If you have heard of the town of Walla Walla, it is probably for one of these reasons:

1)  You read Tom Robbins’ Still Life with a Woodpecker in which he mentions that the Native Americans named the city and “walla” means water.  He goes on to say, and I am paraphrasing here, that if that tribe had continued on to much wetter Seattle, we might have been called Walla Walla Walla Walla.

2)  You grew up in Washington State.

3)  You or someone you know went to Whitman College.

4)  You are a wine drinker.

As a matter of fact, all four of these points apply to me.  In all the years I have lived in Washington (lots) and all the years I have loved to drink wine (lots), I had never visited Walla Walla.  It is in the southeastern corner of the state – about a four hour drive from Seattle and not really on the way to anywhere.  But it is the wine capital of our state and in the past ten years, it has grown from a sleepy farm community with a small wine community and a terrific liberal arts college, to a true destination.

Back in February, the Walla Walla Wine Alliance sent me an invitation to take part in a promotion that they were doing called February Foodies.  I could go to Walla Walla, stay in a nice hotel, go wine tasting, and choose from any number of wonderful restaurants to have my meals.  Sadly, I couldn’t go because Randy was teaching skiing on Saturdays and I didn’t want to go by myself.  They graciously offered to have me come at a time that did work and just a few weekends ago, my little family packed up the car, and set out on an adventure.

So many of our friends make annual trips to the region and we knew we were in for a treat.  My parents now drive out of their way when they go to Sun Valley so they can stay at the lovely Marcus Whitman hotel and eat well in one of the many great restaurants in town.  Now we understand why and we can’t wait to go back.

We loaded up our kids, along with plenty of snacks, some books on CD, and various video distractions and headed out on a Friday morning.  We have traveled plenty with our children but have not taken a long road trip.  We weren’t sure how they would do but they were terrific.  We listened to music, to stories, sang songs, and carried on a continuing negotiation about the snacks.  (My children seem to be capable of eating a tremendous amount when we travel.)  I won’t say the 4+ hours flew by but they went much more quickly and pleasantly than we anticipated.

We had a whole itinerary planned for us with stops at three wineries, a goat cheese farm, and two dinners, but we couldn’t resist a stop at an additional winery.  Randy and I have long loved the wines coming out of L’Ecole No. 41 – one of the original Walla Walla wineries.  The tasting room is housed in an old schoolhouse and a charming child’s drawing of the building used to be on the label of all their bottles.  Now that they are distributing to all 50 states, they have changed to a more, um, sophisticated label but Randy and I both miss the old one.  The wine continues to be lovely and fairly priced.

We literally started laughing out loud when we saw that the tasting, in which you got to try 6 different wines, was $5.  It looks like we are never going back to Napa.  They also had a little chalkboard to occupy the boys.  (Spencer has a perpetual plumber’s crack going.)

After that pit stop, we drove right into the center of town to our hotel, a beauty of an old building called the Marcus Whitman.  The lobby has high soaring ceilings and it is decorated beautifully.  It is a little on the dark side, so I wasn’t able to get a good photo of it, but I love that old style glamor.  We had a great room, a suite with both a king and queen bed in separate rooms, so the boys were able to sleep and so were we.  That first night we were treated to an incredible meal at the restaurant in the hotel called the Marc.

(Warm cookies available in the lobby along with juice and coffee.)

In all the eating out I have done in my life (a lot), I had never done a chef’s table before.  I really had no idea what to expect.  How many people would be there?  Would the food be served family style?  What does chef’s table mean exactly?  In our case, we had a table smack dab in the middle of the kitchen, just the two of us, and two completely separate five course tasting menus.  The chef made my all vegetarian and he treated Randy to scallops, pork, and beef – all things he loves.  Between the amuse bouche and the angel food cake dessert and including all the food in between, we were both blown away by the quality of the food and the experience.  The sommelier paired wines with each course and took the time to really tell us about each wine and why he paired it.  We left vowing to bring friends back for another round of amazing food and wine perhaps in the fall.

The next day was a full one.  After a delicious breakfast at the hotel (which is included in the cost – as is parking), we headed over to the beautiful Whitman College campus to take a look around.

(Waterbrook Winery.  They have a lovely deck where they served us a great taco lunch.)

There was a big bike race going on, so we got to watch them zoom by on our way.  We went to two beautiful wineries, Waterbrook and Dunham, and also went to visit a farm where they make goat cheese and got to taste all the goodies in all three places.

(Monteillet Fromagerie.  We got to taste six different cheeses and they were all delicious.)

The landscape in Walla Walla is absolutely stunning in a way that is so different from Seattle.  The Cascade mountains separate western Washington from eastern Washington and they effectively split the state into two different climates and landscapes.  West is wet, green, very hilly, and mild.  East is dry, brown, flat, and more extreme in temperature.  Walla Walla in the spring is incredibly beautiful.  Impossibly green crops against impossibly blue sky and beautiful weather.  We all really enjoyed driving along their country roads.

But for being smack dab in the middle of nowhere, Walla Walla is an impressively cosmopolitan town.  Part of that has to do with the college being there and part of it has to do with the approximately 140 wineries in the region.  Some of the best wine in the country is being made there and where there is good wine, there is good food and culture.  We had another really nice dinner the second night at T Maccarone’s.  The “T” is for Tom and he is the owner and head chef of the restaurant.  He also waited on us that night and made us feel very welcome in his bustling restaurant.  (It was prom night – that made for some great people watching.)

The next day, we hit two more wineries, Va Piano and Pepperbridge, before grabbing a quick lunch and getting back on the road to Seattle.  As we left, the boys said, “Bye bye Walla Walla!  We will miss you!”  It really was a great little trip and the boys are still talking about Walla Walla and how much they liked it.  I wondered why, what it was specifically that they liked so much.  According to them, ages 7 and 5, they liked Walla Walla because of the hotel and they liked the hotel because of the beds and the “delicious breakfast”.  Clearly, they are my children.

(Full disclosure:  The Walla Walla Wine Alliance paid for our hotel, dinners, and wine tasting at Waterbrook, Dunham, and Va Piano.  Also the goat cheese tasting.  All the opinions and enthusiasm are my own.)

