Happy hour at the Mai Kai to celebrate Don's 50th year in Florida.
"The Mai Kai had white sand all around it then. You walked into this," he said, looking around the intimate, hut-like lounge with its primary color lanterns and water-falling windows (like sitting in a car wash), "and you were in paradise."
Don still savors his half-century home, the fact that it's "bounded on two sides by wilderness: the Everglades and the ocean." In the summer he takes an early morning swim in the latter. "When you're out there you're on their terms," he said. "You're an intruder."
Finished with our rum cocktails, we took a stroll through the garden. None of us had ever seen it in daylight, which took away some of its mystique. Though the tiki replicas got Don thinking of "Jungian archetypes, all the primitive notions that are drummed out of us."
You play tennis at 8:45 - before the sun gets really fired up - and then you buy farm fresh eggs at Marando Farms.
Eat your frittata out on the balcony. When you're finished, come inside, close the door to the heat, and spend the afternoon in air-conditioned comfort. I worked on an article, but you can also curl up with a book; summer in Florida is as conducive to reading as winter in Vermont.
In the evening get in your car and drive up A1A for a delicious Turkish dinner - hummus, baba ghanoush, tomato, cucumber and feta salad, grilled octopus - at Anatolia in Boca Raton. (Bring your own wine.) Afterwards, go with your friends to the beach and gaze at the clouds shrouding a nearly full moon.
On the road, you don't always have a day in which every meal stands out. But Friday was such a day. And, even rarer, each meal got cheaper as the day progressed.
It began with huevos rancheros at the Casa Marina hotel in Key West, and moved on to crepes at La Creperie. The restaurant sits across Petronia Street from Blue Heaven, and was its own kind of paradise, serving authentic buckwheat crepes (included gluten-free ones). I had La Complete - egg, ham, and cheese - and it arrived in the classic square shape, though with the over-easy egg on top instead of inside. (So I missed out on the surprise of cutting into the pancake and releasing a yellow stream.) But the taste transported me to Brittany.
We left around 3 and stopped for dinner at Taco Beach Shack in Hollywood. We found a table as far from the band as possible, on sand that was whiter and smoother than what you find on the beach two blocks away. A group of young women lounged on sofas under a tent, and an older couple played ping-pong.
We ordered three Korean short rib tacos with kimchee slaw, and a carafe of sangria. The manager stopped by; he was from Mexico City and told us he made the salsa himself. The tacos arrived with black beans and rice and an ear of roasted corn that had been sprinkled with parmesan cheese. The tacos were delicious, as were the black beans. Represented on our small table, and mixing beautifully in our mouths, were the flavors of Mexico, Korea, Italy and Cuba - all refreshingly washed down with Spain.
When friends visit from the north, they almost always want to eat seafood at a place on the water. Often, especially here in Broward, this means taking them somewhere where the food is not great (hey, be happy with the view) and overpriced.
Sunday, though, we drove our guests south to the Rickenbacker Fish Company at the foot of the causeway on Key Biscayne. Open only a couple months, the place was bigger than I expected, with a large, second-story tiki hut which was already crowded at 6:30 - a sign that this is a throwback fish house, not another trendy restaurant. The music consisted of songs you knew the words to.
We started with conch fritters, conch salad (because they were out of ceviche) and steamed clams. "I don't usually eat fried food," said Lukasz, grabbing another fritter. The clams were wonderfully plump and tasty.
This was followed by various fishes - snapper, mahi, sea bass - and a delicious paella with a bit of a kick. (The paella is for one, a rare nod to the lone diner who craves Spain's national dish.)
The Key lime pie was, as co-owner Brad Lotspeich had advertised, worthy of the Keys.
But the real surprise was yet to come. On my way out, I walked into the men's room and entered a busy, black-and-white world. Every flat surface - not just the walls but the stalls - was papered with old-time photographs of Florida and fishing. You could spend an hour examining the photos individually, while the overall effect was almost hallucinogenic. It is quite possibly the world's most picturesque men's room.
Yesterday I introduced Drew and Gary to Nacho Bizness, the excellent gourmet taco truck that parks at 1950 SW 1st Ave. Mondays through Thursdays.
For years now, the three of us have been having infrequent lunches. They started out at the usual spots, like Anthony's Coal-Fired Pizza, but over time the places have become more recherche, like the 11th Street Annex and the Tortilleria Mexicana on Old Dixie Highway.
"Are you all together?" the young woman in the truck asked us, which prompted Drew into a long monologue of our relationship, explaining that, while we were eating lunch together, we were not romantically involved, adding that, philosophically, he had nothing against men living together if that's what they chose to do. Drew is a professional comedian, and the crowd waiting for lunch constituted a decent-sized audience.
We grabbed our tacos - Korean spicy pork, grilled shrimp, grilled beef, mahi-mahi - and drove to a nearby park. A picnic table sat under a tree, with a car parked next to it. The driver of the car sat with the window down, eating her lunch while listening to Andrea Bocelli. Between bites we discussed the Golden Globes, movies, tennis, children (theirs), travel, restaurants - all to the sound of Italian arias.
Northerners laugh when we complain about the cold (it dipped down into the 30s last night). But many Floridians don't have heat. And many more don't know about bibimbap.
Yesterday evening we met our heatless friends Don and Joanne at Gabose on University Drive. As soon as we were seated we were brought hot tea in small rounded cups that warmed the hands.
Soon, three hot stone bowls of bibimbap arrived (Don ordered bulgoggi), along with little dishes of red hot sauce. The waitress showed Joanne how to stir the sauce into the mix of vegetables, meat, rice (which was already solidifying at the bottom into thin crispy sheets - little rice waffles) and egg, which was also frying from the heat and traveling in shreds around the bowl.
The table then filled with numerous small dishes, all of them cold but many - like the kimchee - packing a punch.
I didn't use a spoon for my bibimbap, as Koreans do, but chopsticks so to prolong the meal. Even so, when I finished the bowl was still too hot to touch.