Ethiopia–adventures on arrival

I just arrived in Adis Abiba, Ethiopia about 36 hours ago. I am staying at a very non-touristy place with a friend of mine who is involved in a training workwhop for NGOs. So I am having a very un-typical introduction to the country since I am in an enclave with internet access, constant electricity (though not constant water – it gets turned on 3x a day for 2 hours), a cafeteria, and a security force. Indeed, this may be my only blog post from Ethiopia – I have heard there is little internet service elsewhere, and where there is an internet cafe, it’s very expensive and the connections are very slow. And given my cash situation, I think I may just forego the cost. You see, I came to Ethiopia with my money in a miture of $USD in cash and traveler’s checks; mostly traveler’s checks. (Ethiopia doesn’t have any international ATMs, apparently, though it seems this may be changing. There is supposed to be one in the Sheraton Hotel here in Addis, and I saw some postings online about a few appearing here and there in random bank branches of this one bank.) So, I arrive in the airport, and expect to cash in some traveler’s checks. No. Cash only. This is not what I read, so I was confused, and changed $50 cash. Then yesterday my friend tried to change her checks too and the bank here told her no, that can’t change them. Furthermore, no banks in Ethiopia are accepting them right now! We can’t get a straight answer about why this is the case. So…I have less than half the cash available for exchange that I anticipated needing for my trip! We’re going to the Sheraton today to see if we can use their ATM, or if they will cash traveler’s checks. Fingers crossed.

Last night we went out to dinner at a traditional restaurant, with music, and singing and dancing. It was really good, except that afterwards we discovered that one of the dishes was raw beef! I had been warned about this dish, kifto special, and was told not to eat it. So we spent a good amount of time trying to figure out if we had eaten it. Basially, it doesn’t look raw in the way I’d expected it to – it doesn’t look like sushi, for example; it looks like ground beef. I took a few photos, but it was very dark and even my flash didn’t really capture the atmosphere. (The connection is so slow here anyway that it takes 5 minutes to upload one photo. So I posted a few to my flickr.) I tried to get photos of the dancers but they were moving so fast they are a bit of a blur, which actualy does get across some of the atmosphere. The object of the dances we saw seemed to be to make your shoulders and arms appear as if they are not connected to your body. The dancers would isolate their trunk while shuddering and flicking their shoulders, arms, and even legs. Pretty impressive.

Lago Maggiore, Italy

Lago Maggiore is one of many finger-like lakes in northern Italy, close to the Swiss border and the Alps. Right next door is the more famous Lake Como. I stayed in Stresa, on Maggiore with my family last week and it was a great little place to hang out. There’s plenty of things to do, such as stroll the lakeside, trekking from village to village in the area, drive to more small lakes, and ride the ferries to visit the small islands in the lake. There are three near Stresa–Isola Bella, Isola Pescatore, and Isola Madre. Isola Bella and Isola Madre are owned by the Borromeo family, who built castles, one Baroque, and one more English in style on each island with huge gardens. The Isola Pescatori is more plebian; it’s where the fishermen lived.

We also visited two street markets. One was in Luino. This market is very big and apparently people from all over the area, including Switzerland, descend on the little town for this market. Most of it is cheap shoes, leather goods, and clothes. But my sister and I walked to the back of the market and found the food stalls! Pretty spectacular. Saucisson!

Lagging in Europe

I haven´t been keeping up with the postings of my European experiences. But I have a good excuse: schwein (ham) and cheese. These culinary staples are hard to avoid in continental Europe at practically every meal. (Coming in a close second are potatoes.) With all this eating of the pig and the milk fats, I have been spending my time wandering around, trying to walk of the fat, rather than sitting at the computer. So forgive me.
Coming soon: I shall report on adventures touring around the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, driving on the Autobahn, drinking Luëtzebuerger and Belgian beers, and wandering various mediaval streets….first I have to wait 12 hours or so for this slow computer in the heart of Barcelona to upload all my photos….

Munich Report

I have had a hard time keeping up with updates here about my travels. I am now in Oldenburg, Germany, visiting a friend who just moved here. I met a friend from LA in Brussels airport and we rented a car and drove through the Netherlands and Northern Germany to arrive here. We stumbled upon an organic farm where they made their own cheese and we stopped for lunch of cheese and bread - so good!

So first, the Munich update. I ate so much meat there it was kind of crazy. There’s Schwein everywhere! Here’s a picture just in the grocery store.

I borrowed a friend’s bike for the stay in Munich and rode all over town with the bikes. It was awesome to ride bikes through town. I think I saw the whole city. We also rode in the English garten, which runs through the middle of the city, and along the Isar river on a path that you can follow all the way north of the city. The Oktoberfest is about to happen in Munich (actually it started today) and we rode into the fair grounds to see all the preparations. It’s kind of like a state fair, with rides and everything. And loads of beer halls set up – one for each beer haus. Here’s one of the beer halls, ready for the festival!

I also saw the surfers of Munich, surfing on the Isar river.

We also wandered around the market in the center of town (see grindbros.com for photos), ate really amazing pretzles, and of course, drank beer!

