Guest Post: A Trip Down South, Part 1

I just got back from a trip to Louisiana and Mississippi. My parents and I took a much needed vacation for a week and visited New Orleans, Cajun Country, and parts of Mississippi.

It was amazing to go to an entirely different part of the country and forget all about work and Boston life! Unfortunately, most of my food pictures were taken inside dark restaurants and didn't turn out too great, so bear with me.

We flew into New Orleans and stayed for a couple of days at an adorable B&B, Maison Perrier, which was in the Uptown/Garden District area.

It is primarily residential but has tons of cute shops and restaurants.

The first night we went to Upperline, a lovely Creole dinner spot where we first sampled some traditional southern fare. It was a nice restaurant so I wore my new dress which I hadn't worn yet. It's from Target!

Fried green tomatoes with shrimp remoulade:

Entrée of Cane River Country Shrimp (with mushrooms):

Of course we had to split two desserts, pecan pie:

and Honey- Pecan Bread Pudding with Toffee Sauce (it was the first night... we splurged!)

In the morning I wanted to explore the neighborhood and get some good exercise. I ran a 7 mile loop from our B&B down St. Charles Ave (where the streetcar runs) and around the Tulane and Loyola campuses. Then I ran along the gorgeous pathway in Audubon Park, past the golf courses and lovely oak trees. I finished in 1:01:06 and felt very sore - a lot of the sidewalks were uneven which is tough on my joints.

Then it was time for the second B - breakfast! I started with some fruit and peach yogurt before the hot breakfast was served - French toast!

I declined the second piece and just stuck with one - it's been a long time since I've had French toast and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Then we were off to explore the city, starting with one of the picturesque (and somewhat creepy) cemeteries, where the dead are buried above ground because of the low elevation.

We also had fun exploring the French Quarter and being tourists for awhile.

Unfortunately my hip was aching the whole time - argh, not again! It was sore after the run but just got worse throughout the day.

Lunch was another New Orleans dish - gumbo!

It looks gross, but was quite tasty. I also had a couple of bites of my mom's Fried Oyster Po'boy. Yum.

We also found the French Market and checked out some of the cool produce - what the heck are these things?

We found out that they're mirlitons, which apparently are like a root vegetable. Anyone ever eaten one?

And sugar cane! Funny to think this is where sugar comes from.

My mom found her favorite - funky looking gourds.

And my dad found this.. um.. ick?!

After some more exploring (and a bit of an afternoon nap) we wanted to break from the traditional southern foods and decided on Mexican. Usually a meal of Mexican food is full of cheese and I always overeat. However this meal was nice and light. Pico and chips to start, followed by Gazpacho and a chicken taco with Pico. Unfortunately it was too dark for pictures.

However, we did leave room for my favorite - ice cream!

Creole Creamery had tons of amazing and creative flavors like Lavender Honey, Bananas Foster, and Creole Cream Cheese.

I chose Butterscotch Pumpkin Pound Cake - I can't resist something pumpkin flavored!

What are some creative ice cream flavors you've tried?

I liked the motto on the wall.

That's it for part 1, stay tuned for the rest!

Things I Love

Things I'm loving right now:

National Public Radio podcasts:

They’re free, they’re interesting, and they make me feel smart and informed. I’ve been downloading the Fresh Air and Story of the Day podcasts and putting them onto my iPod for entertainment while on the bus to school and work. iTunes has podcasts for just about every NPR show on the air. I love the range of stories- Recently, I’ve listened to interviews with 30 Rock’s Tracy Morgan on being “The New Black,” the admitting psychiatrist at Bellevue Hospital’s Psychiatric ER, and Ruth Reichl, editor of the now-defunct Gourmet Magazine.

Al Jazeera:

Something else that makes me feel smart! Can you tell I like feeling smart? My morning routine has becoming watching Al Jazeera in my PJs while eating breakfast on the couch. It’s so informative- few Western news outlets offer news coverage as wide-ranging as Al Jazeera's. When they do the weather, they do the entire world. Awesome. Al Jazeera gets a bad rap in the US for airing the Al Qaeda videos that we’re too afraid to put on TV, but it’s legit. I love it.

