Walking on the moon

Once...when I was little, it got cold enough in the Bay Area for a puddle to freeze on the playground.  We all rushed to slide on it, and it quickly disappeared.

When I went to college in Massachusetts, I learned to drive my little Nissan Sentra (SE-R, thanks) on snowy roads.

Years later, driving up to my boyfriend's parents' house in the bleak, cold mid-coast Maine landscape felt like a voyage to the frontier.

Well, joke's on me.  That spooky frontier-land now seems like a bustling town.  E's pad in Maine is even more remote!

And now, for some reason neither of us remembers, we were headed through the flaming leaves of autumn, over the unpeopled hills, and across the wiggling highways of Maine...to Autoroute 10.

Holy cow, where are we?

Is that corn?  And heather?

And what is this nuclear winter sunshine that wants to burn our silhouettes onto the pavement?  Are we allowed to be out here without protective clothing?  Feels like I should be wearing a moon suit!

I hate cold, but I kinda love this.  The air seems purified by the cold, and the sunlight is so clear, everything it touches seems larger than life--or brighter than life.  Just look...

This is a field near Beaver Lake on Mont Royal, the hill and park at the center of Montreal -- a city I had no clue I was going to like so much.

On one of the many stunning November days we spent in the city, I crunched my way through the technicolor leaves that seemed almost like flowers.

Montreal seduced me, despite myself.  I can't help but love a city with its own distinct aesthetic.  The natural setting is one dimension.  The built universe is another.  And Montreal won me over with both.  Everywhere I went, a fascinating variety of buildings...

The blocks-long, multi-story mill building on the Lachine Canal.

This 17th century white building with red shutters in Vieux Montreal.

The elegant Mount Royal Chalet designed by architect Aristide Beaugrand-Champagne.

The glittering windows of the Bank of Montreal building at Scotia Plaza.

The elegant lines of the Aldred Building that break up its mass and add interesting shadows...designed by Barott and Blackader.

The Faberge egg interior scented with incense in the Basilique Notre-Dame, designed by Irish Protestant James O'Donnell.

The crazy witch's cap building near (part of?) McGill University.

And the famously perilous outdoor iron steps in the formerly working class (now hipster) Plateau neighborhood. 

  

And there were the grand homes of Westmount and Outremont, Montreal's two toniest neighborhoods.  I didn't get any good photos, so this one's from a real estate site.  Apparently, this little number can be had for a mere $3 million.
  

You can get a sense of the broadness of Westmount's streets from this photo of St. Joseph's Oratory, perched at the tippy top.

I've begun to notice that cities with great architecture also have great clothing.  Maybe that seems obvious, but it's only just occurred to me that the two might be born from the same aesthetic impulse. 

On the more architectural end of fashion...there are some top notch tailors in Montreal. Helping E to touch up his business wardrobe, I poked my nose into a small shop called Arthur.  Wow.

To make you a shirt, they first take your measurements; then they make a muslin shirt; they fit it; and then they cut the *real* cloth.  Can you imagine how lovely the real cloth must be?  Said shirt will run you about $350.  I have never seen a collar as beautiful as the one the man who helped me was wearing.  I've no doubt he read the cut and cloth of my coat in an instant too ;-)

If I had my 'druthers, I would live in a wardrobe of shirts and pants made by this tailor, moulded to my figure.  I'd better start saving for the dry cleaning right now.

I was also seduced (again, this word!) by more girlish garments.  In a shop called Cahier d Exercices (workbook exercises?), I seriously considered throwing rent money at this gorgeous silver sewing needle necklace by designer Lauren Klassen.

 
I did make a much smaller investment in some beaded Iroquois earrings, which I love almost as much.  I got these at a tiny shop -- Varietes des Mains Quebecoises at 400 Sherbrooke Est.

Speaking of Quebec production, I also drooled over those m0851 bags in person which I first spied in Paris in July.  

Oh boy, then there were the Frenchie-French goodies, like those gorgeous heavy nautical sweaters from Royal Mer Bretagne, which pulled me off the pavement into a shop called Azimut, filled to the brim with classic outdoorswear...almost none of it fleece.

