EatingAsia

As George Town Changes, One Thing Remains Constant

 

    George Town is changing fast. In the little over four years since we began visiting on a regular basis the city has sprouted  a dozen boutique hotels (with more on the way), a bakery turning out Paris-worthy rustic French baked goods and coq au vin, a cafe where the daily specials might include handmade tamales steamed in banana leaf or a perfectly dressed Caesar salad and a hole-in-the-wall serving delicate French pastries crafted by a Cordon Bleu-trained chef and siphon coffee from a menu with detailed tasting notes. There are new galleries and performance spaces. The George Town Festival, which takes place every summer, has grown from a nice little celebration of Penang culture to a month-long fest that attracts artists, musicians and performers from around the world.

    But make no mistake: George Town is no twee boutique town tarted up for tourists, with no real sense of its old self. For now at least this place that we'll soon call home -- after 20 months (!) of renovations --  is still real. Those new cafes and exist side-by-side with hawker stalls and coffee shops and restaurants that have been around for decades.

    From the latter category, one of our favorites is International Hotel's coffee shop and its famed nasi Padang/nasi Malay stall. This enterprise is decades old and family run. Its proprietors came to Penang from west Sumatra, Indonesia (home of nasi Padang) over 20 years ago. In the four or so years that we've been eating here the place hasn't changed a whit. Nor has the sky-high quality of its food, or the composition of its clientele. Few tourists seem to make it to Jalan Transfer, which sits just outside George Town's UNESCO conservation core. Fewer still make it to International Hotel which, given the dearth of choices when it comes to Malay cuisine in George Town, is a pity.

    Be forewarned: choice here can be overwhelming, especially if you know (and now you do, because we're telling you) that every dish is worthy of space on your plate. Eating at International Hotel as a couple is painful, the decision of what to eat almost too onerous. No matter how wisely you choose you'll walk away wishing you'd chosen differently, or eaten more, and vowing to return.

    If at all possible, come with a group.

    What you'll find, if you come for lunch around noon (and you shouldn't come much later, lest the most popular dishes be finished and the coffee shop too crowded to seat you), is a two-level glass-fronted display case at the coffee shop's entrance groaning under the weight of stainless steel trays holding dishes west Sumatran and Malay, and sometimes kind of Indian and sort of Chinese. Curries, stir-fries, sauteed vegetables, small rectangles of golden crispy deep-fried tempeh that will make you wonder why chips makers don't get hip to the possibilities of this fermented soybean cake. There are salad-y concoctions of morning glory (aka water spinach), bean sprouts, chilies and coconut and sometimes mango, and a lovely refreshing acar consisting of fresh pineapple, cucumber, and mild red chili rings in sweet-tangy vinegar dressing.There is fish stewed (look for the pot of lemon-yellow turmeric and coconut milk fish curry) and deep-fried and sauced. A glorious, truly truly gloriously warm spice and chili-laden beef rendang. Whole long Asian eggplants, cooked to impossible silkiness and slathered with fresh red chili sauce. An unctuous pineapple curry -- yes, you read that right, a richly aromatic, sunset hued cinnamon-heavy coconut curry sauce with no meat or chicken or fish, just thick rings of semi-firm, sweet-tart pineapple. And chicken cooked with kecap manis, its almost black sauce and slightly sweet stickiness countered by chunks of bright red fiery chili.

    There's more. A small table behind the display case holds milder dishes: greens stewed in coconut milk, rehydrated ropes of delightfully chewy dried bean curd with rice vermilli in soup, globe eggplants halved and floating in a delicious but unchallenging Indian-ish curry. This table is also home to what might be considered this family's piece de resistance: whole fish whose split bellies hold a stuffing of chili sauce-rubbed sliced onions. At a cooker just to the side of the coffee shop the fish are submerged in hot oil; they emerge crisp, the color of black coffee, their bellies spilling onions sweetened by the heat and gone to caramel, some crunchy and some still slightly soft. These fish go fast.

