Wanderlust: Eastern Europe

This summer I took the trip I've always wanted to take, through Central and Eastern Europe. Naturally, there were things I loved (beer and dumplings), things I didn't (a certain snooty city which shall remain nameless), and things with which I am now obsessed (Poland).

In case you want a little taste...


And away we go. Follow that orange backpack!


My tour buddies and I hit Vienna, Austria.

I can always be tempted by a market.









Bratislava, Slovakia.

Behold, the best beer of all I tasted in five countries. Sorry, Czechs, the winner is the Slovakian national lager Zlaty Bazant --delicious! Somebody please import this stateside asap! I am salivating just looking at this photograph!

The Slovak Pub served the most memorable meal of the trip. Tiny delicate flour dumplings (someone had clearly rolled them out by hand) in white sheep's milk cheese sauce with chunky bacon and chives. I will dream of this lunch for a long time.

We ate in the room of poets. Supposedly at this pub students can get free soup if they get an A on exams.

On to the Czech Republic. Driving through the countryside to the medieval town of Czesky Krumlov.

Interesting spending time in a part of the world that sees barely any English speaking tourists and no Americans. Represent!

So charming!

Krusovice and Budvar were the first of many Czech beers...

We went rafting down this river one lazy afternoon. Every boat that passed us had a beaming Czech family, who gave a jolly greeting, with the family dog. Everyone has a dog here and everyone seems happy to be alive. The Czech people are charming and the countryside is all beautiful rolling fields of wheat and tiny villages with red tile roofs.

I mean look at this. No, really, there's a place on earth that looks like this.


Then on to Prague, where the buildings and the beer were much darker. Then again, it was nasty pouring rain when we arrived. I don't remember the name of this porter, only that it was sweet and frothy.

But then, a sunny day, just in time for exploring.

Coffee break at Bakeshop. Yum!

Prague was the halfway point on my trip, and it was lovely, but by the time I got there I was feeling a bit, well, antsy for something familiar. We stayed in apartments in the city, with a full kitchen. I decided that instead of touring the castle and Charles Bridge what I really wanted to do was something I would do at home--cook dinner. I knew it would not only relax and refresh me but it would give me a chance to experience something that local Czechs would. Luckily, my trip mates and tour guide Ance were cool with the idea!

PRAGUE DINNER PARTY CHALLENGE 2010

Can I throw a dinner for 7 when the oven is in Celsius and when signs and labels look like this?

Yes! I accept! Let's do this!

Guide Ance told me to start here, at the local farmer's market.

Oh, yeah, this feels like home.

I know, right? It was paradise. I did a lap around and then plotted out the menu:
Cole slaw with blue cheese and chives
Sliced fresh melon
Farfalle pasta with sauteed spring onion, leek, and peppers (they call these paprika here)
Roasted whole chicken
Cherry plum tart for dessert

The vendors, including this guy with suspenders and mustache, were jovial and kind, even when it was clear I did not speak Czech. For instance, all of them said the price in Czech and then turned the calculator screen around so I could see it. They talked in Czech, I talked in English, and somehow we both understood the language of food. Mustache, here, has the best cherries at that market. I tasted all of them before buying.

Homesickness fading... I was excited and energized for the first time in days.




Then to the supermarket to find the rest. Fun fact: Czech supermarkets have five aisles of meat, an entire one devoted to sliced ham...

...but it took me 45 minutes to find vinegar. This is a nation who does not eat salad.

Dudes, this goat is totally drinking a beer! Why do I find that so hilarious?

By the way, I am fully aware that most of my favorite places and stories involve food and most of my photos are of beer and not of local architecture or sights. I stand by my priorities.

Speaking of food, my Prague dinner party was a huge success! All that food for only 50 Czech Crowns apiece (that's about $2.50). The others brought beer and wine, and everyone ended up helping with the dinner. It was so good in fact that I intended to take pictures of the set table and never did because I was too busy eating, drinking, laughing. It turned out to be a delicious reminder of what I know best. I hope that when my trip mates think of Americans now they will remember bites of cherry plum tart and not what they see on the evening news.

Next stop at the Czech national park of Teplice nad Metjui, for a hike. It really was beautiful.

