Food...

Today I'm writing about food that changed my life. I'm talking about when you eat something that causes your brain to hard stop and wonder, how did I never know this was a thing? How often do we, as adults, get to taste something that is both totally new and completely wonderful? Not often enough? Or maybe because such experiences are so rare, they are that much more impactful.

Now, onto the food...

In 2012, I was living on Maui, and we had a work barbecue. One of my coworkers brought feral cow lau lau. Lau Lau is essentially meat wrapped in ti leaves and then steamed. Traditionally it involves using smoked butterfish, but this lau lau didn't have any butterfish, which was better for me since I don't love fishy fish.

I remember asking my friend who made it what feral cow was. He looked at me, and very slowly said, "Feral means wild..."

And I was like, I know what feral means. What in the world is a wild cow? And that's when I learned the Hana side of Maui has tons of escaped cows that became feral. Apparently hunting them is insanely trippy because they are huge, and they will hide in the bamboo and jungle and be totally silent. So you can be walking... creeping... trying to find them and you won't even realize you're standing next to a eight hundred pound animal. An eight hundred pound animal who is watching you through the bamboo from only a foot away...

But the feral cow lau lau was out of this world. Salty, tender, absolutely perfect.

In 2016, I was in New York City with my mom for my birthday. We went to Nobu, the super upscale sushi restaurant, and I had their white fish ceviche. (I can't remember the exact white fish... Sensory overload only recorded it was some kind of white fish.) This was no wedding appetizer ceviche either. This was legitimately something I had never come across in my life, and have never had any ceviche like it since.

While the ceviche was good, possibly the best part of the meal was that there was a super rude group of middle aged men next to us who were being mean to the server (this isn't the good part, we're getting there). We spent some time talking with the server, found out that she was from a place we had family, and she and I became Facebook friends. The next day she messaged me and said that due to a credit card machine error, a different party inadvertently paid for our bill, so happy birthday to me again! I have no doubt who paid. Thanks, Wall Street bros! Maybe don't be mean to the little people.

In 2016 I was in Asheville North Carolina. A friend brought me to a restaurant called King Daddy's (which is sadly no longer open) and I had my first taste of chicken and waffles.

And let me be clear, I had heard about such a combination for as long as I could remember, but it wasn't until I experienced the combination of salty, crunchy, and sweet that I finally got what people were talking about.

In the spring of 2020, the pandemic lockdown was in full swing, and it was morel mushroom season. And I love looking for morels. We found a bunch. (Side note: My husband is actually really bad at morel hunting. We played that game where I would see a morel and tell him to freeze, and then he would spend several minutes looking at the ground only for me to finally tell him where it was. He's great at other stuff though. Like, finding elk from six hundred yards away...)

But we had a bunch of morels, and since it was lockdown, we had time on our hands, so we made goat cheese and infused it with herbs our garden, and then made pasta dough. We made morel and homemade goat cheese raviolis, then made a morel cream sauce and had a salad of freshly gathered Miner's lettuce.

This was absolutely out of this world. Although I asked my husband about it the other day and he claims not to remember it. It did happen. Just, take my word for it.

In October of 2021, my husband and I found ourselves in Dickinson, North Dakota. We ended up in the Country Rose cafe, and I ordered some bacon. Guys. North Dakota knows how to bacon. I will dream about that bacon for the rest of my life.

Some honorable mentions are:

The first time my husband made me elk backstrap from the first elk he successfully harvested off of public land.

Preserved lemons. I have jars of them in my pantry. I make a few jars every year and put them on chicken salads. I love the citrus/salt flavor.

Fruity Pebbles latte. It's my 1990's childhood slammed into my adult latte addiction.

I don't know what your favorite food experiences are, but I hope they remain visceral and beautiful in your minds.