Little luxuries - the essentials of life

One of the things I'm looking forward to, once I have a regular income again, are a few of the little luxuries I had to cut back on. It's one of the truly soul-crushing things about tough times - having to cut out even the tiny things that make life not just pleasant, but bearable. When you're literally watching every penny, scraping together enough money to pay the water bill before it gets shut off, then everything non-essential has to go. Your whole perception of household economics gets changed: if you have to go to a job interview 20 miles away, you find yourself calculating whether to take the toll road and spend a buck each way on tolls, or whether the extra gas from sitting in traffic on the main road will actually cost you more.

In those circumstances, you're reduced to nothing more than what you need to survive. Life becomes bland, boring and depressing. You say no every time your friends invite you to something, and you make up excuses because you don't want to be embarrassed that you can't even afford the gas to get to the event, let alone tickets or food. Everything that made life fun has gone away, and it becomes harder and harder to motivate yourself and present the right attitude to potential employers. You work your butt off chasing jobs, and at the end of the day, you don't even get to reward yourself for whatever you do achieve.

Just those few little moments of happiness that brighten up your day can totally change everything. Much though I'd love to say that the best things in life are free, and you don't need money to find happiness, it's not entirely true. Some things, you need money for. Not a lot - a few bucks is plenty - but there are only so many invigorating walks you can take before they lose their power to make you smile, especially when you live in suburban Florida and don't have gas money to go anywhere.

2013 is looking much brighter. I'll still be paying off debts for a while, and dealing with some of the neglected maintenance on the house and vehicles, so it'll be a while before any of the big ticket items are going to happen, but there's now room in the budget for a few little luxuries, mostly under $10. I don't see them as luxuries, though. They're something to look forward to. They make me happy, and when I'm happy, I'm less prone to illness, more productive, and more motivated. They're what gives me a reason to keep going.

The first little $5 treat I bought myself, last Tuesday, was a small jar of Marmite. I'm not one of those expatriates who has to have all the comforts of the home country, but I do like to start my day with toast and Marmite. On Wednesday, everything was different. It felt right. It felt like the bad days had come to an end, and things were finally picking up. I felt like me again. Tastes can do that - they're comforting, and they touch a very deep part of the psyche.

My plan is that every week I'll pick up one more little tasty thing for the cupboard. I'm not talking about a bottle of wine or other things that are gone right away, although those are nice too. I'm talking about things that will last for a while, and which you don't think of as luxuries until you can't afford to replace them.  A weekly visit to the Winter Park Spice & Tea Exchange for a $5 treat is definitely part of the plan.

• Truffle salt. A little of this sprinkled on scrambled eggs turns breakfast into a delicious taste explosion.
• Vik's Garlic Mix. Add to olive oil, and dip home-made bread into it for a Mediterranean style snack. 
• Saffron. Add to fruit salad and it takes it to a whole new level. Put it in a curry, and make a mind-blowing korma.
• Medjool dates. My favorite snack. Regular dates just don't taste the same.

And then there are other little luxuries. Not everything in my life is food-related!

• Some decent shaving oil, so my face doesn't feel like it's been sandpapered. And knowing I can change the blade in my razor as soon as it starts to get dull, not seeing if I can make it last another week, or two, or three...
• New shirts. Sure, I have smart shirts, but they're old and worn, and wearing them to the office makes me feel unprofessional. Two for $6 each in J.C. Penney's sale last weekend? That'll do nicely. I don't need new ones, but I feel better, I work better, and I'm sure that's unconsciously reciprocated by the way my clients treat me.
• Replacing the power supply in the stereo for the hot tub, so we can listen to music and relax. Actually, one of the first things we did was get the hot tub going again. We had it powered down after solstice because we couldn't afford to keep it running, and we couldn't afford to change the water either. The hot tub's not really a luxury either. Both of us suffer with back problems, and a daily hot tub is far cheaper than a regular visit to a doctor or massage therapist. 
• A set of steel files. Decent model-making requires decent tools. I managed okay on Kong with just a knife, but the joins weren't as smooth as I wanted. $6 in Hobby Lobby with a coupon, and I'm ready to start making models again. On a similar note, I'll be taking a trip to Office Max and getting them to print out the next cardboard model. 
• Going to a dollar movie. One freaking dollar is all it takes for a few hours of escapism. Last weekend, we saw Cloud Atlas. Lincoln and Skyfall will be coming up soon. Eventually we'll be able to afford going to the Enzian again, but for now, this will do.
• Buying a bunch of flowers for my wife. A little romantic gesture can go a long, long way.

As hobbies go, it's pretty damn cheap, but even making things out of paper isn't free. 

All the above adds up to well under $100 over the next two months. It's not really a lot of money in the big scheme of things, but those few little items are worth everything to me. It's the difference between enjoying my life, and enduring it. 

I was only out of work for a few weeks, although things were tight for a while before that. I was lucky - I had good contacts and a good resume with skills that are in demand. I know how much this affected me in that period.  Some people have to go through unemployment for much longer - six months is nothing unusual. I can't imagine how it would feel to go through it every single day for months on end, knowing there was nothing to look forward to except another day of living in a culture devoted to telling me about all the things I can't have, being told by employers I'm no good, and being told by society I'm clearly lazy and useless. 

Luxuries aren't just luxuries. They're the rewards we give ourselves for getting through the daily grind. In moderation, they're essentials. 

