From SAVEUR Issue #156
It's a cool thursday evening, and Paolo Vitale dodges his tiny Fiat through the cobblestone streets of Naples like it's an escaped bumper car. We speed past crumbling cathedrals desanctified by graffiti and 15th-century apartment buildings flying tattered flags of laundry from wrought-iron balconies. Tiny shrines are embedded into building walls. Jesus Christ is everywhere. No sleep on the flight from New York last night, and I'm experiencing that sort of anxiety codependent travelers like me are apt to feel when we leave home without someone who loves us. I start to worry I won't survive this ride, that I won't get to experience even one bite of the iconic food I've come here to eat—a food I consider part of my heritage. Keep reading »
Credit: Todd Coleman
From SAVEUR Issue #156
One of the most amazing things I've ever eaten was at a potluck lunch. I was all of 19, an American traveler on my first visit to Indonesia, and the dish proved life changing. It was beef rendang, a specialty of West Sumatra, an Indonesian province with a celebrated cuisine, and it helped seal my fate as a person whose life's work would revolve around cooking and eating. Keep reading »
Credit: James Oseland
From SAVEUR Issue #156
Growing up in Germany, I looked forward to the spring spargel harvest. That's when delicate stalks of the white asparagus that grows throughout western Europe (and gets its ghostly pallor from a covering of dirt that prevents photosynthesis) would turn up everywhere from roadside stands to restaurants. Keep reading »
Credit: Todd Coleman
From SAVEUR Issue #156
Generally, you don't see much Farsi in Pittsburgh. So the façade that marks the takeout restaurant Conflict Kitchen—candy-colored, kaleidoscopic, emblazoned in foreign script—seems like a portal to another land. And, in a way, it is. Every six months the three-year-old restaurant, located in the city's Oakland neighborhood, regenerates itself to highlight a delicious sandwich or dish from a country with which the United States happens to be in conflict. The current outpost, Kubideh Kitchen, serves a tender Iranian spiced beef sandwich, while previous iterations explored Afghanistan (bolani, turnovers with pumpkin filling) and Cuba (mojo-marinated roast pork), and Keep reading »
Maui, the second largest of the Hawaiian Islands, hasn't been nicknamed "the Magic Isle" for nothing. First, there is its surreal chromaticism: Avocado green valleys; ultramarine blue seas; amber poha berries, ruby red ahi tuna; vivid, rainbow-hued shave ice; and all those spell-inducing sunsets. The food is equally colorful. Hawaiian cuisine is an amalgam of the traditions of its Japanese, Filipino, Korean, Chinese, and Portuguese immigrants. It is a cuisine in constant evolution, and one that embraces both beloved snacks like spam musubi—a slice of spam on top of a block of sushi rice, all wrapped with nori—and refined farm-to-table dining that makes use of the riot of wonderful ingredients native to the island. The options, like Maui's charms, are plenty. See a dozen things to do in Maui »
Credit: Zach Stovall
May Day, or "Vappu," is a special day in Finland. A carnival-like spirit fills the air, and typically reserved Finns take part in outdoor festivities across the country.
The national holiday is a celebration of "worker's day," but it also marks the arrival of spring and the end of yet another long, dark winter. For kids, Vappu is all about visiting the outdoor May Day markets in the city, where knickknacks of every type are sold, from whistles to big helium balloons. No matter how old you are, May Day is not complete without tippaleipä, a funnel cake only sold around May Day, and a glass of sima, a home-brewed soda made with lemon and honey. Keep reading »
Credit: Laura Sant
Italy may be the destination for countless romantic fantasies, but I arrived in Emilia-Romagna alone, nursing a bruised heart from a recent uncoupling. The portico-covered cobblestone streets and towering Medieval frescoes tried their hardest to woo me, but I am the type who seeks solace in food, not scenery.
Few regions in Italy are better are better suited to eating your feelings in than Emilia-Romagna. Nicknamed la grassa ("the fat") for its production of gut-busting regional specialties like mortadella, tortellini and ragu, Emilia-Romagna will happily cradle its visitors in calories. But although I'm generally not self-conscious about dining alone, the freshness of my heartbreak, combined with a shoddy grasp of Italian, left me sensitive about lingering solo for too long. Waiters gave me strange looks when I said no one would be joining me in sidewalk cafes. One busboy shook his head and took away my bread bowl. My confidence shot, I began looking for a meal that would nurture on all levels, laced with comfort as well as Parmesan. Keep reading »
While reporting our April 2013 special feature on New Orleans, we got to meet the people behind some of the city's most iconic restaurants—the waiters, bartenders, and line cooks who make it all happen. In this Q&A, Philip "Skip" Lomax Jr. talks about working for over 30 years as a line cook at Mr. B's bistro in New Orleans. See the interview »
Credit: Todd Coleman
While reporting our April 2013 special feature on New Orleans, we got to meet the people behind some of the city's most iconic restaurants—the waiters, bartenders, and line cooks who make it all happen. In this interview, Karry Bird talks about his work as a pot cooker at Pascale's Manale in New Orleans. See the interview »
Credit: Todd Coleman
Plenty of people fall in love with a dish while traveling, return home raving about it, and launch a quest to find the most authentic version they can get in their own city. Before a recent trip to Thailand, I operated in reverse: I first read about khao soi, a northern Thai coconut curry soup, on one of New York's myriad food blogs. I then set about sampling every version of the dish my city has to offer—which turned out not to be all that many—and was smitten. So when work took me to Thailand earlier this year, I set out to Chiang Mai determined to eat as much khao soi as humanly possible.Keep reading »
Credit: Jamie Feldmar
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