tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-70328596853606845752024-03-28T23:26:08.643-07:00Devour BlogDon't just taste, devour.Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.comBlogger225125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-38865916328310501192015-07-04T08:37:00.000-07:002015-07-04T08:45:51.796-07:00The Batter Half, Cairo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Ramadan in Cairo. A blessed month for worshippers, for those in need, and for pastry store owners. It's a month with the quietest days the Egyptian capital ever sees, and the most profitable nights of its confectioners' fiscal years. It's also a month where the solid, never-changing Arabic pastry standbys like <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanafeh" target="_blank">kunafa</a></i>, <i><a href="http://from-the-kitchen-of-sara.blogspot.com/2014/05/basboosa-egyptian-semolina-cake.html" target="_blank">basboosa</a></i>, and <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatayef" target="_blank">qatayef</a> </i>get treated to a rare flavor innovation. <i>Kunafa</i>, traditionally filled with cream or cheese, gets stuffed with freshly cut mangos and is displayed elegantly like a gourmet <i>pâtisserie</i> instead of in a traditional shallow platter. The usual simple sugar syrups that adorn most pastries are supplemented by a smooth chocolate cream or a drizzle of caramel. And the tried and true decorations of cracked pistachios and whipped cream grow in volume to generous proportions.<br />
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But perhaps the greatest innovation of the season comes on the island of Zamalek, right in the heart of Cairo, at <a href="http://www.thebatterhalf.com/" target="_blank">The Batter Half</a>. A decidedly youthful addition to the seasoned pastry scene in Egypt, The Batter Half originally opened in 2012 with American and French-style pastries at a quality level until then rarely seen in Egypt. Red velvet cake was the shop's show-stopper, with <i>macarons</i> coming in a close second as the French delicacy conquered the world.<br />
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Bu it was Ramadan that really put The Batter Half on the map. Suddenly, culinary inventions like red velvet <i>kunafa </i>and Nutella <i>qatayef</i> appeared. Murmurs of these concoctions swept through Cairene dinner parties, often followed by gasps and remarks that either landed in the camp of excited adulation or that of wary suspicion.<br />
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These pastry inventions were polarizing, as are most things in post-revolution Egypt. But unlike politics, pastry has a way of bridging the gaps between camps through one simple device: taste. Egyptians possess a sweet tooth so powerful it's a matter of national pride. And when an Egyptian meets a Nutella <i>basboosa</i> cake, smeared with chocolate hazelnut paste sitting on a bed of buttery grains of sweetened semolina, all differences in pastry opinion happily melt away.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCbcNmuWrYFmcACRkXJFDGUAebpL4m08C49U9l2dJFnwZ3rLh1KCt7kL-o3GBlEiaJAoCP7B9rIo87Kf9YUO12K7TOccgCLIpCQARbqbPsySbTS16H-j_5gG72DwFc0hlkPyW4xjdyHeg/s1600/Batter_Half_Cairo_nutella+ramadan-imp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCbcNmuWrYFmcACRkXJFDGUAebpL4m08C49U9l2dJFnwZ3rLh1KCt7kL-o3GBlEiaJAoCP7B9rIo87Kf9YUO12K7TOccgCLIpCQARbqbPsySbTS16H-j_5gG72DwFc0hlkPyW4xjdyHeg/s640/Batter_Half_Cairo_nutella+ramadan-imp.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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The mother-son duo behind The Batter Half have enjoyed making a mark on the pastry scene in Cairo. And as long as they continue to shock the palates of their discerning customers, they're likely to enjoy success for many years to come.<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://www.thebatterhalf.com/" target="_blank">The Batter Half</a><br />
17 Mohamed Mazhar Street<br />
Zamalek, Cairo, Egypt<br />
+20 (0)2-27370036<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-64732955667122339002015-05-02T08:31:00.000-07:002015-05-05T14:16:28.539-07:00b. patisserie, San Francisco<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Walking into <a href="http://bpatisserie.com/" target="_blank">b. patisserie</a> feels like pleasing fate. I've heard about this place so many times. My first visit was last year, with a friend who lives in the city. We sat inside for two hours over croissants and green tea, spring poppies at our table. We left at dusk, smiling at the satisfaction of an afternoon well spent.<br />
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My next encounter with b. patisserie happened at graduate school, where a classmate whom I most admire for her pairings of asymmetrical skirts and chunky boots told me that she had worked with b. herself. "Belinda," she called her, remembering their days together at Gary Danko. I wonder what she's like.<br />
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The next time I visit the shop I get to find out. My friend Scotty and I have arranged to interview Belinda for a class we're taking called Formation of New Ventures. It's one of those classes that business schools love to teach because it has three words that are synonyms for everything business school students love to learn. We arrive at 4pm which means that Chef B. and her team have been on their feet, baking, for 12 hours already. Two hours are left until close. But finally I see her.<br />
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Belinda has the weighty presence of a culinary veteran and the lighthearted spirit of a San Franciscan. It is a jarring combination. On her countertops sit some of the most highly praised French pastries in the Bay area, and yet the air inside her shop is thick with chatter and warmth. Children sit restless on chairs, dangling their feet and chewing on chocolate chip cookies as big as their heads. Neighbors stop in to pick up a sourdough loaf and a packet of vanilla granola. There is no WiFi, so there are no laptops. Most everyone is firmly in the non-digital world.<br />
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Michel, Belinda's business partner, joins us. He is French, a pastry chef, a kitchen designer, and the founder of the San Francisco Baking Institute. He didn't know we were visiting Belinda but makes time for us anyway. We expect a 30-minute chat but what we get instead is two and a half hours of stories and laughter and pieces of wisdom doled out between flaky bites of Kouign Amann. The duo behind b. patisserie live and breath approachability. They have chosen the location of their first spot so that it is not in hipster territory (though some might say that's impossible in San Francisco), but in a neighborhood where firemen wait in line with techies and the man who runs the local bus makes sure to be ahead of schedule so he can stop in for his morning pastry.<br />
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Creating an atmosphere where everyone is welcome is not easy in San Francisco. And especially not in a French pastry shop. Here, Silicon Valley money floods the neighborhoods that have grown accustomed to more humble pay. Districts like the Mission sell $5 cups of tea next to $2 taquerias. And yet b. and her team have done it, at the edge of Pac Heights and on the streets of California.<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
b. patisserie<br />
2821 California St<br />
San Francisco, CA 94115<br />
+1(415) 440-1700<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-4248513444601795802014-07-27T07:20:00.000-07:002014-07-27T07:32:19.228-07:00Bloudan Pâtisserie, Cairo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It was 5pm on a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramadan" target="_blank">Ramadan</a> weekday in Cairo, two hours before sunset. A long pastry case stretched out before me, separating an army of bakers from a hungry mob of customers. Enormous aluminum platters filled with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanafeh" target="_blank"><i>kanafeh</i></a> were lifted out of ovens and carried like trophies above bobbing heads and bent backs. Two industrial machines chugged away incessantly, one producing streamers of pastry noodles ready to be fried while the other squirted out puddles of <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatayef" target="_blank">qatayef</a></i> pancakes, round and fluffy, almost spongey. To place an order with one of the bakers meant to summon all your courage, take a deep breath, and execute a series of gestures, supplications, and commands that would, God willing, result in a package of the most heavenly sweets this side of the Nile delta.<br />
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The pastry scene in Egypt's capital takes on a life of its own during the month-long holiday of Ramadan. The city's 18 million inhabitants create a hefty demand for sweets, and mega-producers and factories in Cairo's suburbs are eager to comply. But in the hidden corners of downtown Cairo, small kitchens flourish. Newcomers from Syria, those brought by displacement, have set up shop in the city's famous Tala'at Harb Square.<br />
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The shop is called <a href="https://www.facebook.com/BloudanPatisserie" target="_blank">Bloudan</a> and, unlike most Cairene pastry shops, it is new (less than two years old) and very small. I found it by intention, having heard of it through a reputable Egyptian academic with a refined sense for pastry. Syrians are known in the Arab world for holding the keys to the region's culinary treasures. In Egypt, housewives go silent when Syrian pastries are mentioned, murmuring only of the special <i>tik-ka</i>, that little way, that Syrians have with food.<br />
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And so, Cairo is blessed to play host to these visitors from Damascus, with their trays of <i>baklava</i>, thinly wrapped flaky sheets of phyllo dough separated by butter, stuffed with roasted nuts, and held together by a sticky, extra sweet syrup. Baklava here takes on several shapes, wrapped up in a cylinder or sliced into tiny cubes sized to make your cheeks swell but still with enough room to chew.<br />
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<i>Namoura</i> is another specialty, with layers of buttery pastry encasing soft cream. Cream here is not whipped, nor clotted. It borders on butter, with a consistency almost of cream cheese. The flavor is clean and milky, with a rounded mildness (like mozzarella) that offsets the pastry dough perfectly.<br />
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<i>Kanafeh</i> gets its treatment in the traditional hotplates, covering a layer of melted sweet cheese (<i>kanafeh bel jebneh</i>), or wrapped up into little birds nests (<i>'aysh el bolbol</i>, literally "the nightingale's nest").<br />
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And the two treasures of Bloudan are <i>halawet el jebn</i> and <i>warbat</i>, both rare in Cairo. <i>Halawet el jebn</i>, "the sweetness of cheese", is made with semolina and <i>'akkawi</i>, a soft and sweet Middle Eastern cheese found mostly in the Levant. Melted, rolled together with sugar and pistachios, and stuffed with fresh cream, this is what I imagine imperial courts in the Ottoman Empire served to visitors and guests.<br />
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<i>Warbat</i>, baklava's triangular cousin, is like a flaky pita pocket stuffed with freshly roasted sugared walnuts, or pistachios, or almonds, or cream. The trick is in the pastry, which is at once light and flaky yet sturdy, and tastes of brown butter.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1qfix_9WKq_ugL1JUkVnJLA0lvsSVGOEiBWSJjciGlJsQaHO1vBQsgKy_juz9dGuf31Wlc09LAxh0C1Emq0om-7NHOJIjL8NlIOFPL5YOfhaak6CwADcUfjfNYaLPU1Fc2BhY3CcM6Rk/s1600/Bloudan_Patisserie_Cairo_baklava.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1qfix_9WKq_ugL1JUkVnJLA0lvsSVGOEiBWSJjciGlJsQaHO1vBQsgKy_juz9dGuf31Wlc09LAxh0C1Emq0om-7NHOJIjL8NlIOFPL5YOfhaak6CwADcUfjfNYaLPU1Fc2BhY3CcM6Rk/s1600/Bloudan_Patisserie_Cairo_baklava.jpg" height="428" width="640" /></a><br />
As sunset nears and the cars slowly empty from the streets, ribbon-wrapped packages sail out of Cairo's pastry shops to restore life to those at home. And though our Syrian friends are far from their homes, they've brought their food and their hearts along with them. And so, for now, downtown Cairo is blessed with a visitor who comes bearing the sweetest of gifts.<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="https://www.facebook.com/BloudanPatisserie" target="_blank">Bloudan Pâtisserie</a><br />
26 Mahmous Bassiouny Street<br />
Cairo, Egypt<br />
+201001410944<br />
+2025756675<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-76360104187585615052014-07-08T14:42:00.000-07:002014-07-08T14:51:00.281-07:00Boulangerie Les Copains Part III, Normandy, France<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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My favorite moment at the <a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/" target="_blank">Boulangerie</a> happened one evening
after the night shift. We had spent five hours baking and 10 wooden crates
stood before us, brimming with hot loaves of bread. That night there had been
six of us in the bakery, four more than usual, so the work finished quickly and
occasionally one of us would have to stand around idly, with nothing to do,
watching as the others made themselves useful.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Whenever it was my time to be idle I stood by the oven,
which is warm and comforting when the oven doors are closed, but fiery and
scary once the doors open and loaves come flying out, weighed down by their
scorching-hot baking trays. The old-timer bakers love to hear new bakers squeal
at the heat of the oven. “Oh! It’s hot!” we usually say. Then they say, “Well,
yeah, it’s an oven, it’s hot.” Then they laugh. I never really got the joke,
but I guess my sense of humor deteriorates when I’m afraid of having my hand
burned off.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So as I stood by the oven, watching our last loaves come
out, two of the bakers announced it was time to prepare <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">les</i> <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tartines</i>. “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Les tartines!”</i> I thought to myself, in
my best French accident. I had no idea what a tartine was. My understanding of
the word came from my father’s stories about his summers in France, when he
would wake up to a hardened baguette that would be made delicious by toasting it, smearing it in jam, and
dipping it into a bowl of hot chocolate. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
But we weren’t going to make those tartines. Instead, I got
to pick a loaf of bread and watched as it was sliced into tranches thick enough
to hold a pile of toppings. Next came the tomato sauce, in drips and splatters,
then sliced zucchini and scallions with a smattering of garlic. After that, the
sardines-- whole filets gingerly stacked atop the bread. And finally, the
cheese. All local, all made from goat’s milk, and all temptingly soft. As soon
as the cheese came out I knew it was time to be proactive and I moved away from
the warmth of the oven and cut generous slabs of cheese to top our tartines.