Stuff'n'nonsense #4

I'm going to kick today's S&N off with a real blast from my past. I thought this had disappeared from the Internet for ever, but I should know better. Nothing vanishes from the Internet. This is a movie I made 11 years ago with Robert Llewellyn (Kryten from Red Dwarf). Okay, so that's the hype. The reality is that it was a short promo movie for a mobile phone game I designed at nGame. It was written and created by Charlie Dancey and Pavel Douglas (whose main claim to fame, in my eyes at least, is that he was in a Bond movie), and I had a small bit part, doing an off-screen voice. Music was by Manny Elias from Tears for Fears.

Anyway, without further ado, I present to you... Alien Fish Exchange: The Movie.

I'm actually really proud of that game. People loved it, even though it was a silly little WAP game which eventually made it onto interactive TV in several countries. In fact, one person loved it so much that he recreated the entire game, and you can go right ahead and download it. (Disclaimer:I haven't played it, so I have no idea whether it's at all faithful to the original or whether it'll turn your computer into a pile of steaming slime.)

Right, that's enough of the shameless self-promotion. On with the random bits and pieces.

• Film news: it looks like there's finally going to be a film version of Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but mostly I'm thinking that's good, because I wanted to like the books, but found them totally unreadable. My dad loved them, and tried to get me to read them, but I just couldn't get through them.
  Mind you, he also had a complete collection of Gor books. I did read those. Several times. I preferred them to Anne McCaffrey.
  Errr, moving swiftly on...
• Ah, Dita von Teese in a Wonderbra. Much better.
  Now click on through to watch the new Wonderbra TV advert for their strapless bras. It's a great advert. And, as one commenter said, if this really works on my DDs, then I want two in every colour they do. So, whether you're a lady or a gentleman, click on through and enjoy.
• So you want to make a movie. How hard can it be? Check out this wonderful flowchart from Canal+. It's pretty much spot on, and very funny. And click around to find a bunch of similar ones from the same designer.
• And more silly infographics (who the hell invented that word anyway?). How men and women perceive colour. Guilty as charged, m'lud.
• Tonight's cooking has turned into something of an extravaganza. Singaporean fish curry for tonight, then I'm starting a tapas frenzy ready for lunch tomorrow. Chorizo & chickpea salad, red peppers with capers, chorizo in red wine, aubergine dip, mixed bean dip, and tuna, egg & potato salad. At least I won't have to cook for the next two days, apart from the bread. Well, that's the theory, anyway.

OK, that's it. Back to the kitchen. But let me leave you with a Gorean slave girl, in memory of my adolescence.

Stuff'n'nonsense #2

As Vaughn said earlier today, Facebook status detox is no joke. Well, I've resisted all day, and here's what I would have posted if I'd just kept clicking the SHARE button, plus some odds and ends thrown in. There's, uh, quite a lot of it.

• Tomorrow (or maybe today by the time you read this) is the 50th anniversary of Gagarin going into space. Here's a few things you may not have known about Gagarin's flight.
  Returning to a theme from yesterday, it's actually quite depressing in some ways. Half a century in space, and we're still amazed by space shuttle launches. It was designed about 40 years ago. I think we've lost the plot somewhere. Weren't we supposed to have space stations, space hotels, space elevators, and be mining the asteroid belts on our way to our first colonies by now?
  And why isn't the day being marked with some huge fanfare? It's one of the biggest milestones in human achievement. Yes, I know he was a Russian. So what? This is bigger than politics. The man was a true hero of the world, not just of the Soviet Union.
• Got a problem with wind power? Don't like those ugly windmills? Well, here's what the Union of Concerned Scientists has to say to you. And so do I. I would have loved for someone to put a windmill on the ridge behind my house when I lived in Somerset. And here, too, if they could make them hurricane-resistant.
  
  