Do you ever realize that you have been carrying around an opinion about something without ever realizing you even have one?  Maybe, for instance, hearing that an acquaintance was going on a safari and wondering, without ever really formulating the thought, “Why would someone go all that way, spend all that money, go somewhere that hot, just to see some animals?”  Traveling to sub-saharan Africa, going on safari, was never on my bucket list.  If not for my husband, I would probably have gotten old(er) and gray(er) without ever visiting that continent.  As it happens, I found myself on a nine hour plane flight, and then holing up for a five hour layover, and then on another twelve hour flight which leaves a lot of, um, time to think about these things – I realized that that was my opinion about going on safari.  Why go?

This is why.  This and more.  There is something about going so far away, just about as far as you can possibly go, that changes you.  I am somewhat embarrassed to say that I didn’t even really miss my children.  Them and our life in Seattle seemed so impossibly far away that I almost felt like, when thinking about them, I was viewing my twin sister’s life.  (I don’t have a twin sister.)  Getting away from everything, living a life so different from the everyday, in a landscape and surroundings that are almost impossibly different from the familiar, is an experience whose value I would never have known.

And the animals.  Each time we came upon them, no matter who they were, I gasped.  And got goose bumps.  It’s not like going to the zoo.  There is nothing like coming around a corner and watch out! there is a rhino.  And her baby.  In all their prehistoric glory.

(I got these amazing shots of the hippos on our first full day.  Every other time we saw them, they were hidden in the water – eyes and tops of snouts visible only.  I feel lucky that we saw them in their full glory.  Our guide quizzed us on our first day – what is the animal that kills the most humans in Africa?  You might think lions or leopards but technically it is the mosquito (malaria).  Second place goes to the hippo.  They are violent vegetarians.  They might kill you but they won’t eat you.  Later in the trip, we went on a boat ride and got to hold a hippo tooth – it was incredibly heavy.)

Our situation was kind of unique.  Because we bought this trip at an auction, we did virtually no planning.  Our package included six nights at a private game park with all meals and two game drives per day included.  Because it was all set, we didn’t look into other options – we didn’t investigate what else is out there in the world of African safari.  In a way, that was liberating.  We just showed up and had the experience rather than trying to choose the best possible option for our time and money.  We both had very modest expectations of what our experience would be but we did assume certain things.  I thought we would be in a small global village.  That we would be a couple of maybe a handful of Americans surrounded by people from all over the world.  In fact, except for one French couple who bore the distinction of not talking to anyone and eating truly incredible quantities of (very bad) food, everyone at our park was American.  Not only American, but Americans who had bought the trip at an auction, just like us.  (And, we were dismayed to overhear, many had paid a good deal less than we did.)

Our little Zulu Nyala, a 3,000 acre game park about 3 hours north of Durban, had found its marketing niche in American non-profit auctions.  (The park is named after the nyala – pictured above – which roam all over the park.  They are related to impala and are one of the food sources for the big cats.  They are beautiful and graceful.)

So, no global village.  Fine.  The upside was that everyone spoke English and that there were several small world scenarios.  The downside was that, since the park catered to Americans, the food was terrible.  After eating divine food in Capetown, I subsisted on bad starch for the six days we were there.   Our very first night, when I passed by the meat carving station at the dinner buffet, the carver asked me if I wanted anything.  I told him I didn’t eat meat.  He told me they were expecting me and were making something special.  A few minutes later, out came a hubcap sized bowl of pasta, covered in several pounds of cheese and dotted with – wait for it – rounds of sausage.

And that is basically the only negative things I have to say.  Upon arrival, we were assigned to a guide – one who we stayed with our whole trip.  Rohan (pronounced Ro-wan) was a 21-year old South African with a slow delivery which belied his intelligence, his incredible depth of knowledge about the wildlife we saw, and his wicked sense of humor.  Fluent in four languages (English, Afrikaans, Zulu, and Swahili), Randy asked him, “What is your favorite language?”  He took a good twenty-second beat, enough time that I thought he had not heard over the roar of the diesel engine, then he finally answered, “Body language.”  Awesome.  (The photo above is Rohan with the remains of an impala after a cheetah kill.)

We asked a million questions, he gave a million answers.  He took out his camera and was shooting alongside us when we we witnessed the incredibly lovely and moving spectacle of the largest land mammals swimming – with grace and incredible good humor – at the watering hole.  His excitement mirrored ours.  (I had tears in my eyes when I took that last shot.  I had just read a book about elephants and how social and intelligent they are.  This is the baby elephant – actually a nine year old – reaching out to her mommy.)

And exciting it was.  Our first day, we couldn’t get enough of the impalas and zebras.  By day six, we asked him to just drive right by those creatures, now as ubiquitous as deer in North America.  I learned so much about animals that I didn’t realize I cared about at all.  I only felt afraid three times.  One, and this might surprise you, was because of this guy.

This is a buffalo.  They are considered one of the “Big 5″, meaning they are one of the hardest big game animals to kill.  Game hunters used to come to Africa hoping to kill the Big 5, now tourists just hope to see them.  (The others are leopard, lion, black rhino, and elephant.)  The buffalo is mean, huge, and really one has one small spot that a bullet will penetrate – just between his eyes.  We came upon a large group of them and they ignored us, like most of the animals in the park.  They see the truck as just a herd of something so they do not run and they do not charge.  We had been warned not to stand up in the truck, not to get out, and to keep our voices down.  Just to show why, Rohan got out of the truck, walked to the side of it, and pawed the ground with his foot.  All 20 or so buffalo stopped eating and looked right at us.  I stopped breathing.  They sniffed and went back to eating.  He pawed the ground again, they all stopped again and a few of them started walking closer to us.  Suddenly, I got very fearful.  I mean, the guide knows what he is doing, right?  But these are wild animals after all and just one of them could have turned over our truck without much effort.  This cutie pie scared me a little too.

Just a kitty cat, right?  A cheetah kitty cat.  Did you know they can run 60 miles an hour?  There were a pair of brothers in the road and three trucks were stopped near them.  Everyone was snapping photos and gabbing away and all the guides, tired of sitting, were outside the trucks.  Again, I had to wonder – do these guys know what they are doing for real?  Are we safe here?