This is a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tartine:</i><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Open-faced sandwiches are a specialty enjoyed by the bakers
of Boulangerie Les Copains, but it was not unusual to find us enjoying other
products sold by the co-op. Like, for example, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">petites brioches de fantaisie. </i>That translates to "fantastical little brioches." The fantasy
part comes from the apples, poppy seeds, raisins, and walnuts piled up inside.
That, and a dash of cinnamon. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
I once ate a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">petite brioche</i>
fresh out of the oven with a glass of fresh country milk. Deepa, my friend who
was with me on our baking adventure, has a thing for fresh country milk, and
insisted we try out the combination. As you can see, the doughy little nobs are asking to be pulled apart, stretchy and airy with just enough crust to hold it all together. So as we tore into the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">petites</i> morsels, accompanied by a big
gulp of milk, Deepa and I went into a headspin of deliciousness, from which we
were aroused only by the threat of a certain sneaking cat.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div class="MsoNormal">
On rainy afternoons we would often bake little pizzas and
apple <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tartelettes</i> for the market.
Rainy afternoons are common in Normandy, so we found ourselves baking pizzas
and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tartelettes</i> fairly frequently. My
favorite part came last: shaking a bit of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">herbes de Provence</i> on the pizza, while Deepa spooned coarse brown
sugar across the scored apples.</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Those were our days in Normandy. Days of farms, fresh food,
and a bit of hard work. If it sounds idealized, then that’s because it is. But
it’s hard not to idealize a place where one neighbor presses apple cider while
the other makes cheese for your evening <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tartines</i>.
We learned many things at the Boulangerie, most of all about a different way of
living. And for that, we are grateful. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
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<a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/" target="_blank">Boulangerie Les Copains</a> (and their book, <a href="http://issuu.com/toniocazin/docs/boulange" target="_blank">Boulange</a> with Antoine Cazin)</div>
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-44256242398455247382014-06-29T05:37:00.001-07:002014-06-29T05:37:57.975-07:00Boulangerie Les Copains Part II, Normandy, France<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Once <a href="http://devourblog.blogspot.fr/2014/06/boulangerie-les-copains-normandy-france.html" target="_blank">we had settled in</a> to Boulangerie Les Copains, it came time to bake bread. The philosophy of the Boulangerie rests on timeworn traditions in French bread making: the day starts at four o'clock in the morning, when the oven is fed dry logs. Once the bottom chamber is full and roaring with flames, a metal contraption called <i><a href="http://www.boulangerie.net/forums/bnweb/dt/touslesfours.php" target="_blank">un gueulard</a></i> (a "screamer") directs the fire from the bottom chamber into the mouth of the oven, heating it to around 250°C (~500°F). Every drop of morning dew is chased out of the baking room and, once the temperature drops to a reasonable 200°C (~400°F), the bread is ready for the heat.<br />
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Most commercial bread nowadays, even in Paris, is made with machines and industrial ingredients-- standardized flours with high gluten content for elasticity and regularity, and yeast for quick rising and increased yields. One other method, a much older one, uses <i>levain</i> to help the dough rise. A natural leavening agent, <i>levain</i> is the by-product of water and flour. When left overnight, the mixture attracts bacteria which slowly eat away at the sugars in the dough, triggering fermentation and releasing carbon dioxide in the process. The end product is a marshmallow-like puff that smells faintly of alcohol and vinegar.<br />
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One handful of <i>levain</i> is all that is needed for a "small" 20-30 kilo batch of dough. The rest is flour, water, and several pinches of grey sea salt (Brittany, a region famous for its salt flats, is nearby). Flour here can be white, <i>complet </i>(whole wheat, with bran), <i>demi-complet</i> (half-wheat), <i>cinq céréales</i> (five-grain), <i>épautres </i>(spelt), or <i><a href="http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engrain" target="_blank">petites épautres</a></i> (Einkorn wheat, an ancient grain cultivated in 7500 BC in Mesopotamia and Anatolia).<br />
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Each <i>enfournement</i>, loading of the oven, handles between 60 and 80 kilos of dough which are kneaded and shaped into <i>baguettes</i> and various <i>pains de campagne</i> (country breads). Shaping bread by hand is a learned skill: move too quickly and the dough will break, but move too slowly and it will stick. The ideal shape has considerable surface tension and a <i>clé</i>, or key, which acts as a seam to keep it all together. The bakers at the Boulangerie -- Seth, Erik, Thierry, and Manu -- are experts in not only the science of bread making, but the subtlety of its art as well.<br />
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<i>Défournement</i>, or de-ovening, comes next. It is intimidating. Peering into the mouth of a wood-burning oven is not an instinctual behavior. Neither is using a long wooden stick (<i>une pelle</i>) to fish out heavy, piping hot loaves of bread. Things crackle and hiss. Beads of sweat form on your brow. The flames advance, turning each loaf from <i>cuit</i> (cooked) to <i>brûlé</i> (burned) in a matter of moments. And if (when) a baguette rolls off <i>la pelle </i>and onto the ground below you, you will curse.<br />
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Five hours and two <i>défournements</i> later, the sun is shining. Golden loaves of bread look beautiful in the morning light.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIh19v7UUoB9stCtR9rxBIv_SEdCILlQc7vHqte5c-oO4fv2jh0kiATyqcZ-VggbolQftyW5nsplixI7bfPJxReIqGZZkkJRP5H5RmTxOH42fg2paX6wVuMrPyl2m_bCenlFVx3F_7UFY/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_pain_demi_complet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIh19v7UUoB9stCtR9rxBIv_SEdCILlQc7vHqte5c-oO4fv2jh0kiATyqcZ-VggbolQftyW5nsplixI7bfPJxReIqGZZkkJRP5H5RmTxOH42fg2paX6wVuMrPyl2m_bCenlFVx3F_7UFY/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_pain_demi_complet.jpg" height="428" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxGQI96AHZXM2hR8c_K1AlfR6QnuyMaJ8vbJCi3Rf5g-TsRp5EaPJXhI6rjKXPYjL6RIZlV8AUCXEuMQCxLilqqB2pUeweBy8ih-GXjX44I4DK-CYkKcRVSM181IRY0sfw117PuRe8bPc/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_basket2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxGQI96AHZXM2hR8c_K1AlfR6QnuyMaJ8vbJCi3Rf5g-TsRp5EaPJXhI6rjKXPYjL6RIZlV8AUCXEuMQCxLilqqB2pUeweBy8ih-GXjX44I4DK-CYkKcRVSM181IRY0sfw117PuRe8bPc/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_basket2.jpg" height="324" width="640" /></a></div>
And as the first shift comes to an end, each bread box is packed and prepared for delivery. Here, in the village of Saint-Auban-sur-Algot, bread making is a community affair. And so as warm loaves depart, other local wares enter: goat cheese, apple cider, baskets of cherries and bouquets of radishes. Lunch begins at half past one and although we are tired, it's easy to say that we're quite satisfied. <i>C'est une belle journée</i>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyy2Id8k6T9jga38-g7Y2iQ8Bd3yky-rD8lMcKyfPDLFYDDnGrE7zP30V30PXglph4dz61fCMKkJX0_onxAnWgoBy2exJoVLdqwsUKArpnN7TBED2EZDMKujPE_Wr9U3HESws5Oac6sPI/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_sheet_farm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyy2Id8k6T9jga38-g7Y2iQ8Bd3yky-rD8lMcKyfPDLFYDDnGrE7zP30V30PXglph4dz61fCMKkJX0_onxAnWgoBy2exJoVLdqwsUKArpnN7TBED2EZDMKujPE_Wr9U3HESws5Oac6sPI/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_sheet_farm.jpg" height="640" width="428" /></a></div>
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<i>Thank you to the </i>boulangers<i> Erik, Seth, Manu, and Thierry for their extensive knowledge in bread baking that helped inform this post.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/" target="_blank">Boulangerie Les Copains</a> (and their book, <a href="http://issuu.com/toniocazin/docs/boulange" target="_blank">Boulange</a> with Antoine Cazin)</div>
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Sales occur at the marches listed <a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/?page_id=25" target="_blank">here</a></div>
</div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-65568953394105465642014-06-24T10:35:00.002-07:002014-06-26T07:21:36.586-07:00Boulangerie Les Copains Part I, Normandy, France<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It's 8am on a Wednesday and a bird is singing outside my window. My roommate is an old friend from college and she's barely awake. There's a half melted candle next to my bed, which consists of a mattress, on a wooden crate, on the floor. The sun has been up for hours and I'm already late for work.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1k-Bt-isRvAu3hSW4ImZjQ4vMzXHv7WhxN0pw3Ct0FJBaeTP0GmJN_C41bMzX5_KeAJr-uOWS5vm7XhH1C5UP7Tf0bb7ILdANyAYBY3n14xMzKlRYaT-MjXCO6Q74dPEUfBxEUVTc5dg/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1k-Bt-isRvAu3hSW4ImZjQ4vMzXHv7WhxN0pw3Ct0FJBaeTP0GmJN_C41bMzX5_KeAJr-uOWS5vm7XhH1C5UP7Tf0bb7ILdANyAYBY3n14xMzKlRYaT-MjXCO6Q74dPEUfBxEUVTc5dg/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_2.jpg" height="308" width="640" /></a></div>
Several months ago my friend Deepa told me about an organization called <a href="http://www.wwoof.net/" target="_blank">World Wide Opportunities for Organic Farms</a>, or WWOOF for short. Her description was as follows: you choose an organic farm somewhere in the world, e-mail them and ask to stay for two to four weeks, and then travel there and lend a hand in exchange for room and board. It's a system that falls exactly in line with the type of barter economy organic farms often create.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq7BwnObRsiNJLKLCwIgJePjvyMEXwwsD5PMxHR6aEf5UlL3wPRfgrICag91FEGzaid0iPgj8Z57vAhRaQIGwl-UbkH35Sm12bbfWx0N9TrAX9v4amEfqyanBJ6XhRUYtO_g6vBTOxsZ0/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_chat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq7BwnObRsiNJLKLCwIgJePjvyMEXwwsD5PMxHR6aEf5UlL3wPRfgrICag91FEGzaid0iPgj8Z57vAhRaQIGwl-UbkH35Sm12bbfWx0N9TrAX9v4amEfqyanBJ6XhRUYtO_g6vBTOxsZ0/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_chat.jpg" height="402" width="640" /></a></div>
I have, for years, dreamed of living the idyllic country life. Fresh air, good food, living off mother earth. All the phrases that would make a Whole Foods executive proud. The only issue is that, when faced with the opportunity (a World Wide Opportunity), all I could think about was the reality I had seen in Jordan and Egypt, Florida and California. Farming is hard work.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKEnKRd7Ntg9InPNzyEc3dXuxCWCAkJaWuL1IqBPrOrCY0mQ4QcFm8aSnSO-hVN1K156NomrxTi50EFaghNCX678KxXYgfzM3da8SXZtbn2Ec_VteQdjuakdaQYlg_s5Jmg2dJs60ZtMM/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKEnKRd7Ntg9InPNzyEc3dXuxCWCAkJaWuL1IqBPrOrCY0mQ4QcFm8aSnSO-hVN1K156NomrxTi50EFaghNCX678KxXYgfzM3da8SXZtbn2Ec_VteQdjuakdaQYlg_s5Jmg2dJs60ZtMM/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_5.jpg" height="428" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRBP0torANzONLM0dGguZmzHxGymqBtINiVlL7WJT0S8txoLlgUXCXptMjW0mRcBm-Z_M5tzKnruBRhI3Asg41q8mzYDhWUtmWoVEplkhPUz7dsEicGiyzhCR8g2EL9LETWxPRdAfTs8g/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_dejeuner_lunch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRBP0torANzONLM0dGguZmzHxGymqBtINiVlL7WJT0S8txoLlgUXCXptMjW0mRcBm-Z_M5tzKnruBRhI3Asg41q8mzYDhWUtmWoVEplkhPUz7dsEicGiyzhCR8g2EL9LETWxPRdAfTs8g/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_dejeuner_lunch.jpg" height="378" width="640" /></a></div>
But a few weeks later I received an e-mail from Deepa. She had registered for a WWOOF brochure and found a farm in Normandy, France that specializes in organic bread baking. <a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/" target="_blank">Boulangerie Les Copains</a>, or "The bakery of friends" (<i>pain</i> also means bread). The Boulangerie is run as a co-op between four members who have dedicated their lives to organic flour, whole grains, and a wood-burning oven. And it was in this bakery that I awoke Wednesday morning.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl-jN2YNJcbo4CfPKxQOPotR8KV-PRNDpi7ytq6O-3wcaH5givRW-BBWvaDz1hpPM1Rg82I8VIfWVtoApOyDAsy3Eejc3Vi_kGh6hbnt5FGGKeq2vG9oNHnnizy93DqgnNdfCuIWen3lE/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl-jN2YNJcbo4CfPKxQOPotR8KV-PRNDpi7ytq6O-3wcaH5givRW-BBWvaDz1hpPM1Rg82I8VIfWVtoApOyDAsy3Eejc3Vi_kGh6hbnt5FGGKeq2vG9oNHnnizy93DqgnNdfCuIWen3lE/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_4.jpg" height="640" width="428" /></a></div>
