Food

There are just 11 days left to raise money for Bowl-a-Rama. We have one more fundraising event this Thursday, July 23rd at Rosita’s in Tempe or Mesa. Please come out, enjoy a great meal and support RESCUE. 15% of your purchase is donated back to RESCUE!!! Pictured is the flyer for the event (you’ll need it in order for us to receive the proceeds). I can email the flyer to you if you are interested, just ask me in the comments. All are welcome for lunch, dinner, dine in or take out. Jim & I will be at the Tempe location around 6:00pm, please stop by.

Via Stranger Fruit. 1. Venison 2. Nettle tea 3. Huevos rancheros 4. Steak tartare 5. Crocodile 6. Black pudding (in Buenos Aires) 7. Cheese fondue 8. Carp (fish allergy) 9. Borscht 10. Baba ghanoush 11. Calamari 12. Pho 13. PB&J sandwich 14. Aloo gobi 15. Hot dog from a street cart 16. Epoisses 17. Black truffle 18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes 19. Steamed pork buns 20. Pistachio ice cream 21. Heirloom tomatoes 22. Fresh wild berries 23. Foie gras 24. Rice and beans 25. Brawn, or head cheese 26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper 27. Dulce de leche (in Buenos Aires) 28. Oysters 29. Baklava 30. Bagna cauda 31. Wasabi peas 32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl 33. Salted lassi 34. Sauerkraut 35. Root beer float 36. Cognac with a fat cigar 37. Clotted cream tea 38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O 39. Gumbo 40. Oxtail 41. Curried goat 42. Whole insects (chocolate covered ants/grasshoppers/crickets) 43. Phaal 44. Goat’s milk 45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more 46. Fugu 47. Chicken tikka masala 48. Eel 49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut 50. Sea urchin 51. Prickly pear 52. Umeboshi 53. Abalone 54. Paneer 55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal 56. Spaetzle 57. Dirty gin martini 58. Beer above 8% ABV (Elephant beer at Carlsberg Brewery in Copenhagen) 59. Poutine 60. Carob chips 61. S’mores (last night) 62. Sweetbreads 63. Kaolin 64. Currywurst 65. Durian 66. Frogs’ legs 67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake (Beignets at Cafe du Monde in New Orleans) 68. Haggis 69. Fried plantain 70. Chitterlings, or andouillette 71. Gazpacho 72. Caviar and blini 73. Louche absinthe 74. Gjetost, or brunost 75. Roadkill 76. Baijiu 77. Hostess Fruit Pie 78. Snail 79. Lapsang souchong 80. Bellini 81. Tom yum 82. Eggs Benedict 83. Pocky 84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant 85. Kobe beef 86. Hare 87. Goulash 88. Flowers 89. Horse 90. Criollo chocolate 91. Spam 92. Soft shell crab 93. Rose harissa 94. Catfish 95. Mole poblano 96. Bagel and lox 97. Lobster Thermidor 98. Polenta 99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee (I’d rather try Kopi Luwak) 100. Snake Fried rattlesnake at Rustler’s Rooste

We’re back from a week of vacation in Seattle–this was my third time in the city, but my first time with free time to do touristy things. We saw the usual sights–the Space Needle, Pike Place Market, Pioneer Square and the Underground Tour, and we took a Snoqualmie Falls/winery tour and paid a visit to Bainbridge Island. We also saw the Klondike Gold Rush Museum, the Olympic Sculpture Garden, the UPS Waterfall Garden, the Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museum, and the oddities at Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, including the feejee-mermaid-like objects pictured and a collection of tsantsas (shrunken heads). We also managed to see some local crazies–a 9/11 conspiracy theorist outside Pike Place Market, Lyndon LaRouchies at Westlake Center, a Church of Scientology “free stress test” center, and building housing the Discovery Institute. And we had plenty of great meals, including a few with friends we haven’t seen in a while (or hadn’t met before in person). Lots of Thai and Indian food. We didn’t get around to visiting the Seattle Aquarium, the Museum of Flight, the fish ladder at the Ballard Locks, the Roman exhibition at the Seattle Art Museum, or trying a doughnut at Top Pot Doughnuts. Maybe next time for most of those. Seattle is a fun city, we had great weather almost the entire time, and we were happy to see how dog-friendly it is. I’m sure we’ll return. ...

I got back this morning from a few days in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on a business trip. It was a beautiful country, with great summer weather. The people were very friendly (and patient with my attempts to use a few Spanish words and phrases, as I’m just a beginner at the language), and the food was excellent. I hope to return for a longer time in the future, and hopefully to get some Spanish tutoring while I’m there. Buenos Aires is a huge modern city (population around 15 million) undergoing a lot of construction, especially in the Puerto Madero neighborhood, where this picture was taken. This was an old port that ceased being used in the 1960s, but is now the location of many restaurants, hotels, and businesses. Although a website about Argentina business warned me that subjects not to discuss were the Perons and the Falkland Islands, both subjects were brought up by Argentinians I conversed with, and it wasn’t a problem. This was one of those rare trips where I returned home to Phoenix to find the weather much colder and wetter than it had been in the place I was visiting. UPDATE (January 26, 2007): CNN Money recommends travel to Buenos Aires, and specifically offers this dining suggestion: Tip: Cabana las Lilas in the Puerto Madero section of Buenos Aires is often cited as the best spot for grilled beef. But Robin Goldstein, a writer for Fodor’s travel guides, says you’ll find a more authentic dining experience at half the cost just next door at La Caballeriza (address: Alicia Moreau de Justo 580).I didn’t visit Cabana las Lilas, but did eat at La Caballeriza with a large group of locals, and it was excellent (even the blood sausage wasn’t bad).

We’ve now completed our second weekend event attempting to get all the oranges picked from our trees–an annual struggle, as we have many (see photo, which shows most of the backyard trees). A few weeks ago, United Food Bank sent out volunteers to try to fill four large bins which each hold 1,000 pounds of oranges. We filled one and part of another one in the course of the day–the volunteers were four families and their children, who picked oranges for several hours along with us. This week, we had signs out advertising free oranges, all you care to pick, and also advertised it on Craig’s List. We put out the two remaining United Food Bank bins to be filled with oranges we picked ourselves, and for any donations others cared to drop in. Unfortunately, a woman who spoke only Spanish came by while we were inside and took all of the fruit out of the bins, so when the Food Bank comes to pick them up on Tuesday they’ll only get whatever Kat and I pick between now and then. We had quite a few people come by and pick bags full of oranges, but the trees still appear to be as full as ever. If you’re in or near South Phoenix and would like to pick some oranges and take them home (or to donate to a food bank), let me know. If you’re from somewhere other than Phoenix and ever plan to be here in March, April, or May, those are the months these Valencia oranges are ready for picking.