Larabars:

I've finally been reunited with my long-lost love! Not long after I arrived in Nairobi, I begged my mother to send me some Laras. They would be perfect for those times when I get stuck in traffic and arrive home late in the evening, ready to chew my arm off. Over one month ago, she packed up a box and shipped it off to me. After weeks of impatiently waiting, I FINALLY received the package notification slip on Friday.

The retrieval process was quite the ordeal- I went to the post office in Westlands bright and early on Monday morning, only to be sent to the post office downtown. Ok, sawa, that's fine. Then I was sent on a wild goose chase throughout the massive building to retrieve a total of seven, count 'em SEVEN stamps on the notification slip before I could get the package. And finally, I was told that I owed them 590 shillings (8 dollars) because the package had been sitting there for several weeks! Holy crap! I was not expecting that. 8 bucks might not seem like a lot to you, but it's not small change over here- it's the cost of a decent meal.

Evidently, the people who handle the mail at my apartment complex just decided not give me the notification for several weeks, so the package was just hanging out at the post office and racking up holding charges. Grrr. Oh well, the whole experience was just so KENYA- I had to just laugh it off. All that matters is I have my beloved Larabars! 20, to be exact.

ArtCaffé:

Swoon! I’ve recently fallen in love with this gorgeous, classy café in the swanky Westgate Mall in Westlands. The food is divine and the atmosphere and décor can’t be beat- it feels very European. Places like this make me forget that Kenya is a developing country. Though I suppose it is yet another example of Nairobi’s glaring economic disparities. I feel like I've really been hitting all the Nairobi bases in the past couple months- jumping from the drinks at the ambassadors house and swanky cafes to the slums and development projects. I’m really getting the whole picture of this place.

ArtCaffé is relatively expensive- and by that, I mean that the prices are comparable to an American cafe. I paid roughly $3.00 for a chai and $8.00 for this delicious Nicoise salad:

And it was so worth it. The salad has the most AMAZING herb dressing (although I would have been happier with half the amount the put on) and the tuna salad on top tasted fresh and light on the mayo, of which I’m not a huge fan. It was the perfect light lunch.

So ArtCaffé might not be an everyday-kind-of-place, but the atmosphere and lightening-fast wireless internet makes the 30-minute walk from my apartment worth it every once in awhile. (Despite the 3-hour time limit on the wireless). I monopolized a table for a couple hours on Sunday to spread out all my development project stuff and get some work done.

As part of my Culture of Politics in Kenya class, I have to complete a 15 to 20-page research paper on a development issue. I'm writing about environment- big surprise, I know. I’m comparing environmental issues in urban Kenya to those in rural Kenya, and assessing the current interventions, both governmental and non-governmental.

I’m still only at the beginning of the process, but I’m finding it totally fascinating and totally overwhelming thus far. There’s just so much to sift through. However, there seem to be some pretty giant holes too- there’s tons of information on Kenyan wildlife conservation, but not nearly as much on the water, sanitation, agriculture, and deforestation topics that I’m researching.

For instance, I expected to find tons of information on Dandora, a massive 32-acre dumpsite on the east side of Nairobi between the Korogocho and Kariobangi slums. It’s is one of the largest dumps in East Africa and is full of some really toxic stuff- bio-waste from hospitals, industrial waste, raw sewage, and more. Apart from one UN Environmental Programme report and a handful of news stories from the Daily Nation, Nairobi's newspaper... nothing. Seriously? Wow.

I’m hoping to visit Dandora before I leave Nairobi- it’s accessible by matatu, and can’t I imagine it would be particularly difficult to find, seeing as it’s a 32-acre mountain of fetid trash. Only I would be interested in going out of my way to see a huge pile of trash.

Back to work!

Safari in the Masai Mara

Wow, this post is WAY overdue! Pole sana. I blame it on crappy internet connection as of late + lots of homework.

When I last posted, I forgot to mention a crucial piece of information... that I was about to go on safari in the Masai Mara! I've got a boatload of photos, but first- an update on that oh-so-pleasant stomach issue. I didn't want to trek out into the bush without getting it checked out first, so I went to the walk-in health clinic in the Sarit Center before I left.

Welp, I'm glad that I did because the doctor told me that my stomach issues were the results of an amoeba infection... yea. Gross can't even begin to describe the situation. You can catch an amoeba from drinking contaminated water, and I probably picked it up from vegetables washed in said water, most likely in a salad. Shudder. She prescribed me an antibiotic , which I very dutifully took. I want that thing DEAD!