English Clouds and Fish & Chips

I just arrived today in lovely Guildford, England, just a 30-minute train ride Southwest of London. Better known as the home of Surrey University and Hoof & Mouth disease. I got in late in the afternoon at Heathrow and took the Underground acrodd London to Waterloo station where I caught the local train to Guildford to visit my friend Samantha. I was here last year, so the route is known and I trudged along like a local (haha) with all the commuters on the train. One of the first things I noticed is the sky. I never get to see clouds in L.A. and I just realized I miss them.

After being up for about 30 hours with little sleep, I was hungry and tired. Samantha took me straight out for fish and chips. I don’t have photoshop to fix the color on this photos. But I figure it’s approproately English to post an image of off-colored food like this. Notice the grease – yum!

Nigella seed (chernushka)

I am on a cooking spree. Indian cooking. Have been madly cooking out of my new favorite cookbook, 1,000 Indian Recipes, by Neelam Batra. For the second time, I made Indian bread and added nigella seeds. The recipes I used in both cases called for adding ajwain seeds. For some reason I always confused these two seeds, and have thought they are the same thing. They are not. I confused them because I have had breads with the black nigella seeds on them many times, and just assumed these were the seeds. It was a great mistake to make. I *love* this seed in bread. It adds this wonderful onion-y savory flavor to the bread that is like crack to me. I just cannot get enough.

I first discovered the black seed on the bagels at Zingerman’s, which I used to live across the street from in Ann Arbor. The chernushka bagels were amazing. Apparently these seeds are a traditional toping for jewish breads. I was so sad when they stopped making them. For years, I searched for the elusive seed. I found them again a few years ago when I was in Kyrgyzstan. I was so pleasently surprised to find that the traditional round bread (“naan”), made in a brick wood-fired oven, are studded with these amazing seeds. Now I can make my own bread with nigella. One of these days I’ll actually go buy some ajwain and try that too. But for now, I feed my nigella addiction.

Cashews

I made an Indian cashew sauce last night. Was really good. Cashews are crazy. They grow on trees. They are a fruit with another, bigger, fake fruit that grows on top of them.

Someone else did all the research for me

chocolate éclairs

Most people who know me know that I love donuts. I am a bit of a donut connoisseur.

I think I have a new passion–cocolate éclairs. It’s been building slowly. I think I haven’t really understood how great these little things can be until recently. Part of the problem is that I live in the united states. Americans tend to make éclairs into dry, eggy poofs of tough dough filled with whipped cream, rather than the traditional custard filling.

A few times in my life I have had a really good éclair and thought this was a new passion. But then I would get a bad one and change my mind again. I’d think ‘no, I must have been mistaken, I really do not like these.’ So here I will note the two best éclair experiences I have had in the last year. The first was last year in London at the Spitalfield’s Sunday market. There’s a bakery that wheels a huge cart of baked goods into the open air market. I spied these huge, almost foot-long éclairs from over the heads of the crowds. The dough was deliciously craggy with dark, shiny chocolate dripping over them, and I could see the yellow blobs of custard oozing out of the end. I was not disappointed. The second ecstatic éclair I had yesterday. I was in Washington DC and walked innocently into a little market on DuPont Circle. Called the Marvelous Market, this little place was like a gastronomic jewelry store. Amazing cheeses, breads, baked goods, Parisian-style sandwiches. They even had Paris-style macaroons (I tried those too!). I spied the éclairs with caution. They were small, and I couldn’t tell what they were filled with. So I asked. Custard. Yum!

Beard Papa’s and Pinkberry

There’s a craze sweeping Los Angeles—Asian reinventions of European deserts. First was pinkberry (sorry about the annoying Flash site), a frozen yoghurt phenomenon started by a Korean-American. Now there’s Beard Papa’s fresh and natural cream puffs, from a Japanese company.

I just had Beard Papa’s for the first time. These are pretty amazing. The slightly salty and crispy puffs are huge – about the size of my palm. They are injected with your choice of custard cream on the spot for freshness; I chose vanilla. I have to say that I love custard in cream puffs. Most Americans seem to prefer whipped cream, which I think is just wrong. So I was pretty impressed. The only problem with these is that they are so huge…I got a stomach ache within an hour of eating it. I think I will ask them to squeeze less custard in there for me next time.

Mint, aka Pudina

Mint is a mgical, if contrary herb. It settles and calms, and stimulates and awakes. It’s really good in ice cream, tea, and toothpaste. But it doesn’t go very well with other herbs ans spices. It’s a solo herb, a loner that attracts a lot of attention. (I find myself thinking of Clint Eastwood’s characters in Sergio Valente’s films as a metaphor for mint. Maybe this is because I have a friend who is quite fond of both.)

Mint is also an ayurvedic favorite. When in India, I popped little green pills of mint every morning, called pudina hara, to thwart off any potential stomach explosions. It works way better than Pepto-Bismol. And it’s natural, and you get these nice little mint burps from the pills.

I just searched google and wikipedia for pudina and thought for sure I would find loads of info about this herb and its history. But not much there….hmmm…