Do I look nervous?  By the way, my hair was incredibly curly in Africa.

Being in a landscape so different from what I expected (green rolling hills lots of vegetation and trees – not flay dry savanna) did not make it any less awe inspiring.  The beauty was incredible.  Seeing the sun everyday and feeling the heat of that sun, after coming off winter in Seattle, was very life-affirming.  We are so busy at home, both Randy and me, balancing work and kids and family and friends and each other.  It felt very luxurious to have hours upon hours to just sit and read.  Our typical day started early with a 5:30am wake-up call for the 6am game drive.  After bouncing over the rocky roads for a couple of hours, we would head back to the lodge for breakfast.  After that, I would sit on our little terrace and begin the day’s marathon reading session.  Lunch was around noon, and then more reading and several dips in the pool.  At some point in the afternoon, we would set up in the lobby, the only place where we had internet access, and check in briefly back home.  The afternoon game drive set off around 4pm and we were back for dinner by 7pm.

(This is a warthog.  We were in the truck when I took this shot.  Later in the week, I was walking to the lobby area when I came face to face with one.  We were about six feet from one another.  We both froze.  We looked at each other in the eyes for a moment and then I moved to keep walking.  He lowered his head, gave me a low growl, and then turned around and took off.)

After a few days of this routine, we both started to feel a little antsy.  Yes, it is lovely to relax but we had flown so far and our little park, filled as it was with amazing animals, was starting to feel a little small.  Fortunately, Zulu Nyala counts on you feeling that way and has some wonderful optional diversions.  More on those next time.

When we bought our Safari in South Africa package at the Boyer auction over 15 months ago (story here), I knew we would not be going for just the six nights included in the safari.  I didn’t think it made sense for us to fly 10,000 miles for a six night stay.  It takes two days to get there and two days to get back, so it almost didn’t seem worth it.  I said to Randy, just minutes after we found ourselves in possession of this trip, “We have to go to Capetown for a few days”.

Capetown.  What do you know about this city?  After he graduated from college, my brother Michael spent almost a year in Capetown so I knew, from him telling me, that it is beautiful.  Did you know that?  Capetown is breathtakingly beautiful.

In fact, it is so beautiful, so majestic, so awe-inspiring that I found it impossible to capture with my camera.  The only city that I think could come close is Vancouver, B.C. with its similar mountains-right-up-to-the-water landscape.  Vancouver has much better architecture (Capetown’s has a vaguely Soviet Bloc feel), but Capetown is right on the Atlantic Ocean and the mountains are truly awe-inspiring.

(This guy is gigantic and is made out of Coke cases.)

There are several snap-shot memories of this trip for me and the first one was on the plane.  The flight from London to Capetown is 12 hours during which I got a few hours of sleep.  I woke up and groggily turned on my screen to see how long was left in the journey.  That silly little graphic they show, the one that approximates where the plane is in its flight pattern, showed it about half way down the west coast of Africa.  Africa!  Somehow seeing our little plane against that massive continent made it finally feel real that we were going on this trip.

We landed at 6am.  Too dark to see the landscape during touchdown.  My first glimpse was from the taxi heading in to the city.  At the same time I was marveling at Table Mountain, Randy pointed out his side of the cab to the townships that line the highway.  Thousands upon thousands of tin-roofed shacks.  Tall metal posts with lights and wiring stringing every few feet.  Some painted bright colors, some sprayed with graffiti, some looking solemn and terrible.  We later learned that each shack has a number on it which represents where that particular family is on the waiting list for a home.  After the end of apartheid, the government committed to providing electricity, running water, and toilet facilities to the townships, and to ensuring everyone eventually has a home.  So far, they have built over 3 million homes but they have a long way to go.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, we stayed at the Westin.  This was our view.  The hotel runs a shuttle every half an hour that takes you to the waterfront, an area that used to be strictly industrial but is now a major part of Capetown life.  There are tons of restaurants, shops, a ferris wheel, and lots of opportunities for day trips.

We decided to go to Robben Island that day.  This is a small island a few miles out from the city where various people have been imprisoned ever since Capetown was settled in the 17th century.  Its most famous prisoner was Nelson Mandela who spent over 20 years on that rock.  The tour takes you to the island in a small boat.  The barf bags everywhere and stains on the seats and carpets clue you in to the fact that the sea can often be rough, but fortunately our ride out there was fairly calm.  The boat leaves you on Robben Island for several hours.  We loaded on to a bus where a colorful guide took us around the island for the various sites, including several houses of worship and a cannon that they began construction on during World War Two, but did not finish in time to actually help the war effort.  Once we got to the actual prison, a former inmate gave us a tour and also a sense for what it was like to live there.  He was imprisoned for taking part in a demonstration and spent over ten years sleeping on the floor, crammed into a room with 100 other men.

Our ride back was a little rougher – think roller coaster in a dense wall of fog.  As I desperately tried to hang on, Randy’s head lolled from side to side as he napped.  Having been in the Navy, rough seas don’t impact him at all.

One of the delights of Capetown was the food.  We had gotten some restaurant advice from a few different people, including a reader of mine who lives there.  The two truly memorable meals we ate where on her recommendation.  But all in all, I had fabulous salads and wonderful fresh pastas, nothing boring or second rate about any of it.  We were shocked by the prices – shocked in a good way.  All the goods we encountered in South Africa seemed to be on par with what we pay here, but food and drink were seriously cheap.  Our meals out were about half of what we would pay in Seattle.

Randy and I debated about whether or not to rent a car.  His inclination was yes and mine was no.  In my experience, driving a car in an unfamiliar place, especially one where they drive on the other side of the road, brings unnecessary stress into our relationship.  But we knew there were sites to see in and outside of Capetown, so we booked three tours.  The first was in Capetown proper.  It was helpful to get a sense of the city but truly the only part we really enjoyed was the ride up Table Mountain.

There is often a series of clouds brewing behind the mountain.  At over 3,000 feet, Table Mountain usually stops them from actually coming into Capetown proper, but they often drape over the top.  They call it the tablecloth when that happens.  Unfortunately, the tablecloth was in place for most of our time up there but the views were still spectacular.