Frankly, I think windmills look a lot prettier than power stations, they don't fill the air with smoke, and they don't explode or dump vast amounts of radiation into the environment when things go wrong. If I were running the show, I'd have windmills and solar panels in everyone's back yard. Seriously. On every roof and every hillside.
• Some days, you realize life really is a joke. Here's a great selection from Cracked - one of my favorite sites these days - of absurd jokes that came true. Stupid things like, err, Ronald Reagan becoming President. Like that would ever happen!
• Speaking of absurdity, check out these fashions from the NY fashion week. Really? People get paid to design, make and wear this crap? Click through and be aghast.
• On a more serious note, this should give pro-democracy activists cause for concern. The Egyptians recently got rid of their corrupt dictator who wouldn't tolerate dissent, and replaced him with an interim ruling council made up of the Armed Forces. A 26-year old pacifist blogger dared to criticize them, and their immediate response was to jail him for three years. So, that's an improvement then, is it?
  And staying on the subject of Egypt's corrupt dictator, I was amused, in a not very amused way, to read that Mubarak has threatened to sue anyone who accuses him of corruption. He'd like it known that all his money - all $30 billion of it - was legitimately earned during his time in office, and he did not use his political office to aid him. You have to admire a man who can make $30bn in 30 years as a hobby, don't you?
• Last night, I read an L. Ron Hubbard book. No, don't laugh. I'm not turning into a Scientologist. Fear is a horror novel from his early writing career, and it's actually quite good, in a sort of Ray Bradbury / Robert Bloch way. I'm tempted to find some more of his earlier works.
• On the playlist today, Bob Dylan's Desire popped up. I've never liked Dylan, apart from that one album, but I haven't heard it since my school days. I was pleased to find that I still enjoyed it, and ended up singing - well, humming, since I couldn't remember the words - along to One More Cup of Coffee. I couldn't get into any of his other stuff, though. I then spent the rest of the morning listening to the Rolling Stones, who, believe it or not I barely know other than the classics.
• I'm really pleased that finally my series of blog posts on using Moviestorm in schools has started. It was a lot of fun to write, and I enjoyed thinking up ways to use Moviestorm. I've got the first few in the queue, and there's about another 30 half-written. I'm now hoping to get round to the other series I'm working on, which is a series of exercises aimed at film students who want to practice their techniques. The first few of those are part written, just waiting for me to shoot the videos that accompany them.
• Okay, here comes the food section. For dinner last night we ended up at Smokey Bones. They've redone the menu: a few new items, and a lot of things no longer available, but the food's still good. However, we discovered that in the same plaza there's a Colombian and a Peruvian restaurant. I know next to nothing about South American food, so I'm quite intrigued by both of these places. (And no, they don't have guinea pig on the menu. Damn.)
  We've allotted the whole of tomorrow to Draco Felis paperwork, and we've promised ourselves that as a reward for getting everything filed, we'll treat ourselves to dinner at the Colombian place, Los Portales. Just the two of us. We need it.
  Tonight, we ate at a Polish place, Polonia, on 17/92 up near us. Well recommended - tasty food, good portions, classic Polish dishes. The kiszka (blood pudding) was surprisingly good, and the wazanki (noodles, bacon, kielbasa & cabbage) was absolutely delicious. Good selection of Polish beer too.
• And still on the subject of food, here's a great article about expiration dates. You know when it says Best Before or Use By? That does not mean the food is bad after that date. Food producers and retailers are making you throw away perfectly good food by making you think it's no longer edible. And different states and countries have different regulations, which confuses things still further. Obviously, don't eat food that has spoiled, but don't just go by the date on the packet.

And I'm going to end with a rant. Kids having mobile phones - it's a great idea. It's reassuring to know they can call you, or you can call them (assuming they remember to charge the bloody thing). But what's not a good idea is allowing kids to make arrangements with each other, instead of adults talking to each other. If Child wants to visit Friend, then telling Child to call Friend and sort it out is an absolute, guaranteed recipe for disaster. Here's what will happen:

• Friend won't speak to Parent about this proposed visit. Child will arrive unexpectedly, and Parent will wonder what the hell is going on. The situation will be exacerbated when it transpires that Friend invited Child to stay for a meal, sleep over or join them on a family outing, without Parent's knowledge. Parent will freak out, and Self (or Spouse) will have to go and fetch Child, probably at most inconvenient time, leading to tears all round.
• Child will not relay vital information back to Self. Either child will arrive without necessary item for family outing (cash for ticket, bathing suit, etc), or Self will fail to arrive at the agreed collection time, due to not knowing about it.
• Child and Friend will agree a time and place to meet up that doesn't work for Self or Parent. One family will end up hanging around waiting for the other, get irritated, and day will be ruined. Alternatively, Child and Friend will make arrangements without consulting Self or Parent, and then get hugely disappointed when told it's not possible.

The answer's simple. Any arrangement made between Child and Friend is deemed to be meaningless. It only counts if it's agreed between Self (or Spouse) and Parent. So don't cop out by getting the kids to sort stuff out. Deal with it. It will save hassle in the long run.

OK, that's me done for the day. More stuff'n'nonsense tomorrow, probably involving food, spaceships, books, and everyday life.

Assorted food-related observations

• I love making my own stock with chicken carcasses, ham bones, and so on. It seems pointless, given how cheap and easy it is to buy the stuff, but I find it satisfying to use as much as I can from the animal. I also enjoy the bit where I pick the bones as clean as they can get.
• On a similar note, I get immense satisfaction from cooking with left-overs, odds and ends, and whatever I can find in the back of the kitchen cupboards. It feels like I'm getting something for nothing.
• I can taste a spicy dish and tell you exactly what spices are in it, but I cannot, for the life of me, identify the grape variety in a glass of wine.
• Of all coffees, I enjoy African coffees the most. And I think Hawaiian Kona is overrated.
• I really like going to the Mexican market and loading up on tomatilloes and assorted chile peppers. I think I have ten different varieties of chiles in my kitchen right now, none of which is habanero or jalapeno.
• My favourite meat is venison, preferably slow cooked in either port or brandy. Or both.
• My slow cooker is my favourite kitchen utensil. It feels good to cook while I make breakfast and then know I'll have a delicious meal on demand later that night.
• I cannot cook omelettes. I can't make scrambled eggs in a frying pan either.
• I'm lousy at cooking steak.
• I rarely eat deep fried food.
• I pride myself on being able to cook food from around the world, but my knowledge of French cuisine is practically nil. I can probably cook more Iraqi, Nigerian, or Polish dishes than French dishes.
• My favourite pizza topping is pepperoni, mushrooms, anchovies and jalapeno, with extra mozzarella. These days I prefer thin crispy pizzas to deep thick ones, and I like to eat the crusts, as long as they're properly crunchy.
• I prefer tawny to ruby port. And I'm partial to a good sherry. On the other hand, I never drink Scotch whisky.
• My favourite fruit is mango.
• I loathe raw tomatoes, except in salsa with plenty of lime and chilli.
• I almost never cook desserts or cakes, but I make a totally kick-ass baklava.
• The combination of meat and fruit is something I love experimenting with.
• I often make vegetarian meals, even though I'm not a veggie. I just like the variety and don't feel the need to include meat.
• I find cooking aubergines (eggplants) really tricky, especially the big Greek ones.
• I cannot eat seafood (but fish is OK) or tofu.
• I had a very satisfying moment a few years ago in a restaurant, when I realised that I was no longer choosing food because I hadn't tried it before; instead, I was choosing dishes which I couldn't make at home because I can't get the ingredients or I don't have the utensils. Now, I tend to choose food based on the restaurant's recommendation.

