Whirl Wind!

So now I am officially back in the States - as of last night, and sorry that I haven't updated in the past couple days but it has been crazy! My last night in Dublin was a bit of a let down after I got rejected from the original restaurant that I wanted to go to, I ended up in a really bad pizza place right by my hotel. But the only good thing was that I was able to go back to my hotel, arrange a taxi for early the next morning and pack up everything that I had managed to accumulate on this trip. The next two days (Saturday and Sunday) are basically a blur of travel with lots of goodbyes. I took the earliest flight back to Paris the next morning (6 am) then took the train down to Clermont where I dropped off my bags at my host family's home and went out to a cafe to say goodbye to all the Americans who will still be staying in Clermont throughout the year. It was really sad and almost everyone had tears in their eyes. But this was also the place where the cheese changed hands - yes folks, I managed to sneak in 3 kg of unpasteurized cheese into the states! It's glorious! Anyway, then after saying good bye I went back to my host family's home for dinner where I met my host Grand-mother. She's so cool! We talked about knitting and food and French culture versus American culture back in WWII. It was really interesting, then my host mom asked me to help her make dinner. So we made crepes with a bechamel sauce. It was very fitting for my last night in France. After dinner we all watched TV together, talked and knitted. It was a very nice last night with my host family. Eventually I went to bed, and woke up early with intention to go to the boulanger (bread maker) to buy 2 loaves of bread in the morning. After a lovely breakfast of all of us together, I went to buy bread and when I explained to the sales lady what I was doing - she threw in a free Pain Au Chocolat! Whoa! Then I said a teary goodbye to my host family, and my host dad drove me to the airport. I got on my plane, made the connection in Amsterdam - and finally got back home in time for the super bowl! Yes, a very slow integration back into the US culture, with take-out chineese food for dinner and the super bowl on T.V. But after being awake and traveling for so many hours I crashed! Then here I am, eating my french bread and butter and drinking my tea out of a bowl. I guess some habits are hard to break!
So if you have enjoyed reading this AWESOME tale of cuisine and travel and would like more - please send money to ___ haha, only kidding! But seriously, I am thinking about starting another blog in the spring (march-ish) for when I get my own apartment and can cook on my own. This spring I am looking to "Live Label Less". This means that I will be trying to eat without buying things pre-made (no TV dinners, no Mac/Cheese etc.) it will defiantly be an adventure to try to do this through a Michigan Spring - but it should be worth it - So if you would like notice of when this blog will be starting please e-mail me at K07ko01@gmail.com or post a comment here. Thanks to everyone who followed this blog and for almost going through this experience of study abroad with me!
Peace, Love, and Love of Food!

Local/Vegan/Organic/What-have-you Eating Options!

Today I decided to find about Dublin food, but through a local/organic/hippee pair of eyes! Because my hotel does not offer Breakfast I went out for my favorite meal of the day! I found really good reviews for this small diner place called Honest to Goodness. I thought I would try it because it was right next door to a market, and it prides itself on fresh, local and homemade food. I ordered the homemade granola with greek yogurt and fresh fruit. Although the portions were skimpy, the granola was delicious and naturally sweetened with honey and no extra sugar. I also had a juice (kiwi, pineapple, and banana) it was delicious as well! Although the kiwi gave it a slight bite to overact the sweetness of the pineapple.
Then after some shopping and sightseeing I decided on a vegan and wholefoods place for lunch that was my other option for breakfast that morning. I walked in and it smelled delicious! I ordered the winter root vegetables, lentils and squash soup puree with a sun dried tomato slice of bread to dip. After ordering, collecting my food and sitting down in the cafeteria style restaurant, I people watched for quite some time before heading back out into the rain. The bread though was amazing, and I'm not quite sure how they did it - it was orange/red throughout and did not have the tomato in small bits, so I'm wondering if it was more of a paste than actual bits.
Finally after sitting in a cafe for a while knitting, some more shopping and walking around I decided to find dinner. I was walking along small streets by the Trinity College, and found this small restaurant called The Fresh Farm. It boasted organic and local foods - so I decided to stick with the theme for the day. I had another soup before dinner with a carrot and winter squash soup that came with small scones to dip in. I much preferred the bread from the previous soup as compared to the small scones (they were too buttery in comparison to the healthy tasting soup). Then for dinner I ordered a chicken pie. This was local, free-range chicken and it tasted wonderful! The sauce was a bit too creamy for my taste, but the whole fresh vegetables that were buried under the puff pastry was delicious! This was of course way too much food for me and I waddled back to the hotel very slowly taking in the rain and the falling night.
Peace, Love, and Rabbit Food!