The next day, we boarded another van to take us to the Cape of Good Hope.  This is the very tip of Africa, where the weather and the seas have shipwrecked thousands of ships.  It is not, contrary to what many people think, where the Atlantic and Indian Ocean converge.  That meeting point is a little farther down the road.  We started our journey heading out of Capetown towards Camps Bay, a kind of suburb of Capetown with a beachy feel, great restaurants, and billion dollar views.

Just after these shots were taken, I started to feel unwell.  At first I thought perhaps the decaf I ordered had possibly been caf, then I thought I was just a touch carsick.  While I was willing it to be just that, I realized I needed to get back to the hotel.  We were far enough away at that point that we couldn’t turn around and ruin the trip for the rest of the people.  We stopped in Hout Bay for a half hour look around and we asked the driver if he could possibly help us find a ride back for me.  We were counting our money, realizing we didn’t have enough for a cab, when the driver said the tour company was sending another car for me.  The tour needed to leave to stick to its schedule and Randy asked if I wanted him to stay with me.  The Cape of Good Hope is a very important symbol to anyone who has every spent any time on the ocean and to anyone who knows naval history – Randy is both of those people.  I couldn’t take that from him, so I told him to go ahead.  The driver said to me, “A man named Sharrif will come for you.  He has a description of what you are wearing.  He will bring you to a white unmarked Toyota and take you back to the hotel”.  And they were off.  As I stood waiting in the coffeeshop, surrounded by smell of dead and decaying fish, pacing, trying to keep the nausea at bay, hoping I wasn’t going to have to throw up in the overly air-freshened bathroom, I realized I was living one of my worst nightmares.  Sick, alone, about as far from home as I could be, waiting for a man named Shariff to come get me in an unmarked car.

It sounds like the plot of a short story, or a bad film, but it ends well.  Shariff did come.  The road back to the hotel was windy and bumpy and I was silently begging myself not to throw up the whole way.  Once back at the hotel, I took some nausea medicine and, as is my way when I am stomach sick, laid down and did not move for 24 hours.  Randy took the rest of these photos.

Invisible Dana.

The next day I was exhausted and shaky but came around fairly quickly.  I actually don’t remember much of what we did that day.  I slept for a lot of it.

The following day, we went on our wine country tour.  South Africa produces the 7th most wine in the world and we went to three different wineries to taste some of their best.  If we came from a state other than Washington, we probably would have been more impressed with what we tasted.  But we have excellent wine in our state and while we liked everything we tasted, nothing blew our minds.  Again, we couldn’t get over the prices.  Just having been in the Napa Valley last spring, where every winery we visited had a $50/person tasting fee, we were overjoyed to see the prices so low.  This winery did a wine and chocolate tasting that was lovely.  The chocolate all had amazing flavors infused in them (white chocolate and lemon verbena anyone?) and the whole thing was $7/person.  It was also nice to not have sales pitch at each place.  They let us taste and then sent us on our way.

We stopped for lunch and a look around in the town of Stellenbosch.  A friend who had been to Capetown gave us the advice to take some of our time and stay in Stellenbosch instead.  We opted to not do that but once we got there, we were a little sorry we hadn’t taken his advice.  It is a beautiful small town with tons of shops and restaurants – totally walkable.  our time there was too short but I’m glad we got to see it.

The following day, the second part of our journey began.  Stay tuned.

(Bye bye rain.  Oh, and while I am using parentheses, my new spring classes are up!  Check them out and I really hope to see you!  And another thing, the winner of the Bialetti pan is Jentry!  She loves her Le Creuset Dutch oven.)

Every October, Randy and I go to a most amazing auction for the Boyer Clinic.  It is a cause very near and dear to our hearts.  Graham did preschool and his very first round of speech therapy at Boyer and it was a beacon of light during a very dark and confusing time for us.

Because we had such an amazing experience there, we have continued to support them in multiple ways.  We attend the auction, we donate to the auction, we ask friends to donate to the auction, and Randy is on the board at Boyer.  An event like this auction is something we don’t often experience in Seattle.  People dressed to the nines in a lovely room bidding on amazing items.  Seattle is a city that is casual to a fault, so this auction feels extra fancy.

We have been going for many years and something that is always donated is a safari in South Africa.  In October of 2010, that trip came up in the live auction, and Randy starting raising his paddle.

Now, this was shocking to me.  We had not discussed it beforehand.  Usually we have a little pow wow before the live auction begins where we talk about things we are interested in buying.  We decide on what items and how much we are willing to spend.  It almost always happens that the bidding goes out of our reach very quickly.  But there we were.  Trip to South Africa on the line, Randy raising his paddle, and me asking him, “Are you f***ing crazy?”  Everyone at our table was egging us on, promising to watch our children for us, until whatever imaginary number Randy had in his head came and went and he put his paddle down.  That was when the auctioneer came over to us and asked the magic question, “If we can get you another trip for your top bid price, would you take it?”  And Randy, again without consulting me, nodded his head yes.  I was simultaneously horrified and exhilarated.

And so, we are going to Africa.  Today.  It has been a long time in the planning.  Soon after the auction, we bought our plane tickets and also secured multiple people to help watch the boys while we are gone.  (Yes, we thought about bringing them.  But ultimately decided that they are too young and it is too far for them to appreciate at this time.)  And then we kind of forgot about it.  I would look at the calendar periodically for some far off date and think to myself, “Wow, I am going to be in South Africa in March of 2012.”

And here it is.  We fly out tonight and have a stop in London.  We arrive in Capetown the morning of March 15th.  We spend five days there and then board another plane to take us to Durban.  From there we have a 4 hour car ride to a game park where we will spend the next six days.  Considering we are flying to the country that is as far from Seattle as you can get, and considering we are spending a small fortune for this trip, I know very little about what we are doing.

I know there will be a day trip down to the Cape of Good Hope and another day trip to the wine country near Capetown.  I know, once we get to the safari part of the trip, there will be elephants, lions, and giraffes.  And many other animals.  At least I hope there will be.  I know there will be an optional trip to Victoria Falls.  And that’s about it.  I know I have some new camera equipment and I hope to take a million bazillion good photos, and I hope my kids are all right without us.  I’m feeling a bit (a lot) guilty about leaving them here without us.