Enough gross talk, onto the exciting stuff- the safari...

Safaris are what make up the majority of Kenya's tourism sector- they're a HUGELY popular tourist attraction and for good reason. It's hard to beat the opportunity to view wild elephants, lions, zebras, giraffes, and more in their natural habitat. However, they're also insanely expensive. A week-long safari in a top-flight resort will run you many thousands of dollars, so we decided to take the budget route- a two-day camping safari.

One my program-mates works with a guy named Alex who was able to hook us up with a pretty sweet deal- we camped in tents and cooked our own food, so the whole shebang (game drives, park admission, campsite, etc) only cost us about US$60 per person. Pretty damn awesome. By comparison, park admission alone costs US$60 for non-residents (as USIU students, we qualify as residents).

So, bright and early on Saturday morning, all 9 of us piled into a van to make the 5-hour drive to the Masai Mara. The Mara is one of Kenya's top safari destinations, and for good reason. It sits on the border with Tanzania, covers about 1,150 square km, and is filled with an insane amount of wildlife.

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The area is also the home territory of the Masai tribe (also spelled Maasai)- the most iconic of Kenya's 40-odd tribes. I feel like one can't talk about the Masai Mara without first discussing the Masai people.

Because they are one of the few tribes to maintain their traditional dress and pastoral lifestyle over the years, the Masai usually end up on the cover of Kenya guidebooks and such. I'm sure you've seen photos- the men wear bright red shuka (blankets), sandals made of old tires, and brightly beaded jewelry. They also carry wooden walking sticks to herd their animals.

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The women wear similar attire, but with several brightly-patterned pieces of fabric called kangas tied over their shoulders and around their waists.

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One of the surefire ways to recognize a Masai if she/he is not in traditional dress is to look at the ears- they have HUGE holes in their earlobes. Like, large enough to put your hand through.

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Another way to identify a Masai is to try to take a photo of them - they will freak out and demand money if you try to take a photo without asking first. I whole-heartedly support this decision- if people brazenly gawked at me as much as they do the Masai, I would do the same thing. I now know first hand how much it sucks to be objectified, so I totally understand where they're coming from.

Wow- I just realized that I am physically unable to write a post about Kenya without incorporating some amount of cultural/anthropological commentary. Hah. What can I say, this shiz is heavy over here. Anyways, we went on two game drives over the course of the weekend- one on Saturday afternoon and one on Sunday morning. I mixed all the photos together because I can't remember which photos came from which day. Without further ado...

into the park we went...

...to see an amazing number of animals:

giraffe

water buffalo

zebra and gazelle

cheetahs- we saw them chase down some prey!

lion!

leopard in the tree

elephant

jackal eating a carcass

baboon

monkey- this one stole my friend's PB & J during our lunch stop! They're wily little creatures.

hippo in the Mara river

We also saw the Tanzania-Kenya border marker!

The Mara essentially continues into Tanzania, but it's called Serengeti on the other side. There is no fence between the two countries so that the animals can free migrate between the two. The annual wildebeest migration is a HUGE event- it's quite dramatic, apparently.

I took a photo with my feet in both countries:

and did a handstand against it!

All in all, it was an awesome trip. I'm really glad we did this after being in Kenya for 2.5 months (rather than at the beginning of the semester) because my experiences thus far gave me a whole different perspective on everything we saw in the Mara. I can't imagine traveling to Kenya for only one week and just doing a safari- there's so much you'd be missing out on!

Bad and Good

Hello friends! I'm back!

Life has been busy and blogging got pushed to the back burner, what can I say. It's crunch time right now- November is shaping up to be a crazy month. Here's what I've got on my plate:

• Grant proposal: Due November 30th
• Giant research paper: December 4th
• "Culture of Politics in Kenya" Final Exam Essays: December 11th
• Final Internship Reflection Paper: December 11th
• Completion of 150 internship hours: By the end of the semester
• Exams/Homework for Swahili and USIU classes: By the end of the semester

...all while finding time to actually get out and see Kenya.

Yikes! So, as you can see, things are a bit crazy these days in apartments T4 and T7. No one ever said this semester would be easy.

