Meal Review

So I hitchhiked from Karamea today to Takaka. It took pretty much all day. Started off at 10 am and didn’t arrive in Takaka until 8pm or so. It was a semi rainy day, and I spent a lot of time waiting at crossroads. But again. Now that I’m here, I don’t mind. And I’m glad I hitched. My first ride was with an Icelander. It was an interesting ride. We spoke about general versus practical education. Iceland has a population of 300,000. I thought this was crazy.

I then waited in Westport (both times I’ve hitched through Westport it’s taken forever. So I don’t really care too much for the place) for two hours. Before a man picked me up who proceeded to tell me ALL about his life. Including his habits with prostitutes his troubles with his ex-wife. His theory on careers and why he doesn’t have one. He’s building his own house. It’s sweet.

Next, I waited in Murchison for another two hours. This sucked. But eventually a really hippie van picked me up with a guy driving who had spent the last 8 days at a Sun Dance ceremony festival (it’s Native American, nothing to do with New Zealand) he explained that he was adjusting back into the world again and everything moved SO fast. His van was SO noisy that we could barely speak to each other. He refused to raise his voice in order that I might hear him. And we all know me and my penchant for hard of hearing behavior. So. Yeah, I ended up saying Oh really? And Yeah? A lot. Perfect. Whatever. He took me a long way and finally I was picked up by a German who had been working/traveling throughout New Zealand for the past 4/5 months. He had just graduated high school. He also engaged me in a discussion about general versus practical education. Seems to come up a lot when I try to explain to people what I spent the past four years doing. For a lot of other countries the American liberal arts education scheme doesn’t exist and well, just seems crazy to them. So not only did I do that, I also majored in something like Philosophy and Religious Studies, not like, psychology, or something that at least sounds like it has a career associated with it. So anyway. I’m here at my new backpackers. I won’t or maybe I will, be working here. But I scheduled a stay here without WOOFing, kinda like four days “vacation” in Golden Bay before doing a final stint of WWOOFing in Timaru before heading home at the end of February !! I am very excited about going home. So yeah. I am going to try to do some touristy things like, who knows actually. But I’m going to attempt to do some sweet ass trail running. The owner of this backpackers is a guy named Paul who vaguely reminds me of my stepfather. Or perhaps maybe, his place reminds me of something perhaps my stepfather in some alternate universe would own. Anyway, it’s funny. The guy is great. Went to Lakewood High and USC in LA so we had a nice little chat about the area. Sweet.

So anyway, old guy ex-pat American? Yeah kinda. Whoo. It was a rainy day and it’s supposed to rain tomorrow in the Golden Bay, but after that it should clear up. We’ll see. I’m sort of mixed about the place at the moment. I feel like if I met one or two cool people I could hang out with, this place would be sweet. But at the moment. I’m not sure I can muster the energy to explore by myself etc etc. You know? But maybe I’ll try because I have to.

So since I didn’t eat or drink anything all day (I tend not to do anything when I hitch because a) I always want to be ready to get a ride so that means no stopping for food, plus who wants to pick someone up when they’re scarfing down food? And b) I don’t drink anything because I don’t want to have to pee in the middle of getting a ride.) So, I decided to splurge a bit on my dinner when I arrived and partly I did because I had too, everywhere else in town was closed including the grocery store.

I got the Siefried Pinot Gris, which was a delicious wine but I should have ordered something drier or perhaps just less sweet for my dinner. Which was, char grilled vegetable stack. It came with a creamy goat cheese and was SUPPOSED to come with a basil pesto. They were out of the basil pesto and instead served a sun-dried tomato pesto. The basil would have been better, the sun dried tomato just didn’t quite work. The goat cheese made the dish, and goat cheese is amazing in general. The veggies were quite delicious and came in a nice variety. There were courgettes (zucchini) kumara (sweet potato, yam type things) Jersey Benne potatoes I believe, carrots, squash, eggplant and Portobello mushroom. All served on a bed of mesculin (a delicious spicy lettuce that I helped grow/harvest at Linkwater Organics). The mesculin bed was a FANTASTIC idea. It worked so well with the cheese and the veggies were done sweetly so it complimented extremely well. I don’t particularly like mushroom and as it served as perhaps the only bitter veggie on the plate I think they could have added something else to balance. The sweet potato was quite sweet and the carrots appeared to have absorbed some of that. The Jersey Benne’s were undercooked and served too hot. Cmon, fucked up potatoes? I also think that overall it was a mushy dish in texture and would have been supplemented well with some sort of nut, say walnut to go with the goat cheese, or hazelnut to tie in with the kumara. Either that or a larger bed of mesculin. Or a tangier dressing sauce. I think the basil would have been better, the sun-dried tomato blended too much into the taste of the veggies. I didn’t need a veggie pesto on veggies I needed an herb.

It was a good dish overall. I ordered a cappuccino as an after dinner drink and it was just run of the mill but a good call. It was served at the correct temperature and they didn’t burn it. I feel like there’s no excuse for burnt coffee. Also, when I was younger I used to say that you could tell a nice restaurant by it’s napkins. (Look for linen). Which, may have been young naïve and simplistic, but another sign I thought to look for tonight was whether or not they served your meal with salt and pepper. I think this is a bad sign. If your relationship as diner to chef is appropriate for fine dining, you should not require and your meal should not require things such as salt and pepper. The dish should be appropriately salted or peppered etc. And if you have a penchant for salt. Stop fucking up good dishes. So yeah. They served my meal with a salt and pepper shaker. No thank you please. Unless you haven’t confidence in your chef.

I guess I did that meal review because I am tired and didn’t have much else to talk about in my blog, but also because I really enjoy dining alone. And especially at nice restaurants. Mainly because whenever I’m out dining (alone or not) I always think those who are dining well alone, are surrounded with mystery. Haha, so yeah, I think it’s fun. Because I can be mysterious. And because it’s easier to pay attention to a good meal when you’re alone because what the hell else are you supposed to do. I also had a nice walk home in the rainy dark.

There are Danish gymnasts staying in the dorm room here. But apparently they aren’t legit gymnasts, they’re like performing gymnasts. I got disappointed. But Danes are always cool, since you know, there’s only 5 million of them. So yeah, can ya dig?

I just read another Haruki Murakami book, which he may become my favorite author. It was entitled Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. It was really creative and had his characteristic style. I like him a lot. Everyone at my last place ranted and raved about Tim Robbins especially Jitterbug Romance. I’m skeptical to say the least. Ugh. We’ll see, I’ll give him a try. But I’m already biased against the poor guy. I’m just worried because the people who recommend Robbins enthusiastically also really enjoy Paulo Coehlo whom in my opinion is one of the most superficial allegorical writers ever. I mean, cmon. It’s like summer romance novel reading feel goody good. And that the world is neat and perfect even in its pathetic attempt to assimilate pain and suffering. Whoops, that was a rant. But yeah, so I’m skeptical of the “amazing” (read: flowery) descriptions and language. Wertever. It probably sucks.