So, I have one food post waiting in the wings.  And I hope to be able to eek out another post while we are in Capetown.  I also hope to be able to upload photos to my Flickr account, but we shall see.  It might be that you don’t hear from me again until early April.  In that case, I’m sure I will have some stories to tell.

I  love that the beach is endlessly entertaining for boys.

About three and a half years ago, we got a letter from Starwood.  In it was an offer for five days on Kauai at a ridiculously low price.  It was an offer we could not refuse.  Randy and I had never been to Hawaii together and we had yet to travel with Spencer.  It was time and Kauai in February seemed like a great idea.

(Yes, we rented a convertible.  We thought the boys would totally dig it.  They were a little perplexed by the whole thing.  I loved it and so did Randy.)

We knew we would get some kind of pitch to buy something while there, but it seemed worth it to us.  Five nights of cheap accommodations for a sales pitch seemed like a small price to pay.  Randy went instead of me and came back with the news that he thought we should go for it.  I was shocked.  Randy is the more fiscally conservative half of our marriage and I would never have thought a time share would appeal to him.  I resisted initially.  To me, time share meant mediocre accommodations, being forced to travel only certain weeks, getting penalized if you didn’t use your time, etc.  Life is complicated enough without stress about a vacation.

But, as it turns out, this time share is very flexible.  There are lots of different ways we can use it and so far, we have had only positive experiences with it.  Being able to travel with two young boys and stay in a place that has a kitchen, separate bedroom for them, and a washing machine takes a lot of the stress out of the picture.  It also ends up being cheaper because we are able to eat in more than out.  (Although the groceries in Princeville are no bargain.  I went for a basic shop – breakfast stuff, snacks for the boys, wine, enough food for a couple of simple dinners, and spent $400.)

Anyway, this is the reason that we went  back.  And will go back again.  After our last trip, I swore we would never go back to Kauai.  Six hours of sun in seven days was not a vacation.  In fact, when we walked in to the living area of our condo this year, it seemed so much bigger – I think because it seemed very small after being cooped up there for an entire week with a then four and two year old.  We had some rain this time but we also had sun and Kauai is impossibly beautiful in the sunshine.

Our boys ask me everyday when we can go back.  Our place has a kids pool that is only 1½ feet deep with a water slide and turtle fountains.  They played there for hours everyday.  The beach paled in comparison for them.

We fell into a nice routine.  Wake up, eat breakfast, be mellow for a bit, hit the pool.  Maybe a lunch outing, maybe not.  After hours of playing in the sun and the water, the boys would take a three hour nap – heaven!  By the time they woke up, it was time for happy hour.

(Trust me, we are not drinking the same thing.)

Randy and I had two dinners out, one with a couple who are friends of ours and happened to be there at the same time, but mostly we just stayed local and mellow.  This is something I like about Kauai.  The pace is slow and relaxed, the people are nice, the beauty is overwhelming.  We heard stories about how you have to get your towel in place on your beach chair by 9am in Maui, otherwise you were chairless (the horror!).  We never felt anything like that on our trip.  Just cruising the roads, soaking up the sunshine, drinking fruity rum drinks, and eating lots of pineapple.  I’m ready to go back.

I’m home.  It was hot.  I got a pot.  The end.

Just joking.  You’ve never known me to be particularly pithy, have you?

My trip to Europe was wonderful as you can imagine.  I had worried a bit about it being too short and that I was trying to cram too much in that short time.  But I didn’t feel that way at all.  By a good stroke of luck, I was able to get right on Cannes time without the three days of jet lag that I used to feel whenever I would fly East.  I think that helped.  And of course I would have liked more time in each of the three cities I visited but I never felt like I was running from one to the next.  The fact that I didn’t have two very sweet but very-noisy-demanding-of-my-time-and-attention boys following my every step made the whole trip feel luxurious.

This also helped contribute to the feeling of luxury.  That would be the view from our hotel room.

You know how every family has stories that get told over and over again?  Every time we all start to talk about American ideas of what European hotels should be, my mom brings out the one about me biting into a bar of soap in Cannes.

In 1971, Europe was impossibly cheap for Americans and because my parents were young and insane, they decided to take me on a whirlwind trip to five different countries.  I was just under a year old.  In Cannes, we stayed at a very posh looking hotel called the Carlton.  The rooms all had toilets but no baths or showers and if you wanted to bathe, you had to call for a maid who would unlock the room with the bath located on each floor.  After a day of playing in the sand, I was filthy and my mom decided she would just get in the bath with me to wash off.  For one second she turned her back and in that time, I managed to get a hold of a bright white bar of soap and take a big bite – a foodie even then.  As soon as I actually tasted what I had bitten into, I started to scream.  And because that little bite of soap got stuck behind my brand new front teeth, I continued to scream.  My mom, horrified, tried to hook her finger behind my teeth to get the soap out and I bit her.  Imagine my poor mother, 25 years old, naked with a screaming baby and a bleeding finger in a hotel where she barely spoke the language, just waiting for some gendarme to come and bust down the door to save the screaming baby.  One of those funny now, so not-funny then stories.

Anyway, the irony is the Carlton is where Randy and I stayed.  I assure you, we had a bathroom with a tub.  And we had that view.  I don’t remember one second of that 1971 trip, so I will tell you that this was really my first trip to the Côte d’Azur – the beautiful Riviera.  I am always amazed by the diversity of landscape in that incredible country roughly the size of Texas.  This view has nothing in common with the rolling hills of Normandy or the Kansas flat of the region right around Paris.  It is a beach very different from the wind-swept wild sands of Brittany and the food, accent, and look of the people is completely different too.  Cannes would probably not have been on my life’s itinerary if not for a conference which brought Randy there.  And we certainly would not have had the room with its king size bed, soaring ceilings, and incredible view, so I am grateful to have experienced it.