Epicurean In Edinburgh

So Edinburgh was a delight for a foodie. The city was very non-chaotic and not very busy the entire time that I was there, it also seemed like a very safe city even late at night. My last full day there I decided to try out a couple restaurants that I got a recommendation on that were to serve good food. The first was for lunch - a specialty shop named Valvona and Crolla. It was a good thing that I had read about this place, because it was a store in the very front that sold all sorts of delicious and rare looking foods from Italy. I had to wind my way into the back to get to the cafe. It was a small place, maybe seating for 40 people, and luckily I was one of the few there that day. I sat down and ordered a ham panini and a tomato salad. The salad was by far the star of the meal. It was amazingly fresh for being February, and the light dressing that was on top didn't over power the freshness of the lettuce. The panini bread was good as well (obviously freshly made there), but it wasn't anything special unfortunatly, even though the ham was delicious. It wasn't as fatty as normal hams and it was slightly cured, but not too salty. It would have been made better with a slight bit of cheese or something to break the taste of the ham.
After lunch I wandered around for a bit of time, shopping and window shopping. I finally stumbled into a very hippee coffee shop. There was no delineation between the bar and the seating (even the customers were making their own espresso). I ordered a hot chocolate and went to sit in the back and knit. Little known to me, the barista was an artist! The foam in my hot chocolate came back with a beautiful flower design in it. It was amazing and I almost didn't want to drink it. But the delicious smell over powered me, and the dark chocolate with some steamed milk mixture was delicious.
A little while later I went on to go out to dinner. I found a French inspired restaurant that was a little walk from my hotel. This restaurant was the best find ever. The small restaurant (9 tables) filled up quickly while I was there, and the menu (which changes daily) was explained to everyone with painstaking detail by the only waiter, and assistant chef. I started with a glass of white wine (from the Loire Valley) and a squash and roasted red pepper soup. The soup was delicious, and very warming on such a cold night. I then had the halibut which was pan seared with rosemary, and some roasted potatoes. Every table had steamed fresh vegetables served with their meal. I ate all of the vegetables! But the halibut was good too - slightly undercooked, but that is much better than over cooked. Finally I had the toffee pudding cake, which had a caramel syrup over top, and a coffee for dessert.
This meal was the best meal that I had in quite some time!
Peace, Love and Caramel!!

Scotland, Beer Quest, Haggis among other things!

So having arrived in Scotland later at night, finding my hotel, taking a quick nap then getting out to explore the city I had found out that another American who is also staying in the same city ran into more K kids in her hostel! It was pretty crazy, but all of us went out to dinner together. We ended up going to a chain restaurant, which was loud, crowded, and dark - everything a French restaurant is not! But after eating some fish and chips, I went back to my hotel and went to bed early. The next morning we decided to tag along for a free tour that was leaving the Starbucks in the middle of the city. It was a really good tour (3 hours!) and the guide was really amusing, even though it seemed a little rehearsed. After wards we went to lunch at a pub down the street, and the food and atmosphere was a little more subdued than the night before. That night we decided to do a ghost tour after dinner. Basically Edinburgh is the most haunted city in the world (or so they claim), but it was cool to hear all about the traditional folklore in the area, and the reasons behind it. Finally after another pint of beer we turned in for the night and got a good nights sleep before shopping and walking around on our own today.
Now my quest for this Scotland/Ireland adventure is to not drink a single beer that I can get in the states. And thus far I have been more than successful and everything has been delicious! I always like the look in a barman's eye when you say you want to try something that's brewed locally - they always seem so proud of their city and what it can produce. The best that I have tried so far is at a small pub called Kay's Bar. I got recommended it by a cabbie that I took into town from the airport. We had a little trouble finding the place - but nothing too bad. It was a small establishment (maybe 8 tables total) and it had wonderfully cheesy red velvet all over the place. Everyone was friendly, but mostly stuck to themselves as it was a locals joint.
This was also where my friend ordered HAGGIS! She insisted that she could not leave Scotland without trying some. And honestly it wasn't that bad. It tasted a little grittier than I would have liked, but nothing disgusting. I had the Scotch Pie, which was delicious with chips and a dark local Edinburgh brew. All in all a very good adventure into the quieter pub life of Scotland.
Tonight's adventure has not yet been decided because it is raining outside and that might damped some plans (oh haha too funny!).
Peace, Love and Sorry for the bad joke!