    And yet still more: nearby, a 2-tiered shelf displays cooked and fresh vegetables and a few sambal (chili sauces, made with belacan/shrimp paste or just fresh chilies and lime) with which to assemble your own ulam spread (think of it as the Malay version of a crudite plate) .Relatively recently the stall's proprietors introduced a new item: a platter holding the makings of gado-gado (tofu cubes, bean sprouts, chunks of cucumber, etc) and a bowl of chunky peanut sauce to spoon over your vegetable mix.

    This is a self-serve operation. Most diners opt for a plate of rice over which they spoon sauce from a curry or two, bits and pieces from 2 or 3 dishes, maybe a bit of sambal on the side. But to make the most of this stall's vast selection we recommend you accept a plate of rice, then use the empty bowls, plates and platters neatly stacked by the rice cooker to assemble a family-style feast at the center of your table.

    Don't be embarassed to make several trips to and from the display to your table; it's the only way to make sure you've covered all of this establishment's hits. Once you've mapped out your meal let the staff know. They'll come to your table and figure your bill, and even offer to cut some of the more unweildy dishes (those long eggplants smothered in chilies, for instance) into shareable portions with kitchen shears. Order a drink from the coffee shop's Chinese owners (and pay them directly), then pay for your lunch after you've finished.

    In the unlikely event that you're still hungry you're no more than a 5-minute walk from an exquisite walnut and salted caramel tart, and a good espresso is just ten minutes further by foot. All this, and International Hotel's nasi Padang too. Welcome to the new George Town.

Nasi Padang/nasi Malay stall at International Hotel, Jalan Transfer at the corner of Jalan Sekerat. Lunch is the best time to go, as early as 11/1130.

Photography Expedition in Gorgeous NE Turkey (and a Feature in Feast Magazine)

The April issue of Australia's SBS Feast magazine includes our feature story on the cow-centric cuisine of Ardahan and Kars provinces, in northeastern Turkey. Included are 6 recipes, for a lentil-tomato soup with handmade noodles and croutons fashioned from the noodle dough; scone-biscuits made from ground dried corn; cherry tomato preserves; fresh pasta handkerchiefs with blue cheese; silky roasted eggplants stuffed with chopped beef; and rustic apple bars.

Doesn't sound much like the usual Turkish fare, does it? As our travels over the last few years have shown us, so much of what many think of as "Turkish food" is really only the tippy-top of the iceberg. Our Feast article is just a taste of what we've found out there, beyond Istanbul, on our road trips. We'll be sharing more in the coming months. 

***

We did part of the research and photography for our Feast article while on a "crash test" trek with Balyolu, an American-founded, northeastern Turkey-based social enterprise headquartered in Kars city. We found out about Balyolu a year ago, via Kickstarter.

We shun tours. But though we certainly do get out there on our own when we travel, we're not equipped to nor, I think, capable of navigating our way across kilometers of open country. We were intrigued by what Balyolu was offering: a very casual, low-key trek village-to-village. Sleeping in homes and eating (and cooking) with villagers. And so we gave ourselves a late 25th anniversary present by contributing to Balyolu's Kickstarter campaign at the maximum level. In June we set off for our second-ever tour. (The first was in Bhutan in 1998). 

That week was amazing. Northeastern Turkey is without a doubt the country's most beautiful region. It's just breathtaking. Wide open spaces. Craggy mountains, high plateaus, rushing rivers, placid lakes, Big Sky. In early June, when we were there, the region's lush greenness was complemented by sprays of yellow, white and purple wildflowers and random patches of unmelted snow. Herds of cows, shephards, cowboys. Oh, the sunsets, and the sunrises. (And then there was the food, the most wonderful cooking from village kitchens.)

A photographer's dream, as you might imagine. Dave was out the door most mornings by 5am (so much for a second honeymoon) and usually had to be dragged inside for dinners that started before nightfall.

We're heading back to Kars this June and we'd love for you to come along, as a participant in fantastic photography expedition that Dave is leading with Balyolu founder and National Geographic Explorer Catherine de Medici Jaffee.