ThisIsWhyYou'reFat

I'm doing my best to lose a load of the weight I've put on since being here. What with not walking or cycling, indulging myself in yummy Southern food, and eating huge American portions, I've put on a few pounds. I've finally got around to making good on my New Year goal to do something about it. I'm even going to the gym most days, and if you know me, you'll know how much of an achievement that is.

Of course, it's easy to point at the ridiculous food you see on Web sites like This Is Why You're Fat, or the absurd (but wonderful) treats like fried cheesecake or the Monte Cristo sandwich. But really, that's not the problem. The fact is that the basic serving size is enormous, and verging on the obscene.

On Wednesday, we went to a restaurant for a birthday dinner. I went with the dieter's meal. For $12.99, they gave me a small Caesar salad, a half-size portion of what was basically a burger, mashed potatoes and broccoli with some cole slaw, and a half-size dessert. In other words, half a regular meal.

I couldn't finish it. I managed the salad, half the main course, and none of the dessert, and went home feeling full. On Thursday, I ate most of the rest of the main course and half of the dessert for my lunch, and still felt full at dinner time. Then yesterday, I finished the main course and the cole slaw for lunch, had a small dinner in the evening, and the rest of my dessert.

In other words, a half size meal fed me for nearly three days. A whole normal meal works out as practically a week's worth of food for an average middle-aged man. In some places, a frickin' salad contains more calories than I need for the day! So even when you try to stick with the healthy options, they're still way in excess of what's necessary, or even sensible.

Compare recipe books from the 1930s with modern recipe books, and what used to be 8-12 servings is now considered 4 servings, even though we're all much less active these days. The smallest latte in Starbucks is three times the size of what you'd get in a French cafe, and contains about a third of my daily caloric needs. I could go on, but there's no need.

And that, my friends, is why I' m fat. And why most Americans are fat, and why there's an epidemic of diabetes.

Let me just reiterate. A half size restaurant meal fed me for nearly three days.

The answer's simple. Put less food on the plate.

Potted woodlouse

Our ancestors were a lot less squeamish than we are about what they'd eat. This fine recipe, courtesy of my former CEO and all-around good bloke Jeff Zie, comes from a 17th century English cookbook. Apparently it tastes like shrimp paste.

Common British woodlice

Collect a quantity of the finest wood-lice to be found, and drop them into boiling water, which will kill them instantly, but not turn them red, as might be expected. At the same time put into a saucepan a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, a teaspoonful of flour, a small glass of water, a little milk, some pepper and salt, and place it on the stove. As soon as the sauce is thick, take it off and put in the wood-lice. This is an excellent sauce for fish.

Well, seeing as I'm allergic to shrimp, but love the taste of shrimp paste, I'm half-tempted to give it a go. This does, naturally, leave me with two questions.

How do our local Floridian woodlice compare to English woodlice? The initial thought is that the American pill bug is likely to be meatier than your English variety, though whether it will have the same taste is a whole different question.

American pill bug or roly poly, of the Armadillidiidae family

And secondly, what are the criteria for "the finest woodlice to be found"? According to Jeff, they'd be "the ones in top hats". Hmm.

This calls for experimentation. Who wants to join me on this culinary expedition?

Why I miss my walk to work

Well, it's like this. I'm about 30lb (2 stone) overweight. No point denying it.

For my lifestyle, I need about 2000 calories a day. I'm eating about 2500, so I'm gaining about a pound a week. So, either I need to cut down to nearer 1600/day and start losing a pound a week, or, more realistically, I need to cut down to 2000/day and start taking some exercise.

Significantly, when I lived in Cambridge, my daily walk to work and back was just enough to burn the right amount of calories to balance what I actually ate. It's not the good Southern food that's done me in. It's sitting on my butt all day and going everywhere by car.

Things that, to my surprise, I don't miss

Yesterday I told you about the things from England I miss most. They aren't necessarily the things I was expecting to miss. These are a few of the things I thought it would be hard to leave behind but I seem to be coping quite well without.

