, I checked in, tweeting that I don’t mind traveling; I just hate travelers.

I love to travel and its twofold journey: the process of getting to a destination and the exploration of that destination. This love of the trek helps to explains why I understand Songlines. However, travelers, on the other hand, can really tick me off.

When I travel, I am mindful of my actions and that my actions can affect others. As common travelers, we’re packed into tight planes and crowded train platforms. We’re driving up and down the same congested freeways. We’re waiting in line for the same outcome.

I wanted to take a few moments to vent about the lack of travel etiquette and remind my follow travelers to make the trip enjoyable for all, including your neighbors. I wish that the in-flight magazines and Arrive: The Magazine for Northeast Business Travelers (Amtrak’s magazine) would explicitly have an etiquette column to remind travelers how to behave.

Travel etiquette: When getting up out of your seat on a train or a plane, do not use the seatback in front of you to support your weight. Push yourself out of your seat by supporting yourself on the armrest of your own seat.

This is one of my biggest pet peeves of all. While it may be one of human’s natural instincts to reach out immediately in front of oneself to lift one out of a seat on a plane or train, this behavior must stop.

It is irksome to be reading a riveting passage in book, lip syncing to the latest pop hit, playing the last level of Angry Birds or drifting off into a nap and to have your seatback pulled away from your torso and bringing you down with it.

This last trip to DC on Amtrak really got my ire up. I was hoping to get on the quiet car to zone out. I noticed that there were plenty of available seats there. I took one, settled in and felt that I was in heaven. Two hours of listening to my iPhone, not worrying about people talking on the phone or too loud, would deliver me in Washington ready and energized for my event.

I sat in front of a recently retired couple, who I discerned to the best of my ability were traveling down to Richmond from outside of New York. They looked very happy for their new chapter in life and enjoying their ride so far. However, this couple got up seven times during the two hour trip and always used my seatback to leverage themselves out of the seat. Perhaps I should have addressed them after the third time. But who wants to start a conflict on the quiet car, isn’t they why we’re all there - to avoid talking? Needless to say, my solace was gone and made me quite the crankpants to write this entry.

I watched their behavior and they both looked fit and active to be able to push themselves up out of their seats. They walked around the train very steadily during the train's more rocky moments. I think they should have known better, too.

I’m asking my fellow travelers to be aware: everything that you do while traveling can and will affect others. If you can't be aware, I'll tell you what you're doing wrong and how to improve.

myPics: White Mosque - Blue Sky

2011-07-21T10:11:00.029-04:00

Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, Abu Dhabi, UAE

Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is located in Abu Dhabi, and its construction was initiated by the late President of the United Arab Emirates, His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. Thought of as the father of the UAE, he has been laid to rest in a tomb located on the grounds. While the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque Center encourages visitors to take pictures of the grounds, photography of the tomb is not permitted.

I used this picture as the wallpaper on my iPhone for my locked screen, and the phone wonderfully cropped to accentuate the minaret in the archway.

Finally, the mosque has many noteworthy architectural and design features.

The carpet in the main prayer hall is the world's largest carpet.
There are seven chandeliers which incorporate millions of Swarovski crystals, and the chandelier in the main prayer hall is the largest known chandelier inside a mosque.
The mosque is lit at night to reflect the phases of the moon: the lights dim from a bright light blue to its darkest shade when starting at the full moon to the new moon.
The marble tile mosaic of the courtyard with its floral design, measures about 180,000 sq. ft., making it the largest in the world, and can accommodate about 30,000 worshipers. Additionally, the white marble remains cool to the touch even during the heat of the afternoon.

Not yet named food entry: Green Chili Stew (Austin)

2011-07-20T10:36:00.006-04:00

In Austin, there is a great restaurant that is its own small chain, Chuy’s. To comment on their food and restaurant philosophy, I need to phrase it in the company’s own words, “if you’ve seen one Chuy’s, you’ve seen one Chuy’s.” I’ve seen only one Chuy’s, the first one on Barton Spring Road in Austin. It’s been love at first order.

I was led to this Chuy’s by the “big as yo’ face” burrito 5 years this upcoming February when my travel companion wanted to show off a Tex-Mex burrito since I champion a Mission-style burrito as the world’s best. (Still I religiously go to El Farolito at 2779 Mission Street whenever I visit San Francisco). The line was long in the restaurant – about a 45 minute wait – and we were starving from driving up from San Antonio. We perused the menu to come up with our order: two burritos and some chips and salsa.