 









And speaking of fleece...this is fur territory, n'est ce pas?  I quite enjoyed going lèche-vitrines at this furrier on Renee Levesque, which seemed to change its windows daily.

Perhaps you are wondering whether you are still reading a food blog?

I have to tell you...all of this eating out, all of this fancy-pantsing of the past year...has left two enduring imprints on my palate.
  

First, I've developed an allergy for restaurant food.  I don't mean all food served in restaurants.  I mean those dishes that sound like they were concocted by a desperate chef in the middle of the night.  Things like "grilled cocoa-ajwaan Kobe bavette steak with truffled potato-celery root puree and zinfandel butter."  Yikes!  No thank you.

Second...I've had the chance to try some really sharp cooking.  Now, when I eat almost anything, I know how much better it could be in the right hands.

In the end, I've been left with a hankering for plain food cooked by magicians.

Ta da!  

Just kidding.  Poutine -- French fries with cheese curds covered in gravy -- is some seriously decadent junk food, but it is not my holy grail.  I gave this one whirl and decided to save my calories for other stick-to-your-ribs Montreal treats.  Things like...

 

Smoked meat at Schwartz's.  For you Montreal-neophytes, it goes a little like this...pastrami and smoked meat are like twins separated at birth and raised in different cities (NYC and Montreal).  My take on the matter is that smoked meat is more tender and spice-y.  Pastrami is more meaty and savory.  

My very best bite of the sandwich above hit squarely in the magic-ordinary-food-category...the part of the rye bread that got both the melted fat and the light touch of mustard.  Mmm.

Wow, this image warms my heart.  How can one not feel good looking at overflowing baskets of warm sesame bagels?  

Like the smoked meat, Montreal bagels are close relatives of their NYC counterparts, but a little different.  They're crunchier on the outside (like a good brezin) and sweeter, which makes them delicious with butter.  And there are two rival bagel stores, just around the corner from each other (Fairmount and St. Viateur).  Kinda like street gangs...

 
Bagel gangs.  Just imagine them holding steaming brown paper bags and saying, "You wanna piece of me?" in French.

Ok, I'm getting loopy (about bagels).

Onward to the pho.

The what?

Yes -- we all know that colonialism was a terrible thing.  BUT we are also very grateful that it means we can find yummy, fragrant bowls of Vietnamese noodle soup in virtually every neighborhood of this arctic, French-speaking city.  My best bowl was at Pho Lien in the Côte-Des-Neiges neighborhood.  (The bowl below was from a lesser joint in Chinatown.)

This city really has a delightful array of cuisines represented...French (of course), Jewish delis and steakhouses, Italian, Greek, Lebanese, North African, Portuguese, Japanese...really, you name it.

And, there are many good vegetarian offerings.  We ate three times at Olive & Gourmando, a sandwich shop heaving with people every hour of the day.  Their vegan sandwich with tapanade and arugula on grilled homemade bread was great.

The first time we went to O&G, we had a bit of a shock.  We haven't encountered such an intensely scene-y scene since...well, I imagine this is what Santa Monica must be like.  The male host was a model of Pilates sinewy strength, the clientele all ultra-chic, ultra-casual.  And yet, much to our surprise, everyone was friendly and polite.

Much much hip-ness in this town, a lot of it in the Plateau Mile-End neighborhood.  I guess this ain't really Mile-End, but I really liked L'Avenue restaurant, where the waitstaff wore fitted vests over their tattoos and tailored shirts with pencil skirts with their turquoise hair.  Everything was fun to look at, from the food to the...er, restroom, which had blacklights and sci-fi movies ;-)

  
















Man, we haven't even talked about Jean Talon and Atwater Markets, with all of the specialty food stores, like Fromagerie Hamel, where I got a hunk of some seriously creamy and complex goat cheese.  

And we haven't talked about the delightful La Croissanterie Figaro, where I had an almond-cream filled croissant that was a better use of my poutine calories -- and a divine capuccino. 