• Marmite. I couldn't survive without Marmite. Fortunately, they sell it in Publix. It's stupidly expensive compared to the price in England, but I have a tiny jar of it in the cupboard, and every so often I treat myself to toast and Marmite, and I don't miss it as much as I thought I would. There's so much else to have for breakfast!
• Beer. Two surprises here: first of all, I'm quite happy drinking American beer. Secondly, there's plenty of imported beer, and I can get all the Belgian beer I want. OK, so I can't get most of my favourite English beers, but the temperature's all wrong here anyway.
• Pubs. I know this is heresy, but American bars have a charm of their own, and in many ways I'm starting to prefer them to English pubs. I've even started to tune out the twenty-three TV screens all showing different channels. There are still some wonderful places I intend to revisit when I'm back in England, but Odin's Den and the like are doing me just fine right now, and I'm not sitting around moaning about how I can't get a proper drink.
• Walker's Prawn Cocktail Crisps. Every time I feel the need for a bag of these, I distract myself with honey mustard pretzels, garlic bagel chips, or something funky from the Saigon Market. It's not like they're short of crunchy snack food in America.
• English accents. On every previous trip, I've found myself really glad to hear the dulcet tones of Croydon from the cabin attendant as I step on board the Virgin Atlantic plane. Now, it doesn't bother me any more. I'm quite used to hearing American wherever I go, and I've just begun to accept that I need to speak the local language. So yeah, I say tom-AY-to, sidewalk, trunk, and pants. Expect me to talk funny when I'm next in England!

Tomorrow: things I'm really glad to have left behind.

Things I miss

Florida is feeling more and more like my home now. I've been here for nearly five months, and England is beginning to feel somewhat far away. I still miss a few things about the old country, though.

• Sausages. Of all the foods I expected to miss, it's proper English sausages, with mashed potatoes I miss most. The stuff they call sausage here just isn't right. And salami and wurst, while they're also sausages, are just not what you need for bangers and mash. If I really felt like it, I could get some at The English Shoppe (sic) but I can't quite bring myself to go in there. When I get back to England, expect me to gorge myself on sausages for at least three days.
• Decent Indian food. The Thai food is fabulous here, and the Asian food in general is astounding, but I still haven't found a good curry. I love making it myself, but I haven't cooked a proper curry in ages, because I just don't have the ingredients. I've been told a few places to buy good Indian spices, but I do miss having a huge selection in every supermarket, and I really miss having Mill Road on my doorstep.
• Fish and chips. Yes, they sell fish and chips in the local Irish pub. It's not the same. It's really not. I crave Tommy Tucker's. (You may detect a food-related theme emerging here...)
• Top Gear. Yes, yes, I know you can get it on cable. And I know you can torrent it. But we don't have cable, and I can't be arsed to torrent it. Top Gear was pretty well the only show I watched on British TV in 2009, and I just used to like settling down on a Sunday evening with a beer watching the Hamster.
• Old stone buildings. I grew up in school buildings 600 years old. I went to university in buildings 500 years old. I owned a house with bits well over 400 years old. It's weird being in a place where anything older than me is called "historic". Orlando and Winter Park literally did not exist 120 years ago, and most of it is only a few decades old. I yearn for places where you can sense the passage of time. Maybe ancient Indian mounds will do the trick.

Tomorrow: things I expected to miss, but don't.

A nice cuppa

I'm slowly getting used to the fact that when I ask for tea in Florida, I'm not going to get one of these.

Nope, what you get is something completely different. For a start, it's cold. If you want hot tea, you need to specify hot tea. Then the chances are they'll bring you something made with green tea. You see, you should have said black tea if that's what you wanted. Then they helpfully go and put cream in it instead of milk. And then, if you wanted it sweetened, they pour honey in it. There's not much else they could do different. It is, in the words of the late, great, and much lamented Douglas Adams (who was, like me, an alumnus of St John's College, Cambridge) "almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea."

It's easier just to accept that this is tea, and the good old English cuppa is something to be enjoyed in the comfort of my own home.

Eatin' my way thru O-Town

It's kinda traditional for Europeans to take the piss out of Americans for being, how shall we put it politely, fat. Well, just try living here. Honestly, it's not their fault. Even if you avoid all the nasty greasy fast food, there's so much good eating on offer it's impossible to maintain a svelte figure without spending four hours a day in the gym. 

I've become a regular at the local farmer's market on Saturday mornings, where I load up with aubergines (eggplant) & courgettes (zucchini) as well as top quality honey, and oranges, and then feel morally obliged to stuff myself with cinnamon buns and Venezuelan pastries.  And then we've been working our way through the enormous Vietnamese supermarkets and filling the freezer with dim sum. Our current favourite is the Saigon market, which has a counter of unbelievably tasty French-style Vietnamese pastries. And, of course, there's now a Spice & Tea Exchange in Winter Park, so we have Pirate's Bite and salmon tea rub. So cooking's pretty much covered.

When it comes to eating out, there's loads of choice.  Highlights so far include:

The Enzian. OK, it's a cinema, not a restaurant, but the menu there is impressive. You don't get a huge portion, but it's really delicious stuff.  Just check out the meatball sandwich, for example.  Meatballs made with grass fed bison and fresh local pork, truffle parmesan tomato sauce, sauteed shiitake mushrooms. I mean, c'mon, how can that be bad?   Eating this while watching a movie makes for a great date.  The selection of wines and beers is pretty reasonable, but the absolute killer is the manchego cheesecake. It's cheesecake turned up to 11. It was a real struggle to finish one portion between two of us. 