But on to Paris and the list of kitchen shops I had crunched in my fist.  We walked into the first gleaming gorgeous shop and I got that huge flutter of excitement in my gut.  Like the proverbial kid in a candy shop – where do I start first??  I want one of everything!  (Incidentally, I later found myself in an actual candy shop on the Île St. Louis and I got precisely the same feeling.  I walked through the shop, running my hands over the gorgeous sweets on offer, and was too overwhelmed to actually buy anything.)  As my eyes flicked around the shop and as I wound my way up three floors of beautiful things for the kitchen, I started to realize something a bit disturbing.  I have most of this stuff.

There are those people who say that all you really need in the kitchen is a few good pots, a frying pan, a trio of sharp knives (chef, paring, bread), and a cutting board.  While I appreciate the simplicity of that claim and can certainly tell you that those are the only things I use without fail every single day, I am the person who will also tell you that having a citrus juicer and an egg slicer, several bench scrapers and pastry cutters, 9, 10, 11, and 12-inch fluted tart pans, all manner of palette knives and offset spatulas, countless wooden spoons, and an egg poacher – not to mention drawers and cabinets full of other things – is a joy impossible to describe.  Until you find yourself on a trip six years in the making and realize that all those things you thought you might purchase?  Well, you already have purchased them.

Not everything of course.  I bought some tiny tartlet pans and a loaf pan in a size you never see in the States.  I got a couple of serving forks and a spatula with a wooden handle, and a bread knife from Poilâne.  I bought a copper ladle that I will probably never use because it’s too pretty.  I also got this guy.

On my search for a brand of copper pot well-known in France but impossible to get in the States, what I found is that everyone sells Mauviel.  The type you can get in any Williams Sonoma store.  The exact brand of the gorgeous risotto pot that my parents bought me for Hanumass last year to start me on my collection – the pot that I returned because I was going to find my boutique brand of pot in Paris, and I wanted them all to match.  No need to kick me, I am doing it to myself as I type.

Anyway, the prices were better in Paris than in the States and I couldn’t come home pot-less so I decided on this beauty.  As someone who bakes, I actually have use for a double boiler.  Yes, putting a bowl over a pot of simmering water works just as well – but isn’t this pretty?  My dad, ever the scientist, asked me about the chemistry of this decision.  Why do you need copper if you are trying to tame the temperature?  Don’t you buy copper for the heat conductivity?  Silly dad.  No,  you buy copper because it is gorgeous.

Speaking of gorgeous.  Look at my mom.  I have that to look forward to.

Anyway.  I got all kinds of food treats and ate some yummy things.  All to come in the next post.

Six years ago, right around this time of year, Randy and I were living in London.  One day I sat in a wonderful cooking class at Leith’s – a day-long class on vegetarian food.  The teacher was swift and engaging and while I didn’t learn much in particular, it was a joy to watch such a professional work.  My eyes kept drifting up to the stacks upon stacks of copper pots on the shelves behind her.  She mentioned that the school had bought the pots and pans back in the 1950′s and they were the ones still used in the kitchens.  Dreamily I thought, “I want copper pots from Paris”.  Practically I thought, “I just got brand new stainless steel All Clad pots – there is no way I could justify buying copper”.  Dreamily I thought, “For my 40th birthday, I want to go to Paris and buy copper pots”.  The class wrapped up, I went home and told Randy about my 40th birthday plan – six years in the future – to which he said, “Got it”.

“Got it” in Randy language means many things.  Sometimes it means “please stop talking, I understand you” and other times it means “I am taking your criticism and I am moving on”.  In this instance it meant “you are making a special request of me and regardless of how frivolous it may sound, I will see that I fulfill it”.  If you know my husband, he is a get-shit-done kind of guy.  He is a tremendous problem solver, an incredibly hard worker, and he really likes to plan.  What you may not know is that he is a pretty romantic guy and he really likes to make me happy.

So, my 40th birthday is this summer (July 26th to be exact) and on Tuesday, I am flying to France.  Randy has business in Cannes so I will meet up with him there, then fly to Paris for a few days, then take the Eurostar to London for one day, and then back home.  It will be whirlwind.  I feel very lucky.  My in-laws are flying in from Atlanta to stay with my kids and I will get my husband all to myself for a whole week.  A week in Europe where I have not been in six years.

Will I buy pots?  I don’t know.  It is highly impractical.  I can’t carry them on the plane and to ship them would be ridiculously expensive.  I hope to maybe find a brand that does business online and buy them that way.  I have a list of shops to visit but our time is limited, especially since one of our two full days in Paris will be a Sunday.  Maybe I will just buy a symbolic pot (like a ½ quart butter-melter) and spend the rest of my money on chocolate.  I know that it doesn’t matter.  I will lay on the beach in Cannes.  I will have an early birthday dinner with Randy and my parents (who are joining us) in Paris.  I will get to have lunch with Ele and Hilary in London.  I get to fly on an airplane armed with stacks of books and magazines and not one single Sesame Street DVD, garbage truck, or Leap Frog game.  Parents of small children, you know what I am talking about.

Whenever I feel extra spoiled, I feel like I want to give back.  Here is where the chocolate cookies come in.  I got the recipe for these treats from David Lebovitz’s new book Ready for Dessert.  David Lebovitz, if you don’t know, is an American pastry chef and ice cream guru living in Paris.  He has written a number of cookbooks (including the only ice cream book you will ever need – The Perfect Scoop) and also a memoir about living in the city of lights called The Sweet Life in Paris.  Wouldn’t it be nice to have a contest, pick a winner, and send that person to Paris?  Unfortunately, that is not going to happen.  So, I’m going to have a contest, pick a winner, and send that person a copy of The Sweet Life in Paris and winner’s choice of one his other books.  Just tell me what your favorite spot is in Paris and if you haven’t been, tell me what would be your first stop in that beautiful city.

I will pick a winner when I return from my journey.  I will have a few posts go up while I am gone.  Until then, à bientôt!

One Year Ago: Strawberry and Sour Cream Ice Cream (from The Perfect Scoop!)
Two Years Ago: Spicy Lime and Herbed Tofu in Lettuce Cups (pardon the photo)

Flo’s Chocolate Snaps
Adapted from Ready for Dessert
Makes about 50 cookies

I took the liberty of adding ½ a cup of mini chocolate chips to my batter which you could, of course, leave out.  I cut my cookies a bit thicker than he recommends and next time I will just listen to him so they are thinner and snappier.

