It only takes about 2 hours to get from Bangkok to Hanoi, but the two cities feel centuries apart. Bangkok is all brashness, noise and bluster; at just about 200 years old it’s one of the youngest capital cities in Asia. Hanoi, on the other hand, is getting ready to celebrate its 1000th birthday as the hub city for northern Vietnam.

Hanoi wears its history proudly — from the ancient pagodas and the crowded shophouses to the French opera house and the shiny new modern condos, it’s all on display admist the neverending sea of motorcycle traffic belching noxious fumes into the air.

We spent a few days here on our last trip to Vietnam four years ago and I was looking forward to getting back and seeing the city again. The Ghormley family trip was a good excuse to spend a few more days here.

We were staying at the swanky Maison D’Hanoi in the old quarter just a quick walk down to Hoan Kiem Lake which is always bustling with locals, tourists and vendors.

our first night in Hanoi, the group heads down to the Lake

early in the morning, Hanoians show up for lakeside exercises. There are varous tai chi groups, one massive aerobics class and joggers — all going counter-clockwise around the lake. This fellow was going solo.

fan tai chi

Chris and his mom on the bridge to the temple in the lake

and us on the same bridge

Mostly what we did in Hanoi was a lot of walking around, but we did a bit of sightseeing around town, too.

at the Temple of Literature

Hanoi street pups check me out to see if I’m OK. Don’t worry — I still have my rabies vaccine from last time.

at the Hanoi Botanical Gardens. Pop has his camera at the ready.

kids at garden

more from the Botanical Gardens

Pop and I with a dragon made of flowers

But I know what you’re thinking: sure, Hanoi has a lot of nice architecture and pretty sights to see, but what about the food? Well, rest assured we ate well. Here are a few of the highlights:

Our first night we stopped off at this restaurant near the hotel which would have been pretty forgettable except for the elaborate way they cooked this delicious fish for us tableside. It was, like, 150,000 dong, but worth it for the show alone.

The fabled doner kabob banh mi which we did not actually eat, but it looked good. This is near the place where one lady tried to shake me down for 10,000 dong for a fish skewer, but the conscience of the grilling woman caused her to slip a 5k note back to me.

My favorite stop of our trip in Hanoi (maybe my favorite meal in Vietnam) was at Bun Cha Hang Manh, a classic multi-storey, claustrophobic Hanoi affair where they only serve bun cha (pork slices, meatballs, noodles and tons of fresh herbs) and nem (spring rolls).

bun cha greens

A pile of delicious nem which unfortunately had crab in it so my dad couldn’t eat it.

Pop enjoys his bun cha even if he couldn’t have the nem.

bun cha pickles

Chris says: enough!

We stopped in at Fanny, a Hanoi ice cream shop with fancy sundaes and some unusual flavors. I got the Young Rice flavor which had the subtle, floral flavor of green rice.

C + sundae

Our last breakfast in Hanoi was at a chao ca (fish and rice soup) stand. In this picture I am moments from discovering that the bowl is crammed with fresh herbs and meltingly tender fish just beneath the surface of the rice soup.

Hanoi loves its donuts. Most mornings I was pursued by vendors who would repeat, “Hello, Madam. Hello, donut!” which is the greeting I imagine getting in my magical dream world. We got some street donuts, but we also stopped in at a national chain called DOCO (for DOnuts and COffee) where they have wacky flavor combos, a la Voodoo Donuts.

I didn’t get anything too crazy at DOCO

I can add this one to my collection of pictures of me eating donuts.

After a few days of acclimating Chris’s parents to life in Bangkok, we dragged them upriver to Ayutthaya, the former Thai capital, sacked by the Burmese in the late 1700s. The temples and palace buildings are eerie reminders of the teeming city that once was there. And, this being Thailand, there was plenty of good food, too.

pandan pancakes outside one of the temples. These would later be stuffed with candy floss — think cotton candy taco.

The intrepid travelers tackle Ayutthaya

I’d been wanting to go this restaurant in Ayutthaya for a very long time indeed and finally got my chance. It totally lived up to the hype and we ate like marauding Burmese invaders.

wing bean salad

catfish salad

sauce for catfish salad

we asked for the chilis on the side for the tom kha gai

banana blossom salad

fish!

pop documents the meal

This kitty wisely showed up at the end of the meal and scored a fat chunk of fish.

