urbpan | Why I love a) living in the city b) trying new foods

When I first moved to Boston I was fortunate to quickly meet older, more experienced people, who guided me to some positive experiences. In particular, my friend Otto (not his real name, except to me) was wonderful in exposing me to foods that my suburban upbringing had deprived me of. He was also the first vegetarian I'd ever become friends with, and so when I became vegetarian some five years after meeting him, he'd helped me find some foods that make not eating meat a joy rather than a chore.

Early on he took me to an Indian restaurant, and it most definitely changed my life. We had vegetarian thali, poori, and lassi. It's notable that I remember what we had--this was eightteen years ago. I don't think I'd ever had food that tasted so good--or perhaps my tastebuds had been blunted by the cold fried chicken and mac and cheese that I'd been eating every day since I'd arrived. I'm still devoted to Indian food, and one requirement for when we move is that there has to be a decent Indian place nearby. Fortunately, Indians have widely migrated and almost every city on earth has Indian food (as far as I know). The best meal I ate in Rio de Janeiro was at an Indian restaurant (the proprietor came out and talked to us: he assumed I was a Hare Krishna).

Otto taught me how to make stir-fry. In one fell swoop this introduced me to sesame oil, tamari, water chestnuts, baby corn, and most importantly pre-fried tofu. I had heard of tofu--never in a positive context--but had never eaten it. When its pre-fried (available at Asian grocers) it has a chewy meaty texture that I appreciate. It tastes like, well, sesame oil and tamari. Now when I eat at a Chinese restaurant, if it doesn't have pre-fried tofu, it's not worth eating. The best meal I had in Anchorage (and in all of Alaska) was at a Chinese restaurant. There wasn't a tofu meal on the menu, but I asked the waiter for one of the meals with fried bean curd instead of meat and without hesitating he said yes. Delicious.

Otto took me to the North End of Boston and showed me what cappucino was. He was horrified at my attempt to put sugar in it. Later he showed me plain espresso. Another requirement for a place to live is access to espresso. Fortunately, the Seattle invasion of the 90's has put espresso machines all over the country. I could probably get a low-fat macchiato in my tiny home town now.

Speaking of which, a friend of mine from my home town had moved to Boston a year before me. When I caught up with him, we ate at one of Boston's many pizza/sub shops--most of which are owned by non-Italian Mediterraneans: Greeks, Lebanese, etc. The advantage of this is baklava. I didn't know what it was or even how to say it but oh my god is all you can say after your first bite of it. It's rich and sweet and crisp and gooey and you just want to slowly eat it for hours. It's the kind of food that if I saw it as a child I would have thought it was gross, now, well, now it was the inspiration for me to write this post.

I was a really picky eater as a kid. Partly there wasn't much variety where I grew up, and in larger part I didn't ever want to try anything new. When I moved to the city, and had to feed myself, I was suddenly more willing to try new things. Luckily Boston has a great many new things to try. I'm so happy that I had friends who showed me them, and made me try them. Now I can't live without them.