Macau and Pastéis de Nata

Our 3-day visit to Macau ended up in a gastronomic experience. We could already sense it upon arrival, with the ‘boa noite’ (good evening) that the passport control lady gave us, that we were in for a treat.

Forgetting the fact that Macanese drive on the wrong side of the road and have squinty eyes, one could easily imagine himself in a Portuguese downtown, well packed with small rococo churches and colorful façades.

We had read that many restaurants were famous for their Portuguese menus so we decided for ‘Caravela’ (Pátio do Comandante Mata e Oliveira), honoring the boat that took Portuguese adventurers to discover new worlds. We could as easily be in a small ‘tasca’ in Lisbon. The atmosphere was the same… small tables too close to each other to let people pass; RTP channel screaming news from Portugal out of the TV set; loud customers talking about how much better they would run the country…

We ordered in Portuguese – even though the waitress didn't speak it (but recognised somehow the sounds) – carrot soap and seafood rice but not any food rice – sauce was flooding the plate and it had swimming crabs, oh nostalgia!!! When we were about to pay an old man with a cane walked in and said “I want a galão, please!” – ‘galão’ is a drink of espresso and foam milk. Rustically delicious, but don’t expect to drink a gallon of coffee, we are serious people mind you.

By counting the incredible number of windows with custard tarts (‘pastéis de nata’) we decided on a benchmarking, giving the winning prize to a local joint not far from ‘Caravela’. They make them crustier…

We ended our day splendidly by going to ‘A Lorcha’ – more Portuguese delicacies, including ‘pastéis de bacalhau’ (cod fritters) and açorda (bread porridge). A chinese fellow sitting next to us thought that we were Brits at first. We explained “we are Portuguese”, to which he promptly replied “ah! you know that Portuguese were here in Macau for many years?”. Talk about short memory loss! We just left the place in 99. He even added “Oh! You should have gone to Shanghai instead”. Big red and blasting WRONG!

Macau, Casino Lisboa

Lonely Planet and fishing quotas

Hong Kong will be always present in our memories as the place where we’ve eaten the best shushi of our lives. We were in Hong Kong Island and it was late. 2pm is not time anymore for lunch for an average ‘Hong Konger’, mind you. The place was gloomy, in one of these narrow streets behind striking grey skyscrapers, smelly, rubbishy. It was nevertheless referenced in Lonely Planet and we treat our literature as serious stuff. The kitchen was about to close, we had to rush ordering. Service was unremarkable, no frills decoration, decaying restrooms. But a second after tasting that fresh, soft and salty tuna all the surroundings faded away and we imagined ourselves swimming freely in the Pacific waters, in a time where Bluefin is not synonym for fishing quotas.

Hong Kong

"Why Seattle?"

Mrs. Noz2 has already revealed that we got married in Sao Tome and Principe, the smallest country in Africa (not counting with the Seychelles). Ever since, we decided to celebrate each marriage anniversary in a different continent. Ok, I admit, this was a whim, that the majority of our friends could not even think about... and not the most suitable wish for a compromise that we had accepted for the whole life, as there are only six continents… Nevertheless, until today we managed to fulfill such desire... sort of: North America (East Coast), Southeast Asia, North America (Pacific Coast). Though, this year we decided to stay in Europe. Normally, next year we will go to South America.

Coming back to the title of this post, last year we started our annual big trip in Vancouver, BC and went down to LA, Ca, passing by Lake Tahoe, spending our anniversary in the former and the New Year's Eve in Seattle. Obviously, we have a couple of good stories from our time among the Canucks compatriots, but the point now is to talk about the capital of the grunge.

We all keep memories and live our life relying on them. I, for instance, will never forget the taste of my grandmother's omelet or the smell of the french washing powder that my aunt would bring every summer or even that poem that I recited for X-mas when I was 8 years old, not to mention the precise moment when I fell deeply in love in December '06. Having said that, going to Seattle was all about memories: we both grew up with Pearl Jam, smoked weed listening Nirvana (Mums: that's not true, just wanted to make a point...), went to parties where Alice in Chains played (well, not really…) and followed the several rehabs of Scott Weiland.

Moreover, there was this radio presentator/shrink that influenced us in a way never seen before, and we have followed all episodes of Seinfeld, Lost, That 70's, HIMYM, The Office, The Simpsons, South Park...

