As we set out for The Grand Sweets & Snacks, on the outskirts of Chennai, Daveena and I were in agreement: We didn’t like Indian sweets. If they weren’t dry as sawdust, they were rehydrated in sugar syrup and tasted of little else. No wonder Jeffrey Steingarten, the man who ate everything (or tried to) […]

This is one of my meals on the British Airways flight from London to Chennai. Note the achar (pickle), raita and the adorable mini pappadum! It wasn’t the best Indian food ever, but it was far better than the standard fare on a U.S. carrier. I flew American Airlines home, and believe me, I […]

As I was booking my trip to India for February, I found an itinerary that involved just two flights, but with a stop in London — for 17 hours. Wow, that would suck, I thought, and went on looking for the shortest flight itinerary.
Then I realized that the stopover would give me one night […]

I’m going to be traveling for the next month. Taking lots of photos, but I’ll have to upload them later. In the meantime, I may be posting some old material that I hadn’t written up yet, and/or some text-only posts. A preview of coming attractions: my dinner at St John Bread & Wine (in which […]

The vodka known as Hangar One is actually produced by St. George Spirits, which is made on a former naval base on Alameda, a pile of landfill on the bay wedged between San Francisco and Oakland.

By a happy accident, we got there last weekend just in time for a tour of the facilities (Saturdays and […]

We had waffles yesterday morning. Um, still trying to work on that - we used Alton Brown’s recipe, but we haven’t gotten the hang of the waffle maker yet. I think it needs to be hotter. Plus, I got the first waffle, which supposedly is the worst.
Such a contrast with last weekend in Oakland, where […]

Our first anniversary brought up all kinds of issues. Should we go away on a romantic weekend? Or just go out to dinner because we’re trying to save money for our first house? Since Wes and I hadn’t seen much of each other lately, I decided we should go to Palm Springs, where summer deals […]

Earlier this year, I went to Miami, where I had fantastic Cuban comida criolla; Spanish paella; Argentinian alfajores (tender shortbread cookies sandwiching creamy dulce de leche); and a great dinner at Michy’s, a newish restaurant nowhere near trendy South Beach. There was an upscale twist on the Cuban croqueta, this one a fritter of ham […]