Unlike the cooking / photography workshop near Istanbul that Dave is co-running in September, this week will be all about photography. Oh sure, cooking will be happening in villages, and you'll be able to join in if you'd like. And there will be photography of culinary subjects (bee keeping, cheese making, bread baking in a traditional tandoor). We don't compromise on meals, so that the food will be fabulous should go without saying. But the focus for the week will be on pumping up your photography, and on taking a big pictorial bite out of the region's landscapes, ruins, nature and daily life.

What's different about this expedition? One word: access. You'll overnight in villages (with a few nights in a boutique hotel in Kars), gain entre to artisan workshops, be led to secret ruins. You'll work on portraiture with individuals. You and your camera will go where you'd never go on your own -- and for that matter, where few if any other photographers have gone before. There will be a couple workshops, and lots of one-on-one coaching time with Dave. You'll leave with drop-dead images to add to your collection or portfolio, not to mention lots of good memories of a wonderful week with great folks in a beautiful setting.

(If you're anything like us you'll also leave with an extra pound/kilo or two.)

Best of all? A portion of the profits from the expedition will go to fund Balyolu's work in local villages; the organization offers entrepreneurial aid to rural women and sends village girls to school. (Read more about Balyolu and its activities on the website, here.)

We cannot wait to get back to northeastern Turkey. This 8-night/7-day expedition happens the first week of June. It's limited to six participants. You should be fit enough to get yourself and your camera equipment out to the field, but don't worry, there will be no all-day village-to-village hikes on this trip!

Have a look at the detailed itinerary below, then click here for the full brochure. To view some of Dave's images from our Balyolu experience last year go here and here.

Any questions? Shoot Dave an email: drhagerman [at] gmail [dot] com.

We would love to see you in Kars!

Cook, Photograph and Eat with Us in Turkey this September!

This space has been quiet, and finally we can tell you why. We've been working on some Turkey projects. 

The first is a collaboration with Istanbul-based cooking instructor and food tour leader Olga Tikhonova Irez, publisher of the blog Delicious Istanbul: a 5-day food and photography workshop this September in Sapanca, a lovely small town two hours by car from the big city.

Our partner Olga's story is compelling: Russian, well-traveled, multi-degreed with extensive experience in the consulting industry, Olga visited Istanbul a few years ago and fell in love (as so many of us do) with the city, its people and its food. So she quit her high-level job, left her home in Moscow and moved to Turkey to make a new life and career in food. Determined to learn everything she could about Turkish home cooking Olga talked her way into an apprenticeship to the female owner-chef at Zelis Ciftligi, a family-run lodge in Sapanca. There she met her future husband, son of said master chef. Now fluent in Turkish, Olga splits her time between Kadikoy, Istanbul where she introduces travelers to the delights of marketing and cooking Turkish-style with her tours and classes, and Sapanca where she helps her family run their business.

When I first stumbled across Olga's blog about 1.5 years ago I spent hours stuck in the archives. I was struck by her honest musings on topics like adjusting to her role in her Turkish family's business and the challenges of finding her place in her mother-in-law's kitchen. I salivated over her descriptions of home-cooked meals at Zelis and found that we share preferences for certain Istanbul restaurants. I found too that we share a dismay at the fact that Turkey's cuisine is little known and underrated.

So when Dave and I were in Istanbul last November we met Olga for coffee. The three of us clicked, and the seed of this workshop was planted.

Earlier this month Dave and I visited Olga and her husband at Zelis. Right away we knew we'd found not only the perfect partners for such an enterprise, but the perfect place: a comfortable, family-style lodging in a beautiful, quiet setting. A casual place where guests could truly feel relaxed and at home. A lodge large enough to easily accomodate a group but small enough to maintain intimacy. A kitchen equipped for a restaurant but homey enough to be right for a small group of people learning and cooking together. Lots of windows and beautiful light for photography. Proximity to great markets. Access to local producers. Gracious and friendly hosts. Even an adorable cocker spaniel named Bakir ("copper" in Turkish).