Were these, reasons enough to go to Seattle? The locals don't seem to think so, as we were asked more times than the Pearl Jam"s debut album title: "Why Seattle?" I started to count:

1. Space Needle

2. Monorail

3. Puget Sound

4. Pike Place Market

5. Canlis restaurant

6. Jimi Hendrix

7. Benaroya Hall

8. Seattle Art Museum

9. Shawn Kemp and the SuperSonics

10. The first Starbucks

Again, the number 10...

It was the summer of 93 and I was 15. Didn’t have much to do while on school holidays and the afternoons were spent with older friends either at a bar watching MTV or at the place of one of them, drinking whisky "borrowed" from my dad's collection. How many times did we hear “Jeremy”, “Alive”, “Black” or “Even Flow”? More than ten, for sure. That summer the video for "Jeremy"was put into heavy rotation by MTV and won the Video of the Year and Best Group Video at the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards.

“Why Seattle?” Because that was the best summer of my life!

Coffee and Schengen

One would think that the probability of speaking German with locals on a Malaysian island is undoubtedly low. Well, maybe not when the owner of the hotel you're staying in is an Indonesian married to a Swiss germanophone. And things got linguistically messier when we discovered we could speak French to her son, who had studied in France for a while. And this in a place where female staff go around with theirs heads covered. We also learned that the hotel's furniture came by boat from Indonesia. And we go on about Schengen…! We had our heads in a twist but a few things remained in our memory: how to say cockroach in Bahasa: 'lipas'; and that Indonesians repeat a word twice to form the plural, so coffees become 'kopi kopi' – now that's simply clever!

Malaysia, Truly Asia

Pastéis and Italy

The best 'pastéis' in the world are the 'pastéis da Estela', in Pipa Beach, Brazil. And we only discovered the joint because we decided to play Portuguese and ask the oldest man we could find: 'where can we find the best pastéis here?'. The name 'Estela' came bursting out of his mouth. 'And tell her Manuel sent you!', he replied with a proud toothless smile. If you forget about the greasy tables, the flies zooming around and the smelly rubbish on the floor, then Estela makes the most heavenly crab 'pastéis' on earth. A 'pastel' in Brazil is a kind of deep-fried pie filled with cheese, meat or fish. Everyone will tell the secret is in the filling, but it's actually in the 'pasta'! Proof? Estela got the dough recipe from her grandmother. She was Italian.

Pipa, Brazil

Ewoks and the ‘Selecção’

We don’t know if it was because the host was a ewok from Coimbra named Aleixo or his co-host a Napoleon bust, but 'Aleixo FM’ was our 5min company for 100 working mornings in 2010. We tuned in every day at 8:20 and 9:20am. And oh boy they put us ROFL with the ‘cap guys’ in st John ’s festivities in Porto – synonym for cell phone burglars! With warnings about the freezer in the ‘Aires’ tavern – don’t eat ice creams there, it’s turned off during the night! Or the list of players of the Portuguese national team in 1991, including the honourable João Pinto I (primeiro) and João Pinto II (sigundo).

Saiu cocó

São Tomé and Alcácer do Sal

We got married in São Tomé and we have to admit that our favorite local hero  is the one and only João Carlos Silva. We even spent a night in his B&B in São Tomé – hot water was not included in the menu but OK, all the ingredients he touches turn into a mouthful of flavour. We used to watch his show 'Na roça com os tachos' and are very fond of his philosophical approach to gastronomy in Alcácer do Sal – and we quote – "shrimps making love to onions and olive oil in the pan" (with smoochy sounds in the mix). We wonder if this gastronomic drive is linked to São Tomé's fertility rate: 6.08 children born/woman (2000 est.).

Roça São João

Portuguese fish and Ralph Lauren

Cultural interchange is somehow connected to the quality of sea water. In Boston – Ralph Lauren store – the shop assistant asked us where we were from. After hearing "Portugal" he started rambling about fish, naming all the kinds of fish one can find in the Portuguese coast. Uh! What kind of hobbies do people dedicate themselves to nowadays!? He was less convinced about the possibility of us buying something in his store than the fact that Portugal has the best bream in the world.

Boston, US&A