Tequila Moans and Groans

When it comes to tequila, you either get cheers or jeers. It’s a favorite of some, a nightmare for others, but it’s the only alcohol that has singers relentlessly singing its praises. Carrie Underwood blames not knowing her last name on the Cuervo. Cassidy is home and got the Patron for his drink and his two-step. After ten rounds with Jose Cuervo, Tracy Byrd loses count and starts counting again. The Champs like it so much that in the 1950s they created an instrumental song with the only word sung being "tequila" (for those of you a bit younger, think "The Sandlot," fair scene). Jimmy Buffet wastes away in Margaritaville. And Joe Nichols knows the secret to life for men – tequila makes her clothes fall off.

No matter what they sing, they all recite a universal truth: tequila makes us make bad decisions. If tequila is the drink of the night, we’re going out strong and probably not going to remember it the next day.

With Spring Break looming and sandy surroundings seizing my thoughts, tequila night in bartending class was highly anticipated.

Made from agave pinon, which is still harvested and tended to by hand, tequila considers itself the crème-de-la-crème of alcohol. If there’s a pretty bottle and a pretty package, you can bet there’s a pretty price. Tequila, more aptly a headache in a bottle, is so prestigious, in fact, that there are really only two drinks that tequila can make: a margarita or a tequila sunrise, both perfect for tiki bars somewhere tropical in the Caribbean.

For the heavyweights, however, tequila can be sipped straight or shot, with a lime in one hand and salt on the other. A celebratory chant (“arriba, abajo, al centro, para dentro”) may be in order, but watch out – one shot of tequila is enough to make a person legally drunk.

Mixto tequila, the type used in well drinks, such as Jose Cuervo or Montezuma, is artificially colored to mimic the more expensive, better tasting 100-percent-agave blanco, reposado and anejo types, which have all been aged for at least some time in oak barrels. No matter its age, all tequila comes from in and around the Tequila region of Mexico. Other alcohol made the same way as tequila but from a different region is called Mezcal and includes a signature worm that does nothing but add a fun gimmick.

Whatever the type, tequila gives us liquid courage to make infinite memories or lack there of, so sip on this while I search for my lost shaker of salt.

The Perfect Margarita

1 ¼ oz. of Patron

¾ oz. of Citronge

Sour Mix

Grand Marnier float on top

Margarita salt

Lime

Fill a margarita glass full of ice. Pour both shots over the ice (don’t be afraid of a heavy hand). Fill the rest of the glass with sour mix. Pour drink into a shaker and shake. Rub a lime around the outside of the glass and dip into margarita salt, being sure to only get it on the outside rim of the glass. Return the drink to the margarita glass and pour a little Grand Marnier on top as a float. Squeeze in 1/4 of the lime to top. And there you have it…disfruta!

Pad Thai in Gainesville

Life’s been quite busy lately. Between bartending class and working for some extra cash as a beer tub girl, I’ve been eating here and there, trying to be cheap and save a penny or two, but when a craving comes, there’s no denying it.

Thai food is my absolute favorite cuisine. I could easily slurp up peanuty pad thai noodles and chomp on mee krob, sticky, sweet crispy noodles, every day of the week. Nom sod, a spicy salad with ground pork (though I ask for ground chicken) topped with fresh with lime or lemon zest, finds its way to list of weekly cravings too. I have found “my thai place” in every city I have lived and in many of the places I have visited. My Gainesville Thai hunger pains led me to Bahn Thai.

Bahn Thai is attached to a motel, but don’t let that deter you. It has fabulous food. The dark interior, filled with an array of booths and tables, is not pretty nor ugly, but their food, specifically their pad thai, is superb. I order it to-go about once every two weeks, and the portion, piled into a heap in a Styro-foam container, can easily last me three meals.

The noodles are cut short, the peanuts are ground into crumbly deliciousness, the chicken is chunked into bit-sized pieces and the egg is mashed up so that you never have a bite full of fried egg. Bahn Thai’s pad thai stands out from all the rest in Gainesville because it is not soupy. The peanut sauce is flavorful and fully coating the noodles without also coating the plate.

Whenever I feel too lazy to cook or too tired to go out, I bring home some pad thai, sit in bed, turn on the television and veg. Bahn Thai has officially made its way into my feel-good, “you-worked-hard-this-week, you-deserve-something-delicious” routine. And I’m already delirious imagining when I’ll order it next.

