There’s something about tasting food in a new country that’s a little like magic. Like the essence of that country transformed into the meal before you with the sole purpose of making you understand the place and its people.
Because you don’t want to be the person putting people off because you unknowingly crossed your chopsticks.
Roundups and reviews aren’t always your best bet for finding places to eat when you travel. More often than not, the locals have the scoop on places you won’t find in print.
Eating might be one of my greatest loves—new food, home food, strange food (I recently ate a termite in Belize)—I’ll take it all. Happily. But eating local food, to me, is the truest way to a country’s soul. In China, what did it for me was the dumplings.
Not that you can really claim to know a city after spending 24 hours there, but sometimes that’s all the time you’ve got to see it. And although it doesn’t seem like much, you can really handle business in a day if you do it right. Here’s how I spent one perfect day in Shanghai.
Travel is my cure-all elixir. The magic potion that restores almost everything to goodness. I love more than anything just to breathe the air of new places. And traveling solo usually best does the trick. Why? It’s simple, really.
For someone from Trinidad, making pastelles is either a daunting task they hope someone else will undertake and send them some, or a yearly tradition where family gathers to press, wrap and eat the Christmastime treats.
I refuse to travel somewhere new and leave without understanding even an ounce of the culture, so I did my best to squeeze the real Ethiopia in when I went to the capital city of Addis Ababa for a textile trade show.
Whenever I flee New York City for a weekend, slowing down is the primary goal, finding good food a very close second. Turns out, Maine is great for both. Even if you don’t live for lobster (the crustacean is so prevalent here, that even McDonalds serves up a seasonal McLobster sandwich), America’s northeasternmost sea-loving state is never short on charm—and York is one town there that does charm best.
I’m not exactly sure what it is about travel products that make me the kind of excited that comes with Christmas, but I could test, try and talk about adventure paraphernalia all day long. But let’s face it, everything can’t make it on every trip or I’d be going completely against my endless advocacy for packing light. There are however, a handful of things that I always pack for a trip—my version of the essentials.