International Travel & Food Adventures, Part II

Well, unfortunately my last evening in the UK had me going down the burger route again.  The problem with staying at a hotel literally inside of Heathrow is that there's no where to go without spending a fortune on taxi fare, so alas, we ate here in the Sheraton Hotel.

I'm assuming that the custom-made burger craze (here), (here) and (here) is starting to gather some steam outside of the US, however the execution of that fails miserably amongst the business traveler hotels.

1. I didn't get any choices, the "create your own" was already done on the menu and there were about three options in total.
2. This concept fails when you have chuk-chuk the caveman burning the burger, the base of the creation, to it's miserable death back in the kitchen

That said it had the makings of a good idea especially if you are on the Atkins diet.  Burger, topped with a chicken breast, topped with bacon (English bacon, so basically Canadian Bacon), topped with cheese all on one of those Bap buns (see yesterday's post or click on link).  I took it upon myself to top it off with some brown sauce.

Sadly the burger was dense and medium well/dry as hell.  Everything on top of it was stellar.  How I was yearning for a Lamb Kofta burger again!

So anyway, I catch the shuttle bus into the Heathrow Terminal in three and a half hours and then it's breakfast inside the airport.  I have high hopes for that and will report back later.

International Travel & Food Adventures

Although I'm in the midst of a 4-week travel hell tour of the world (only being outdone by friend Tom Paul who will earn airline status in a period of 4 weeks!!) the one thing I always love about traveling internationally is the chance to experience "new foods" or rather foods that I normally wouldn't see on an American menu and that tickle my fancy.

The last two nights have seen some fun choices which I'm happy to share with you.

Last night I had a starter called "Duck Pancakes".  I threw caution to the wind and didn't even ask what they were.  One could envision big American style pancakes with duck embedded but what arrived was really a 'build your own' taco/wrap with pulled duck breast meat, small pastry type 'shells' and a wonderful Hoisin sauce to dip them in.  The only knock was that the wrap was too doughy and broke up too easily once stuffed with the ducky goodness and dipped into the sauce.  All in all though, a really nice surprise and a good contrast to the typical Fish & Chips and mushy peas that I ordered.

Tonight, I tried a Lamb Kofta burger which was the bomb!!  It was a great re-purposing of what traditionally is a kabob.  The seasonings were done just right.  Normally a kofta has things like garlic, ginger and cardamom but I think I tasted some clove in there as well.  One of the drawbacks of it was that the bun was a really dense Bap bread.

Stupid me now has a phone that can take pictures but did I take one (of EITHER food)??  No, so here are two images, one of a Bap bun and one of Lamb Kofta.  You do the photoshopping in your head okay?

The frustrating thing about this is that when I get back stateside I end up having a craving for something like this and can't find it worth a lick.  This happened in 2004 when I had pleasure of eating a combination of two of my most favorite foods, Indian and Italian with a Chicken Tikka Pizza in Edinburgh, Scotland.  Call it a desperate cry for decent food when the local fare isn't that hot, but I've been talking about that pizza ever since!!

Can't wait to see what my final night brings for dinner!  Tomorrow I'm heading back to London as my flight home is ridiculously early in the morning on Friday.  London opens up many doors, unfortunately, I'm housed right next to Heathrow and so that'll limit anything of true quality, maybe...

What a week!!

This was an incredibly tough week at work.  So much so that I'm not even going to talk about it ;-p

I also was battling a sinus infection which was killer.  Thanks to Doc Mercado (he's from Bolivia and is a great MD), I got some instant meds which took about 24 hours to kick in and I'm almost back to normal.

That was key for the week though as I'm traveling for the next four weeks solid for work.  I've been told that flying with a sinus infection is one of the most dangerous things out there and that wouldn't have been fun.

Last Sunday we stopped for lunch at the re-born Tastee-Freez on Rte 31 in North Aurora.  When I first moved out here in '98, it was on its last legs and ended up closing that summer.  Since then it's had several attempts at quick drive-in food but mostly has been a closed, vacant building over the last 12 years.

Yummy-tummy as Aidan says.  They have expanded their flavors of soft-serve and the types of treats you can get.  Aidan had a small strawberry/vanilla twist in a cup, MK had strawberry, chocolate dipped and I had their version of the DQ Blizzard called a Freezee with Reese's Pieces.

I'm glad they are back.  It adds some more character to that entrance to our fine Village.  There's a lot of "scary" looking buildings over there but a healthy TIF district combined with some new businesses and a brand new Police Station set to open in September are good positive signs in a crappy economy that there's hope.