Bahn Thai

1902 SW 13th St.

Gainesville, Florida

A slice of Baltimore

Accepting my offer to be a Teach For America elementary-school teacher in Baltimore, MD, sort of quieted my burning desire to be a food writer. My passion for food would go by the wayside, I decided, while I feed craving, young minds with knowledge, washed down with a big gulp of confidence. This bittersweet trade off would be well worth it.

Then I got a text from my brother singing my praises for moving to Baltimore – not because I’ll be helping children, but because B’more is home to….wait for it, wait for it….Charm City Cakes - the locale behind the ever-so-popular Food Network show, Ace of Cakes.

For those of you with an intimate knowledge of me, you know that I am obsessed with cakes, fondant and all. Mad-hatter-style ones in bright pink and blue hues, and awesome pipe work are masterpieces in my eyes. Charm City Cakes is quite the icing on the cake, if you will, to my placement in Charm City.

But what about the rest of the city’s offerings?

During the past few years, I have discovered my standard foodie sites. Some tell me what to cook or bake; most tell me where to eat in NYC, Florida or Europe. I know that I go to 101 Cookbooks for healthy, yet delicious recipes, and Chef Olivia for restaurant suggestions in NYC. Never once had I examined the Baltimore food scene.

My first premonition was to find some new, reliable sites and blogs to guide me through Baltimore’s unknown abyss of eateries. With a few clicks, I had discovered Baltimore Eats and Baltimore Bites. Even the city’s newspaper, The Baltimore Sun, seems to have quite an extensive food base.

Of course, I could never accept a city with sub-par food. Baltimore’s blue crabs and Natty Boh (National Bohemian) beer beckon my taste buds. My boyfriend swears in agreement with Wedding Crashers, “Crab cakes and football – that’s what Maryland does.” Ethnic foods – Ethiopian, Indian, Thai, Japanese – are in abundance, and coffee shops abound. I’ve also read about B’more’s Corned Beef Row with Jewish delicatessens. While deli food isn’t my thing, I’ll definitely have to try it. Heck, there's even a Baltimore restaurant week! Even better, Washington, DC, just a 30-minute drive away, is home to some of the world’s best restaurants (Two Quail and White Tiger were my childhood favorites when I’d visit my aunt living on the Capitol).

So while I will be serving my students in my classroom, there’ll be tons of fab finds serving me. Guess I can have my cake and eat it too!

Bartending 101

I’ll admit it straight up – I’m a cork dork.

That’s what my bartending teacher calls those of us who are wine snobs - those of us who already know which wines are varietals, which should be served with dessert and which should be heated, even before he writes it on the board. It’s a plus that I know “grigio” in Italian means “grey.”

Wonton, our teacher, and as far as I am concerned, our drinking buddy, teaches the University of Florida’s bartending class for two hours on Wednesday nights. The class – a motley bunch of 21-and-older frat boys, wanna-be bartenders, curious souls and borderline alcoholics – each came with a different purpose, but all with the coveted idea of learning a thing or two about college's true takeaway, alcohol, without a killer hangout or a burnt-out pocket.

Each week greets us 30 students with a different alcohol – vodka, whisky, tequila, rum. After a bit of history, mixology and description, we get to taste and try what we learned. Tonight, for our first class, we began with wine and beer.

Reds, whites and blushes span the wine scale. Chianti, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Riesling and all others were described to my fellow classmates. Optimal serving temperature and food pairings were glossed over, and wine wasn’t served (another class at UF is dedicated specifically to wine). Bummer for us cork dorks.

Beer, on the other hand, was in abundance. Little plastic cups dispersed at the end of the lesson were for sampling the smorgasbord of cold ones.

Kona, from Hawaii, left a lasting impression, perhaps just because of its origin. Guinness in a can, with its ultra-cool, patented CO2 filter, showed its skills in making packaged beer taste like draft. Shock Top took the place of Blue Moon. Bottled apple cider and Bud Light Golden Wheat were easily identifiable as the ladies’ heartthrobs. Local beers from Key West and Tampa somehow squeezed their way in, but couldn’t quite hold their own next to the standards like Red Stripe, Yuengling, Samuel Adams, XX and Stella Artois. Gluten-free and organic beers showed just how far the ale and lager industry have come. Flying Dog Tire Bite and, dare I put it in the same category, Old Engine Oil, were too bold to be truly enjoyed. And missing from the crew were Corona, Heineken and Bud Light. Perhaps they were too drunk to come to class.