The Black Bean Deli. This isn't eating out, in that there's nowhere to sit, so if you want to get picky, yeah, it's take-away. (Or take-out, as I'm learning to call it.)  This is the best Cuban food I've ever had.  Well, if I'm honest, it's the only Cuban food I've ever had, but everyone tells me it's the best I'm ever likely to find anywhere outside Cuba. The medianoche is filling and yummy - ham and cheese on Cuban sweet bread, and the chorizopan is similar, but with chorizo instead of ham.  One of their sandwiches for lunch, with a tub of rice and black beans, and then a flan to follow... oh yeah!  I can see this becoming a regular mid-week thing.  Set something rendering or uploading, a 10-minute drive down 17/92, grab myself a bag full of Cuban goodness, and then not bother with dinner.  No, really, no more food today.

El Bodegon. My benchmark for good tapas is whether it's as good as the Tasting Room in St Augustine. El Bodegon most certainly passes that test.  Tapas isn't really their speciality, but like any good Spanish place, they have a good selection on offer. Not so great for vegetarians - if you're OK with seafood, you'll be fine, but you really need to be a carnivore to enjoy this place. We munched our way through five plates with a pitcher of sangria.  The serrano ham was some of the best I've ever tasted, the patata bravas were just perfect, and the garlic mushrooms were succulent and mouthwateringly mushroomy. The piece de resistance, though, was the chorizo flambeed in brandy. Chorizo is good anyway, and I love the effect of pouring liquor on food and setting fire to it. We'll definitely be going back there for evenings when we can't decide what to eat and fancy a little bit of everything.  

The Nile Ethiopian Restaurant. No prizes for guessing the speciality of this place tucked away off I-Drive. Ethiopian food is quite unique, and something I love.  It's good communal finger food: it comes on a big tray, with piles of different dishes, and you eat it by scooping it up with pieces of pancakey sourdough bread. When it arrives, you wonder whether you've ordered enough. Two thirds of the way through, you wonder whether you can finish it all. The yasa tibs (fish) is truly gorgeous, the doro wat (chicken stew) is total yumminess, and I seriously recommend the veggie combo, even if you're not a veggie. Don't skip the coffee. They roast the beans right there, and then bring the pan round for everyone to have a sniff. It's the best coffee I've had that isn't Turkish. Try it if you're looking for a friendly meal with friends that's a bit out of the ordinary.

And there's more...  Urban Flats had a variable selection: basically posh pizza, the good ones were good, and the rest were mediocre.  Chipotle is just a Mexican fast food chain, but they do a damn good pork burrito, and it's all free-range, hormone-free meat, so it's actually good food, just served fast.  Tomorrow, we have a big family meal at Buca di Beppo, where I intend to eat pasta and chicken saltimbocca until I look like Luciano Pavarotti  Next, I need to try the various steakhouses (Ruth's Chris and Colorado's both recommended, for completely different reasons), and find myself some catfish and some grouper, and at some point I really need to get back to the bagel place...

We've been making the most of coupons from restaurant.com. Basically, you buy a $25 coupon for $10, so there's an instant saving of $15.  But it gets better. As the month goes on,they discount the coupons that haven't sold yet, and you can pick up a $25 coupon for $2.  We just spent a mighty $10 to buy ourselves $125 off in various St Augustine restaurants which we intend to use in about a week while we're on honeymoon.  And yes, that includes the Tasting Room. 

Oh, God, please can I have just a salad now? Before I explode?

The Pope Room in Buca di Beppo. Look, that's the Pope in the middle of the table. Holy spaghetti,  Batman!

Anya's pheasant

While walking through Wandlebury yesterday with the Morrigan, she spotted pheasant running down the forest pathways and wondered what they tasted like. So.... here's Anya's Pheasant, inspired by a Hungarian recipe, Chicken Badacsonyi.


Lightly saute some chopped onions & garlic, rosemary, and finely chopped bacon in olive oil for a couple of minutes, using a big heavy saucepan. Then put your pheasant in and turn it a few times to lightly brown it on all sides. Now add mushrooms. Lots of them, and with as many varieties as you can. (European mushrooms, not shiitakes or the like, though. Go with wild forest mushrooms if you can get them.) A touch of parsley, salt & pepper, then add a couple of glasses of port. (I then threw in some left over champagne that had gone slightly flat). Now put the lid on, and leave it simmering very slowly for twenty minutes or so until a lot of the liquid has been absorbed.

Baste the pheasant with the remaining liquid, and chuck in a few small potatoes. I used Anya potatoes because they seemed appropriate. Then in goes the rest of the port. Half a bottle of Warre's Reserve works just fine. Put the lid back on, and leave it for another half an hour or so, cooking very slowly. Then, when everything's cooked through, take the lid off and let most of the liquid evaporate into a sauce. Serve, garnished with chopped coriander and parsley, with a strong red wine.

Yeah, my tablecloth sucks. Like I care.

We followed with chocolate souffle (yeah, I cheated, it was from Gu), and Warre's Otima 10-year old Tawny port, and coffee spiced with cinnamon, clove and vanilla.

Porkin' out

Last night was a bit of an experiment, blending Elizabethan flavourings with Eastern European style cooking, and ending up with the sort of thing that might have been around in the days of Dracula. (The real bloke, not the neck-biting undead "I never drink... wine" geezer.")

Sadly, there's no proper picture to go with this, because we ate all the food before we realised it was blogworthy, and empty dishes don't look so good. So here's Vlad Tepes and Bela Lugosi instead.