We stopped by a lackluster monkey temple on the way back home. There were a few monkeys, but the best part was this play structure and my favorite monkey playing on it…

Aside from the Sonoran hot dog, the other thing I was most excited to encounter here in Arizona was this creature called the javelina. Unfamiliar? Take a look at some pics of these creatures and you may become as enamored as I did. They are adorable, but listen, don’t call them pigs or you might get gored. They’re collared peccaries and are unrelated to swine despite the similar snout.

I was told that javelinas were common in Southern Arizona. “You just seem ‘em walking down the street,” a friend of mine said. I was eager to start my new life frolicking with these grazers of the desert.

But the only thing was that I got to Arizona and not a single javelina was to be seen. I asked just about every local who I started a conversation with whether they’d seen javelinas around and everyone said something along the lines of, “Oh… I think I saw one once when I was out in the country, but not here in the city.”

So much for spotting wild beasts in the street. So I plunked down my dollars to go to Arizona Sonora Desert Museum — which is a really more like an open zoo and natural park than a museum — where they reportedly had a large number of javelinas in an open natural habitat.

As soon as we got there I checked the map and made a beeline for the javelina area. And then we looked. And waited. And looked some more. I stood there for half an hour waiting for them to show up, but no dice. I went home javelina-less and broken-hearted.

“Did you check under the bridges?” Tucsonians asked when I told them of my zero-javelina trip to the Desert Museum. Yes, I checked under the bridges. “Did you look under the bushes?” Yes, I looked under the bushes. Then they’d shrug as I hung down my head.

Then the other day I decided, by golly, I was going to get a good look at those guys and I went back to the Desert Museum, this time early in the morning.

And lo!

There were several of them all lured out by vegetable popsicles (they looked like hunks of sweet potatoes frozen in blocks of ice) and happily chomping away. I stood at the bridge and watched them for a good long while and finally felt satisfied.

Here we are flush from our javelina hunt success

there’s lots more cool stuff at the Desert Museum — like Danger Snake!

and this chubber lizard

But then! I got a little lagniappe javelina on our trip to New Mexico over the long weekend. We were driving through the Gila National Forest wending our way through high altitude forest. We had already seen several deer on the side of the road so were driving carefully when what should come rustling out of the bushes, but a genuine javelina! I didn’t manage a picture because I was squealing too much, but ask Chris — he can confirm that this wasn’t just a fever dream sighting.

I didn’t get a pic of the javelina, but I did get a pic of javalina, a coffee shop in Silver City.

and extra bonus: cool blue beetle at Gila Cliff Dwellings

Chris crouched in the ruins of Gila

The view from the caves… is that a javelina on the hill?

Gila Cave visitors

While we’re talking about the trip to New Mexico, here’s the run down: Silver City, Gila Cliff Dwellings, awesome green chile pasta at Diane’s, Alamogordo and an insane monsoon that almost kept us from getting back to our motel, Saturday morning menudo, sledding at White Sands, fireworks in Mesilla, a hike to Dripping Springs on Organ Mountain and, finally, an awesome, awesome stuffed sopapilla in Las Cruces. Fun trip. Here are the pics.

a shocklingly good Hatch green chile alfredo at Diane’s in Silver City

White Sands is… really white. Chris treks across the desert in search of the perfect photo

the unusually dramatic parking lot at the end of the park

sledding! on the dunes!

hooray!

there weren’t that many places open on the Fourth, but gracias, Alamogordo, por Panaderia Amigos where we got tamales, pastry and their Saturday special: menudo. Yum.

from Panaderia Amigos in Alamogordo: a surprising – and tasty and filling – bready pumpkin pastry

an excellent selection of Sonoran/South New Mexican specialties including pork and potato chili from Andele in Las Cruces all jammed onto a big sloppy plate.

C and I thought we’d just share one combo plate and a side of guacamole for a sensible meal… only the guac arrive as a verdant mountain

wow! stuffed sopapilla in red chile sauce at Las Trancas in Las Cruces

huevos rancheros with green chile sauce at Las Trancas

complimentary sopapillas with honey come at the end of your meal at Las Trancas. Who can say no to *free* deep-fried bread?

the very cool Dripping Springs ruins floating above Las Cruces. It was nice and cool up here and there was actually a spring!

You know how I said I was through with the Sonoran hot dog?

Well, I thought I was, but apparently it wasn’t through with me.