...and then we drove into Poland.

Can we talk about Poland for a second? This country and its people blew me away. We're talking about a nation that has been invaded and screwed over by everyone and yet the people are the most warm, generous, welcoming souls I've ever met. Seriously, some of the greatest people I've ever encountered in my travels. Period.

And if they find out you're Polish? Forget about it. You're a long lost cousin come home again. People everywhere have that round Polish face, the face of my mother, grandfather, great grandparents, the face that stares back at me from black and white photos. And there it was. In bakeries, on street corners, in toll booths, in the musty underground bars of Krakow.

I fell in love at once. Madly, madly, head over heels in love.

The evening light in the square,

the cobblestone alleys,

the park that hugs the city,

the huge mugs of frothy beer and heaping platters of food. Food to warm you on a winter night and cheer you on a summer afternoon. Hot borscht with meat dumplings? Fresh soft pillowy pirogi filled with cheese? White sausage with warm simple sliced potatoes in mustard dressing? Oh, Poland, I love you so.

Or how about a little honey vodka to complete a perfect day? That's right, I said honey vodka.
(My new Aussie friend Laila and I strike a pose)

I did not want to leave Poland. I could have spent another month. We went next back to Slovakia, for a hike in the Tatra mountains. The entire time, all I thought of was Poland. I was only mildly appeased at the thought of having one more Slovakian beer.

From there onto Budapest, Hungary.

I only had a half a day there and wished I had more time. I will definitely be back to Hungary--the people and city seemed very interesting. I did have time for a relaxing dip at the famous public baths and a piece of walnut cake at Lukacs.

Mmm...ritzy.

Over one last beer at Szimple Bar, I realized that despite everything I had seen, done, and tasted, I was quite eager to go home. Sign of a perfect vacation, maybe? At any rate, I will most certainly be back one day for more. Anyone want to join me?

Sauce it up, yo

This is the summer I live for. Look at these beautiful jars of tomato sauce! Pizza in January? Meatball subs in March? Why of course, with sauce from the freezer.

My sauce party was such a delicious success last year that I had to have another. And I had to do it in a big hurry before I moved to my new place. Luckily, my friend Jenn was on hand for some sauce makin'. That girl is a sauce makin' machine!


$20 for 24 pounds of overripe early girls. What a steal. This time I was smart and drove to the farmer's market.

Right, so first you've got to remove the skins. Well, you don't have to, but it's my sauce party, so, yeah. Look at this kitchen toy that Jenn brought--it's the handled colander insert from her spaghetti pot. This thing saved the day. So much easier to submerge a bunch of tomatoes in boiling water for a minute than to have to drain each time or stand there with a slotted spoon fishing them out. Let me tell you, I have wicked gadget envy now. I must have one!


Peel them, crush with fingers, and try to let some of the water and seeds run out...

Last year we tried to chop the hot tomatoes. Crushing by hand is much better. This is where your Sicilian grandmother would be useful, but as neither of us is Sicilian, we did it ourselves.

We made lunch and let the tomatoes cook down for two hours, maybe more. This batch had salt, pepper, crushed garlic, and garden herbs (three basils, flat leaf parsley, rosemary, and oregano)

We went with two styles--Jenn and her sweetie Tom prefer their sauce chunky, while I like it smooth so I can make pizza. Half the sauce went through the food mill.




Sauce two ways. Yup, this should last us a whole...five seconds.

Movin' On Up

Well, it's been a fun 5 years here at my first grown up apartment but it's time to pack up ourselves and move on. And by move on I mean move to a place down the block so I can still walk to Sushi Tomi, Steven's Green and that goofy used bookstore whose name I can never remember.

Strange thinking about the place I've called home for so long--It was here with an innocent pot of mint (any of you who have mint plants from me, they were all pieces of that original plant!), a snake plant (same) and a maidenhair fern that I was first bitten by the gardening bug. It was also here I really came into my own as a cook. Here I brought home my sweet Maxie boy. Here was my sanctuary, my place to think and unwind after long days at my favorite job in the world.