Matt's Transylvanian Pork

I started with a lump of pork, and rubbed it all over with caraway, paprika, salt, pepper, cloves, nutmeg and allspice, then stuffed it with bits of apple. Then I simply put it in a roasting dish with more sliced apple, sultanas, dates (instead of the usual prunes), onions and garlic, added a touch of vegetable stock, a bit of ginger, and some red wine, and left it to slowly roast in the oven for about five hours.

While that was cooking, I made a bacon and mushroom salad: I fried the mushrooms with garlic in butter and olive oil, then fried chopped bacon, rosemary, and ciabatta in more butter and olive oil. Add balsamic vinegar, spread on top of rocket, and then crumble some Stilton on top.

By the time the pork arrived, we were well and truly ready for food. I decided to go for bulghur wheat as an accompaniment, rather than potatoes, in keeping with the Eastern feel, and actually got it right this time: roasted peppers, fried leeks and onions, and a touch of caraway made for an interesting pilaf which worked well. The fruit in the sauce gave it a lovely touch of sweetness, combining well with the caraway and other spices. We then followed with strong, sweet Malabar coffee, flavoured with cinnamon and cloves, and a glass of tawny port.

And, what's more, there's enough pork for sandwiches!

The tasting room

Another one to add to the list of fabulous places to eat: The Tasting Room in Cuna Street, St Augustine, Florida. St Augustine is an utterly charming old Spanish town about 100 miles north of Orlando. The historic district is just beautiful, like stepping back about three hundred years in time. Apparently it's the oldest continuously occupied settlement in the US.

A bit of the historic district - not the Tasting Room, though!

Hidden away in a back street, we found The Tasting Room, a marvellous little tapas bar, and sat out in their courtyard as the sun went down. They have a great selection of wines and champagnes, which we sampled liberally, and then gorged ourselves on dish after dish of Spanish food. The highlight was manchego cheese, with cherries marinated in sherry, almonds and spiced olive oil. It doesn't sound that spectacular, but the flavour was just incredible. In fact the whole evening was a non-stop barrage of flavour, culminating with chocolate truffle cake and cinnamon icecream, accompanied by a "port-like" wine which was an inspired recommendation.

The whole ethos of the place is about tasting and sharing, and they're only too happy to bring you tiny little portions of everything to try just a mouthful of. The "World of Bubbles" selection is a great way to try all sorts of champagnes. The live music was pleasant, the service was first-rate and friendly, and the ambience was welcoming and unhurried. The only tiny disappointment was that their espresso could have been stronger and blacker, but that's the only thing that stops me giving the place 10/10. 9.95/10 will have to do. After three hours of very pleasant eating, we very reluctantly hit the two-hour drive to Orlando.

We had change from $100 for two people, which given the quantity we consumed and the quality of the food, is astonishingly good value. Well worth the trip, and very highly recommended. I'd like to get back there some day, and see if the other restaurants round there are as good as people say. If so, then perhaps the historic district of St Augustine could rival the Rue de St Michel in Cannes for my favourite places in the whole world to eat.

Stupidly, I didn't take a pic of the place in daylight, and all the night-time shots are too flashed out to post, so if anyone has a pic of the Tasting Room, please give me a link!

OK, Teddy, it's chow down time!

A short while ago, I mentioned that a Finnish friend was bringing over a load of bear meat and other Scandinavian goodies. Well, here they are!


We have (sorta clockwise from top-left-ish):

• Diced bear meat (saute and eat with potatoes)
• Sliced bear meat (put on bread and eat with pickles)
  
• Bear salami (slice thinly and eat with ice cold vodka)
• Bear stew (heat & eat)
• Bear soup (add cream, optional wine, heat & eat with bread)
• Smoked reindeer salami (slice and eat with beer)
  
• Tinned moose (not sure what to do with this)
• Bear pate (tempting to make beef wellingtons with this)
• Potted bear (eat with cheese)

This bear comes with a history and the paperwork to prove it. All the meat comes from a single bear. He was shot near Kuusamo in Northern Finland on January 31. Apparently he was a tough bastard. They shot him once, but he ran off, so they shot him again through the lungs. He still didn't die, so they had to call in some marksmen to finish him off.

(Sorry if you didn't want to know the gory details, but that's what eating real wild animals involves. I find there's something deeply atavistic about knowing where meat comes from, and I think all carnivores should appreciate that.)

Anyway, I'll let you know how it comes out!

Loaded for bear

A new gastronomic experience awaits. We have a friend coming over from Finland in a few weeks, and he's bringing not just some reindeer (which I've had once before), but moose (which I haven't but I'm guessing is similar), and bear (which I've never had, but he assures me is "pretty strong stuff"!).

Taste buds are tingling already...

Get on my plate!

Oh dear

We just went to the Waggon and Horses for the first time in about a year, only to discover that it's under new management. What used to be one of the best pub menus in the South of England has been replaced with a bland, identikit "pub grub" menu. Not only that, but it's tasteless, overpriced, reheated frozen food, and very, very disappointing.

The new owners have also got rid of the art gallery, the classical concerts, the jazz nights, the play area, and the animals, and with it, they've shipped out all the character that made the W&H such a great place. Francisco spent ages trying to find a buyer who would continue what he had built up; I think he'd be mortified to see what's happened.

Anyone know of any pubs in Somerset where they serve game?

