We were hustling through Tel Aviv to get to the Palmach Museum, where we were scheduled for a tour to learn about the young men and women who worked underground to help Palestine become Israel. We didn't yet know that we'd grow attached to the characters in a sort-of re-enactment (and that I'd cry. Twice.), or that we'd see a photograph of
Read moreIsrael, in Bits and Pieces
So clearly my plan to blog about Israel isn't bustling along. I've been home for nearly three weeks without posting a word. So let's do this inbits.
Bit No. 1: Instead of touring on our own or with a group, we splurged and had a private tour guide. A cousin recommended a guy named Nir Nitzan, who
owns a company called Nirtours4U. The name doesn't appeal so much ...
Read moreThis Chick Has No Need for Speed
I’d made it three times around the track already, heart thumping, sincerely scared. Yet I hadn’t knocked over any orange cones or barrels, hadn’t tipped the $270,000 Lamborghini LP570-4 Superleggera on its side, hadn’t accidentally bloodied the bored young man in the passenger seat.
Read moreNo, Publicist, I Will Not Guarantee Ink for Your Client
No ma'am. No sir. A journalist does not guarantee, promise, pledge in writing, with a signature, that s/he will spread word of your glory because s/he ate a pork chop with slaw as your guest at a media dinner.
Read moreCharlotte County, Upscale and Down
Should you fear that Charlotte County, Punta Gorda and the surrounding areas are good only for eating food, you're mistaken. You can also learn aboutwhere food comes from.
We travel writers began Day 3 at the Peace River Wildlife Center.
We saw injured birds including two bald eagles, quite close up. The highlight was wading in Peace River. The adventure is held periodically ...
Read morePunta Gorda, on a Plate
My journey around Charlotte Harbor & the Gulf lslands turned out to be a gorge-a-thon -- which is a lovely way to see Punta Gorda and itsenvirons.
Our troupe of food writers and bloggers began Day 2 at The Egg & I Restaurant in Englewood.
Homemade Olive Oil and Wicked-Good Scallops
Our Charlotte Harbor, Florida, culinary adventures began with a visit to Catania'sWinery.
You're thinking grapes, right? And vines? Me too. But this place isn't like that. It's a little storefront in what seems to be an industrial area.
Husband and wife John and Margarita make their own wine -- from ...
Read moreWelcome to the WannaB Inn
The folks who handle tourism for Charlotte Harbor and The Gulf Islands were kind enough to invite me on a media tour of the this pretty coastal area. Please indulge my sharing the highlights.
I just checked into the WannaB Inn, a pretty hotel down a quiet block with 900 feet of beachfront. Lemon Bay is one side, filled with dolphins and manatee. The Gulf of Mexico is steps in the other direction. The hotel has been around ...
Read moreThe Pickypants Family, Part 2
Background: For a friend's Christmas dinner, I baked a chocolate "decadence" cake from the Silver Palate Cookbook.
Read moreFantasyland’s New BE OUR GUEST Restaurant
For food-focused travelers, the most exciting part of the Magic Kingdom’s new Fantasyland additions will be Be Our Guest, arestaurant themed around Beauty and the Beast. Here are some inside details about what to expect.
The restaurant will be an immersive experience. You’ll cross a bridge lined with pots of fire to reach it and, upon entering, be swept up in the movie. Three dining rooms have entirely separate looks, such as the ballroom, which is grand and carpeted, and the ...
Read more17th Annual Epcot International Food & Wine Festival
For 17 years, Epcot has transformed its World Showcaseinto a mecca for folks who like to taste new foods and wines. And for 17 years, the Food and Wine Festival team has brightened the festival with new flavors. The 2012 event will have Florida and vegan (called Terra) marketplaces. Kids will get to drink frothed up Nesquick in chocolate or strawberry and adults can sample a wine made from key lime juice. The Florida Beer ...
Read moreTaco Tuesday. Meh.
“It looks pretty saucy. Is it saucier than usual?”
This is Josh, my college student, home for the summer. He’s examining a frying pan filled with flavored chopped meat, perplexed, nay concerned, that the dinner set before him isn't quite right. It’s Taco Tuesday, you see, a weekly event in our kitchen because Josh misses Cornell’s make-your-own supper, in which he indulged every Monday last school year. (They don't menu plan via alliteration there, apparently.) Taco night relieved Josh from the monotony of ...
Read moreThe Rest of Orlando's Best
When the editors of Orlando Home & Leisure couldn't fit all my "best of" suggestions into their next issue, they generously agreed to let me share the remainders here. These are sensational tastes and such in and near Orlando. Get in those cars, locals! For more -- the ones that did make the cut, check out the magazine's May 2012 issue.
Best Reason Never to Order Fried Mozzarella Sticks Again
We used to battle over ...
Read moreFaux Moi
You should have seen me Saturday night, wiping salt off my tongue. Not wiping. That’s too civilized a description. With a force of desperation, I was dragging a linen napkin over my tongue, from top to bottom, top to bottom. Occasionally I’d jam a finger in and wrap it around my tongue to scoop out more of the assaulting mess.
Read moreFood Bloggers: Keep Your Day Jobs
“I am a underwriter by day.”*
Well that’s it. This food blogger surge must stop.
Every house in every subdivision, it seems, is home to a food blogger. In every apartment, petite or palatial, sits a would-be scribe compelled to share the joy of each smoky slab of ribs, silky slice of pie or chilled glass of single-origin iced coffee consumed. This I-shoulda-been-a journalist flits 10 fingers across a laptop keyboard by night, interspersing pedestrian photos with enthusiastic, ...
Potty Training
Did I mention the toilet? Ours worked perfectly well. I liked it fine. Only nowadays owners of upscale homes who redo bathrooms install “comfort height” units. They’re higher off the ground so we don’t have to struggle to squat so low. (I never struggled; did you?)
Read moreBand Camp? Maybe If It Had A/C
Ryan has a brutal upper respiratory infection. He’s lucky. Why? Because if he felt good, if his nose and throat and head and glands weren’t swollen and achy, he’d be at band camp.
Read moreHear Me Roar
One fine spring day in Oneonta, New York, my college friend Chris and I bolted out of her car in a bank parking lot while belting out the words to Helen Reddy’s “I Am Woman.” Newspaper editors, serious students and overall ambitious young women, we were giddy with possibilities – until we came face to face with Clifford Craven, our school principal.
Read morePicky, Picky
Toppling out of a meeting at my kid’s school 8 o’clock at night, famished and damn sick of the black pumps squeezing mytoes, I was happy to learn that Son No. 1 had remembered to take the chicken wings dinner I’d prepared in advance out of the oven. Until I read his text: “Please never make them again.” Pissed, I scrolled to the next message, from my husband: “Wings for me? They’re all skin.”
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Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
Low-grade terror of spills, stains and general culinary chaos aside, I decided to cook for company in my new kitchen.That’s a normal thing to do, right?
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