A French pastry chef once told me that the kitchen attracts different species of humans. The spic-and-span pâtissiers, the burly butchers, the army of cooks. The bakers, he said, were an elusive breed, waking up long before the sun and toiling away in a hot oven, only to disappear just as everyone else began their day. When Deepa and I woke up at 8am, we had already missed the first shift of bread baking.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQwTHiYL5EFFFi0GRtQ15fCdp1Ty6epM6FsYPCjz_iuni2R6_KbWIu3fmNwdXEP1cveXPmOhs56s8r9lTBBaaPz5bBXbyQvap5XOki2T2DbbUhYIGlypfLdDQk8o74prUChKVtBnRKiOg/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQwTHiYL5EFFFi0GRtQ15fCdp1Ty6epM6FsYPCjz_iuni2R6_KbWIu3fmNwdXEP1cveXPmOhs56s8r9lTBBaaPz5bBXbyQvap5XOki2T2DbbUhYIGlypfLdDQk8o74prUChKVtBnRKiOg/s1600/Boulangerie_Les_Copains_1.jpg" height="428" width="640" /></a><br />
But unlike city bakeries, the Boulangerie runs all day, six days a week. So we crawled out of the treehouse (I didn't mention-- we live in a tree house) and followed the scent of fresh bread across a field of cherry trees, past a horse and a donkey, and through a pebbled courtyard to the <i>fournil</i> (baking room). And there, we waited to make bread.<br />
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
<a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/" target="_blank">Boulangerie Les Copains</a> (and their book, <a href="http://issuu.com/toniocazin/docs/boulange" target="_blank">Boulange</a> with Antoine Cazin)</div>
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Sales occur at the marches listed <a href="http://www.boulangerielescopains.fr/?page_id=25" target="_blank">here</a></div>
</div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-90655158849946836542014-04-26T11:20:00.000-07:002014-04-26T11:28:01.912-07:00Intelligentsia Coffee, Los Angeles<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEr3ElMFiBKy2WHdx2tITivCeObcMJXFHaOBpz6hh_z7mjPRTCHRjH2_6b8nA6QNYQDFpac5vek-1GmRR-zMMHINyzXReanNOMtX3iiOgrvND2Lo-2dlc70WY9up_fkweiCkotK7-LngA/s1600/Intelligentsia_LA_-imp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEr3ElMFiBKy2WHdx2tITivCeObcMJXFHaOBpz6hh_z7mjPRTCHRjH2_6b8nA6QNYQDFpac5vek-1GmRR-zMMHINyzXReanNOMtX3iiOgrvND2Lo-2dlc70WY9up_fkweiCkotK7-LngA/s1600/Intelligentsia_LA_-imp.jpg" height="640" width="450" /></a></div>
I love coffee shops, so much. Sometimes I try to imagine what the world was like before they existed. What did all the 20-somethings with facial hair and/or exercise pants do before then? If my adolescence in Florida is any indication, maybe they hung out in mall parking lots, blasted music from their Acura's, and memorized lyrics to Eminem songs. Or maybe they just went to bars. Maybe they still do.<br />
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It might be best for me to stop guessing at what hip 20-somethings do with their free time and instead focus on what I do know: good coffee in LA. I mean really good coffee. I'm sure it's good not only because it tastes like what I imagine good coffee should taste like, but also because of its name: <i>Single Origin Black Cat Organic Macchiato</i>. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXnsa_vemJSA2dbsflW-FJYN86ce6LghBtKDpL-ppFtksYUyas6gG1qxgozUa2XhV63-y4qYT_mZ_8plp6-KD4rK6VXfGxNrOw_V85XQgh3IeUSswWcTkPeNxoZ_w6Mrt5kE8HowozBV8/s1600/Intelligentsia_LA_foam_art-imp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXnsa_vemJSA2dbsflW-FJYN86ce6LghBtKDpL-ppFtksYUyas6gG1qxgozUa2XhV63-y4qYT_mZ_8plp6-KD4rK6VXfGxNrOw_V85XQgh3IeUSswWcTkPeNxoZ_w6Mrt5kE8HowozBV8/s1600/Intelligentsia_LA_foam_art-imp.jpg" height="404" width="640" /></a></div>
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I've spent some time trying to understand what single origin black cat organic means, but I've got nothing for you. I was too embarrassed to ask at the register, and I also got distracted by the bars of dark chocolate wrapped up in brown paper packages. <br />
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Walking into <a href="http://www.intelligentsiacoffee.com/" target="_blank">Intelligentsia</a> in LA is like walking into a foamy cloud of counter-culture (pun intended) just before it rains thick drops of tiger-striped espresso all around you. The air is humid with coffee-shop-smells and sounds, the clinking of ceramic cups against steel milk frothers and slotted metal trays. There is a distinct difference between walking into Intelligentsia and your typical strip-mall coffee chain.<br />
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It's not clear where that difference comes from. It might be the fact that they work with their coffee growers <a href="http://www.intelligentsiacoffee.com/content/history" target="_blank">365 days a year</a> to cultivate the highest quality beans and ensure high payment standards. It might be that the coffee bar operates like a small-scale factory, with an interior so clean and efficient it might as well be run by German engineers. Or it might be the tongue-in-cheek humor that is so funny I couldn't understand it.<br />
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But, in sincerity, this place is special. It is unique in the truest sense of the word, because it reflects exactly the path it took to get here from 1995. From San Francisco to Chicago, eventually to New York and LA. With the salt-of-the-earth stability of the Midwest and the fluctuating artistry of the West Coast. It is itself, and nothing else, and if you don't get it at least you feel it. And you'll certainly taste it in their coffee.<br />
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<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://www.intelligentsiacoffee.com/" target="_blank">Intelligentsia</a><br />
1331 Abbot Kinney Blvd.<br />
<div>
Venice, California 90291<br />
+1 310.399.1233<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-85803503578494701962014-03-28T12:15:00.000-07:002014-03-28T12:21:27.708-07:00Big Sur Bakery, California Coast<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Three people, in one car, driving down the California coast. It's Big Sur, and the town of Carmel where Clint Eastwood once was mayor, sometime in the 1980's. This isn't the SoCal of Orange County and Hollywood, its glamour lies in the height of its seaside cliffs and the ostentation of its redwood trees.<br />
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We arrived at <a href="http://www.bigsurbakery.com/" target="_blank">Big Sur Bakery</a> at 11am, just in time for a lazy Thursday breakfast. The much-anticipated pancake griddle was off for the morning (sorry, weekends only) so instead we had to settle for hearty sandwiches made on bread baked in heaven, with chips thin and crispy that bent under the weight of the spices heaped upon them and that colored our fingers orange and red.<br />
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It seems a quaint coincidence that we three friends sat in this bakery started by three friends of its own: Michelle Rizzolo, a (Four) Season-ed pastry chef; Philip Wojtowicz, her husband and Kitchen-King chef; and waiter, bird watcher, host, and musician Mike Gilson. I imagined every corner of the bakery-restaurant to be a reflection of their partnership, from the espresso mirror menu to the hastily-written pastry placards to the piles of recipe books for sale, stacked high against the wall and just out of reach of crumbly-buttery hands.<br />
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As for the bakery customer triumvirate, we sat in anticipation of the grub that would soon be placed before us. We were hungry, despite the chocolate hazelnut almond bark and apples that had kept us busy on the drive up highway one. We fluttered between the table and the counter, ordering more drinks and debating the benefits of a macadamia chocolate cookie. Our temptation to consume every item in the pastry case was forestalled only by our intentions to complete an exercise in physical exertion ("hiking") later in the day.<br />
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Luckily, we demonstrated self-control. But that exercise of will power would be our only exercise for the next several hours: shortly after we set off from Big Sur Bakery, our stomachs full and our minds at ease, we were found napping by the ocean as its foamy roars lulled us to a post-breakfast sleep.<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
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<span id="goog_1741519159"></span><a href="http://www.bigsurbakery.com/menus/" target="_blank">big sur bakery + restaurant</a><span id="goog_1741519160"></span></div>
highway one big sur, CA 93920<br />
+1 831.667.0520<br />
<i>“no phony allergies, bogus intolerances, nutritional nonsense, or provincial preferences”</i></div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-91458775257135982082014-02-06T20:26:00.000-08:002014-02-06T20:42:19.605-08:00Focaccia from Dima Sharif<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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When I first arrived in Jordan, I knew almost no one. I was there to work with farmers and learn about the land-- it was an independent research project best done independently. I would come back home with jars of <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sarah-dajani/sun-dried-tomatoes_b_2829106.html" target="_blank">sundried tomatoes</a> and bundles of fresh rosemary and thyme and sit in the kitchen, sniffing each ingredient and smiling in satisfaction. I would spend afternoons toasting fresh <i>taboon</i> bread on my gas stovetop, listening as it crackled at me from the atop an open flame. My evenings were held in the company of <i>za'atar</i>, a soothing mixture of sesame and thyme, which swam in pools of liquid green olive oil.<br />
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Being with my farmland loot was magical. But after three months of alone time in the kitchen, I decided it was time to get some friends.<br />
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So I set about meeting people in the best way I knew how: through food. I contacted my friend <a href="http://www.dimasharif.com/" target="_blank">Chef Dima</a> who told me about a recipe for focaccia that included tomatoes and herbs and olive oil. But she warned me that it was temperamental. Bread making, like friend-making, is a sensitive endeavor-- it requires patience, and above all time. But the process is beautiful.<br />
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First, you make the sponge from yeast, flour, and warm water. The measurements are precise, and the temperatures must be controlled. Then, you leave the sponge to ferment overnight. Patience is critical. In the morning, you add 3-4 cups of flour. The exact amount requires intuition—the dough must be malleable, yet hold together. It must be moist, but not stick to the countertop. As it is kneaded, the bread speaks to you and you must listen well. If it breaks, then water is needed. If it melts, then flour is required. But if you get it right, the bread will sing. It will puff up and roll around happily. It will smell of yeast and stretch to your movements. But soon you have to place it back in its bowl and allow it to rest. Patience once more, this time for one hour until it doubles in volume. The process is repeated and then the bread is stretched out, with gentle encouragement, and placed in a piping hot oven where it takes on a golden crown and after ten minutes emerges, triumphant.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJVdL1ahTajHfFZO7cLooPQOEcueT4HYpOshzC104ve2HPxfKWtOQSKpcJJ1w_LBgic4d7_ytF1RF0PMelss3JPiUSnzgpRWq3FcHi2IoEVY2p9hdrSEOnQpT2oN9s9zqP02UIdW5jFXk/s1600/Focaccia_Dima_Sharif_sponge-imp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJVdL1ahTajHfFZO7cLooPQOEcueT4HYpOshzC104ve2HPxfKWtOQSKpcJJ1w_LBgic4d7_ytF1RF0PMelss3JPiUSnzgpRWq3FcHi2IoEVY2p9hdrSEOnQpT2oN9s9zqP02UIdW5jFXk/s1600/Focaccia_Dima_Sharif_sponge-imp.jpg" height="428" width="640" /></a><br />
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My kitchen smelled amazing. And as tempted as I was to sit in it and soak up the coziness of its doughy, humid warmth, I packed up the focaccia and ventured out into Amman. It was time to finally break bread.</div>
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<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
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For the full focaccia recipe, visit Chef Dima's page <a href="http://www.dimasharif.com/2011/09/mediterranean-focaccia-with-rolled.html" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-36493976392121913452014-01-02T19:09:00.002-08:002014-01-02T19:13:34.434-08:00Holidays in Helsinki, Finland<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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From the moment we got off the train in Helsinki it was dark. Dark and cold. But this Scandinavian country once ruled by the Swedes and the Russians has very little to do with either. At least, as far as I can tell. Russia seems to be as massive and old as India, and as diverse as well. And all my knowledge of Sweden derives from <a href="http://search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0oG7lq8wMVSR1gAsCpXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTBybnZlZnRlBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA2FjMgR2dGlkAw--/SIG=11lnj4e5h/EXP=1388720444/**http%3a//www.dragontattoo.com/site/" target="_blank">The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo</a>, which features the culinary stylings of boxed pizzas, sandwiches, and coffee... so there's that.<br />