My personal favs (and no, I am still not a beer drinker) included Wild Blue, Newcastle and a raspberry-infused brewski that, with each sip, tasted like a sun-kissed field. I regret to say I can’t remember its name.

If my beer-tainted mind from tonight’s class is any indication of future lessons, I cannot wait until next week.

Georgia Gorges

Georgia. Home of peaches and apples and pecans. The rivers and lakes are full of trout, the mountains with wild game. Whatever they lack in food they make up for in service. I’m glad Georgia was on my mind.

To escape the world of college, applications, interviews, exams and papers, my mom and I drove to peachy Georgia – some six-plus hours from my place in Gainesville – after my last final exam of the semester. With no Internet and no cable, reading and eating were the only two activities possible. No complaints here.

Downtown Blue Ridge’s 30-some-odd shops sold knick-knacks and log cabin trinkets, glitzy, fake jewelry, antique books and fine wines. Homemade fudge and ice-cream rounded out the hodge-podge of shops - perfectly quaint for a girls’ vacation. Out of the Blue wine shop, serving tastes of Dutch chocolate wine, was the favorite.

As a Sunshine-state native, the 20-degree weather had me bundled up in scarves and mittens. To-go coffee cups filled with café mochas and crème-brulee lattes followed me in and out of shops.

Mercier Orchards, a woody, local market where all things apple are sold, was like a traditional general store. Sugary apple cider warmed my insides. Chicken salad with pecans and apples, and a cup of rosemary chicken soup made it easier to weather the weather. After completing my lunch in a small room by the fireplace, I walked through the rooms of the market, ogling the homemade jams and jellies, the fresh meats, the old-fashioned candy, the chocolate-covered nuts, the holiday decorations. Most impressive (and delicious) were all things apple - apple bread, apple dumplings, apple pies and apple teas. The fried apple turnovers were too much to resist. I selected a warm one from the case with drizzled frosting on top. I took a chocolate-fudge-covered apple (my greatest obsession ever) to go.

Dinner decisions were surprisingly difficult for a tiny town. Reservations were a must. The Blue Ridge Brewery, the newest upscale establishment, with only about 9 tables, was well worth driving the windy, mountainous roads in the pitch-black night for a 7:30 mealtime. Though there was no brewery or homemade beer in sight, the bar had an extensive wine by the glass and wine by the bottle list.

The meal: spinach salads with candied pecans and goat cheese, topped with a pancetta and champagne vinaigrette to start. Roasted squash soup, drizzled with crème fraice, to taste. Trout almandine served with fingerling potatoes and green beans for my mother and her girl friend. Pan seared duck with a fig reduction for me.

Every item on the one-sided menu called to me. Not only main courses, but side dishes made my stomach growl and my mouth salivate. The wilted spinach, the roasted beats and the sweet potato confetti sold me on the duck. Sweet and tender, it certainly lived up to our attentive waitress’s raves. Quite a Hanukkah treat!

Lunch at L & L Beanery meant more chicken salad, a Blue Ridge specialty. Walnuts, grapes and apples tended the chicken and the thickly cut slices of wheat bread. Lunch on the Toccoa River at the Toccoa Riverside Restaurant consisted of crinkle-cut sweet potato fries and scallops in a sweet and sticky coconut sauce. The top-notch view took second to the food.

In true Southern tradition, all meals were plentiful dishes loaded with tasty ingredients and a Georgian flair – a perfect way to relax and celebrate the first few nights of the holiday. I felt just peachy after all my Georgia gorges.

My end of the date rate the plate(s): Georgia has some of the best food I have ever eaten. Some Southern food may be only fried and greasy, but the quaint establishments in Blue Ridge offer first-rate food, service and quality.

