Thoughts on the Airplane Beverage Cart
It would be hard to believe that anyone out there actually enjoys airplane travel these days. At most, we all try and make the best of it. And I’m sure everyone has their different strategies for coping with the inhumanity of it all.
As much as possible, I like to explore different airports during layovers, and try to find something delicious to eat. Although, sometimes, it proves to be an impossible task. Phoenix was looking bleak until I discovered that Cartel Coffee Lab has an outpost in the C section of Terminal 4. That sighting made me squeal with delight, and provided me with a delicious cortado for under $4.
Next door was a burrito shop, which wasn’t horrible. Although it was a bit painful ordering a fair-to-middling burrito after feasting on great Mexican food from Oakland’s International Boulevard, just the day before. Still, the airport burrito was a lot of calories for under $10, and chock full of vegetables. Eating more vegetables will be key to getting back onto my healthful diet.
But there are little joys that can be found in the simple pleasures of the airplane’s beverage cart, even if you don’t opt for something alcoholic.
The High Price of Beer in Berkeley
It hurts. Everything hurts. My toes hurt. My feet hurt. My legs hurt. My body hurts. My skin is hot. My eyes are burning. Oh, and I’m covered in dust.
Yesterday, I made a deal with the devil.
She agreed to accompany me on another beer outing, if I agreed to go on a hike through the Berkeley hills. Tilden Park is full of gorgeous trees, so I imagined a nice shady stroll through some glorious bug-free nature. Maybe we’d go up hill a bit, maybe there would be some exertion. But I’ve been eating badly, and a little exertion might be good for the waistline.
What I wasn’t expecting was long stretches of treacherously steep declines on loose, gravely soil, in the blazing hot sun. Did I brush up against any poison oak? I sure as hell hope not. But I have no idea. The last time I found myself afflicted by the itchy rash from these infernal plants, it took my completely by surprise.
All of this for some beer. Was it worth it? Totally.
Tasting The Day Away
For those keeping score at home, I still haven’t had my tacos.
Amazingly, this will be my last full day in California. I have no idea how this visit flew by so quickly. I suppose part of it had to do with taking a brief road trip yesterday up north a little ways.
When I was living in the Bay Area, I got into wine. These days I’m getting more and more into beer. But one of the things I never really did when living in Northern California was to explore the region’s breweries.
Mrs. Fussy still isn’t on the beer bandwagon. And while ADS may enjoy a beer every now and again, spending a lot of time going to breweries isn’t high on his priority list. So I thought long and hard about where I might go, if I could only do one beer outing. Because surely, I could convince my wife and lifelong friend to indulge me on one beer stop.
I even checked my gut instincts with the Capital Region Craft Lovers beer group. And we agreed that there was one place I simply had to visit.
Delinquent From the Road
It must be summer vacation, because I don’t think I’ve ever had a post go up this late on a weekday before. Sorry about that. The three hour time difference between the East Coast and West Coast is a bit more challenging to deal with than I imagined. My thought was that if I woke up early enough, I could bang out a post and get it up by 9am or so.
I don’t know what I was thinking. California must have already softened my mind.
But that’s easy to do, because everything is gorgeous out here. The weather is gorgeous. The strawberries are gorgeous. The scenery is gorgeous. The tacos are gorgeous…um, actually, I still haven’t had a taco. How can that be? I can’t even blame the diet, because the diet has completely gone to hell.
The following is part travelog, part food diary, and part personal reminder of what I still have left to eat before we head back east on Wednesday morning.
Photo Friday From PIT
Maybe the Pittsburgh Airport actually does have WiFi. My computer says it is connected, but the connection so slow and unreliable, that effectively the airport had no internet.
That means I’m posting on my phone. Let’s see how this goes.
Maybe I’ll be able to pull off a photo Friday. You know, since my phone is also my camera, this just might work.
Read more…
Summer Break Starts Now
Thankfully, this has been a relatively good blog week so far. Because this morning, I don’t have much time for writing.