And the food? Spectacular. We've been eating in Turkey since 1998 and we have never eaten such delicious, lovingly prepared meze. We were served liver that turned me, a liver-hater since childhood, into a liver lover. Breakfast was an orgy of gorgeous fresh baked goods (Best. Borek. Ever.), cheeses, a killer menemen, too many made-on-site jams and preserves to name, fresh yogurt, an intriguing cheese salad that is a specialty of Olga's mother-in-law. It was hard to leave. We wanted to move in.

The four of us ate and visited a market and walked around Sapanca and brainstormed and took notes. Dave and I left excited for the workshop that he and Olga will lead in September.

So here's the deal: 5 nights, 4 full days and two half days of cooking, eating, marketing, photographing, with one long excursion further afield, to a sweet little Black Sea town, for a bit of street, architecture and nature photographry. We'll visit a local farm and meet a cheesemaker. Olga will lead in the kitchen, where you'll get your hands dirty (or dusty) baking bread, making borek and traditional cookies, crafting meze, patting together kebabs, seasoning soups, and more. She'll draw on the sort of deep knowledge of Turkish home cooking and food culture that can only be gained by immersion in a Turkish household -- and she will share it with you. 

Meanwhile Dave will be there to coach you to great photography. He's been shooting for international publictions for a few years now, off next week for his fourth Saveur assignment in 6 months. Dave's also been teaching individual and small-group photography workshops since 2010 -- he loves it, and he's good at it. In Sapanca you'll tell Dave about your goals for the week -- whether it's getting comfortable taking photos of people, maximizing your time at markets to walk away with great images, or using light and shadow to bring out the best in a plate of food, whatever -- and he'll help you get there with plenty of one-on-one coaching time.

This has been a long time coming; we've wanted to offer a workshop marrying the two major elements of EatingAsia -- food and photography -- for a long while. But we're picky about who we work with. Olga is good folks. We're on the same wavelength. We enjoy her and her Turkish family and we learned so much during our brief stay at Sapanca. We certainly did eat well.

If this sounds of interest please hop over to the workshop website [here], read the detailed program, learn about the venue and see Olga's and Dave's bios. If you're interested, head to the sign-up page. We're limiting participation in the workshop to 9 individuals -- first come, first served. There is also room for 3 non-participating partners at a reduced rate.

I'm not teaching (nor am I photographing) but I'll be there, along for the ride. Dave and I hope to see you in Sapanca in September!

 

 

 

EatingTurkey

Try as we might we almost never manage to blog when we're on the road. When we're traveling -- and especially when we're traveling for work, as we are now -- it's hard to make the time. 

Then we return home to Malaysia, get caught up in the day-to-day .... and 85% of what we've eaten, experienced and photographed never sees the light of day. This is especially true for material from Turkey, where we've spent a lot of time in the last two and a half years. 

So we've started a tumblr called EatingTurkey. The idea is: a quick, manageable post -- one food-related photo and a short caption -- every day that we're on the road in Turkey. When we're not in-country, occasional posts from past trips.

Nothing changes here on EatingAsia. It's still our place for multi-photo, longer posts from Malaysia, the rest of Asia, Turkey and wherever else we happen to find ourselves.

We don't plan to announce EatingTurkey posts here. So if you'd like updates, please subscribe to ET's RSS feed. (We'll also throw up EatingTurkey posts on Twitter and on the EatingAsia Facebook page.)

We're almost a week into this trip, we have two more to go, and we'll be returning to Turkey a few more times in 2013. We'd love to take you along for the ride.

 

Phở: Not (Just) A Noodle Soup

So sue me. I thought that phở referred to a Vietnamese street dish comprising rice noodles in a rich broth. It does, of course. But phở is much more, for the dish is actually named for the rice flour sheets from which its noodles are made.

