Miami and Tampa are at war over which city has the Official Cuban Sandwich. Miamians claim that the Tampa version is a travesty, some say a sacrilege, because it contains Genoa salami. This makes sense, since Ybor City, where Tampa's Cubans lived, was also home to Italians and Spaniards. It also makes the sandwich sound more like a hoagie, which to this former Philly boy sounds pretty good.
Tampa's Cuban ties are older than Miami's, though the latter's sandwich is probably more "Cuban." But it's hard to take food purists seriously in a country that turned the croissant into sandwich bread.
In the classic earthquakes vs. hurricanes debate the clincher for me is not that you can prepare for (or flee from) hurricanes, but that they have a season. Those of us who reside in the subtropics (and tropics) get a breather, while people in California live with the idea that at any minute, of any month, their houses can crush them.
And with exquisite timing, hurricane season winds down just as stone crab season begins. The taste of the sweet sea meat is enhanced by the returned feeling of tranquility.
I had reservations about my fellow travelers when I first laid eyes on them in the lobby of our Prague hotel, and they were confirmed a few hours later when we sat down for lunch.
Almost as soon as the menus appeared, hands shot up. "I don't eat fish," one young woman announced after reading about the smoked trout salad with caviar. "I don't eat lamb," a middle-aged woman barked on seeing it offered as our main course. Our bemused waitress conferred with our guide, and solutions were found.
The young woman, I learned, didn't like the "texture" of things from the sea. (Her dismissal of the salad had nothing to do with health.) The anti-lamb lady didn't eat "young animals." Though she didn't inquire about the age of the pig she received as a substitute.
I used to be a picky eater, but then I started traveling. It seemed rude to refuse foods I was graciously served, and also wrongheaded: the whole point of travel is to experience the new, even - some might say especially - at the table. I don't like everything I eat abroad, but I usually give it a try.
The waitress returned for our drink orders. The restaurant sat in a vineyard overlooking the city, in a country famous for beer. The two ladies ordered Diet Pepsi.
There was a gathering of food trucks Saturday afternoon in Esplanade Park on the New River. We did a tour of the L-shaped formation and settled on Mr. Good Stuff ("Food from the soul - Stuffed with love").
I got the Sweet Caroline: BBQ pulled pork with melted cheddar cheese and coleslaw in a white cornmeal arepa. This was not the thick, sweet, greasy ballpark arepa; it was thin and toasty (but a lot tastier than toast). And it was stuffed with lean and delicious meat that was beautifully buffered by the slaw.
Finished, we headed over to the dessert truck parked in the middle of the park and got a spicy Mexican chocolate creme brulee. We found a seat nearby, where we ate the pudding while watching the people and admiring the dogs (including an albino boxer). A band played blues from the stage. This was pretty much what I had envisioned for the old Hyde Park Market lot, which has a better location on Las Olas (visible to clueless tourists) and still sits vacant after all these years.
Sunday we returned next door, to the Broward Center, for Indian Independence Day. Inside the Amaturo Theater, groups of children sang and danced. In the lobby, representatives from various Indian organizations sat behind tables, some handing out information on upcoming festivals. The growth of the Indian community is one of the encouraging and under-reported developments in South Florida (especially in Broward).
Two buffets were set up in the courtyard, serving black lentils, creamed spinach, spicy chickpeas, butter chicken, naan, dosas, mango lassis. For the second day in a row, we ate a meal sitting on steps. But here the people-watching was even better, as most of the attendees were Indian, and many of them, even the men, wore traditional dress. I felt a bit self-conscious showing my legs.
Wandering around Manhattan last week I was struck by the large number of businesses devoted to food. There were blocks with only these, restaurants next to pizzerias next to fast-food franchises. There were the familiar - Chipotle seemed almost as prevalent as Starbucks - and some that were new to me, like Maoz (wonderful falafel with a fresh salad bar). One day in midtown I walked past the soup place made famous by Seinfeld (and now selling T-shirts printed with the words "No Soup For You"). Then of course there were all the street carts grilling kabobs and sausages.
It was hard to walk a block without seeing or smelling something to eat. It didn't seem so much a health problem - people generally looked pretty fit - as a psychological one. New Yorkers, like other Americans, have become obsessed with food.
I stayed in a friend's apartment on the Upper West Side, and was disappointed to see that the Barnes & Noble at 66th and Broadway had closed since my last visit. Walking around the neighborhood I found a choice of edibles from around the world - many of them temptingly displayed and ready to eat - but no store where I could buy a book. On the Upper West Side, one of America's intellectual enclaves. There seemed no clearer sign that in the national battle between the mind and the stomach, the stomach has won.
Something you may not know about me: I love crackers. I love bread too, but bread gets stale, especially when you're married to a celiac.
A brief history: Like many Americans of my generation, I grew up on saltines. In the late 70s, I discovered Stone Wheat Thins from Canada - I loved the blue, bi-lingual box - which immediately became my cracker du jour. Living in Poland, I would buy matzoh crackers (and spread them with horseradish). In the early 80s, at a small gourmet store in West Philadelphia, I found the greatest cracker ever: a small, dense, wheaty flatbread with a subtle hint of cheese. It was imported from New Zealand, and shortly thereafter disappeared. In 1999 I traveled to New Zealand for work, though one of my goals was to find my long-lost cracker. It was nowhere to be seen. None of the famed natural beauty of the country was able to console me.
My crackers for the new century were croccantini, which I found at Whole Foods, though my meager freelance earnings forced me to switch to Wasa. I bounced back and forth between sourdough and sesame until the other day I saw they had come out with something new: Thin & Crispy Flatbread. There was plain, sesame, and rosemary. I bought the sesame, thinking they would go well with tapenade. They went well with everything. They had a taste reminiscent of the croccantini, but lighter and - with 8 grams of whole grains - healthier. I went back to Publix and bought the rosemary. I served them to our guests this weekend, one of whom remarked: "These are really good crackers." I eat them with tapenade, hummus, cheese, alone. I am a man who is once again happy with his cracker.