My favourite places to eat

Well, I'm sitting in a hotel room in Beverly Hills, just having eaten one of the best steaks I have ever had, and casting my mind back to when I made the bookings for this trip. I told the agent to save me money on the hotels, so I'd have more to spend on restaurants. I'm glad I did. One of the best things about travelling the world is getting to sample the food wherever you go. So I was very pleasantly surprised to find that the hotel they'd booked me into was right over the road from one of my very favourite eateries, Factor's.

So anyway, I'm going to kick off this blog with a list of my very favourite places in the entire world to eat, in no particular order. They're all first-class, and I thoroughly recommend any and all of them.

L'Auberge Provencal (Cannes, France)
Rustic French-style cooking. It's off the sea front, so it's largely undiscovered. (Why am I telling you about it? I don't want it to be popular, I want it to be my little secret.) The wild boar stew is without a doubt one of the richest, most sumptuous main dishes you will ever find. Go for a really ballsy French wine with it, and you've got all you need for an evening of decadent eating.

Le Mesclun (Cannes, France)
This place is just up the hill about 20 paces from L'Auberge Provencal. In fact, there's an entire street full of amazing restaurants. Really. Every shop in the street is a restaurant, they're all tiny, and they are all superb. This is the only even vaguely posh place on my list. And even then, it's not actually posh, just a bit smart, and amazingly not at all pricey. In fact, it's probably one of the cheapest places on the entire list. A fine meal there will cost you about the same as a good pub meal in the UK. Everything there is good. I know. I've tried it all (except the seafood). What's really nice is that they keep bringing you little tasters in between courses, even if you didn't order them. Stuff like truffle soup, or Roquefort with figs, and so on. If you like French food, this is the place. Oh, and drink the cheap wines. They're nicer than the expensive ones, and go better with the food.

The Waggon and Horses (Doulting Beacon, UK)
This is a tiny little pub a few miles from my house. They specialise in game, most of which is shot locally, so it's not so good out of season. They have an amazing selection of Somerset cider brandy, which rivals Calvados any day for my money. I've learnt that rather than choosing from the menu, ask them what's good, as it entirely depends on what the different meats are like that week. Don't bother with the wine list - drink beer. See what local brews they have, and sample them.

Factor's Famous Deli (Beverly Hills, USA)
Breakfast at Factor's is the most wonderful way to start the day. Unfortunately, the effects are noticeable. After three breakfasts in a row, you won't fit into your trousers. I'm speaking from experience here. It's happened to me a few times, and I keep coming back for more. It does Jewish American cooking, set in a 1950s style diner. Portions are huge. No, they're bigger than huge. They're enormous. But it's so good, you just can't help eating it all. This trip I had dinner in Factor's for the first time, and the dinners are even better than the breakfasts. And the puddings - well, let me recommend the banana caramel cheesecake zango, which is basically banana cheesecake inside a fried flaky tortilla with caramel sauce and cream and fruit. One of the most luscious puddings I have ever eaten.

Spark Woodfire Grill (Beverly Hills, USA)
Practically over the road from Factor's, this steakhouse delivered one of the best meals I've ever had in the US. Nothing fancy, just very, very well done. The only other time I've had steak that good was in the Buenos Aires Grill in Seattle. The chocolate mousse was exquisite (and less damaging to the waistline than Factor's chocolate mousse). If, like me, you can't decide which wine to have, go for one of their tasters, where they bring you a tiny glass of three different wines, and give them all a go.

The Thai Kitchen (London, UK)
These guys were in business long before Thai food became popular. Don't go in there expecting to order a Tom Ka or a Pud Thai or a Green Chicken Curry. It's more like a Dim Sum restaurant. Order a load of tiny dishes, and spend the entire evening nibbling. When the bowls get low, order more food. Repeat until closing time. Better still, let the chef choose what to send out, and unexpectedly delicious things will just keep arriving at your table. That's a wonderful dining experience.

Pipasha (Cambridge, UK)
This does Indian food as good as any I ever had in India. In fact, better than most Indian restaurants in India. Of all the eateries on the list, this is the only one where I have ever had a disappointing meal. But then, I've eaten there more than I've eaten at any of the others, so I can forgive them one lapse out of maybe forty or fifty meals. And even then, it wasn't a bad meal, merely a good one. The Shabji Jalfrezi is one of the best veggie dishes I've ever had, and the Shakuti chicken, a fiery Goan dish is magnificent.

Javier's (Laguna Beach, USA)
I love Mexican food, and several people told me that Javier's was the best in California. They weren't wrong. It's not the typical TexMex food you find all over the place, and there's so much more than just burritos and tacos. I told them I was from England, I liked Mexifood, and I'd heard they were the best, so they brought me a platter with some of everything to try. The mole is gorgeously rich, and the carnitas are really succulent. The only thing they didn't have that I would have liked was a puerco pibil. (Which is probably a good thing, or I'd have had to whack the chef.)

My house (Somerset, UK)
No, seriously. Restaurants are all very fine, but I really like eating in my own house. We cook all sorts of food - I enjoy cooking North African, Turkish, Indian, and Mexican as well as traditional English game and other local dishes. And Ali is the Queen of puddings, does a fine roast, and knows how to cook just the right comfort food when it's needed. Borris's house is a pretty damn fine place to eat as well, easily as good as any restaurant on the list, and Phil does a mean pibil. Sometimes, you just can't beat home cooking.