Today, is officially the last day of school. But the Fussy Little Children are advanced for their age, so they finished a day early. The last day of school is more ceremonial than anything else. As far as I can tell, they watch movies and eat ice cream. So I don’t feel too badly about pulling the kids out of these festivities.
We’re going to do something even more exciting. We’re loading up the car for a six hour drive.
No Free Lunch
Sometimes I think that I was born with strong preferences about food. If it were a genetic trait, I’m fairly certain it would come from my father’s side of the family. While my dad himself may be relatively easy to please in the food department, my aunt and grandmother are decidedly more particular.
My grandmother just turned 93 yesterday, and I was on the phone with her recalling the time that she schlepped a giant bag of Long Island bagels on a flight to visit me in California. That trip cemented Nana as a legend in the eyes of my bagel-loving friends.
There is an argument to be made that I truly discovered food in my 20s when working in the ad agencies of San Francisco. One of my favorite parts of the job were the business lunches. And I was lucky enough to grow weary of some of the best choices in Bay Area dining.
The old saying is that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. And that’s very true. Back in the day, the cost of my free lunches was not only time, but typically some kind of sales pitch from the vendor who was footing the bill.
These days, the free lunches come at an even higher cost.
Leave the Tomato. Take the Peppers.
It’s taken me a while to learn about Italian Delis, but I’m doing my best. If I had spent more of my life in New York or New Jersey, I might be embarrassed by my lack of knowledge on the subject. Instead, I’m more familiar with Cuban cafeterias, Philly cheesesteak parlors, and California taquerias. So I don’t feel too badly for myself.
But here I am now, today, in upstate New York, surrounded by Italian Delis. The Tour de Italian Deli went a long way in my educational efforts. I learned that Italian Mix isn’t a universal combination of ingredients. I learned that “cappy” can really mean a bunch of things. And I learned that Italian sandwiches actually benefit from some time to cure in their wrapper for all of the ingredients to come together.
The last one sounds like bullshit, but it’s true.
I also learned the importance of shredded iceberg over leaf lettuce, and how onions and vinegar are critical ingredients for cutting through some of the fatty and salty meats stuffed into the roll. I even came to realize that “fatty cappy” is the only deli meat worthy of the name.
All of which is to say that I thought I had triangulated my way to my ideal Italian sub. As it turns out, I was wrong again.
Cheap Eats
Last week, I shared some of the highs and lows from the Times Union’s Best of the Capital Region readers’ choice poll. And I’d argue the results were some of the best yet. I was thrilled that Stacks Espresso finally found its way onto the list. But there are still some best of class local businesses that are still widely unknown to the newspaper’s readership, and that is a shame.
But the fact that neither Mrs. London’s, Crisan, nor TC Paris are on the list for Best Bakery pales in comparison to the fact that the Best Cheap Eats category is dominated by chain restaurants.
One of the reasons the FLB was created was to help spread some knowledge of issues concerning food around the Capital Region. An ongoing mantra has been that good food does not need to be expensive. The corollary to that is that inexpensive food doesn’t have to be mass-produced dreck.
This region is filled with great places to get cheap eats. And to its credit, the number one pick from the TU Poll was Gus’s Hot Dogs. Personally, my favorite place for the Capital Region’s signature mini dog is Famous Lunch, but to each their own. We’ve got lots of places for mini dogs. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Considering The Best of 2016
In the first few years of this blog, I put a lot of stock in the Times Union’s Best of the Capital Region readers’ choice poll results. In part because when visitors or new arrivals to our region would search online for the best places to eat, this annual list would serve as an insight into the tastes and preferences of the area.
When I arrived in Albany, what that list said about the region was both embarrassing and disheartening. Because either Pizza Hut was one of the three best pizza shops in the region, or a plurality of locals believed that to be the case.
Well, we’ve come a long way, baby.
Not only has the food culture greatly improved in the Capital Region year after year, but Yelp has become a more reliable resource too. And on the flip side, the TU Best of the Capital Region poll results now reside behind a paywall. I actually had to go out to the store yesterday and buy a few hard copies to take home and study.
A few?
FUSSYlittleBLOG 