So there I was, like an idiot, proclaiming myself to be unimpressed with phở -- it is true that I am not enamored of the dish, but I'm open to being converted -- when by doing so I was unwittingly writing off a whole host of foods made with phở or, to be more precise, bánh phở (those rice flour sheets).

But, before we go there, a quick diversion into the murky origins of Phở the Dish. By now pretty much every phởnatic knows its story: phở is the result of a marriage of French culinary prowess and Vietnamese adaption, an indiginized version of the classic pot au feu.

But not so fast. There is a contrarian take on phở's origins. I was glad to learn of it (thank you Mark of Stickyrice; the pot-au-feu-to-phở tale always struck me as a wee too neat and tidy.

In her book Aspirations and Appetites in Vietnam: Food and Drink in the Long Nineteenth Century Erica J. Peters tells us that phở first appeared on Hanoi streets (the creation of one single cook? or many cooks? the identity of the dish's inventor(s) are lost to the ages) after cows -- not traditionally eaten by Vietnamese but used as draft animals -- were imported into the country and raised for the colonial French table.

"Networks of Chinese and Vietnamese who butchered meat for the French or cooked their meals probably diverted beef remnants to street soup vendors," Peters elaborates in a paper titled "Defusing Phở: Soup Stories and Ethnic Erasures"

And to me at least, this take on phở's origins rings true. Wouldn't Vietnamese cooks, as enterprising as any cooks anywhere, have figured out what to do with meaty bones and scraps? Would they have needed -- or wanted -- to call upon a classic French dish for inspiration? For that matter, why should we assume that phở''s inventor(s) knew pot au feu firsthand? In her book, for which she drew on French writings from the colony, Peters describes French colonials who went to great pains to hold themselves apart from locals, right down to what they ate.

Yet there is still the question of name -- phở' must certainly be a Vietnamese transliteration of feu, right? But the word phở' could have come from fun -- Cantonese for phở'-like rice noodles -- which Vietnamese would have known from the noodle dishes that, Peters observes, were sold by southern Chinese on the streets of Saigon and Hanoi. It wouldn't be the last time Vietnamese street cooks adapted a noodle specialty from a neighboring Asian country (see hủ tiếu).

Whatever phở''s true origin story we know its evolution: from Hanoi street specialty to Vietnam's most iconic dish. Food-focused travelers to the country tend to obsess over it (often to the point of missing out on other, equally delicious Vietnamese noodle specialties) even in Saigon, which lies about 1,780 kilometers south of Phở' Central. (Phở' made its way to Saigon with migrants from Hanoi in the middle of the 20th century, and morphed into a whole other animal. Which version is better? I'm not sticking my toe into that debate.)

Lesser known to visitors is that Vietnam's beloved noodle soup now lends its name to other dishes made from banh phở', those rice flour sheets. A few weeks ago we sampled two, in a neighborhood near Truc Bach Lake that's home to a rash of shops spilling tables streetside and serving all things banh phở'. For reasons I know not of, most of these dishes include beef.

Phở cuốn are rice rice flour rectangles rolled around roughly chopped beef, cilantro and lettuce served with a nuoc mam floating thin slices of kohlrabi. Think Vietnamese fresh spring rolls with a thicker, slicker wrapper and a meatier, heavier filling. Whether it's made from wheat or rice flour I love a noodle or a dumpling wrapper that boasts a bit of heft and chew, but the phở cuốn didn't wow me. The beef was a bit chewy for the delicacy of the wrapper and I missed the in-your-face herbiness of a classic "salad roll". Tasty enough but I probably wouldn't go out of my way for a repeat nosh.

I would, however, travel many hours for another go at phở chiên phồng, a delectable saucy stir-fry of beef, tomato and choy sum or Chinese mustard (thanks Duy, for the correction) ladled over crispy golden rice flour pillows. The rice flour puffs are made by deep-frying squares cut from two banh phở' sheets that have been pressed together.