Compounding the craziness was the fact that I've been out of commission for a couple days with a nasty stomach bug of sorts. I won't go into the gory details but it was bound to happen sometime. You're pretty much guaranteed to get sick at least once during a stay in Kenya. I finally bit the bullet yesterday and took a ciprofloxacin pill yesterday morning. Cipro is a very heavy prescription antibiotic used to treat a wide range of illnesses, including typhoid. Yikes. Taking intense drugs makes me rather nervous, but I was in enough pain to warrant it. The upside? Cipro kills everything in your stomach. The downside? Cipro kills everything in your stomach. Meaning it wipes out all those good digestive bacteria that you need in order to break down your food. So, while it solves one problem, it can cause another...

Yea. I think I ate about 2 cups of yogurt with tonight's dinner. Cross your fingers that I will soon be able to fully digest food normally.

ANYWAYS! Thus concludes your daily dose of TMI (too much info).

Despite all the bad stuff, there have been some bright spots as of late. Such as this GORGEOUS rainbow behind our apartment the other day:

And a delicious baked good!

You see, I've been experiencing a lot of food nostalgia lately- feeling homesick for seasonal fall foods, namely pumpkin. To remedy that situation, I've been baking many batches of "pumpkin bread, Nairobi-style." Here's how:

1. Take 1 butternut squash:

2. And go to town on it with (your only) sharp knife:

3. Boil the chunks until they're tender:

4. And mash them up well:

5. Find any random pumpkin bread recipe online. No need to follow the instructions precisely, because you don't have any measuring spoons or even any dry-measure measuring cups. Substitute any ingredients as you see fit, and definitely don't use a mixer. Those things are damn expensive.

6. Pour the somewhat lumpy batter into your only baking pan:

...and bake on the number "6" oven setting, because your oven doesn't have any temperature markings, only numbers 1-10.

7. When it's lightly browned and the center is no longer jiggly, take it out and let cool. Cut into small pieces, photograph quickly, and watch it disappear in 2 minutes at the hands of your 4 hungry roommates.

Delicious. Butternut squash is a great substitute for pumpkin- I can barely tell the difference.

And lastly, a piece of REALLY good news!

I landed an internship in DC for next semester!

I'll be working for Big Green Purse, a website that encourages consumers to adopt greener lifestyles and shopping practices as a way to protect the environment and human health.

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And get this: it's a Social Media Networking Internship! So basically, it will be my job to keep their Facebook page, Twitter account, and blog up-to-date. Um, can you say AWESOME?! I honestly don't think I could have constructed a better internship myself- it encompasses two of my passions: the environment and blogging! I'm still pinching myself over here. I can't wait to get back to DC and start working. But clearly, I've got some things to finish up in Nairobi first, as evidenced by previous laundry list of tasks.

Homework time?!

Guest Post: PDR and Blog Meetup

Hi everyone! How was everybody's Halloween?

Even though it was an otherwise gorgeous fall day, it was 70 degrees here in Boston and I got to spend Saturday wearing shorts and flip flops.

I had actually put these away for the winter and had to drag them out again! I'm such a geek, I get excited about getting to wear summer clothes. I hate the cold!

I spent part of Saturday baking a delicious pumpkin treat: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip squares! I'd made these before for my family, using oil as ordered by the recipe. Since this time I was making them only for my own consumption, I decided to make them healthier and experiment using yogurt instead of oil, half the sugar, half whole wheat flour and half white flour, and eggs (I basically un-veganized the recipe.)


I didn't have the right pan so I used this glass one instead - and ended up with a giant pie-like creation! The yogurt made the bars incredibly moist, with more of a bread-like consistency than a bar/cookie consistency. That was fine with me, though. It still tasted satisfying and not too sweet. The chocolate chips helped in that regard!


On Sunday I decided to do a long run of 9 miles. I planned out my route but made a few wrong turns and ended up doing 10 miles! A new PDR and it felt great! I finished in 1:34:16 for an average split of 9:26 !

I was aiming for 10 minute miles, but must have spend up at the end - I was impatient and wanted to be done.

I also tried something new during my run. I brought 3 Clif Shot Bloks to eat with me during my run. I've never eaten or drank anything during a run before.

I know I should be properly fueling and hydrating during longer runs, but I'm not sure how my stomach will react to water sloshing around. Eventually I'll have to get used to it. I didn't have any water during this run, just the shot bloks. I ate them around miles 5 or 6, and they definitely helped for a short while. Perhaps I should bring more next time?



