Pain (Xi'an Famous Foods)

Liang Pi Cold Skin Noodles

Coach Boone: What is pain?
Team: FRENCH BREAD!

The above, of course, is from the movie Remember the Titans, which is one of my favorite movies. To the five people out there who actually read my blog, forgive me for my lack of content over the past couple of weeks. I've had a lot going on these past couple of weeks, and right now, I'm gouging my eyes out studying for a monstrous 132-question neurology exam on Monday. I found it amusing that some of the lecture topics -- most notably, sleep disorders and pain -- are particularly salient in the lives of medical students.

Taking Pictures of Food - Yay or Nay? (Café Constant)

Foie Gras

It's nearing the end of October, and I still haven't even finished writing about my visit to Paris from the end of July. I'm such a terrible blogger; no wonder why nobody reads my blog. But anyway, continuing on with the recap of my three-day foodfest in Paris, I visited Café Constant for dinner on a Saturday evening. I had actually wanted to eat at Chez l'Ami Jean, but they were full, so I resorted to my backup plan just a couple of blocks away. As the restaurant is very close to the Eiffel Tower, there were a ton of places catering to tourists in the neighborhood. While Café Constant -- with its English-speaking staff and English menus --  is quite obviously one of the restaurants in the area catering to tourists, the quality of its food makes it clear that it is anything but your typical tourist trap.

Taking the Plunge (Christophe)

Veal Brains with Polenta

When I was a kid, I was a notoriously picky eater. As I've already established, sushi wasn't something I had any interest in trying. Tripe, duck feet, tofu, and some other mainstays of Chinese cooking? Nope, I turned those down, too. But while these foods are, admittedly, a bit on the adventurous side, my pickiness wasn't restricted to just the likes of raw fish and intestines. Even the simplest and most basic of foods -- tomatoes, eggs, ice cream (I used to say that ice cream was "too cold" -- yeah, I have no idea what I was thinking, either) -- were rejected by my ten-year-old palate. Fast forward to the present, and thankfully, my tastes have changed. I have become much more open-minded about trying new foods and am no longer squeamish of unfamiliar foods. Kidneys, tripe, gizzards, and bone marrow are just a couple of the foods that, twelve years ago, I wouldn't have wanted anything to do with. But now, when I see something like veal brains show up on a menu, I am not only intrigued, but I'm ballsy enough to order it.

Baseball and Doughnuts (Doughnut Plant)

Oatmeal Doughnut

While the end of September means that the days are getting depressingly shorter and the weather is becoming ever cooler, there is one thing that is actually great about this time of year: the start of the MLB playoffs. While my Mariners haven't made the playoffs since 2001 and came no closer to making it this year thanks to an epic 17 game losing streak, playoff baseball still gets me excited in a way that no other sport can. And with the dramatic and absolutely improbable way that the regular season ended, I think that the playoffs will be just as exhilarating and fun to watch.

Dining Alone in Paris (La Régalade Saint-Honoré)

Margret de canard épais rôti sur la peau, petites pommes de terres rôties au jus de viande  

During my summer abroad, I experienced solo travel for the first time. It took me a little getting used to traveling alone, but I eventually learned to really embrace the freedom that it gave me. I could go wherever and do whatever I wanted, stay at sites for however long I desired, and move around from place to place much quicker than if I were traveling in a group, thereby allowing me to see and do more. But one rather large downside to traveling alone is that it also means dining alone. While dining alone in places like Edinburgh and Cardiff didn't bother me at all, the combination of the language barrier and the fact that Paris is full of lovey-dovey couples everywhere you look made solo dining in Paris much more awkward and uncomfortable. My dinner at Le Chateaubriand the previous night did nothing to alleviate my unease, as my table was a bit isolated from most of the other tables, making me feel all the more lonely and friendless, not to mention that a two hour-long dinner by yourself is the nadir of loneliness. *cue Akon's Lonely* For my second dinner in Paris, I visited La Régalade Saint-Honoré, and while the food itself was pretty incredible, the distinctly Parisian experience of conversing with your fellow diners made this meal one of my most enjoyable.