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Having established myself as a cultural specialist, allow me to explain what Finland seems to be to me. In one word: design. Think ice, sleek and shiny like steel. Snowflakes, each one perfectly unique in its crystalline lattice. And darkness, the absorption of all light and the undying fashion statement of "artists" around the globe.<br />
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To examine the design habitat, let us venture into the holiday market ecosystem, a series of adorable wooden stands strung with simple white lights and peddling weather-appropriate wares to all passersby. Notice the symmetry, the precision of placement. Notice the colors, the contrasts and complements. But mostly, and most of all: notice the food.<br />
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Large, thick tranches of salmon are nailed to fragrant wood planks (usually alder, juniper, or apple wood) and set around a blazing fire until they transform from rose to amber to burnt orange, flecked with black.<br />
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<a href="http://www.freshfromfinland.com/elements/fish.php" target="_blank">Other fish</a>-- zander, whitefish, Baltic herring-- are steamed, barbequed and pickled and piled up in great big slippery heaps, dipped in sour cream or smothered in dill and lemon and onions and served on slices of dark bread. Have you ever held in your hands a piece of hearty Finnish bread, smeared with sauce and layered delicately with briny morsels of herring? You would remember if you did, because it is a work of art.<br />
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Then there are the sausages, smoked until charred and placed upon a bed of cabbage swimming happily in whole grains of mustard and the ubiquitous mayonnaise. You'll be reminded of Berlin, which has developed its own reputation for design as well.<br />
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Next we have sweets, candies of all sorts. Simple exteriors hide surprising interiors with the Finnish snowballs, sugar balls filled with a tart cranberry jam. Gingerbread, perfectly spiced, is shaped into trees and people and sleds, wrapped in clear plastic and done up in ribbons. Squares of fudge are stacked like Lego blocks, inviting sweet tooths everywhere to sink in with one luxurious bite.<br />
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A harmony prevails, as one stop at a fish stand leads seamlessly to another for mulled wine, ending finally with spiced bread and candy canes (and honeycakes and plum jam and liquorice and more Finnish snowballs...).<br />
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And so we exit our holiday market ecosystem, this habitat for design, and continue on our way in Finland, stomachs as satiated as our eyes and uplifted, for a moment, by the festivity of Finnish design.<br />
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<i>All photos for this post provided by design aficionado Mickey Du. For more of Mickey's work, follow him on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/mickey.du" target="_blank">Facebook</a> or <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/mickeydu" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>. </i></div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-79809089457610783822013-12-28T10:50:00.000-08:002013-12-28T12:23:02.560-08:00Café Pushkin, Moscow<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3YP4cXpuskMNioOpqaldQmUVf8jwZV0JTYpUrO5YlsnoOBIXqfwnQQMt1tgRdZGMPJ8yl6mpn7Vd20-jASd88RyXc-OD2enbWx74P3BmwnHKIwDk-URfllKePI5QqXf_lUa8MMmut9rc/s1600/Cafe_Pushkin_Moscow_soup.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3YP4cXpuskMNioOpqaldQmUVf8jwZV0JTYpUrO5YlsnoOBIXqfwnQQMt1tgRdZGMPJ8yl6mpn7Vd20-jASd88RyXc-OD2enbWx74P3BmwnHKIwDk-URfllKePI5QqXf_lUa8MMmut9rc/s640/Cafe_Pushkin_Moscow_soup.jpg" width="428" /></a></div>
A few days before getting on a plane from San Francisco to Moscow, my father asked me if I was excited to go. I answered no. "No? Why not?!" he asked. A little while later my roommate asked me the same question: "Excited?" Her smile of anticipation disappeared the moment I replied, flatly, no. On the 5am car ride to the airport my friend from business school and her generous boyfriend who had volunteered to act as airport shuttle asked me again. When my reply came, the gravity of the silence that followed felt like the death knoll of anticipation. Why had I become <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVUlGuQD4Io" target="_blank">Debbie Downer</a>, travel edition? <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuFXIpdKbshP104N8-0RKLaIMd3gEY6DA5quDH_iIqQoTHhh3GwauDaLuZaIqx7b7wJJsIyJFrs1eAMYoobMWvyR1rplrwHmk9Yp-qs-p6NYm4EFxpiMCeChGZHfUEwlkO4Fhj4kTx5gg/s1600/Cafe_Pushkin_Moscow_macarons.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="428" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuFXIpdKbshP104N8-0RKLaIMd3gEY6DA5quDH_iIqQoTHhh3GwauDaLuZaIqx7b7wJJsIyJFrs1eAMYoobMWvyR1rplrwHmk9Yp-qs-p6NYm4EFxpiMCeChGZHfUEwlkO4Fhj4kTx5gg/s640/Cafe_Pushkin_Moscow_macarons.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
I have considered several explanations. Explanation #1: I caught <i>ennui </i>in Paris. That pervasive <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/french-culture-bleak-chic-2013-12" target="_blank">French miserabilism</a>, that passivity that turns <i>joie de vivre</i> into Sartre-sized* existentialist crises. Why be excited about traveling? Aren't we all going to die anyway, in fulfillment of our meaningless existences?<br />
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Explanation #2: I was living in "the present." My lack of anticipation for future events stemmed from a vigorous and pervasive sense of in-the-moment-ness. My fixation on the now, on the phone I held in my hand, on the apartment that surrounded me, on the car in which I rode, eliminated any fixation on the future. In other words, I had reached enlightenment.<br />
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Explanation #3: Moscow is cold. And I'm afraid of the cold.<br />
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<img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuSOqsCIraGS1eq6knqZ2-sWCWDCCQWa62GKniQGvvlzXESHJn35zl4KdUDv0UKVjS1xlgYaEgXu-1niko9BGbHoGrA0aA5CT2Mq-2Rrb_Q3TOy7VgPzQtuZ_VA8BvcNeJH2aTHSEA5HM/s640/Cafe_Pushkin_Moscow_christmast_tree.jpg" width="428" /> </div>
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Now let's leave all that aside (we'll return later) and move on to the food. The food in <a href="http://cafe-pushkin.ru/en/" target="_blank">Café Pushkin</a> to be precise, a place known to delight Moscowite tourists from around the globe with its stylized Russian cuisine and distinctly French ambiance.<br />
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We arrived in full view of one of Moscow's most precious wintertime scenes: snowy streets with strings of white ornaments, the darkness of frosty, short days punctuated by the glitter of frozen light. Our hands were cold and our noses red, and so Café Pushkin greeted us, eager travelers, with the simple warmth of a dining table and good food.<br />
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The authenticity of Café Pushkin as a Russian dining experience has been contested by many, including my Russian dining companion who explained that Russia does not exactly have a "foodie" culture. Café Pushkin, in fact, was not created by a Russian chef, has no roots in czarist Russia, and was never frequented by the poet who shares its namesake [Pushkin]. Instead, it was born from a song.<br />
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As <a href="http://cafe-pushkin.ru/en/" target="_blank">the story goes</a>, in the 1960s a French singer by the name of Gilbert Bécaud sang a song about his love in Russia, and their time together at a fictional Café Pushkin. Confused tourists searched Moscow for the non-existent café until 1999 when, at long last, they found it. Andrey Dellos, a French restauranteur, had decided to turn Café Pushkin into a reality and, in a bizarre story of creation, invited Bécaud to attend the opening, where he once again sang of the café and of his love, <a href="http://search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0oG7m15Gb9SGAoAvmhXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzdmZuYXNiBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA2FjMgR2dGlkA1NNRTM0Nl8x/SIG=120p4f3gc/EXP=1388284409/**http%3a//www.youtube.com/watch%3fv=TilQ8BIHisw" target="_blank">Nathalie</a>.<br />
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I'm not sure where I stand on authenticity and food, but something has to be said for eating in a place born from a song. And if Bécaud's expression while singing of Nathalie is any indication, his love for Russia, and for his Café Pushkin, is entirely authentic. <br />
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And so now we return to my pre-trip expressions of ambivalence. Were they fueled by <i>ennui</i>? By present thinking? By a fear of frostbite? Or maybe something else? I prefer not to know.<br />
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All I can tell you is that on a day so cold it reached -14°C, I took refuge in a French café in Moscow and enjoyed a meal and conversation so engaging I forgot for a moment about the past, I forgot about the future, and was happily, forever, stuck in the present. <br />
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<i><span style="font-size: small;">Thank you to Masha, Nir, Dianne, and Javier for a wonderful trip. </span></i><br />
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<br />
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://cafe-pushkin.ru/en/" target="_blank">Cafe Pushkin</a><br />
Tverskoy bulvar 26A<br />
Moscow, 103009<br />
+7 (495) 739-00-33<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">*Actually, Sartre was only 1.53 meters, or just over 5
feet tall. No wonder no one used "Sartre-sized" to describe an
existentialist crisis before. I had hoped I was starting a trend.</span></div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-51131779423595461472013-12-06T23:57:00.000-08:002013-12-07T00:31:48.578-08:00Tart Shells of Perfection, in Palo Alto<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The search for perfection is a daunting task. It is something that stirs up deep emotions that a body at rest need not attend to. Why worry about going to the gym when you'll be bundled up in thick-knit sweaters all winter? Why read every word of a news article when only the first three sentences matter? Why make endless tart crusts when the first try was good enough?<br />
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Why? Why? Why? It doesn't matter, does it? The search for perfection requires that we relinquish things we would prefer not to. Like time, mostly. Or energy. Or variety. I just watched <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1772925/" target="_blank">Jiro Dreams of Sushi</a>, a documentary paying tribute to the 85-year-old sushi perfectionist Jiro Ono. For every day of his life for the past 75 years (he began when he was about nine years old) Jiro has made sushi. Ten minutes of the film are spent comparing a meal prepared by Jiro to the movements of a classical symphony.<br />
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It is possible that we rarely spend enough time on one thing to understand it completely. Consider, if you will, a tart crust. Butter, flour, sugar, salt, and egg. Cubed, stirred, scraped, chilled, rolled, and shaped. The steps are simple, but the results vary widely. Sometimes, when I'm working with tart dough, I feel as though I have no control over the outcome.<br />
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Some days the dough will tear, splintering at the edges with each stroke of the rolling pin. Other days it will stubbornly cling to whatever it can-- the counter top, the plastic wrap, my hands. And certain days it will be pleasantly compliant, easing into the tart ring and forming to its curves ever so delicately. But then, once in the oven, it rebels, shrinking away from the rim and seeping out from the bottom.<br />
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I wish I understood my tart shells.<br />
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So I ask myself: what if I became the Jiro of tart shells? What if they one day made a movie about me and called it Sarah Dreams of Tart Shells? Think of yourself-- Sunita Dreams of Chocolate or Bob Dreams of Sports Cars or Anny Dreams of Flowers. Imagine getting to know something so well you understood it as if it were a living being, that it became a part of you. Imagine if, through knowing it, you could know perfection. I wonder what you would find out.<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-21844911073924660402013-11-23T23:06:00.000-08:002013-11-23T23:23:11.741-08:00Le Bonbon au Palais, Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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One summer day in Paris I stood on a street corner waiting to meet my friend Sarah. She was late, and I busied myself by watching the cars drive by. When she finally arrived, she held out her hand and gave me a piece of candy. "I'm sorry I'm late," she said, "but just taste this." The wrapper was egg-yolk yellow and read <i>madeleines</i>, a cake-y cookie made famous in France, and particularly in the town of Commercy.<br />