After my run I re-hydrated with a Powerade Zero, the last of my freebies from the Tufts 10K.


How does water/fuel make you feel during your runs?

For lunch I had plans to meet up with some local bloggers at Myers + Chang in the South End. I'd never been there before or had dim sum at all, so I was excited to try something new. I met Caroline at Back Bay station and we walked together to meet up with Meghan, Kelly, Gina, and Kirsten.

Even though I'm not a real food blogger and just a guest poster, it was nice of them to allow me to tag along! We discussed travel, jobs, blogs, running, food blogger events, and more. Here are some of our eats - we shared a bunch of small plates and I didn't catch them all.

Lemony Shrimp Dumplings and Shitake Mushroom and Chinese Greens Dumplings

Sweet Potato Fritters (this were amAZING)

Tofu and Garlic Chives

Papaya Slaw

Ginger Chicken

They were a fun group of girls and I look forward to meeting up with them in the future!

"Eat a Real Dinner" Challenge

Mambo? I'm thinking of creating a Swahili page with translations for all these phrases I keep dropping. Stay tuned for that. Speaking Swahili is feeling much more natural as time goes on, which makes me think I'm making progress! I certainly hope I am, seeing as the midterm exam in on Tuesday...

Anyways, in an effort to talk more about FOOD on this here food blog, I want to recap a challenge I set for myself this week. I'm calling it the "Eat a Real Dinner" Challenge. If I recall correctly, Rose and Heather set a similar goal for themselves not too long ago.

Basically, the challenge was as such: eat a real, complete, proper, nutritionally sound dinner every night for one week.

Why? Because I've noticed that I've falling into a pattern of just eating a bunch of different snacks in the evening and calling it dinner. Cooking real meals in my Nairobi apartment is challenging, I'm discovering:

• I'm often too tired or too starving to cook at the end of the day
• Keeping a fully-stocked fridge and pantry is challenging, because I share 1 tiny fridge with my 4 hungry roommates.
• Many of my usual go-to ingredients aren't available here (or if they are, they're imported and prohibitively expensive) and cooking with the same limited ingredients over and over can get pretty boring.
• My cooking tools are limited- we've got a couple saucepans, a skillet, 2 or 3 knives, a cutting board, and a glass baking dish. Plus plates and utensils, of course.

So, as you can see, to eat a real dinner here requires much more effort than it does at home. But this week, I took the time to cook a complete dinner for myself! Here's what I came up with:

Monday:

Tofu ricotta and chickpea-marinara sauce served over wagon wheel pasta, serve with sauteed collards, tomatoes, garlic, and onion.

For some reason, these collards (or maybe it was Swiss chard?) are called spinach at the grocery store. However, it's not remotely like any spinach I've ever seen. Regardless of the name, it's only 22 shillings (30-ish cents) for a giant bunch. What a steal.

Tofu ricotta is one of my favorite vegetarian ingredients. To make it, simply squeeze 1 block of tofu through your (clean!) fingers for a couple minutes until it resembles ricotta cheese. Stir in 1 minced garlic clove, a pinch of salt, a splash of olive oil, and a handful of nutritional yeast if you like (optional- I didn't use any because they don't have nooch here). Delicious.

Tuesday:

Tofu ricotta "pizza" on whole wheat toast with tomato sauce, served with sauteed collards and snap peas.

Can you tell I like re-using leftover ingredients? Both the tofu ricotta and collards made another appearance on Tuesday night. The pizza toast was DIVINE and vegan to boot! So many wonderful flavors. In fact, I liked it so much that I made another one after I polished off the first.

Wednesday:

Zucchini, okra, chickpea, and onion stir-fried with garam masala, cumin, and tumeric, served with oven-roasted balsamic tomatoes and eggplant.

I cubed an eggplant and a plum tomato, tossed them with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and salt, and roasted them in the oven for about 30 minutes on high heat. Fun fact: our oven doesn't have degree settings, only the numbers 1-10. Makes cooking more exciting, that's for sure! You just have a take a shot in the dark with the number choice.