So the next four weeks see me in the lovely destinations of Atlanta, Warwick (England), back to Atlanta and then off to New York City.  Between the first two is a quick Labor Day weekend at my in-laws cottage in Michigan where I hope we have great weather.  There's also a looming trip to Fairfield, CT (yes, get excited all my FFD peeps, it's been TOO LONG since I've been there) either in the FIFTH week or the week after but that won't be confirmed for awhile.

I'm going to try to enjoy my weekend, but I'm also very conscious that I'm going to be away from my adorable son too too much over the next four weeks.  Makes all the days I'm with him that much more special.

Louuuuuuuu! It continues to be a Way of Life

It was only fitting on Sunday that I got news that Lou was going to manage his last game for the Cubs while in the bathroom, taking care of business, sitting down.

It was interesting to see how quickly Shite Sox fans started posting that "the Cubs were so bad, even their manager doesn't want to stay" without realizing that in fact, his Mom continues to be ill and isn't getting any better.  Yep, that's right, continue to deflect the crumbling of your own hopes back to the North Side hoping people will just continue to ignore what's happening with the Mouth on the Southside, Ozzie.

I know everyone is always quick to crucify the manager of a club when they don't perform, and definitely there were times where Lou made bad decisions, but if the problem isn't any bigger than the old Torco sign to spot, the organization failed him.

I do truly believe he was the right man for the right job.  But when he was saddled with having to play high-paid failures like Soriano, Bradley and Fukudome as well as the pressure to validate the "farm system" by having, (who my fave Cub Blogger Aisle 424 calls something similar to the midget circus of gnomes up the middle) Theriot and Fontenot TOOTBLAN their way through games, then it's obvious he was continually asked to make soufflé out of sawdust.

Warning! Rare compliment towards the NY Yankees forthcoming!

It says a lot about an organization that year after year they can produce high-quality individuals when it comes to running/managing ballclubs.  I'm sure everyone can point to horrible examples from the Bronx Bombers, but there is a culture built around winning and not accepting mediocrity and that does transcend downward to the managers and players (who might eventually become managers).  Every time Lou Pinella took the reigns of another club, it was likely related to the fact that he played, coached and was GM for a winner.  After the Yankees, he took that success to Cincinnati and Seattle and then found out what it was like to try to manage a team that had no clue how to win in Tampa Bay.  I really do think he saw the ability of ownership with deep pockets and a somewhat loose plan on how to build a winner with the Cubs.  Hell, we did and that wasn't just by drinking the Kool-Aid.

The sadness here is that the Cubs have continued to look at the Yankees and say "Hey, they spend well above the salary caps and look at them!" but there has to be multiple layers of support beneath that for it to happen which includes quality talent evaluation, not being wimpy during Free Agent contact talks and strength 'down on the farm'.  The Cubs seriously have done a relatively good job of the 3rd item, but the first two continue to bite them in the backside and when they are combined (Fuku/Bradley/Kevin Gregg) they are left with poor performers with monster contracts who they can't move OR when they move them, they have to still pay the salary.

Cub 'nation' is saddled with the 2nd highest payroll in MLB along with the 2nd highest ticket prices and we still have as many World Series trophies as we did in the 50's!! 

This does keep coming back to Jim Hendry.  Sure he was the GM during the 2003 year, but he had only been in the position for less than a year and it wasn't totally his doing.  Yes, he worked in the organization since '95, but he was successful at the talent evaluation from colleges/high schools and had built a decent farm system which still exists today.  No one is convinced STILL that he has the right talent to be a GM and make the big calls.  The Ricketts' bold statements that he's still the man and will lead the search for a new Manager and will stay as GM makes every Cub fan nervous that the new owners are over their heads here and instead of understanding baseball, they are drooling at the revenue glut that is the Cubs and Wrigley Field, even if they went deep into debt to buy them.

We've yet to see a move by the Ricketts that shakes us to our core and says "Hey, here's some people fed up with these losing ways and are demanding excellence".  It's just more of the same, very similar to the McCaskey's with the Bears or the days of Dollar Bill Wirt$ with the Hawks.  See, the Ricketts have had to follow the comeuppance of Rocky Wirtz, someone who felt the pain of the fans (even as his own Father inflicted it upon us) and so the people of Chicago are watching.

Sadly, Lou was beaten down by the system and that combined with family matters has had him quite abruptly leave the organization.  For a man who has lived baseball and excelled, this is bittersweet, I'm sure.  Thanks to the guys on the field yesterday for totally hacking that up by the way.  At least Lou could make 5 or 6 trips to the mound to get standing o's.  Nice way to send him off boys.