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I peeled away the wrapper and found a hard candy inside. I wrinkled my nose and peered up at Sarah. I was not in the mood for a sickly sweet rock of a bonbon. She sighed, fatigued by my intransigence, and gave me a look that said I had better try it. I popped the golden nugget into my mouth and then took a bite.<br />
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I tasted, first, sugar. No, not sugar, caramel. Not caramel, no, but something buttery. Something sweet and buttery. But there was a granularity to it, something crumbly. I took a deep breath and all of a sudden I was in a bakery, the scent of <i>madeleines </i>engulfing me, whispers of vanilla dancing all around me. I was a million miles away, suspended in a daydream of of pure happiness.<br />
<br />
And then I was back on the street corner, staring at Sarah.<br />
<br />
"I know." She said, smiling. "Let me take you to <a href="http://www.bonbonsaupalais.fr/" target="_blank">Le Bonbon au Palais</a>. You need to meet Georges."<br />
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When Georges was only eight years old, he dreamed of owning a candy store. Born into a humble background, he was keenly aware of the simple pleasure afforded by a piece of candy. One day, he received a present of five francs from his uncle, who gave him permission to spend it as he pleased. Georges bought 500 pieces of candy (which were at the time only one centime each) and shared them with his brothers and sisters. As they feasted on the sweets before them, Georges looked up at his mother and promised her: "When I grow up I'm going to have the most beautiful candy shop in the world."<br />
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Many years later, Le Bonbon au Palais sits at 19 rue Monge in Paris's Latin Quarter, an homage to the artistry of candy making in France. Georges opened his store six years ago, after a long career in luxury restaurant management and many months of research in the candy-making villages of France.<br />
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France has more than 200 registered artisans who have dedicated their lives to making poetry out of sugar. Georges has visited most of them, and selected 70 of them to showcase in his Paris boutique. There are the calissons de Saint-Rémy de Provence, crystallized squares of sugared almonds, cooked and ground into a delicately perfumed paste. There is <a href="http://www.cotemaison.fr/recettes-de-cuisine/gourmandises/diaporama/un-petit-tour-de-france-des-confiseries_14310.html?p=10#diaporama" target="_blank">la tomme de Savoie</a>, which resembles a mini-version of its namesake, a well-known cheese, but is in fact a sugar-dusted dark chocolate ganache surrounding a brilliant wild blueberry <i>coulis</i>. There are sugared violets, rose petals, and mint leaves; clementines <i>confites</i>, soaked in sugar syrup for weeks on end; and les coussins de Lyon, shaped like silk cushions and made of cocoa, blanched almonds, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cura%C3%A7ao_(liqueur)" target="_blank">curaçao liqueur</a>.<br />
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Georges takes pride in his store. Many of the sweets, such as the papalines d'Avignon, cannot be found outside of their regions-- except at Le Bonbon au Palais. (In the case of the papalines, the <i>confrerie</i>, or brotherhood, of candymakers in Avignon debated for weeks until conferring upon George the honor of distributing their bonbons outside the village.)<br />
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As you may have guessed, Sarah did take me to visit Georges. I tried more <i>madeleines</i>, and marshmallows, and licorice, and the nutty-chocolate-y mehnirs de Bretagne. I spent an hour in the petite boutique, and as soon as I left I wondered when I could return again.<br />
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Just after opening his store, before he had a chance to tell her about it, Georges's mother came to Paris for a visit. He took her out on rue Monge and, as they walked down the street, Le Bonbon au Palais caught her eye. She peered through the glass, in awe of the treasures inside. Georges smiled at her admiration and discreetly pulled out his keys. As he opened the door, his eight-year-old self alive in his mind, he announced to his mother that he finally had the most beautiful candy shop in the world.<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://www.bonbonsaupalais.fr/" target="_blank">Le Bonbon au Palais</a><br />
19 Rue Monge<br />
<div>
75005 Paris, France<br />
+33 1 78 56 15 72<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-68564448503884142722013-10-20T21:47:00.000-07:002013-10-20T21:48:22.681-07:00Eden Rock, Antibes, South of France<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The setting was <a href="http://www.hotel-du-cap-eden-roc.com/fr/bienvenue/" target="_blank">l'Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc</a>, built in 1870 in a time when European aristocracy graced its halls and dined in its salons. I was there in 2013, now known as the Summer of Paradise because it was during this summer that I discovered a paradise.<br />
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The subtleties of a place can often be the source of its wonder. When a palm tree stands in an unremarkable place, it simply stands. When a palm tree stands in a place of wonder, it doesn't just stand, it towers. When the breeze blows it sways, its palm fronds dance. When night falls it acts as sentry, guarding the hushed quiet of the evening. And in the brilliance of the sun its scorched trunk displays a burst of green, the fireworks of an island paradise.<br />
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I'm still not sure why some places possess such wonder. A friend of mine once argued that it's never the place that's wonderful, it's the people that make it so. That might be true, but then I have trouble explaining why a place like this can be so moving when it's absolutely empty.<br />
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Luckily, brunch at Eden-Roc paired place with people. We sat outside on the patio, watching yachts float by. The activity gave me an appreciation for the immensity of the ocean. How large must a body of water be to make someone mistake a boat that fits 200 people for one that might fit 20?<br />
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But what swam below the surface of that ocean was of equal interest. Especially when encrusted in sea salt from Bretagne, baked in a cavernous oven for hours on end, and then freed from its briny home, tender and flaky and barely able to support itself on the tines of your fork.<br />
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When you're in a place like this, it seems like nothing else exists. For those two or three hours, the cogs of your mind slow to a crawl and everything that passes before your eyes comes into sharp focus. The gradients of pink in a shrimp, the delicateness of an egg shell, the symmetry of a melon. In a moment like this, your brain works to register more moments than it normally would, making life seem richer.<br />
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By the time the <i>choux à la crème</i> arrived at our table we had passed an afternoon enthralled in conversation punctuated by brief silences of enjoyment. For many of us, it had been the first time we met. And yet there had been no abruptness, no uneasy hesitations, no forced laughter. The ailments of hurried minds were absent.<br />
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I may never return to Eden-Roc. And so, for me, it will reside in my memory as a place where palm trees dance and the ocean holds the promise of paradise.<br />
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<a href="http://www.hotel-du-cap-eden-roc.com/fr/bienvenue/" target="_blank">l'Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc</a><br />
Boulevard JF Kennedy<br />
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Antibes, France<br />
Tel: +33 (0)4 93 61 39 01 | <a href="https://mail.google.com/mail/?view=cm&fs=1&tf=1&to=reservation@hdcer.com">reservation@hdcer.com</a></div>
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-87962199028131306202013-09-14T18:12:00.001-07:002013-09-14T18:25:37.921-07:00Gâteau Basque, Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The end of summer can trigger a brief sense of melancholy. It is almost involuntary, something inside us reacts badly when the sun begins to disappear earlier, like we're experiencing a loss. For years the reason was clear to me: it meant free time was finished and school time was about to begin. But into adulthood the feeling persists: the end of summer means the end of something.<br />
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This summer in Paris was a summer of picnics. The sun set at ten in the evening and a meal that began on the grass at seven could stretch on for hours until the first cool breeze of the night sent us off to bed. One picnic night, we sat on the banks of the Seine until eleven thirty. The stones lining the river were warm to the touch, having absorbed the heat of the day they acted like mini radiators, and kept us there out of sheer comfort.<br />
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Another evening we sat near Invalides on the large fields of grass facing the Quai d'Orsay. The <i>esplanade</i>, as it is called, was dotted with crowds drinking wine and tearing off pieces of bread and pairing them with wads of cheese. I brought a <a href="http://www.legateaubasque.com/la-recette-du-gateau-basque-traditionnel/" target="_blank">gâteau basque</a> I had baked and after we ate our dinner we sliced into the crumbly almond cake. The cherry jam inside bled into the pastry cream and as we each took a bite we sat there in silence, thinking of nothing.<br />
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I should explain that the days of my summer in Paris were not empty, not like the school days of summer vacation. An afternoon spent baking a gâteau basque would be followed by an eight o'clock morning class, meetings, errands and chores. Yet there was always time for pleasure. A moment or two devoted to enjoyment that broke the flow of daily life.<br />
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Perhaps the way to prolong the pleasure of summer is to simply never let it end. It may require some effort at first, but most things in life do. And if that effort brings me the pleasure of Paris long after summer's end, then it is certainly the right thing to do.<br />
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<i>To learn all you want about gâteau basque, visit Le musée de gateau basque <a href="http://www.legateaubasque.com/" target="_blank">here</a>.</i><br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-60818223626665040622013-09-08T07:24:00.002-07:002013-09-08T07:30:31.788-07:00Dinner at Anny's, Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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One Paris morning I woke up at a quarter past seven and took the 12 train in the direction of Mairie d'Issy. It was a normal morning in most ways, the metro car was full of sleepy-eyed Parisians folding back their newspapers and waking up to the sound of screeching brakes at each train stop. On my mind was the recipe for the day: chocolate ganache and orange cream tartelettes. A fine shell of buttery, crumbly pastry dough and a filling of unctuous fresh orange pastry cream, or a light chocolate center smothered in dark, lustrous ganache.<br />
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Although it was barely 8am I was already thinking about the dinner party I was invited to that evening. It would be in the 20th arrondissement on the eastern border of the périphérique at the temporary home of a girl named <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Anny</a>. I think I should tell you about how I met Anny.<br />
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When I first arrived in Jordan I was introduced to a group of Americans conducting research in the country. Anny was one of them, and the bits of information I learned about her early on were fascinating. Two years in the Peace Corps in Morocco, fluency in Berber and two Arabic dialects, born and raised in North Carolina, curly hair. But it wasn't until several months after our initial interaction that Anny and I really <i>met</i>. I was in the middle of a fragile emotional state known to most field researchers as... well... life, when I decided to pay Anny a visit. I had heard that her kitchen was a place of wonders, where <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2012/12/14/alf-ruman-wa-ruman-1-galland-manicotti/" target="_blank">rosewater and saffron made their way into pomegranate cr</a><a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2012/12/14/alf-ruman-wa-ruman-1-galland-manicotti/" target="_blank">ê</a><a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2012/12/14/alf-ruman-wa-ruman-1-galland-manicotti/" target="_blank">pes</a> and <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2013/07/28/summer-flatbreads-part-2-basil-ricotta-honey/" target="_blank">summer flatbreads were baked with ricotta and basil and drizzled with honey</a>.<br />