After our hot dog adventures, we gave up on the local favorite. But the other night when we were cruising for late night taco stands we were tricked into stopping at yet another dog stand. This one was busy and had wonderful smell coming from it so even when we found out that they only had the local dogs, we stayed and shared one.

And you know what? It was pretty good.

The best part about the experience was the grilled pepper that always comes with the dogs. This one was wrapped in bacon and stuffed with cheese. How can you go wrong? When in doubt, add cheese and bacon and likely your foodstuff will be improved.

The dog itself was probably the best specimen yet, full of smoky flavor. But I dunno… if it weren’t for those awesome peppers I don’t think I’d come clamoring back for me.

Of course, that’s what I said the last time, too.

We’ve been eating lots of other, non-Sonoran-hot-dog foods, too, but I’m kind of overwhelmed by all the stuff I have to do before we leave — in ONE WEEK! — to sort through it all so it may have to wait until we get back to Portland. But rest assured, our bellies are full, as are our camera memory cards.

The very first part of the fellowship program which has brought me to sweltering Tucson actually took place one snowy weekend in January in Denver. That was where we first met our sponsoring schools and mentors and discussed program details and plans for the summer. I got the lowdown on my project and after a lot of shop talk about all the details of the fellowship, we moved on to small talk and of course the first thing I asked about was food. I asked the group what only-in-Tucson specialties I should try while there and Leslie excitedly said, “Sonoran hot dogs!”

This was the perfect answer in so many ways. First, I’d never heard of such a thing. Second, it involves hot dogs.

So here’s how you make a Sonoran hot dog: take a hot dog and wrap it in bacon (always a good start). Grill it, then stuff it into a bun. Top with beans, salsa, green chiles, cheese and mayo. Serve with a grilled pepper. All of this preferably occurs street-side from a truck (which probably also serves tacos).

Needless to say, I was sold and for the 5 months that came in between the time I first heard about these local delicacies and the when I got here, I told anyone who’d listen about the Sonoran hot dogs.

So it’s kind of surprising, actually, that I was in town a full 5 days before actually tracking one down.

We decided to start with the place that every Tucsonian seemed to recommend, a place called BK Tacos. They’ve been around forever and started life as a taco and hot dog stand in South Tucson and have moved up the fast food chain to include two indoor restaurants with tables and flat-screen TVs. We ordered the famous dog, plus some other goodies on the menu.

introducing… the Sonoran Hot Dog!

The hot dog arrived and… well, I was a little underwhelmed. I looked at that flaccid bun and the spray of mayo and said, “Is that all there is?” And actually eating the thing didn’t really improve my impression. I mean, it was fine, but it I just thought it would go through the roof, is all, and really it was just a gooey, bland hot dog.

But! there’s much more to recommend BK’s. We got a side order of their fire-roasted chiles in some kind of amazing yum sauce on the recommendation of the server — and holy cow! they were so flippin’ good ! I’d come back just for those.

chiles ahogados

We also got a caramelo (which is basically a quesadilla with carne asada) which was tastier than such a simple thing had the right to be — and was especially good soaked in the pepper juice.

Feeling a bit disappointed and still hungry from our BK hot dog experience, we decided to try the second most recommended place for those indigenous dogs in town, El Guero Canelo. It wasn’t too far so we swung by there and ordered one more dog, plus another caramelo. Oh, and some flan. You know, for balance.

While BK was all dark wood and blasting pop music, El Guero was bright, bright, bright and full of colorful memorabilia. Plus! there’s a huge self-serve condiment bar right in the middle which includes such unusual items as grilled green onions and roasted jalapenos.

the condiment bar at El Guero Canelo

El Guero’s roasted chile

we got a wide array of condiments

Ok, so the hot dog:

Looks familiar now, doesn’t it? So this one was much like its predecessor at BK. Maybe a little more flavorful. Remember how I said the hot dogs were wrapped in bacon before grilling? I didn’t even realize that at BK. Here I could at least taste the smokiness. Aside from that — and the stellar condiment bar — it was pretty much the same meh experience.

We left our mini hot dog crawl declaring that we were done with the Sonoran hot dog. Maybe you had to grow up with them to have such a fondness in your heart for them.

But!

At work the next day the librarians convinced me to try just one more place. This one was not a restaurant, but a street cart in the parking lot of a discount grocery store called Food City. It was already sounding better to me than the other places — that’s a lot of street cred for one little hot dog cart. So that weekend, the Sonoran Hot Dog Brigade set out once again.