3 cups flour
¾ cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
2½ tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1¼ cups sugar, plus more for sprinkling
½ tsp. vanilla extract
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
½ cup mini chocolate chips (optional)

Into a small bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt.

In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together the butter and the sugar on medium speed just until smooth.  Add the vanilla, then beat in the egg and egg yolk.

Gradually add the cocoa mixture to the butter mixture, mixing until completely incorporated and no streaks of butter remain.  If using, mix the chocolate chips in by hand using a spatula.

On a lightly floured surface, divide the dough into quarters, and shape each quarter into a log about 7 inches long and 1½ inches in diameter.  Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate until they’re firm enough to slice, about 1 hour.

Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven; preheat the oven to 350ºF.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.  (DT: I skipped this step and had no trouble with the cookies sticking.)

Slice the logs into disks ½-inch thick and place the disks on the prepared baking sheets, spaced about ½-inch apart.  Bake, rotating the baking sheets midway through baking, until the cookies are puffed and slightly firm, 10 to 12 minutes.  Remove from the oven and immediately sprinkle with a bit of sugar.

Let the cookies cool on the baking sheets until firm enough to handle, then use a spatula to transfer them to a wire rack.  They will continue to firm up and get “snappy” as they cool.

(The dough can be refrigerated for up to 5 days or frozen for up to 1 month.  The baked cookies can be kept in an airtight container for 2 days.)

Signs near the farmers’ market in Bayview.

The birthday girl, setting the table for lunch.

The outermost point on the property.  If I had a better lens, you would see a full mountain range in the background.

So many lovely places to sit and enjoy the beauty.

One of the friends brought beads for each of us to make bracelets.  The charm says “Jen Zen”.

4pm yoga was optional.  It was amazing to practice outside.  That is me in the purple shirt off to the right attempting a handstand without help.  (Didn’t happen.)

The grass was perfect for a headstand though.

Jen requested cowgirl attire for dinner.

She was one of the most well-behaved (and beautiful) cowgirls at the party.

(This photo is actually from last week’s yoga retreat.)

And dip!  I made this dip twice in a week and both times it got devoured.    People dig in expecting something mildly sour, as so many dips are, and are surprised by the lusciousness of it.  This dip gets its rich texture from avocado, silken tofu, and yogurt.  The interesting flavor comes from curry powder and mint.  The mix sounds unpromising, but the empty bowls speak otherwise.   Jen’s sister, after learning about the healthy mix of ingredients, told me, “I’ve been dipping delicately since I assumed it was really fattening.  Now I’m going to dig right in!”.

Curried Tofu-and-Avocado Dip
Adapted from Food and Wine
Makes about 2 cups

1 12-ounce box silken tofu
1 large or 2 small Hass avocados, peeled, pitted, and coarsely chopped
1/3 cup low-fat sour cream
1/3 cup low-fat plain yogurt
Zest and juice of 1 lime
1 garlic clove
2 tsp. honey
1½ tsp. curry powder
3 tbsp. chopped mint
Salt and freshly ground pepper.

In a food processor, combine everything except the salt and pepper.  Process until completely smooth, then season the dip to taste.  Chill until cold.  This dip will keep for two days in the refrigerator, but the top layer will turn brown-ish because of the avocado.  I suggest storing it in a cylinder-shaped container (such as a large yogurt container) which has a smaller top surface area.

The Sunday before New Year’s, Jen’s husband Tom called to ask if we wanted to join them for a couple of nights at her parents’ island paradise.  We had plans already and I had a lot of cooking to do for our supper club, but it took us about 1.5 seconds to say yes.  We had been there twice before and words cannot begin to describe the beauty and special energy this place possess.  Each small building is warm, welcoming, and not at all grand, just perfectly homey.  Each of her parents have an art studio (her dad is a painter and her mom is a weaver) and there are lots of bunk beds for all of the grandchildren.  Their table seats 12 or so, even though most of the time it is just the two of them.  They are always ready for a few guests.

If, perhaps, it is a beautiful warm night with a full moon, you may decide to sleep here.  In the summer months, a mattress is laid on this bed along with pillows and all kinds of warm blankets.  Tom is a big fan of this bed and I’m sure, as the kids get older, there are going to be fights about who gets it.

This photo was taken on rainy windy New Year’s Day – not usually a banner weather day in our part of the country.  And still, I hope you can see how powerful and riveting the beauty is.  Imagine this exact same spot on a sunny summer evening with cocktail in hand and children running about.  Imagine it again in the darkness and with roasted marshmallows and a guitar.  Imagine on your way back to your bed you stop by the hot tub to warm up.  Yes, hot tub.

Years ago, our famous Pike Place Market had artists all over the city design a pig.  They were then auctioned off in a benefit for the Market and its’ medical clinic.  I (somewhat) jokingly told Randy I wanted one of the pigs.  I should not have been surprised to find one on her parents property – and one of the coolest pigs at that.

In fact, the art may be what I love most up there.  Each sculpture is so lovingly chosen and placed.  There is so much whimsy and celebration of what makes art special.  Nothing stuffy about it.

Three years ago, we had an epic wind storm in our area.  We only lost power for about 18 hours at our house, but some people were without it for up to two weeks.  Just as the storm was brewing, Jen went in to labor.  She was able to make it across the Sound to the hospital with husband and other three children in tow.  After she had the baby, they stayed downtown in a hotel while waiting for their power to come back on.  Imagine.  Newborn baby, recovering from childbirth, three other young children, and not in your own home.  At some point, her mom, who had power thanks to a generator, had her come to Whidbey where she gave up her bed to Jen and her new baby.  Jen says that visit healed her in more ways than one.  Take a look.  Couldn’t we all heal here?

I can’t mention Whidbey Island without telling another very special thing about it.  If it weren’t for this very long island (2nd longest in the country after Long Island), I would never have met this guy.