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It was in Anny's kitchen, over a cup of sage-honey tea, that I learned about the secret world of ancient Arabian recipes, of edible flowers with potent health benefits, and of the gourmand exploits of Shahrezad's imagined characters in the tales of <i>1,001 Nights</i>. That afternoon, the trivialities of my day faded away and my mind was reacquainted with the brilliance of enjoying a good meal in good company.<br />
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And now back to Paris, where at noon I finished delivering the completed tarts to Anny's house and went home to rest before dinner. We gathered at sunset and opened the meal with a plate of <i>comté fruité</i>, a semi-hard nutty cheese from the Jura region, topped with a citrus-chocolate ganache. The tartelettes had inspired a theme: gazpacho followed, drizzled with lemon juice. Then <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2012/09/03/gnocchi-bechamelevantine-sauce/" target="_blank">gnocchi</a> in a bechamel sauce, and lemon zest. <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/lemon-olive-chicken-redux-chicken-no-8/" target="_blank">Moroccan chicken tagine</a> with salty olives and tangy stewed lemons over <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2010/02/06/couscous-of-magic-and-wonder/" target="_blank">couscous</a>. Fig-spinach salad with dark chocolate shavings and a honey vinaigrette. And finally, for dessert:<br />
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All the while a light breeze floated in through the window, carrying sounds in from the courtyard and relieving us from the heat of that summer day. And the conversation took on a wondering tone-- filled with open-ended questions and speculations, nearly devoid of directives or declarations. It was a rare evening for a group of twenty-somethings living in a beautifully foreign city like this.<br />
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And although Anny soon left us for a turbulent <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/from-cairo-to-paris-left-is-south-now/" target="_blank">Cairo</a> and a <i>third</i> Arabic dialect, her adventures in life never take her too far away. I'm sure we'll all see the curly-haired North Carolinian again.<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-10592353681292787382013-08-10T02:20:00.000-07:002013-08-11T14:16:23.273-07:00Gérard Mulot, Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="text-align: center;">"</span><i style="text-align: center;">You should have one absorbing occupation and as for the other things in life for full enjoyment you should only contemplate results. in this way you are bound to feel more about it than those who know a little of how it is done.</i><span style="text-align: center;"> </span><i style="text-align: center;">She is passionately addicted to what the french call métier and she contends that one can only have on métier as one can only have on language. Her métier is writing and her language is english."</i></div>
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- Gertrude Stein on France, writing, and herself</div>
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"Yesterday I ran into <a href="http://www.gerard-mulot.com/" target="_blank">Gérard Mulot</a>" is a sentence that most readers of English would interpret to mean, "Yesterday I ran into the man Gérard Mulot." Because Gérard Mulot is a man's name. And yet when I write this I refer to a shop, not a man. Gérard Mulot is a pâtisserie as much as he is a man and the encounter therefore has the potential to be of equal significance. And because of Ayesgul, for me, it was.<br />
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Ayesgul is a writer friend living in Paris. Because writing is a personal act, I will not dwell on the subject of Ayesgul's personally professional pursuits. She was introduced to me by my very good friend Sarah whose introductions always result in the proliferation of friendships. And because introductions through mutual friends are commonplace, I will not dwell on a description of the introduction.</div>
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The first three times I met Ayesgul I was exhausted, and yet she agreed to see me for a fourth time. On that fourth time she and I and Sarah went to visit Gérard Mulot, the pastry shop. Our aim was simple: <i>clafoutis aux cerises</i>, or cherry <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2003/aug/02/foodanddrink.shopping3" target="_blank">clafoutis</a>. For those of you who do not know what a clafoutis is, this translation is utterly <i>inutile</i>, or useless. But that is why I inserted the link. </div>
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When we arrived at Mulot, I realized I had been there before. But visiting a pastry shop without knowing what's good is like visiting France without knowing what's wonderful about the French. This sounds like a set-up for a joke about the nature of the French, but it is not. I love the French. </div>
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Thankfully, Ayesgul had directed us towards the clafoutis. And so we bought a large, thick slice and a few coffees and a <i>macaron</i> and sat down in the high, uncomfortable stools at the counter framing the shop's windows and ate and talked. We talked about many things, about Gertrude Stein and the French metro, about the Eugène Boudin exhibit and <i>financiers</i>. All the while an endless stream of customers poured into the shop, queuing then <i>commande</i>-ing then <i>encaisse</i>-ing, then pouring back out.</div>
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Imagine, right now, the feeling of finding something good, something truly good, and knowing where to find it, and knowing that every time you return it will still be good, and truly so, and that it will always be there, and that you will always find it. That is Ayesgul. That is Sarah. That is Paris. That is Mulot and that is clafoutis.<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://www.gerard-mulot.com/" target="_blank">Gérard Mulot</a><br />
Magasin Saint Germain:<br />
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76, rue de seine<br />
2, rue lobineau</div>
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75006 Paris 01 43 26 85 77</div>
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Magasin Glacière:</div>
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93, rue de la glacière </div>
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75013 Paris 01 45 81 39 09</div>
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Magasin du Marais: </div>
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6, rue du Pas de la Mule</div>
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75003 Paris 01 42 78 52 17</div>
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*All quotations above taken from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Autobiography-Alice-B-Toklas/dp/067972463X" target="_blank">The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas</a> by Gertrude Stein<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-47431782950378474612013-07-20T17:38:00.001-07:002013-07-20T17:38:10.614-07:00Zen and the Art of Feuilletage<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The little fan inside my computer has been whirring at top speed for several minutes now. It’s become a habit. At first I thought that my computer was reacting to being used in the summer heat, at high noon, outside (I have to sit on my balcony to get reception), but I think that thought was wrong. Even now, as I sit in a cool room, with a breeze, at night (I’m writing offline for now, no balcony-WiFi needed), the fan just won’t stop spinning.<br />
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Maybe my computer’s fan is in league with my mind, which hasn’t stopped spinning either. I quite often have the sensation that thoughts are circling my mind in one big endless loop. Sometimes they’re triggered by the most benign observation: I’m sitting on the metro and notice a man reading a book, then look over his shoulder and discover he’s reading not words but <i>lines of music</i>. I consider telling him that I just finished the same book and have started the sequel, which is twice as catchy. I quietly chuckle at my sharp wit then frown… I wouldn’t be able to deliver that joke in French. When will my French reach metro-joke-delivery levels? Is my English even at metro-joke-delivery levels? Would it be easier on a bus? Do people even make jokes on buses? And so on.<br />
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Sometimes the whirring thought loops are triggered by something more serious, like .<br />
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In fact, I didn’t forget to write something after “like,” I just don’t feel it’s appropriate telling you what the serious issues on my mind are. That’s not for blog writing, that’s for in-person conversing. Don't take it personally. I’m actually quite forthcoming in person, so even if I’ve never met you before I would probably tell you what’s seriously on my mind. Even if we met on the metro.<br />
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There is one place, though, where my mind comes to a stop. The pastry kitchen. For three hours, my mind is in bliss, and those three hours pass by in what seems like an instant.<br />
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I’ve considered why that is. Maybe it’s the manual labor, stimulating that primordial motor cortex part of my brain that doesn’t deal with “complex” stuff. Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve taken on a persona as pastry-chef-in-training, decked out in a spotless white uniform and apron and <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=kitchen+shoes&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=Py3rUembKISqOt6sgJgB&ved=0CE8QsAQ&biw=1362&bih=747" target="_blank">chunky kitchen shoes</a>. Or maybe it’s the fact that rolling out layers of pastry dough and butter, folding them, and rolling them out again, <i>feuilletage</i>, is the one activity that puts my mind at ease.<br />
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It helps, of course, that the moment the pastry dough goes into the oven a magical scent begins to fill the room. A mind enveloped in the puffs of steam from softly caramelizing butter can be easily assuaged into a state of meditative serenity. <br />
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It also helps that the result is a puffy-hot <i>chausson aux pommes</i> that sizzles at you with its hot apple filling, or a crispy heart-shaped <i>palmier</i>, so brittle that it breaks your heart a little bit to bite it. <br />
<br />
… But eventually you leave the kitchen, and that whirring starts again.<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-53531453643900257912013-07-09T06:23:00.000-07:002013-07-09T06:23:10.183-07:00Du pain et des idées, Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It's 4:30pm and I'm standing outside the Jacques Bonsergent metro station in Paris. Any minute now the fleet will arrive. Nearly ten other pastry students are making their way from all around the city to converge at this one point on the map.<br />
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I've been conditioned to believe that a thing's value is directly related to the effort expended to acquire it. Landing a job after months of interview prep can make you put on a suit like you're pinning on a badge of honor. Finding the perfect conch shell after walking on a beach for hours might mean you tote that shell home-- by hand --just to place the fragile souvenir on your windowsill. Discovering the ideal bakery after an 8am pastry class and a two hour trek through Paris can feel like finding Sindbad's treasure.<br />
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The moment in which you realize the value of what you've found is a moment in which a memory is formed. That memory carries the imprint of your mood-- the way it shifts away from mundane distractions and instead towards elation. It carries the imprint of your surroundings-- the shuffle of commuters moving in and out of the metro station, the smell of doughy bread being lifted out of the oven. In that moment, a story is being written, scribbled furiously into the deep recesses of your mind, in an indelible ink that may reappear when you least expect it.<br />
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But at 4:30pm I had no idea that this was about to happen. At 4:30pm I was wondering whether the pharmacy across the street from the metro carried soap that cost less than <span style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 16px;">€</span>5 a bar. I didn't know that the next few steps, down Rue de Lancy and then around the corner, would be engraved in my mind as the moments that came before <i>the bread</i>.<br />
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And I didn't know that by 4:45pm I would be biting into a piece of bread so aromatic I wished I could eliminate all other smells around me so that I could stand there, alone with the bread, and understand the full complexity of what it was trying to show me. I inhaled deeply and exhaled, took another bite then paused, inhaling again, biting down on the crust, chewing steadily so that every last crumb could reveal its smoky flavor, its delicate texture.<br />
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By 4:50pm I realized that I was surrounded by fellow pastry students and that some of them were just as distracted as me. <i>Pain des amis</i>, as it is aptly called, is what brought fame to this little bakery in the 10th arrondissement. Made from a uniquely harvested wheat, it is left to ferment from somewhere between 28 to 32 hours, allowing the sponge to develop a distinctive <i>fumé</i> flavor that envelops the corner on which the bakery stands.<br />