After getting a little turned around, we finally found it thanks to Regina who with her eagle eye saw the word “Hot” on the side of a truck in the parking lot and we zeroed in from there.

That’s Chris waiting in line to order while an impatient Tucson native looks on. Note that if you’re short the 2 bucks you need for a dog, there’s a check cashing place next door to Food City

the menu

si, si!

Like BK and El Guero Canelo, this stand had a little condiment bar, but it was much, much smaller than the others. No worries, though, because the salsa was excellent.

a pleasant assortment of condiments even at the truck

But we weren’t here for the salsa, we wanted a hot dog. And may I introduce you to…

the best — but still final — Sonoran hot dog

So this one had great bacony flavor, flavorful beans and had the added benefit of atmosphere. It was definitely the best of the three… and yet… I feel pretty confident in saying it will still be my last. It was good, but still nothing spectacular and I still don’t grok the dog. I’m writing it off as a Tucson thing and will leave it at that.

However!

It will probably not be my last trip to this cart as they had many other tantalizing treats in store for us, like…

birria tacos!

carne asada caramelos!!

both of these kick the ass of the yappy little Sonoran hot dog clear across town. Since visiting here I keep trying to come up with excuses to cruise by and pick up another birria taco.

Chris and Regina, happy from tacos, caramelos and, yes, hot dogs, too.

and to make the place even better, there were tomatoes growing in the cracks of the sidewalk nearby — presumably the seeds got there from over enthusiastic salsa consumption. These guys look like they’ll be ready to get into the family business pretty soon.

feral tomatoes

So I wanna be a librarian, right?

Only I don’t have any experience, see, and those employers are so picky about making sure you know what you’re doing.

And I’m unemployed now, right?, and I’m graduating soon which means I’m about to run out of excuses for being a poor layabout.

All of this is to explain how it is that I find myself in Tucson, Arizona at the height of summer.

So what happened was that back in the winter I saw this announcement for a fellowship opportunity through the Association of Research Libraries which — in case you’re not immersed in librariana like some of us — is a kind of big deal association of big ol’ research libraries. This program assigns students who are members of under-represented groups to a mentor at a large research university and then pays for them to spend a few months in intensive learning, while gaining practical work experience along the way — which, if you’ll recall from a few paragraphs back, is exactly what I need.

Well, I applied and was accepted and was beyond thrilled to have received such an honor. There were eight possible schools to which I could have been assigned — everything from Columbia to University of Kentucky — and I was assigned to the University of Arizona. It’s a highly prestigious post and with a cutting edge library.

But Tucson in the summer? Is this some kind of punishment for claiming Portland gets too hot for me?

And that’s why I’m here now melting in the desert’s 100+ degree days.

I don’t mean to complain though — I’m learning lots and having a good time. But I do thank my lucky stars that I’m in a *library* program and not here on a track scholarship or something.

Anyway, more about Tucson and the program later. Right now I’m going to tell you about the road trip that brought us here.

Chris and I set our from Portland early one morning with the intention of driving as much as we could in one day. We blew through Oregon and I bid my Beaver State a teary farewell. Idaho passed by in a blink (or two) and we stopped in northern Utah — Snowville to be exact — for a bit of dinner before seeing how much further we could go before drifting into a ditch.

Chris was reading reviews of the (limited) food possibilities in northern Utah and found a place called Mollie’s Cafe that more than one person called the best greasy spoon road food around. I was sold especially once I saw their attractive neon signage.

The nightly special was liver and onions which could have been an ill-advised thing to try at the beginning of a long haul road trip, but I was game. I got it and was surprised to find that the liver had been chicken-fried and drowned in brown gravy. Not what I was expecting, but it was actually pretty delicious in its way. Not that I could eat more than a quarter of what was on my plate, but I ordered liver and onions at a truckstop — all things considered, it went as well as one could expect.

disgusting and delicious

We managed to push on only an hour more and stopped off in Ogden, Utah and there’s not much to report there except that the motel had a waffle maker and we availed ourselves of free waffles before shuffling off to Moab.