The spice mixture in the stir-fry really made this meal delicious. Spices are super-cheap here so I bought a bunch at the beginning of the semester and keep them in a rack by the stove. The mixture of textures really made this meal delicious. Oh, and I ate it with ketchup. I love all roasted vegetables with ketchup.

Thursday:

My camera ate the picture! But that's okay, because it wasn't very good. It was a veggie fried rice dish of sorts which I split with a roommate. It ended up being too oily and bitter- I think the eggplant wasn't a good one- they can get bitter if they're too seedy. Oh well.

Friday:

And on the last day... I cheated. I went out to eat at the fancypants (read: AWESOME) ArtCaffe in the swanky Westgate Mall. And I forgot my camera to boot. Blogger fail. Anyways, I had a divine hummus plate. The hummus was topped with caramelized onions and mushrooms and served with foccacia bread. This was the first hummus I'd had in TWO MONTHS! They just don't really do hummus here. And I can't make any cause I don't have a blender or food processor. Do me a favor and hug a tub of hummus for me today, because I miss it so.

Well, there you have it. With a little forethought and creativity, I was able to eat a nutritious and complete meal every night (if you count Friday). You'll probably notice these meals were very veggie-centric. This is because I don't often get the chance to eat a lot of veggies during the day, and because fresh produce is the cheapest thing you can buy here. I don't think I've paid over 50 shillings (70 cents) for any one bag of vegetables here. And because it's good for you!

Lastly,

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Halloween isn't really celebrated here, but that doesn't mean we can't throw a party! My roommates are I have invited some of our friends (both Kenyan and American) over to our apartment(s) for a party tonight. There will be plenty of Tusker consumed and creative costuming galore. Not so much on the candy, though. Sadface. Reeses and Snickers haven't made it over here yet. Have fun tonight, whatever you're doing!

Guest Post: Two Firsts

This week I attempted a couple of firsts. I finally got around to cooking real pumpkin pancakes. I've made them using my TJ's Pumpkin Pancake mix, but that has dried pumpkin and not the real thing. (Though it is still very delicious!)

These pancakes were made after a long run with Caroline - 7.5 miles! I am trying to up my mileage and set new PDR's. There's something about a long run that's just so satisfying. Currently my PDR is 9 miles, but I'm working up to double digits. Also motivating me is the fact that I've registered for my first half marathon, Boston's Run to Remember on May 29. I know - it's ridiculously far in the future, but at least I am committed early! Tina ran this race last year, you may have read about it.

These pancakes were made using another TJ's product.

Instead of oil, I added pumpkin. I didn't measure, but instead just dolloped the pumpkin into the batter. The pancakes were incredibly moist and so flavorful.

Something about baked/cooked pumpkin really makes me happy! I had a little bit of maple syrup and this cranberry conserve on top.

Very thanksgiving-y!

What delicious pancake variations have you tried?

Another first this week was my first meal from a "raw food" café!

I had a pretty crappy day at work on Wednesday. I had to go out to a client ALONE and find documents that basically didn't exist. I cheered up when I saw that the office was across the street from Prana Café. Prana is affiliated with Prana Power Yoga, my favorite yoga studio in Cambridge.

Prana features raw, vegan dishes and has an extension offering of juices and smoothies. I decided to go for lunch. I ordered a Raw Burrito and a V7 vegetable juice. The burrito was described as "wrapped in chard leaves with refried beans, avocado, marinated vegetables, and sour cream." The V7 juice had "Kale, celery, cucumber, romaine, tomatoes, onion, red pepper, fresh lemon, and salt." Veggie explosion!

It was quite an expensive meal (almost 20 dollars!) but well worth it. I opened the take-out box to find two HUGE burritos wrapped in chard. The salsa was sweet and spicy and the burrito was packed with veggie goodness.

It didn't seem like there were refried beans in there, but instead tasted like some sort of whole grain and nut mixture. I couldn't tell, but it was tasty!

The juice was what I expected - a flavorful blend of vegetables that filled me up quick.

I like the concept of drinking vegetables. I'm terrible at cooking them and always feel like I'm eating them because "it's good for me" and not because I like the taste. If I drink them, the experience is much better. Maybe I'll try to make some veggie juices in the future?

I ended up eating one of the burritos and taking the rest home for lunch the next day. I'd say my first "raw food" experience was a definite success!

Anyone else have experience with raw food restaurants? I definitely want to go back!