 

And outside, just by chance...a rainbow.

I have to pause here and say a big thank you to my friend D--'s family, who were incredibly gracious in offering suggestions and welcoming us to town.  An especially big thank you goes to R--, who showed me some of the best nooks and crannies of the city and even furnished me with some gorgeous hot peppers and red onions from her garden.  If you guys read this, thank you all so much!

Gardens...maybe that was why I felt so at ease in Montreal.  When we settled into our flat, I peaked out the window and holy cow, a big community garden.

But it might have also been the yoga.  

They've got great Bikram studios in this town.  First series en français, second series in English.

And so it is, dear readers (if you're still out there), from this fun, cool bilingual city, that I am...at last...wrapping up this blog.

Adieu farewell!

Frizzante!

Our first exposure to Italy came at the beginning of our trip.  We flew through Milan. Cruising on the people mover toward immigration, I saw something funny.  Two businessmen were chatting and one of them put down his briefcase so he could talk ;-)

People really do talk with their hands in Italy.  At least, when they have something important to say they do.

Italian gives you something to work with.  It gives you words like frizzante.

Is that for real?  People say frizzante and don't even crack a smile.  In English we don't even have one word like frizzante.  Italian is loaded with fun words.  In fact (I'm going to get nailed for this), it almost sounds like a made-up language.  It's like someone started out speaking Spanish, and thought, "This is too dry.  Too subdued.  There's not enough...flair." 

We practiced saying frizzante a lot.  It wasn't just sparkling water that was frizzante.  Anything vibrant was fair game.  Like this donkey above.  I wouldn't even have noticed these guys except that I heard one of the strangest noises...like a cross between a whinny and a squeak toy.  Well, let's just say that they donkeys were...uh...getting a little frizzante in the field.

Italian stallion.  Tee hee ;-)       

Sorry.  I think maybe, because I'm 1/4 Italian myself I can get away with goofing on Italy.  But really, how Italian am I?  At the train station in Milan, a guy unapologetically pushed his way in front of me in line, and then pulled a sucker move pretending he'd knocked his change under the cash register (he didn't have enough money for his drink).  

Did the presence of nuns cruising through the station deter this guy's dishonesty?  No...  I was incensed!  "That guy's such a liar," I said to the cashier.  The cashier just shrugged his shoulders like "whatever."  Whatever?

Well, clearly, the food part of my Italian nature is intact.  I like the food culture in Italy (you can't see it, but I'm waving my hands).

When we arrived in Lake Como, we stopped for groceries at a little store called Dino Market in the town of Lenno.  Light years away from the kind of corner store you might find in say...New York or SF even.

Walking into Dino Market was like walking into your grandmother's tidy, well-organized kitchen.  A grocery is a serious thing here.  The people behind the counter with the beautiful cheeses and fresh pasta are important people.  And when you're in their store, they take care of you.  You don't walk in and grab some tomatoes...actually, you don't even walk in and look at the tomatoes.  It is a major faux pas to touch the produce.  They fetch the tomatoes for you, after advising you what the different tomatoes are like.  When they have discussed and selected your items for you, they check you out, hand you your bags, and say goodbye...as if this had been a meaningful interaction.

It's kind of intense.  But you get really good stuff.  Like the wonderful creamy cheese pictured above.  Or this excellent butter (the package was sealed with grommets!).

Or these sunshine-in-a-shell eggs.  I practically cried they were so beautiful. 

And while we mourned the loss of our morning baguettes and puzzled at the dry, fluffy Italian bread...the focaccia, oh my goodness.  Chewy, crunchy-salty, olive-oil-buttery, leaving us with greasy paws.  This is from a chain bakery in Menaggio called Il Fornaio.  Crazy thing...this looks like the same Il Fornaio I grew up with in the Bay Area!  Only I don't remember the focaccia being quite this good.

I don't know if we lucked out, or if it's usual to equip kitchens this well...but our flat's kitchen in Menaggio was fantastic.  Besides having sharp Henckels knives and every imaginable kitchen tool, the kitchen was really intelligently laid-out.