The puffs are slightly oily (difficult to avoid when you're deep-frying any dough made from rice flour) but boast the most lovely delicate crunch, which they manage to retain even after absorbing some of the dish's beefy juices. By no means a light dish (this meal was one of the few moments of our week in Hanoi during which I was actually thankful for the persistent bone-penetrating cold) this phở chiên phồng was utterly delicious.

The next day I asked Hanoi Cooking Centre's Tracey Lister, author of two cookbooks on Vietnam (Tracey's Vietnamese Street Food is out in the USA as of this week) about the dishes' origins. Almost all of the customers at Phở cuốn Hưng Bền, where we ate our phở cuốn and phở chiên phồng were young, university age or below, and this made me wonder if the dishes were relatively new. Was this a "kids' thing", a group of dishes that Hanoians middle-aged and beyond simply can't wrap their minds around? Tracey dates their appearance on Hanoi streets to fifteen or so years ago, give or take a few, and reminded me that this isn't the first "new take" on a dish made with banh phở: versions of the noodle soup made with chicken didn't appear until Vietnam suffered shortages of beef during wartime.

They're a reminder of the ever-evolving nature of street food, which we tend to think of in terms of Classics. Like phở cuốn and phở chiên phồng, beef phở itself must have once challenged notions of what one should, or would even want to, eat on the street.

Phở cuốn Hưng Bền, 26 Nguyen Khac Hieu, tel. 043-829-2040. Is this place the best of the dozen or so similar shops near Truc Bach Lake? No idea. But we did enjoy our lunch.

 

KL Quickie II: Pan Meen

A quick trip down to Kuala Lumpur by road, three and a half hours down and the same back, two nights.

These jaunts are never initiated in the name of pleasure; there's something to do, an errand (or 50) to run, a bureaucratic formality to tend to. We pack our schedule tightly so as not to wear out our welcome at the homes of the friends who host us -- and, well, because we just really don't love KL anymore.

Meals aren't planned ahead, they're where and what we can squeeze in between stops but sometimes, as in the case of yesterday, geography and timing work out and we are able to revisit an old favorite.

Pan meen -- why oh why don't more foreigners, more visitors to Malaysia, know about this dish? If you order it "dry" -- the best way to eat it, I think -- it's a tangle of sturdy wide wheat noodles slicked with lightly sweet dark soy sauce and topped with chopped pork and slivered mushrooms and/or tree ear fungus. Daun manis, small sweet green leaves, too. The piece de resistance is deep-fried ikan bilis (tiny dried anchovies). A textural wonder that brings so much goodness to your mouth with each chopstick full -- all heightened by the green cilantro-lime-chili sambal that comes alongside.

Like most any "dry" Chinese Malaysian noodle  there's a corresponding soupy version. But we like the way the dry noodles maintain their bite and chew. We take our soup, floating a couple of pieces of tofu skin wrapped around fish paste and deep-fried, on the side.

If you find yourself in KL, seek out pan meen.And ask for extra sambal. There's a good version at the wonderful Imbi market. Our favorite -- because of the fish paste, the mushrooms sliced a bit wider than usual, and the larger ikan bilis which, after a bath in the oil, come out both crispy and chewy -- is in Section 17, a 15 or so minute taxi ride from KL Sentral Stesen. Details here.

New Year

2012 was good to us.

We traveled to interesting places. We shopped for, cooked and ate delicious food. We made new friends and met up with old ones in Turkey, in Malaysia and other parts of Asia, in the United States. We had some career successes. We wrote and photographed for publications we've enjoyed working with in the past and received commissions from new (to us) ones. We started projects that we are passionate about, made decent progress on ongoing work and have new challenges to look forward to in the New Year.

I didn't have as much time as I would have liked to have had to be here in this place, writing on whatever I felt like writing on. It's always refreshing to be here (literally -- often I am here when a deadline looms but the words won't come). But that's because I was busy writing elsewhere. And as a freelancer I will never complain about that.

I could spool it all out for you, the pretty-high highs and the stratospheric highs, along with the wheres and the whos and the whats. But sometimes those posts feel boast-y. That's what archives are fo.