Mercier Orchards, 8660 Blue Ridge Drive, Blue Ridge, GA

Blue Ridge Brewery, 187 Depot Street, Blue Ridge, GA

L & L Beanery Cafe and Bakery, 260 West Main Street, Blue Ridge, GA

Toccoa Riverside Restaurant, 8055 Aska Road, Blue Ridge, GA

Turkey day

Turkey day (or in my case, turkey days) sucked all life out of me. Stuffed even fatter than each turkey I engulfed and woosy from celebratory “I’m thankful for…” toasts, writing and blogging was far from my mind. Food comas ensued, parades were watched and catch-up sleep was a must.

Of course, like everyone else, I said thanks for my family (adopted and real), my friends, my health and my happiness, but I also added a few new “thanks” this year. I attended not one, not two, not three, but FOUR Thanksgiving meals, making me realize just how thankful I am for all the love in my life – love for one another and love for food.

Everyone wanted to host and celebrate the day grounded in gobble-gobble goodness. I gladly obliged and reaped the benefits.

Thanksgiving meal #1: Cuban Thanksgiving meal, Aventura, Wednesday night Though I arrived late, even by Latin standards, to meet up with my boyfriend and his family, I nibbled on a few scraps of pulled pork and moist pumpkin muffins, the latter made by my boyfriend’s sister. I washed down my glass of red with café con leche, a bite of birthday cake and flute of champagne for dessert.

Thanksgiving meal #2: Mom’s Thanksgiving feast- half Italian, half American, Plantation, Thursday afternoon My mom and stepdad have friends who live to cook. They enjoy preparing dishes that guests go ga-ga over – the tried-and-true crowd pleasers. Appetizers began at 1 p.m. Spinach dip, artichoke dip, sliced meats and veggie trays competed with “sausage bread,” a take on my stepdad’s special pepperoni-and-cheese pinwheels. Certainly no lack of food.

Usuals – the turkey, the stuffing, the green bean casserole, the cranberry sauce – made their appearances. My plate, however, was taken over by the sweet potato concoction that makes me salivate even six months before Thanksgiving. Like dessert for dinner, the sweet potato mush is cooked with butter, brown sugar and candied nuts on top. Nothing else on the table is worth eating. But just to add some variety to my meal, I opted for a heaping portion of salad with chopped apples and Gorgonzola cheese. Italian-style stuffed artichokes and green peppers were also too good to pass up.

Thanksgiving meal #3: Boyfriend’s family’s intimate dinner – the non-thanksgiving Thanksgiving, Plantation, Thursday night Andrew’s sister, a chef extraordinaire in her own right, doesn’t do the whole “you gotta have turkey on Thanksgiving.” Instead, she prepares a medium-rare rib roast with a perfectly seared outside. Cranberry sauce is spruced with oranges and apples; mashed potatoes are chunky and with the skin, just like I like. While I was too full to take anything more than one bite of each, I was able to enjoy a taste. Andrew, his parents, his sister, her boyfriend and I laughed as even the cat begged for snack.

Thanksgiving meal #4: Daddy’s Thanksgiving extravaganza – Jewish-style, Cooper City, Friday Let me put this out there – my dad is an awesome cook. I called him frantically the week before turkey day begging and pleading for a free-range turkey (I am on a new kick, adamantly supporting free-range and organic items because artificial drugs, pesticides and plumpers disgust me). Without so much as a complaint, he ordered my special turkey from Whole Foods.

Turns out, my turkey prepared by my stepmom was the most moist I have ever eaten. Even its gravy was juicy. In true Jewish tradition, food abounded. As if an entire turkey weren’t enough, sweet spiral ham was served. Full trays of green bean casserole, stuffing, sweet potato casserole and cucumber salad filled the serving table. My dad’s moist pumpkin bread and my grammey’s chocolate-covered, crunchy Chinese noodles had me fingering the dessert tier before dessert was even served.

My immediate family is notorious for too much food. Left-overs were boxed and sent home with guests, and that that couldn’t find a home was frozen for later enjoyment.

Spending time with family (especially my baby brother, home on leave from the Coast Guard Academy) and friends at all my meals made this November even more special. I did, however, somehow manage to miss the pumpkin pie at all my meals.

It’s funny – normally, I hate Thanksgiving, but not this year. Though my family didn’t set aside differences like the pilgrims and the Native Americans did, I was able to celebrate with all those whom I care about. There’s always enough of me to go around…too bad I can’t say the same about all the sweet potatoes I devoured.