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But with <i>le pain</i> come <i>les idées (</i>the ideas), like swirly-shaped chocolate-pistachio <i>escargots</i>, or orange blossom <i>niflettes</i>, or a goat's cheese and abricot <i>petit pain</i>. Each one, I imagine, with its own story to tell through perfumed bites of luscious pastry dough.<br />
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As I walk home at night, clutching my paper-bagged <i>pain des amis</i>, I wonder whether this moment is one that will stay with me forever-- <i>that day that I discovered the bakery of my dreams </i>--or whether a series of other moments will one day crowd this one out. But I'm so exhausted from the day that I hop onto the nearest metro line and make my way home daydreaming about the joy tomorrow's breakfast is sure to bring.<br />
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<br />
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="http://dupainetdesidees.com/" target="_blank">Du pain et des idées</a><br />
34 Rue Yves Toudic<br />
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75010 Paris, France<br />
+33 1 42 40 44 52<br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-25391014262694892952013-07-04T13:01:00.000-07:002013-07-04T13:01:49.427-07:00Andre Agassi and Pastries<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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For the past 72 hours all I have been able to think about is Andre Agassi. </div>
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It's not that I'm a tennis fan. In fact, I've never sat through an entire tennis match. I vaguely remember learning the rules in my high school Phys Ed class, but a red clay court under the blistering Florida sun never seemed as appealing to me as the aquamarine waters of the neighborhood pool. So, why now does a game I barely know occupy the entirety of my mind?<br />
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It's probably because I'm reading Agassi's autobiography, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307388409" target="_blank">Open</a>. It was recommended by a close friend, twice. Since I've started reading it, I feel like I've become friends with Andre. And I don't think Andre would be surprised that a tennis amateur like me has become so obsessed with the sport. <i>"It's no accident," </i>he says, <i>"that tennis uses the language of life. Advantage, service, fault, break, love, the basic elements of tennis are those of everyday existence, because every match is a life in miniature."</i><br />
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I'm in Paris now, learning to make pastries. Every pastry class is like a match for me. I read the recipe like I'm sizing up the competition, examining my challenger's components so I can pick the exact techniques that will exploit his or her (or, actually, its) weaknesses and lead to my ultimate triumph.<br />
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First were the <i>diamants</i>, or diamonds. An easy opener. It is hard to go wrong with sugar, butter, flour, and orange zest. The diamonds were beautiful and simple and, like their stony counterparts, last forever. I'm still nibbling away at my stash, several weeks later.<br />
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Next up was <i>Saint-Honoré</i>, who is less of a saint and more of a Chantilly cream-covered devil, waiting for you to burn yourself on the piping-hot caramel which beckons innocently to your choux puff-dipping fingers until you make contact and discover its wily tricks. I got burned, blistered with pain, but triumphed in the end with a wobbly version of the pastry that was saint enough for me.<br />
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Then there was the apple tart. <i>Tarte aux pommes</i>. I sailed through the first two sets-- pastry crust, done. Apple filling, easy as pie. But the final set gave me trouble, and as I piled too-thickly-sliced apples atop my beautiful base, I realized woefully that it was all over. And we hadn't even reached the oven. I wrote it off as a loss and gave it away to a friend who made it disappear with big scoops of vanilla ice cream.<br />
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The latest opponent, a veritable fruit cake, was an easy win. Soften the butter. Mix the batter. Chop the fruits. Throw it in a pan. You'd have to be crazy to lose to a fruit cake. Back to basics, and with a little extra effort at decoration (the cherries on top), the <i>cake aux fruits </i>came in as a solid win. Even the Chef was impressed ("<i>pas mal</i>").<br />
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The truth is that pastry school is not hard. It can be challenging, but it's not hard. Unlike Andre and tennis, I love pastry. That makes the challenge easy, fulfilling even. So why is it that every time I prep for another practical I get the butterflies? Why does tying on my apprentice apron feel like I'm lacing up my tennis shoes? Why do I keep tally of each face-off with <i>feuilletage</i> or calamity with a <i>caramel</i>?<br />
<br />
I genuinely don't know. But I know that I'm working towards something, and that it's a little bit strange and a little bit off-track, but entirely worth it. At least I hope so.<br />
<br />
And if Andre has taught me one thing, it's that you don't judge a career by a win or a loss, or even a match. Because a career is made up of dozens of matches, each one a life in miniature, and each one worth living to the fullest.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<i>You can buy Andre Agassi's </i>Open<i> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307388409" target="_blank">here</a>. </i></div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-58805706987004064082013-07-01T03:44:00.000-07:002013-07-01T03:44:42.710-07:00Sawsan Cuisine, Amman<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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This month has taught me a lot of things. I've learned how to make a vinaigrette with piment d'esplette mustard. I learned that Spanish pastries have more in common with Middle Eastern pastries than just sugar and butter. And I've learned that catering is a job that's high challenge, high reward.<br />
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During my last week in Jordan I ordered a big meal from one of my favorite catering companies-- <a href="https://www.facebook.com/SawsanCuisine?fref=ts" target="_blank">Sawsan Cuisine</a>. I was in a taxi driving to a friend's house, trying to hold on to my shopping bags and stabilize a box full of pastries while giving directions in Arabic, when I called up Sawsan to place an order (add that to the list of things I love about Jordan-- when you call Sawsan's Cuisine, you actually speak to Sawsan. As opposed to say, Sara Lee, who I was upset to find out didn't actually come up with that pound cake recipe...).<br />
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The conversation went something like this:<br />
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"Hi, Sawsan, how are you?"<br />
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"I'm good Sarah! How are you?" (Note: I've met Sawsan once before, she doesn't just know everyone by name)<br />
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"Good! I'm -- <i>take a left here please!</i> -- in a cab and I'm actually leaving the country soon"<br />
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"You are? We'll miss you a lot! Are you going to Paris?"<br />
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"Yes, I can't believe you remembered! Thanks so much for that ghraybeh recipe you gave me last time, it's great!"<br />
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"Oh I'm glad it worked. I have the name of the bakery you asked for too let me get it for you... So what would you like to order?"<br />
<br />
Then commences a 10 minute conversation about what dishes are available, how many people she'll be feeding, what their preference is between tabbouleh and fattoush, how much salt they like to put on their dishes, whether 5 main dishes is enough, and what the savory pastry spread should look like.<br />
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By the time I arrive at my friend's house the taxi driver take my payment and asks if he can join for dinner too.<br />
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This is how it always is with Sawsan-- I call expecting a set menu with little variation but instead get a conversation with a new friend who is interested in how her food (and her mom's, who is the head chef in their kitchen) can satisfy the people I care about feeding. It's a challenging task-- imagine making homemade dishes for a rotating roster of choosey eaters --but a rewarding one as well. For Sawsan, it's not just about creating a business in a country where entrepreneurship is often the only way to stay afloat, it's about taking that most sacred of gatherings, mealtime, and making it special.<br />
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That last meal she made for me was a special one, not just because it one of my last in Jordan, but because it was made by a person who could have very well just taken my order and hung up, but who decided to take the time to get to know me and become my friend. That's a rare quality in a community, and it's one I'll miss very much. I'm sure I'll be back, but for now it's so long, <i>ma'a salama,</i> to the delights of Jordan and on to another devour-able discovery...<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Practicalities:</b><br />
<a href="https://www.facebook.com/SawsanCuisine?fref=ts" target="_blank">Sawsan Cuisine</a><br />
+962 (0)6 581 0290 / (0)79 9 223 158 / (0)79 6 666 535 <br />
sawsancuisine@live.com </div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-45650266982394464562013-05-17T01:18:00.001-07:002013-05-17T01:23:41.633-07:00Moveable Feasts in Jordan<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I constantly encounter an unsettling contradiction in the Middle East. Home cooked dishes are fantastic, but restaurant versions are, essentially, not. In Jordan, it results in this sort of odd social interaction where newcomers to Jordan are constantly complaining about the lack of good food and their well-fed Jordanian friends have absolutely no clue what they’re talking about and can only assume that these foreign visitors to their country must lack taste buds, or tact. <br />
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This is not to say that restaurant food is bad here—non-Jordanian restaurants make a good showing and quintessential street food is quintessentially tasty from the street (<a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&ved=0CEkQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.abu-jbara.com%2F&ei=ouaVUZO0MaGw4QSmw4DoCw&usg=AFQjCNHvz0HFZodsBBh7iyzLxtDcc_c2PA&sig2=XvQFzFPO8FqEMklqI5E81w&bvm=bv.46471029,d.bGE" target="_blank">Abu Jbara</a>, a local hummus and falafel joint, is open 24/7). <br />
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But this odd local food dynamic may one day change. As a result of a series of unfortunate events, Jordan is home to many displaced men and women, often called “refugees” (the term gives an impression that can be very far from reality). Imagine having to leave your home with only the clothes on your back and precious few other possessions, and settling down in a new country for a period of time that could last for as little as a the length of a summer skirmish to as long as the indefinitely unfriendly regime. <br />
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The reality of displacement and the immovability of a life is something few of us, luckily, will ever have to deal with. But for some Palestinians, Syrians, Iraqis, Armenians, Egyptians, Lebanese, and Kuwaitis living in Jordan, it’s very real. And while some elements of home life will fail to make the journey over with those living this reality, one very critical element is as transportable as a mental recipe book. </div>
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Ernest Hemingway coined the term “moveable feast” to refer to his love affair with the city of Paris, but the concept can be easily applied to any nostalgia-triggered consumption of food (I have an American friend here who stocks his cupboards with marshmallows and graham crackers). In Jordan, with each wave of new immigrants comes a wave of new food, washing over the country and settling in little pockets, creating enclaves of homemade Arabic food dens, their aromas wafting out of uniform beige houses and throughout neighborhood streets to tempt any passers-by.<br />
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In one particular house in Amman, a woman named Elham runs a veritable production line of <i>ma’ajenat </i>(mini stuffed pastry pies) and <i>halaweyat</i> (Arabic sweets) from her home. She has long been settled in Jordan, having come over in the early 90’s from Kuwait, “just two days,” as she puts it, before the Gulf War. Her home business is run with assistance from <a href="http://www.tamweelcom.org/" target="_blank">TamweelCom</a>, a microfinance institution under the <a href="http://www.nooralhusseinfoundation.org/" target="_blank">Noor Al Hussein Foundation</a>. <br />