I thought about it. If the burrito was truly as big as yo’ face, that was going to be a lot of burrito for two of us, even if we were grown men. I talked us down from the ledge, but my friend saw the green chili stew and thought that it might be worth a shot. It was February in Texas, so not too warm, and stew sounded good. How bad could chicken and hot peppers in a stew be?

Before we found out, we waited at the bar for our order. The place is like a 50’s diner with ADD. Painted in kitschy aqua, pink and teal, I noticed all the character in this restaurant. In the main bar, there is a jungle of wooden fish in a combination of primary and tropic colors hanging from the ceiling. Dotted throughout are pieces of Elvis paraphernalia; over the cashier’s podium, there is the galley of t-shirts for sale.

What caught attention was the wall of pictures as you entered – people posing in their Chuy’s shirts in front of landmarks from the four corners of the globe. I remember Chuy’s at the Salt Lake City 2002 Olympics, in front of the Pyramids in Egypt, with the Sydney Opera House, at the Grand Canyon, and more. Obliviously there is some reason for the cult of Chuy’s.

Our order was ready and since it took longer than the hostess had thought, they threw in some hot appetizer. Making sure we had all the utensils and napkins we needed, we hurried back to the hotel to eat. We snacked on the chips en route, and set up a place to eat in our room. We dove into the burrito, and it was ok. It wasn’t bad at all, but it didn’t wow me. Again, Mission-style burritos are the gold standard. The appetizer was fine. We were ready to say that Chuy’s wasn’t a bad choice but it’s just Tex-Mex, we tried the green chili stew.

Remember, “how bad could chicken and hot peppers in a stew be?” The stew was far from bad; it was incredible. The chicken was tender and moist. The carrots and potatoes were cooked to the point of easily giving way when bitten and releasing a sweet flavor or a good starchy sensation. The broth of the stew was fragrant with sharp garlic and onion, verdant cilantro and the happy stinging heat of peppers. We fought over the stew. Simply, it was that good.

While it was the lure of burritos that brought me to Chuy’s, it’s the green chili stew that brings me back. The green chili stew with its famous hatch peppers, only grown in Hatch, NM, made me jump feet first into the cult of Chuy’s. Not all of the Chuy’s have this green chili stew, I understand that the San Antonio ones don’t make it.

The Cult of Chuy's - Wearing a Chuy's T-shirt in a desert hookah lounge in Dubai, UAE

My friend and I searched the internet for a recipe since we were profoundly in awe of it. Through the years, we have worked on our recipes separately to come up with the right alchemy to recreate the stew that we tried that February. We swap our notes and I am pleased to say that we have a great recipe (that’s not for sharing, sorry!)

I’ve been back over the years, and I believe that the recipe has changed since my first experience. I think that it’s a matter of who’s making it at the restaurant, personal touches that made more recent stews differ from that first one. Touches like grilling chicken and adding it to the stew immediately before serving versus slow cooking the chicken in the stew from the beginning. Though the stew is different than I first remember it, it is still my happy comfort food for when I’m in Austin.

Chuy's Restaurant is located at 1728 Barton Springs Road, Austin, TX.

Wish List: An August Weekend.

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I’m looking to sandwich a weekend jaunt during August between my big California family and friends vacation and my big Ireland vacation with my folks. My gut is to schedule around the usual Bookclub weekend, the third weekend of the month, since we take a break from Bookclub in August. I’m looking to go somewhere a short flight away that I haven’t been to and just spend a weekend there, solo, taking in the culture, sites and some social life.

Charming Hamilton, Bermuda

The quandary is I can’t find an affordable location at this time in the game. Flights to Montréal and Ottawa are hovering around $450 for the weekend, and the affordable flights are to places I’ve been before like Raleigh and Pittsburgh. There are cheap flights to Bermuda coming up, but they will be during my Ireland trip. I’m looking for a place that doesn’t need a car too much and the airport’s an affordable taxi ride away (or accessible via public transportation). I even looked into Las Vegas, because who in her or her right mind would want to be in a desert in the summer? But, those packages aren’t affordable for the solo traveler.

The exciting Strip - Las Vegas, NV

Do you have any ideas on a fun locale?

(The photos of Bermuda and Las Vegas are courtesy of TripAdvisor.)