Moab is a tourist town in Southern Utah that tends to attract outdoor adventurists and Utah’s hippie outcasts. There were more coffee shops — and boutique roasters — here than in the rest of Utah, I think. The main event for us here was Arches National Park, a stunning collection of natural land arches spread out over many acres of scenic Utah landscape. They really are incredible and kind of menacing in their way. I imagined what it must have felt like to be an early western explorer who came upon these things. I would have been terrified enough to turn my wagon right around and go back to Boston or whereever.

C took lots more cool pictures of the arches. Here are some from his visit here last year.

Moab is a fairly touristy town and as such there’s a lot of mediocre food. But one place that gets good reviews from people who care is a place just outside of the park called the Desert Bistro. It’s a pleasant upscale sort of place that’s trying to do a kind of nouveau southwest thing, but it’s not as awful as that sounds. The most successful thing of the night was this charming gelato caprese starter. That’s three scoops of ice cream: tomato, basil and mozzarella.

quail quesadillas

duck breast wrapped in chard and stuffed with asparagus

the resident kitty at the Desert Bistro

And remember how I said that Moab was full of Utah’s misfits? Well, I chose a place for breakfast the next day because it sounded like a serious hippie enclave and after that meal at Mollie’s I was feeling like I needed to do some nutritional penance. The place was called Love Muffins and was just as I’d hoped — a funky, semi-veg place with a real Portland vibe. I got hot toasted quinoa topped with blueberries. It was really, really good and filled me with whole grain self-righteousness. Chris got a breakfast burrito that was so good you can see how sad he was when he realized he’d reached the end of the burrito.

So the curvy rocks of Moab are cool, sure, but the main event was yet to come. We were here to see the big daddy of cool rocks, the Grand Canyon. Just eight hours of curvy driving later we were on the rim of one of the natural wonders of the world and let me tell you, if you have never been, don’t think you’ve seen this place just because you’ve seen pictures. You really need to see it in person to understand the awesomeness of this place.

Now, you should totally go to the Grand Canyon if you can and if you do go to the North Rim because South Rim is for chumpies. But listen here, if you go and you get a mite peckish (as you will) and you find yourself at the deli outside the Grand Canyon Lodge and it’s morning and that breakfast frittata on the menu sounds pretty good — let me tell you: DO. NOT.

Just don’t.

You wanna know why? I’ll tell you why:

Ok?

But the nicer restaurant inside the lodge is perfectly cromulent and while it isn’t really anything to write home about (which you could ’cause there’s a post office right there), it’s serviceable especially after a long day of hiking around one of nature’s greatest works of art.

After two days at the Canyon (which was barely enough to see even a little of it), we finished our journey south, landing in sunny Tucson. The house we’re staying in as charming as all git out. We’ve only been here a few days so there’s much to explore — and eat. More on that later.

bienvenido a mi casa!

Apparently I am experiencing some difficulty in completing what I start so I am just going to power through the rest of the NYC trip with pictures and very few words.

I was very much looking forward to lunch at Sriphiphai, a place often called the best Thai restaurant in the US. Since I’ve been to the other place (Lotus of Siam, Las Vegas) that sometimes claims that title, too, I was eager to compare and contrast. But first…

Vanessa informed me that Sriphiphai tradition dictates that you must have a tamale before your meal from the Oaxacan cart under the elevated subway. Well, I’m not one to buck tradition so we got a chicken one and shared it between the three of us.

Several friends met us at the restaurant and we were 7 people all together which was good because we had a lot of eating to do. The menu at Sriphiphai comes in a thick binder with lots of pictures and explanations and many, many choices.

Vanessa tried to convince us that we should order 2n dishes — which totally flies in the face of the n+1 standard. We talked her down to n + .5n , but I think that somehow in the ordering process we went back up to 2N. How’d that happend?

Mee krob, crispy noodles with shrimp

fried, pickled pork — yes!

crispy catfish salad

crispy watercress salad – gotta love the mad genius who first decided to batter and deep fry watercress

pork knuckle stew — my personal Bangkok food court favorite

a delivery truck outside was dropping off… duck heads?

C taking a picture of the duck heads… and I only just noticed the perplexed delivery man behind him.

After that we took the train to Roosevelt Island, an island in the East River between Manhattan and Queens. It was a lovely day and a great day for a stroll around a scenic island.

There’s an awesome aerial tram that travels between the island and midtown.

The views from the tram are pretty amazing and unlike anything other views in NY.

Standing in the field in front of the former Small Pox (!) hospital, Chris tells Craig about the one that got away.