Orlando Food and Wine Festival

I’m still tasting the prime rib sliders on buttery, biscuit-like buns. My lips still pucker at the thought of the cool Riesling (it was served in a see-through plastic cup, but it didn’t bother me in the least). Moist, rainbow-colored cupcakes in shot glasses continue to dance across my eyelids when I close them. And I’m still longing for just one more piece of the chopped bruchetta on a crunchy cracker drizzled with thickly aged balsamic vinegar – one of my biggest weaknesses along with chocolate and goat cheese.

To continue the three-month celebration of my birthday, my boyfriend and I took a trip to Orlando. Not for Disney, not for Universal and not for any of the subsidiaries, but for the downtown food and wine festival around Lake Eola. The festival lasted two days, Saturday and Sunday, so we made a weekend getaway around it.

Upon entrance, Andrew bought us a pack of tickets at $2 a ticket so that we could purchase food and wine from all the vendors we fancied. We decided a complete walk up and down the mile-long, one-street festival was pertinent before any purchasing or trying anything, no matter how tempting. We both internally and externally noted which tapas and wine goblets were the “must-haves” and the “definitely nots.”

Like ducks in a row, each vendor was given their spot next to some other vendor with equally delicious-looking food. The stands vied for attention by impressing with their food displays, wine bottles and signs. PF Chang’s piled mounds of fortune cookies, Primo displayed a fresh salad bar to decorate their Italian sandwiches, Pure Magic ice cream had nitrogen tanks to miraculously turn their cream into ice and The Boheme’s stand was decked to the nines in white tablecloths and a lamb carving station in the back. With only so many tickets and only so large of an appetite, where do you go?

The four- and five-star restaurants that typically take weeks to score a reservation at and tend make a bigger dent in your wallet than your pants were reduced to even smaller portions of shrimp scampi and lollipop lamb chops than usual. Their cost, though, three to four tickets a taste, was just a fraction of the restaurant’s cost and way too good to pass up. While it’s rare to eat at The Black Olive, Ruth's Chris Steak House and Il Mulino all during the same lunch, I had no problem stretching my stomach for a nibble of each.

But is it really fair to put significantly reduced-cost Ruth's Chris Steak House next to Tijuana Flats? Probably not. Yet with festival-goers in shorts and T-shirts because of the brutal Florida heat, no one was too good or underdressed for any restaurant. Little bites from each restaurant were affordable by all. For those with a keen eye and the ability to trace people like ants back to a food source, Kobe was serving full meals or chicken in black bean sauce, rice, veggies and lo-mein at the same price as a cupcake or two. Lines moved quickly, as most restaurants only served two or three mini dishes of the plates they deem to be the highlight of their restaurants.

Andrew and I enjoyed lunch, dinner and the following day’s lunch at the festival. With each bite of food I took, I could taste the pride and the love of its creator. My favorite tapas included (but were certainly not limited to) tender, grilled lollipop lamb chops and smashed potatoes, aranchini in marinara sauce, coffee gelato smooshed between two mini, double-chocolate cookies, shrimp in a butter sauce atop a crunchy piece of bread and the filet mignon in a fig puree. You’ll have to excuse me for not recalling where each scrumptious dish came from, but with a wine-fogged mind, I’m sure you’d forget too.

A food and wine festival would be nothing without the alcohol. Wines from Bulgaria, California and France flowed freely from noon to 9 p.m. Because of the heat, I always drank a chilled white to keep me cool. Andrew craved pale ale and gulped down large cups of beer. While we learned nothing about beer or wine pairings with our food selections, we did sip on some tasty beverages before listening to the live music and watching the celebrity chefs cook.

The executive chef Matthew Price from The Capital Grille in Orlando took to the stage to demonstrate his signature medium-rare sliced filet with Cioppolini onions and wild mushrooms. Using fig essence and demi glace, Price showed exactly why a good meal is worth savoring. Other chefs taught their secrets of bananas foster, Nova Scotia lobster tail and holiday tres leches cake with seasonal flavors of Eggnog.

While the festival featured only Orlando restaurants and was geared toward Orlando residents, it celebrated food and wine, which people from anywhere can appreciate and enjoy. It reminded festival-goers of the joy of sharing recipes, cooking, walking around outside, socializing, listening to live jazz and eating food all types, reaffirming my love affair with food (and my boyfriend, for bringing me).