vacation

Essay: What I did over end-of-summer vacation.

I am back! One week on the sand went a long way toward restoring what little sanity I had left… I regained my mind and then proceeded to leave half of it on the beach on the Cape Cod National Shoreline. You will not see a single photo of food from this vacation. The food we had was outstanding- goat milk mozzie in pesto tossed with heirloom tomatoes served with crusty bread, char-grilled hamburgers, homemade garlic dills and bread and butter pickles, garlic bean dip with homemade tortilla chips and more- but we were so hungry from all our time on the beach that we laid into each spread of food like a swarm of locusts before thoughts of photography even occured to me.

We left our indelible mark on South Wellfleet. We terrorized a very tightly-wound, perfectly coiffed and tanned surf shop owner by merely walking in the door. Can I help you? Oh! Don’t touch that! Or that! Oh! Don’t touch that surfboard! Is there something you NEED? Just DON’T touch that! I suppose the fact that my husband, father-in-law and I were all present did nothing to assuage the woman’s fear that we would allow our little fuzzy-headed minions to run roughshod over her precious laid-back surfer haven and up-end all her painstakingly polished gear. Interesting, because the first thing inside the door was kiddie-sized boogie boards, water pistols and kites. Here’s a thought. If you don’t want kids in the shop, put up a sign- or better yet- don’t carry toys. Poor woman. I guess we are a little intimidating…

We put a dent in the lobster population. Have you ever seen an ten-year-old, an eight-year-old and a six-year-old truly appreciate eating a lobster? I did last week. The eldest boys and the Evil Genius each ordered a boiled lobster the one night we went out for dinner. The two youngest ordered ‘the beach toy special’ (fresh caught fried scrod with french fries in a sand-pail with a shovel.) By the time we left the restaurant we could’ve squeezed about a quart of clarified butter from our hair and clothes. It’s not the tidiest proposition to feed kids lobster. My father-in-law and I ordered scallop jerky. Er, actually we ordered broiled scallops, but we were served scallop jerky. The name of the restaurant will remain a mystery because the rest of their food and their service was fine. Just take this advice. When a restaurant has the word “Lobster” in their name, it’s best to stick with the lobster for dinner.

We spent hours and hours and hours on the beach:

playing in sand,

picking tiny rocks and sea shells,

letting the tide lap at our toes and bury our feet…

Staring at the waves…

The brave among us boogie boarded their hearts out…

It was fabulous. It was relaxing. It was a timeless family memory.

And it is good to be home…

What goes in a foodie’s vacation suitcase?

We are going on a long anticipated vacation in a couple days. The place we’re staying has a semi-equipped kitchen; dishes, flatware, assorted pans, working stove and fridge, etc… When I say the kitchen is semi-equipped I mean it is not constantly inhabited by an obsessive-compulsive, gadget-loving foodie like myself. I have found myself wondering how little clothing I can possibly pack for a family of seven in order to preserve room in the van for my knives, mandoline, whisk, large cutting board, dough bucket, organic ketchup, natural peanut butter, homemade pickles, homemade jam, spices, huge cooler filled with pantry staples such as pesto marinated bocconcini and fresh herbs, tomatoes and zucchini from our garden, etc… Is there any possible way I can pack my stand mixer? It is like another child to me. One which I am very glad not to have birthed. I am contemplating whether to pack butter in the cooler. I mean really, what if butter’s price is astronomic there? How would I make cinnamon rolls? Or toast?

**At this point I would very much like to be able to say ‘just kidding!’ except that would be lying and I’ve repeatedly mentioned that my moral compass is set to ‘honest’.

I’ve settled on taking my knives and steel *There is, in a kitchen, nothing worse than someone else’s dull ginsu, the large cooler and whatever will fit in it *I refuse to leave behind that fresh jar of lovely basil/garlicky fresh goat milk mozzarella, a whisk *You just try making pasta á là carbonara with some poor trodden upon fork, small amounts of some spices *No way am I paying $8.00 for half an ounce of cumin at some tourist trap grocery store, and the dough bucket *No excuse here. I just want it with me.

“Why not just eat out?” I know there is someone out there who is thinking or muttering just that. It is because we are a family of 7. Vacation with 5 kids under the age of 10 is merely chaos relocated. Leaving aside the cost entirely, eating out is double chaos relocated. We’ll probably have at least 1 meal in a restaurant, but the majority of our food will be eaten in situ.

This brings me to a couple questions I have for you all.

When you go on vacation do you pack food related tools or food? If so, what do you take with you? What can’t you live without even when you’re ‘getting away from it all’?
Do you think, as does my husband, that I should ‘relax’ and just eat boxed macaroni and cheese for a week *shudder* **Does this place even have a colander? Oooh, maybe I should take one of those…
Do you have any favorite ‘vacation meals’ that remind you of places or rely on the local foods from your getaways? And lastly…
Did I forget anything important?