But this reflection tells me that there are more amazing adventures to come. As to the garden, I suspect that only the green beans might not survive the move and there is good news: at my new place there's plenty of room for gardening, even expanding from containers to the ground. There's an adorable kitchen with antique tile and bright sunny windows, the site of many future dinner parties. I can actually take a chip off my dad's block and learn to barbecue--no more rules about that! So, readers, stay tuned for more California gardening and cooking adventures coming soon!

Plum Jam!

Yesterday I experienced the essence of summer--no, it wasn't sitting on the beach with a trashy read (that's planned for next week). My childhood friend Diane and I walked to my cousin's house, picked these gorgeous ripe Santa Rosa red plums from his tree, and then made plum jam! A delicious success!

I had tried before to make jam thinking that it was done like tomato sauce where you can make it up as you go. Wrong. Apparently making jam is more like baking a cake than sauteeing vegetables for a sandwich--it's an exact science. Last year's plum jam looked like shoe polish and tasted worse. My apologies if I pawned some off on you thinking I was Martha Stewart. Then earlier this year I tried again with yellow plums but made the mistake of letting the fruit pulp sit out on the counter and it oxidized and looked like pond sludge, which is not what I go for in a condiment.

This time, I was going for something a little, well, brighter.

Luckily my mom came to the rescue. She has been making jam since I was a kid. We used a James Beard recipe for freezer jam that doesn't require cooking and it came out great.


The taste test: Diane approves!
(and her mom is English, so she should know good plum jam...)

Chemistry lessons never tasted so good.

This will keep me in sweet spirits all year round. Anyone want to come over for scones and jam?

And South Bay folks, stay tuned for the upcoming second annual tomato sauce making party!

Recycle, Reuse, Restyle

I grew up knowing that recycling was important. We heard it everywhere in the 80s, right? At school, at home, on tv. Don't throw out that plastic bottle because then a fish might get stuck in it and it will take a trillion years to break down! What I'm starting to understand now is that sometimes recycling is not about plastic bottles and metal cans. Sometimes it's about making strategic choices and not buying a plastic bottle to begin with. And sometimes it's about taking something old and making it new. It's taking an out of style dress to a tailor and emerging with a new shirt (made of course from your old shortened dress!). Which brings me to the chunky blue sweater.

My aunt gave me this gorgeous Rowan yarn and the pattern as a present when I went to graduate school. I had only been knitting for a year or two when I made it. Naturally I was proud of it when I was done and wore it a lot, but it was really poorly made--shoddy seaming, ends tied together in knots (!), sleeves built for a gorilla. But this sweater and I had such good times (and I made it) that I could never bear to give it away. It sat on a top shelf in my closet, waiting...

...until January of this year when I ripped the whole thing apart and wound the yarn into balls. Which waited again until I could figure out what to do with it. Then on spring break while visiting my cousin in Minneapolis (a knitter and creative thinker herself),
I found this--Click here to see pattern!

Perfect! So cute! And it called for the exact same yarn, too. Now, this sweater took some fine tuning on my part--I am working with yarn that was dyed like 8 years ago, so if I run out, that's the end. I shortened the body, omitted the collar, and am shortening the sleeves (in progress as we speak).

That's where you come in, dear readers! Vote now for my reinvented blue sweater! Do you like the buttons here, off center, cardigan style...

STYLE A

...OR do you like them double breasted? By the way, aren't those buttons great? I bought them in Amsterdam at this fantastic street market, and they too have been waiting for the right time.

STYLE B



What do you think? Style A or B? Thoughts? I must know!

The Summer of Me

I have waited for sweet peas since my folks gave me the seed packet in December. Sweet peas are my very favorite flower, but they sure took their merry sweet time arriving.

Swoon! That sweet delicate smell, feminine petals and tiny tendrils.

I am in love all over again! (Sigh)

The arrival of sweet peas can only mean one thing--this is going to be a beautiful summer. The summer of sleeping in and crisp morning walks to the local library or farmer's market. The summer of driving up to some funky SF neighborhood and hanging out just because I can. The summer of seeing friends. The long coastal drives and late night movies summer. The summer of lunch beer and more lunch beer. The garden summer, the flowering summer. The summer of all the small things I sometimes forget.