Instead, I'll share a story that encapsulates what, at the beginning of 2013, we are most grateful for in 2012: kindness. From friends, from family, from virtual (as in -- Twitter, Facebook) acquaintances, from good editors and incredibly generous colleagues, from all of you who come here, whether to read or to just look at the photos, from people whom we've never met face to face but hope to know better in the coming year. From perfect strangers.

In the middle of 2010, after an absence of over a decade, we reacquainted ourselves with Turkey, a country we first visited in 1998 and formed an immediate, inexplicable bond with. We have been back many times since, and will be there again in about a month.

If you asked me what it is about Turkey that entrances us so, I would tell you: the wide open spaces (since we spend most of our time way out east, on the road). The breathtakingly beautiful landscapes that can change dramatically in just three hours on the road. Mountains, rivers, expanses of green. The food, so rich and layered and, out there, so surprisingly unlike what most non-Turks (and even some Turks) imagine Turkish food to be. The incomparable markets and the quality of fresh ingredients. The ease of getting around. The seasons! We love Penang, enough to put money and time into renovating a shop house in George Town, but we need balance. Turkey works.

Mostly though, it's Turkey's people. There are bad apples everywhere, of course. But generally speaking, in no other country have we encountered such warmth, generosity and kindness. Nowhere else have so many people invited us into their homes and into their kitchens, to sit at their tables, to tour their farms or their orchards, to enter their workshops. Nowhere else have we been offered, so often and out of the blue, beds for the night.

A couple of months ago we were driving on a lovely little stretch of the Black Sea for that anchovy story. We'd just eaten lunch and Dave was scouting for photos, scenes appropriately fishy. We spied a harbor full of gir-gir, or fishing trawlers, parked our car and got out to investigate.

No anchovies, unfortunately. The fishermen were unloading levrek, a type of bluefish, and small bonito instead. We circled the harbor on foot, stopping to watch three men building, by hand, a wooden trawler, and then continued to the end of the pier where four fishermen in rain slickers mended a net. 

It's painstaking work, closing the holes in a net, and requires bare hands that won't fumble the needle. The sky was leaden and spitting drizzle. It was cold, windy and raw. The fishermen worked away, heads down and silent, sometimes smoking, while Dave photographed their labors.

"Where are you from?" asked one. America, we told him. He broke into a huge smile. "America! Ohhhhhh." He stopped his mending and extended his right hand, to Dave and I both, while placing his left hand over his heart. We shook. His hand was like an iceberg.

"Hold on!" he said. He ran to a nearby boat and jumped on board, then reappeared. "For you. Levrek! We just brought them in," he said, extending his chapped red hand. It held three fish.

Oh no, we couldn't possibly, we told him. And we couldn't. We didn't have a kitchen. But he insisted -- "Just take them to a manggal (the outdoor barbecue joints that line stretches of the eastern Black Sea coast) and cook them there!" the fishermen said -- and we relented.

We thought he would just plop the fish, whole, in a plastic bag. And that would have been enough, more than enough. Instead he proceeded to clean them.

The fisherman hauled a jug of water from the galley and filled an aluminum tub, then placed a wooden board on the ship's railing. He scaled, gutted and filleted the levrek with more care and precision than I have ever seen a fishmonger or cook display anywhere, ever. Everytime he plunged his hands into the tub I shivered, imagining how cold the water was.

We chatted while he worked the fish. He was from Persembe, a small town up the coast. Yes, fishing is hard work, but he likes it, he told us. "I like to be on the water." The anchovies were late this year, he said, and it would be a small catch. No one knows why. But the season's ongoing bonito haul was epic.

After not too long, ten minutes maybe, he handed us a plastic bag of beautiful levrek fillets, explaining that he had them crosswise so that they would cook faster and more evenly on the grill. Then he rejoined his mates over the net, and we said good-bye. I forgot to ask his name.