Many years before I knew him, Randy was a Naval Aviator.  He graduated from the Naval Academy in Annapolis and went to flight school in Pensacola.  He was assigned to fly the A-6 Intruder which gave him two choices of bases.  One was Virginia Beach and one was Whidbey Island.  Being an East Coaster his whole life, he just assumed he would go to Virginia.  Some friend who had been to Whidbey took him out for a beer one night and told him about the beauty of Puget Sound.  The close access to Seattle and the proximity to skiing, boating, hiking, mountain biking, and just the general outdoors.  Because Randy will always choose adventure over complacency, he decided to listen to his friend (bless him) and take a chance on Whidbey.

Once he oriented to West being the ocean and East being land (important if you are flying a fighter jet), he fell in love with our area.  He took advantage of all it had to offer and then some.  After a few years, his life became a little more complicated and he opted to move back East to teach at the Naval Academy, to get more schooling and to appease a difficult first wife.

In 2000, as he was finishing business school in Boston, a friend from the Navy came for a visit and to try and recruit him to join a company that he had founded in Seattle.   Randy had already accepted a very good job with an international consulting company and had planned to set down roots in Boston.  For many different reasons, the friend’s job offer was enticing.  Perhaps the main reason was that, having spent time on Whidbey, he missed the Northwest.  And so, he did something very un-Randy like which is to re-neg on an accepted job and take a different job for half the pay.  In June of that year, he landed back in Seattle.

His then wife was supposed to close up house in Boston and then take her time driving across the country.  At Wyoming she decided to go back to Boston and end the marriage.  Two months after that, Randy and I met.  Almost two years after that, we got married.

So, even though I have only been there about a dozen times, I have a deep appreciation for Whidbey.  If it weren’t for that island, my life would be very different.  It is hard to imagine life without Randy.  And very hard to imagine life without these two.

First of all, this is my 250th post!  As with every other blog milestone that I have surpassed, I’m not sure how I got here or how it happened so quickly.  I’m just grateful that you are all here along for the ride.  It was so wonderful to hear from so many readers who don’t usually comment.  Thank you all and please know I cherish those comments so don’t hesitate to leave one if you are moved to do so.  I also loved reading about everyone’s most cherished cooking tool.  It seems that simple tools are the things that people can’t live without – wooden spoons, whisks, spatulas, zesters, tongs, chef knives.  Quite a few of you need your Kitchen Aid mixers (I understand) and Nancy can’t live without her wine opener – amen Nancy!  I want to cook with you!

Graham picked #44 which was Tammy who loves her apple slicer.  Tammy,  please email me at danatreat {at} gmail {dot} com so I can get your address to send you the Japanese knife, shears and paring knife combo, and the $25 gift card.  From the conference, I also have a voucher to mail in for a Cuisinart mini food processor.  I already have one so Graham picked #31, Lesley who loves her tongs, as a second prize winner.  Lesley, please email me so I can send you the voucher.

So, New York.  Wow.  I had so many memories being in that city.  Because both of my parents are from there, I grew up going back East at least once a year.  At first we went to visit family and then, as my extended family became more and more estranged, we went just because we wanted to.  When my dad moved our little family to Seattle in 1972, there was not much going on here and it was hard for my mom to leave the Italian food, the theatre, shopping, and the culture.  He appeased her with one family trip and one trip just for the two of them each year.

I went to college in Connecticut and would take the train down to the City a couple of times a semester.  My mom’s cousin and her husband still live on Staten Island and I would stay the weekend with them.  From time to time, I would also take the art history bus in just for the day.  I went in my 20′s before I met my first husband, I went with him just after we were married, and I went with him as our marriage was completely falling apart.  I went with Randy right before we were married, and again while we were living in London, and then this past trip.  New York is a city that I keep coming back to and while it does change, parts of it are refreshingly always the same to an admiring visitor.

One of the first questions I got from people when I told them I would be visiting is, “Where are you going to eat?”  We had three nights and, because there were other people involved besides just myself and Randy, I only got to plan one of those nights.  I chose WD-50 because I have heard so many incredible things about it and because I am fascinated by that type (molecular gastronomy) of cooking.  Years ago, Randy and I were lucky enough to eat at The Fat Duck just outside of London.  It had just been awarded it’s third Michelin star and the 17 courses we ate were by far the best food of our life.  Not only did they make all of mine vegetarian, Randy thought my food was even better than his.

I had heard that WD-50 could do a vegetarian tasting menu for me as well and so I encouraged our table of five to go that route rather than ordering off the à la carte menu.  The guys’ food was clever and innovative (including a play on bagel and lox where the “everything bagel” was bagel shaped ice cream) but mine was a little ho hum.  Out of nine savory courses, three of them were soups and four of them were fried.  I started off tweeting was I was eating and as they all started to blur together, I stopped.  Still, twelve courses of vegetarian food is always a treat and the mere fact that they offer it (and that they also offer a vegan tasting menu) makes me appreciate the restaurant.

If you watch Top Chef, you probably would recognize the chef, Wylie Dufresne.  He has been a guest judge and competed in Top Chef Masters.  He has kind of stringy 70′s era hair and pseudo mutton chops.  In other words, he is instantly recognizable.  As we walked in to the restaurant and I could see into the kitchen, I was impressed to notice he was in there cooking.  I love that a well-known chef is still doing his job.  At the end of the night, he was sitting at the bar with some friends and while I got my coat on, my husband thanked him for a great meal.  I walked up and told him how much I appreciated the thoughtfulness that went into my menu and that we vegetarians usually get the short end of the restaurant stick.  He said, “Well, I’m sorry you are a vegetarian.  If you ever change your mind, come back and I’ll buy you dinner.”  Given that I haven’t eaten meat in 23 years, it’s not likely that I will wake up one day and decide to start eating meat, but if I do – I’m hopping on an Eastbound plane.

The other two dinners we had were good but nothing to write on my blog about.  I had the good fortune to meet Stacey from Stacey Snacks for lunch at the Standard Grille and while the food was good, the company was the most delicious part.  She is gorgeous, funny, and we have about a million things in common.  I knew just from reading her blog and her emails that we would get along but I had no idea that it would be so much fun.  I was also able to see my friend Victoria which was wonderful and heartbreaking at the same time.  She had just gotten some not-so-terrific news and was still handling it like a champ.  If you have a spare second, please send a good vibe to her.