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Elham brought out a plate of freshly baked, golden brown, braided cheese pastries, crispy on the outside and gooey-mild on the inside, each releasing a puff of steam with the first savory bite. Her business, for now, is simple. She is self-trained, having attended formal cooking classes but choosing instead to rely on her home-honed culinary expertise. Her employees are her family members, who help out whenever they have free time. Her customers are a local co-op and a few neighborhood clients. And her working hours follow demand, peaking around holidays and national events. <br />
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Elham’s ambition is to one day open her own restaurant, expanding her menu and production. It would be a revelation for Jordan’s food scene—a chef whose training began at home, as a child, and whose skills were refined outside a commercial kitchen. A menu of memory, traveling from Kuwait to Jordan over the span of more than two decades, and subject to the critiques and adjustments of the pickiest of Arabic food critics: Arabic friends and family. <br />
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Of course Elham is just one in a multitude of moveable feasts. But her passion for her business is a sign of what may come. Jordan is a neighbor to some of the richest culinary traditions in the world, the countries of the spice routes that connected east to west, the collectors of herbs and seeds, flora and fauna that make surprise appearances in our modern cuisines but are still largely undiscovered. Perhaps those like Elham, who seek to build a future on their culinary past, will find a good home in Jordan and finally introduce the gastronomic secrets of their homes to the public. <br />
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<b>Practicalities: </b><br />
To order homemade specialties from Elham, call her at: <br />
+962 (0)795613048 <br />
Be sure to have an Arabic speaker with you! <br />
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With support from <a href="http://www.tamweelcom.org/" target="_blank">TamweelCom</a> and the <a href="http://www.nooralhusseinfoundation.org/" target="_blank">Noor Al Hussein Foundation</a> <br />
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-89478021974343067452013-04-13T04:10:00.001-07:002013-04-13T04:10:41.438-07:00Spices in Rabat, Morocco<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The early years of my life were filled with spice. I don't mean that (entirely) metaphorically-- my mother would cook us meals filled with spices. My grandmother, similarly, made liberal use of spices. And my aunts, also, liked the spices. It's not that the men in my family didn't cook, it's just that they for some reason didn't use a lot of spices. Perhaps they were going through then what I've recently gone through: a relatively spice-less cooking life.<br />
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The moment I flew the coop for college I entered a world where spice meant, at most, salt and pepper (two of the most under-appreciated and misused spices). Ah, yes... the days of the Dining Hall. Where salad meant iceberg lettuce with little orange sticks referred to as "carrots." Where dessert somehow became peanut butter topped with frozen yogurt. And where the world of fruit was whittled down into two distinct categories: bananas and apples (they introduced something orange once but refused to tell us anything about it except its color). </div>
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When I had left home for college I hardly expected that I would leave behind the meaning of flavor, the essence of smell, the bedrock of taste. Eventually I started cooking for myself, keeping it bland at first. Brussel sprouts with olive oil and salt were a staple until my gastrointestinal tract suggested I lay off the cruciferous vegetables. But spices slowly began re-entering my life, in poofs and bursts. One summer in France I discovered <i>baie rose</i>, a pink peppercorn that introduced itself during a meal of salted duck with stewed figs. I bought a bag of it and took it home to experiment.</div>
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The experimentation lasted for about two weeks until I realized that I had no idea how to use pink peppercorns and that I essentially was substituting it for black pepper despite it having a taste profile that in no way resembled its spicier cousin. </div>
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After that followed an extensive educational period in my life, a spiceducation, you might say. I learned to listen for the "pop" of a cardamom pod roasting in a dry pan, that telltale sign that flavor has re-entered its tiny, greenish-grey cavern. I learned to always grind nutmeg fresh and sprinkle it sparingly into unbaked loaves of banana bread, so that those who didn't know what they were tasting would impulsively twitch their noses and be reminded of home. And I learned that sage, rosemary, and thyme might not exactly be "spices" but that they had the same sense-memory effect as their cupboard mates and an interesting effect on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsley,_Sage,_Rosemary_and_Thyme" target="_blank">musicians from the 60's</a>. </div>
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And so now, when I walk through a spice souk in Morocco, I have no worries, and I have no fears. That green pile of leaves is dried spearmint (time for tea). That orange dust is turmeric (chicken curry and a permanently-stained apron). And the pile of sticks that looks remarkably like tree bark is, in fact, tree bark (ask the <i>'attar</i>, there's no way you'll figure out how to use it alone). </div>
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I'm still far from home and that will probably go on for a while more, but at least now I'm back with spice and spice with me, and I hope that's how it will forever be.</div>
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-71807145753659775232013-04-02T12:27:00.003-07:002013-04-02T12:36:30.533-07:00It's better in Morocco<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Why haven't I been here before? I've been on this planet for over a quarter of a century and why is it only now that I've come to Morocco? One of my closest friends is Moroccan, and he has been subtly hinting for the past four years that I visit his country. I used to think that his long-time catchphrase, "It's better in Morocco" was just a symptom of overeager nationalism. But after I witnessed him sniff at a satin-cushioned, ocean-facing, twinkle-lighted hookah lounge in Dubai and utter his go-to phrase, I decided he was crazy.<br />
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Then I came here. I landed in Casablanca and got in a minibus headed for Rabat. There is a coastline that stretches for miles and miles, framing a sea so blue it almost blends into the sky. There are pastures as green as the Green Isle itself, spotted with wildflowers-- some big, some small, purple, red, orange-yellow. There is a precision and a saturation to the country that makes you feel like you're constantly looking at a photo edited for a tourism brochure. The reds are Red. The yellows are Yellow. And the geometry ubiquitous in every ceramic tile paints itself onto the most unexpected of minutiae: a police officer's epaulette, or a plate of <i>pastilla</i> with sweetened milk and almonds.<br />
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Tagine, here, is an artform. Anything cooked in a clay pot is an artform. The conical hat that covers the tagine dish acts like a mini sauna, a food <i>hammam</i> (in the Turkish sense, not the other), steaming the chicken with prunes or sliced lemons, or the lamb with peas and purple olives until they've soaked up their flavors and are ready to sing.<br />
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My friend <a href="http://imiksimik.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Anny</a>, a Moroccan veteran (in the lived-here sense, not the other), once told me that the mealtime ritual in this region is about more than just the food. The food is key, she told me, don't doubt that for a minute. But that's just taste.<br />
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You have to have smell-- the warm broth of simmering chicken, the sharp tang of steamed lemons. And you have to have touch-- the silk of the chair cushion, the springy dough of the bread.<br />
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And then there is sight-- a vision of color, of gold and bronze, of stacks of plates and piles of dishes. And last, there is sound.<br />
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That, she told me, is how to enjoy a meal. Because a swab of bread smeared in <i>zaalouk</i> tastes better if enjoyed with the strum of an olive wood <i>oud</i>. Because the scent of mint tea smells better if it drifts out of an azure tea glass. Because sweet snap of a milk and almond <i>pastilla</i> feels better if you're cushioned by a silk chair pillow. But most of all, because in Morocco a meal is not simply a meal: "It's better."<br />
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<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
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<i>All dishes set on golden table from:</i></div>
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<a href="http://www.tripadvisor.fr/Restaurant_Review-g190326-d2097466-Reviews-Arabica-Rabat_Island_of_Malta.html" target="_blank">Arabica Restaurant</a></div>
Rue Moulay Abdelhafid<br />
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Hasan, Rabat</div>
Morocco</div>
Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7032859685360684575.post-81851265710304333462013-03-22T06:33:00.002-07:002013-03-22T09:50:55.471-07:00Tales at Teatime, Jordan in Spring<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>This journey will end where the flowers grow wild. </i></div>
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It begins, however, in <a href="http://www.rscn.org.jo/RSCN/HelpingNature/ProtectedAreas/DanaBiosphereReserve/tabid/93/Default.aspx" target="_blank">Dana</a>, on the edge of the Great Rift Valley, where the land is thirsty and shards of clay curl upwards from the earth towards the desert sun.<br />
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Here, in <a href="http://www.feynan.com/" target="_blank">Wadi Feynan</a> east of the Jordan River, the winter air sends a chill through the sandy mountains. We watched as he scaled a sheer cliff, worn down to an angle of about 75 degrees and smooth from years of sandy winds and desert rains. He came down just as quickly as he had gone up, only to be outdone by the surrounding mountain goats (which, if you have never had the pleasure of observing, are capable of exploiting the slightest groove in a rock mass as if it were the broadest of foot stools). We followed him silently, like sheep with their shepherd, until he came to a desert shrub and twisted its stem in one swift loop, pulling tight to hold it in place, both a marker and a talisman.<br />
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Several paces down the trail a stream of water appeared, just a trickle at first, lapped up by the dry earth and parting around our sneakers as we trod through the valley. Around the bend the water quickened—and thickened—as we leaped from bank to bank, using stones as steps and soaking ourselves nonetheless. Here the earth was softer and wildflowers poked their lazy heads out of the rock bed, craning their necks towards the sun. Spring had come. <br />
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We sat and rested in the shade, while our guide prepared a sweet elixir of tea leaves and chamomile, and the warmth of our glass cups amidst a cool breeze brought us closer as we listened to his story… <br />
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“They visit us,” our guide began, “and they say, ‘How sad! You have no comforts of your own. No coffee shops with free WiFi or TV screens to complete your home.’” Quietly, a nervous chuckle tiptoed through the crowd as listeners reached down unconsciously to touch their roaming-3G-smartphone-holding pockets. “But they don’t know…” he continues. <br />
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“They don’t know of the stars, which at night shine brighter than any spotlight or movie screen. They don’t know of the wind, which whistles to our music as we play by the campfire. They don’t know of the mountains, which challenge us by day and guard us by night. And they don’t know of the wildflowers that worship the spring’s setting sun.” <br />
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His words were said once but heard many times over. Several kilometers away, perhaps from where the water came, a meadow in full bloom carried his words to fruition. Almond blossoms blushed on branches, reaching up to the sky in announcement of their arrival. The red anemone, with its cherry red petals crowning a center of deep purple, reigned over the hills as Jordan’s springtime queen. And a silent breeze carried the buzzing bees to a place no one had seen. </div>
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<b>Practicalities:</b></div>
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Meadow pictures taken in Dabouq, Jordan</div>
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Sarahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17619244143800883264noreply@blogger.com0