One thing I really liked was the hidden drying racks above the sink for putting hand-wash items that didn't fit into the (elegantly hidden) dishwasher.

There was also a super garbage-and-recycling system under the sink.  Do you see how there are two drawers?  And you can keep your dish soap and scrubbies in the top drawer, but still access the lower garbage drawer through the cutout without opening it too?  Great design!

Ok, so here I am raving about the kitchen in this flat.  The whole point of this flat was not what was inside.  It was this...

This was my first experience of Alpenglow.  Absolutely awesomely gorgeous.

Which is not to say this view wasn't exquisite at other times of day...

When I wasn't in the kitchen, I was out on the terrace, trying to soak up as much of this blueness as I could.  Even when I was staring at the computer!

Occasionally the neighbor's boxer with the rubber chicken would snap me out of the rapture...

Or maybe it was his owner's strong Dutch voice singing "I was right and you were wrong...doo-da, doo-da," to the tune of Yankee Doodle.

That's just what traveling is like.  It's weird sometimes.  Like when we were training out of Italy and suddenly were told that everyone was getting on a bus to the next station (with our five suitcases).  And then, packed cheek by jowel in the bus, riding through the Dolomites, we found ourselves listening to...Reggae Nights.  Yeah, those flower boxes really remind me of Jimmy Cliff.  E too.  He's jammin' over there in seat 3B.

Part of what makes things a little bit weird here is that the beauty is so intense.  So things that are ordinary or odd can be shocking.

Riding the open-deck ferry to Bellagio, I was lulled into a kind of bliss, feeling like I had stepped into a painting...

But then, when I got there, it appeared that a boatload of other tourists had stepped into that painting with me and were trodding heavily over the beautiful flowery walkways and jockeying for benches from which to bliss out.

Or a friend asked me, "Don't you remember the marriage scene in Star Wars where they're standing in a villa on the edge of a lake?"  And I think, yeah, that's where E goes to the gym.

How can you go to the gym in a place like that?

But people are leading ordinary lives here.  One afternoon, hoofing it from the only parking place I could find one town over, I came across...rock climbers.

And blackberries.  Good Lord, this feels like the Pacific Northwest (a place I have been avoiding like the plague since escaping its soggy skies fifteen years ago).

Actually, Menaggio is a hiker's paradise.  And there are pathways snaking all through the town and up into the hills.  There's even a serious hike where you have to hold into chains to reach the Refugio Menaggio.  Since we are not members of the Club Alpino Italiano, we didn't attempt that one.

But we did enjoy some more leisurely strolls up paved pathways, in and out of farmland, with (of course) phenomenal views...

Until we came across a slightly jarring sign: "Cardano Nuclear Storage."  I am kicking myself for not taking a picture because I can't find any mention of it in English or Italian online.  Strange thing was...I'd just finished a mystery novel set in Venice called Death in a Strange Country, where nuclear waste was at the heart of the mystery.

Well, so that's life.  This place that is like a dream for us is part of a living, breathing Italy.

That said, wandering through the neighborhoods, I did have some charming experiences like receiving a cat escort up to a pretty church, that had the most beautiful handmade lace...

This was something that left a real impression on me.  This lace in Menaggio was a reminder that the larger town of Como at the base of the lake is a textile -- and specifically silk -- manufacturing center.

When I went to Como itself, window-shopping (gelato in hand), was a real pleasure.  After months of browsing past chain stores in HK, Spain, and France, I found myself gazing on these beautiful necklaces at a shop called Benzoni.

Do you see, in the topmost necklace, with the gray-green ribbon, that's a piece of gray-green granite at the center?  That's so cool.  And a reminder that we were just an hour from Milan, where inspiration for much of the  frizzante throughout the world originates.

Passing through Milan's central station on the way out, I got another taste of the aesthetic yumminess that I imagine permeates the city -- in this art deco mosaic.  

While I might not be all Italian, I would love to come back to Milan for more of this...