I think this would make a nice album cover

The only officially recognized ruins in the city of New York — ladies and gentlemen, the Small Pox Hospital!

Noah explains it all to me

more ruins

After lunch at Sriphiphai, but before we came to Roosevelt Island, we walked through an Indian neighborhood in Jackson Heights. In addition to the awesome grocery store Craig took us to (where I finally found all the exotic spices I need to complete my 660 curry journey, like wet kokum, anadarna and kalonji), we also collected a box full of Indian sweets. On the island we hunkered on a bench, snacked on our sweets and gazed out at the Manhattan skyline.

I’m going to fast forward to the next day because the rest of the day consisted of a failed attempt to go to a free concert (turned out to be a semi-interesting lecture instead) adn yet another meal at Franny’s…

But our last day in NYC brought us to…

the Shake Shack!

Luckily the weather was just cool enough that not a ton of people were waiting for burgers and shakes and yet not so cold that it was hard to wait for our turn…

While we were waiting for our Shack Shack shaker to shake, we were approached by a reporter from cnet asking silly questions about facebook. I ducked out of getting caught, but the camera, but here’s Vanessa considering an answer to the question, “Who do you think should play the founder of Facebook in the movie about it?” Well, any thoughts, anyone?

After a little more sightseeing a quick trip back to Brooklyn, we were on our way home, with bellies full of deliciousness and cameras full of memories…

cheese! (this picture turned out way better than the one I was trying to take)

I’ll call Saturday our Day 1 in New York since our train pulled in just after midnight on Saturday morning/Friday night. That evening is best left
forgotten, however: we spent nearly an hour on the subway platform at Penn station waiting for a train to take us to Brooklyn.

We did eventually make it and were welcomed warmly into Vanessa’s house along with enthusiastic greetings from Boo and Stinky.

The next morning was rainy and grey, the perfect weather for ramen. We headed into the East Village to go to Ippudoh, but found that the wait was an hour and a half which would make it nearly dinner time by the time we finished. So we gave that up and headed down St. Marks to Setagaya, which was a most worthy replacement.

the cooks at Setagaya keep track of time with a wall of timers.

pickled bambo shoots, an outrageously delicious boiled egg and wowee-zowee fried pork belly.

and ramen, of course.

C and I muscled our way into the crowded Frick Museum after lunch and spent the afternoon wandering through the stately gallery and gawking at Vermeer paintings. There’s nothing like looking at art to make your tummy grumble so afterwards we strolled through Central Park and looked for a place for a snack and landed on a little chain bakery with the less than appealing name “Hot ‘n’ Crusty.”

But the main event for the day was yet to come: we met Craig and Patricia in their enviable Harlem apartment before heading over to Gemma and Jen’s highrise home a few blocks away. Gemma had whipped up a Spanish feast for us which we all readily gobbled away.

tortilla

chorizo

one of our lovely hosts and a pitcher of sangria

Coming from a city that lacks a real Chinatown, I’m always happy to go to New York’s bustling, overwhelming real thing. That Easter Sunday we made our way to Joe’s Shanghai, a place famous for their soup dumplings. So famous, in fact, that as soon as you sit down they ask you how many orders you want. And so famous, in fact, that we waited about quite a while for a table, though not quite as long as the line out the door had us believe upon arrival.

these are the famous dumplings, filled with crab and pork and a fragrant broth

there’s a technique to opening them… be careful and don’t lose the soup!

we also got an order of razor clams in black bean sauce

and some Shanghai style beans

The food was awesome, as always, but the best part was as we were getting up to leave, I found out that I was sitting next to an old co-worker from Portland. ‘Tis indeed a small world after all.

More museum time, this time the New Museum of Contemporary Art which had a special exhibition of artists under 33 (“Younger than Jesus”, the show was called) — it was interesting, but that those little young ‘uns sure made me feel old.

Off to Franny’s, the Brooklyn restaurant where Vanessa works, for dinner.

We got seats at the bar and the very friendly and efficient bartender served us well all night long.

look at ‘er go!

housemade tonic — my favorite drink and this is easily the best one I’ve ever had.

Sorry, the pictures get worse at the night got darker…

marinated leeks, melt in your mouth deliciousness

blood orange salad. C tried to recreate this the other night and while his was good, it wasn’t nearly as lovely as this one.

bucatini with sardines

pizza!

ah, beautiful canolo. It was perfect in every way.