Last Supper

Tonight was the last super with all the Americans together, the first person will be leaving on Monday - it's very sad! But I don't leave Europe for a little over a week. Anyway, our program director invited us all out to a restaurant for dinner. As per usual dinners in France, this lasted quite some time. But it was really nice to have everyone together at the same moment so that we could all chat (in both English and French) to each other about our experiences and different things that have happened recently. We went to a really nice restaurant (which is actually a chain in France) and we got to order what we liked, thanks Kalamazoo!
Anyway, I started with the escargots, because I had not had them yet in France, and they were quite good, less buttery than I expected, but bread dipped in the sauce was delicious! After I had the scallops and what I believe were cooked endives. They paired the endives with sun dried tomatoes which helped cut the bitterness of the endives, it was really ingenious. Finally for dessert I split a cream stuffed pretzel and a tiramisu. Also during this dinner someone had marrow on their plate and I was really excited that I was able to try it! I found it didn't have much taste but the texture didn't both me that much. After a really long dinner of talking we finally said good bye to everyone and walked home.
Today I also made a day trip to Thiers where I was able to buy some artisan knives. I was very excited because that was one of my goals when I had heard about Thiers, as a city though it is very depressing and there isn't much to do there. All in all, I would recommend going there to buy a beautiful knife, then get right back on the train and go home!
Peace, Love and Leaving on a Jet Plane

Meeting the Extended Family!

So last night when the doorbell rang right before dinner I knew something was up. Aperently without telling me, my host mom and dad had invited over all the cousins (from both sides of the family) for dinner! It just so happened that this random Wednesday in January all the cousins were in Clermont at the same time. What better time then for a cheese party? We started with appetizers and drinks around 7, and dinner and dessert didn't finish until about 10:30 at night! It was really fun to listen to other people my generation talk, and even though I didn't say much it was a good time over all.
We started with pistachios and kirs (a white wine drink mixed with flavoring like Cassis) in the living room all of us talking to one another. Then my host mom asked for my help in the kitchen to make sure everything was ready, we went into the kitchen and we were slicing up HUGE bricks of cheese, there were about 4 platters of cheese, and another 2 of ham, and a bowl of pickles! There was so much food - this is when she announces we would be having Raclette tonight for dinner. Now raclette comes with it's own little apparatus to make table side. There is a large heating system, that is covered with open slots all around. Into these slots you put small pans that you have filled with cheese, or bacon, or whatever you want to cook.
For this meal there were two raclette machines on the table, with about 9 pans to each machine. It was chaos and as always way too much food. You melt the cut cheese in the pans until it is gooey, then you pour it on your plate (with the help of a wooden spatula), you then pair it with ham or potatoes, or both as my host dad did. After wards you can munch on pickles to clear the taste if you so desire to change cheeses. There were 5 different types of cheese on the table that you could choose from. Honestly I couldn't tell much of a difference between them all other than one had herbs in it.
After cheese and potatoes (yum!) we had salad, now in a normal french meal this is the part where you would serve the cheese, so my host mom made the joke that she was going to go get the cheese platter from the kitchen and everyone groaned!! It was hysterical! After some salad, we all got ice cream cones (the pre-fabricated kind) and oranges for some dessert. At this time the younger cousins either left to go to the movies or to go home or to go do some homework, and all the older people (me included) went back into the living room with my host parents to talk over a tea.
Finally, everyone left because everyone was quite tired, and it ended the very long night by me helping my host parents and one host sister clean up the dishes. It was a fantastic evening meeting everyone, and also listening to everyone talk. The food wasn't bad either! Although I don't think I will be eating again for a week!
Peace, Love and FROMAGE!

Last Week Here

So it's my last week here, and because I thought i had a lot more work than I actually did I'm finished with all my final papers! It's very exciting, but it's also making for a very boring last week. That being said, I've been home and had nothing to do so I've been helping my host mom make dinner the past few nights. Last night she showed me how to make poached eggs, now I have never eaten a poached egg, let alone made one. It was an interesting experience especially when she said "now you put it in the microwave", wait what? Yes that is correct, she cooks her poached eggs in the microwave. Her secret is to put boiling hot water into a microwave safe bowl, add some vinegar, crack the eggs in and put them in the microwave!
We had this with pasta and a tomato cream sauce, considering I had pasta that day for lunch it was still pretty good. Although the egg had a strange texture, I was able to eat it the same time as some tomato pieces and it wasn't that bad, I might even try this method in the states to put it on some bruchetta!
In other French-y news, I am planning on what to bring home from France in terms of food. I have already decided to being home an entire wheel of cheese from this region (TSA says it's ok!). Also I'm going to try and smuggle two loafs of bread into my luggage. I am not sure how this is going to fare and if there will be crumbs everywhere in my clothes, but I figure I'm going to be washing them as soon as I get home anyway, so no big deal - right?
If any one has any other requests for French goodies please let me know!
Today is a relaxing day and right now I'm just trying to decide where to eat lunch - I'm thinking Indian?
Peace, Love and Spices