Baffling and wonderful and, sometimes, ovewhelming, this kindness that strikes like a lightning bolt out of nowhere. Is it a very American thing to feel an urge, a need, to reciprocate? Sometimes we do, when we're able. Often we're not, and we can't help but feel sad about that.

I don't know where it comes from, this outsized Turkish hospitality that is so often offered in expectation of absolutely nothing in return. Something, maybe, to aspire to in 2013.

Dreaming

Winter, Anatolia. No filter, un-retouched. 2012 All rights reserved by David Hagerman

Dreaming. Not necessarily of a white Christmas, but of a more Christmas-y Christmas.

Today marks our fifteenth Christmas in Asia (for me, the sixteenth). And except for one Christmas, which we spent working in the Philippine province of Pampanga, it's never felt right. Nor does it today. It's not that Christmas here in Malaysia is bad, it's just that it's not. It's not anything special, it's a day like any other. For us, anyway, for me. It's been no different on Christmases at home in Vietnam, Thailand or China.

They say Christmas is a state of mind. I disagree. Thanksgiving is an American state of mind. It's about food and nothing but food (American-style football too, for some). A week of menu planning, days of shopping, hours cooking, a feast with friends, that you can conjure almost anywhere if you're willing to ignore weather and make an effort. Thanksgiving is a bubble holiday. It's less about what is going on around you than about what you make of it in your own home and your own kitchen.

Christmas is different. The holiday requires a build-up, a general atmosphere, a certain type of environment that extends beyond the boundaries of home. It's more than Christmas trees in public spaces, caroles blasted in shopping malls and an excuse to shop. I hate to use the cliched phrase "Christmas spirit" but it neatly sums up what, for me, makes Christmas Christmas. And what I've never, but for once, felt in all my Christmases in Asia.

We found Christmas spirit one year in Italy, in Piedmont, where we rented a farmhouse on top of a hill outside a small town. There, for ten days preceding the day, you could feel Christmas in the air -- at the outdoor markets we frequented, in the osteria and trattoria where we ate, in the wine shops where we browsed and in the town's piazza where we walked.

On the morning of Christmas Eve we drove down the hill into town to shop for two days' worth of provisions. We went to the butcher's, the baker's, the greengrocer's, the fishmonger's. The streets and shops were crowded and lines were long. But civility ruled the day. Locals strode along pavements toting gold-wrapped panettone, greeting each other with "Buon Natale!". No one pushed, no one shoved. Not a single driver honked his or her car horn.

By the time we got to the bakery, our last stop before lunch, there must have been 35 people in line. Except there was no line, just a crush of shoppers filling every inch of floor space in front of the counter. We despaired of having bread for breakfast the next day. We were living in Saigon that year, and I tried to imagine the logistics of getting waited on in a similar situation there. Or in the United States, where on Christmas Eve day even generally genial Americans can descend into depths of rudeness as the pressure to finish all shopping before heading home to family mounts.

We squeezed in at the back of the shop. All was orderly. When the baker's staff finished with one customer another stepped forward, often at the prompting of fellow shoppers who pointed in his or her direction to indicate to the staff who was next. When a tiny elderly lady hemmed and hawed over her order for a full ten minutes no one sighed, no one muttered loudly at her to hurry it up. It seemed everyone in the shop knew everyone else but when our turn came fingers pointed to the back of the shop at us, the strangers. I ordered in halting, horrible Italian and no one snickered, no one harrumphed. As we left, our backs received a dozen "Buon Natale!" At least half a dozen more greeted us when we walked into a nearby restaurant, where we lingered for two hours over agnolotti three ways, gorgeous cheese plates and a lovely bottle of dolcetto di Dogliani.

Dave and I haven't exchanged Christmas presents since early in our marriage, when we decided that we'd rather pool gift money to buy something for the two of us: a vacation, a couch, a barbecue, whatever. Our farmhouse-for-two-weeks had no Christmas tree, and there was no snow on the ground but that night, as I prepared a Christmas Eve dinner of pasta with walnut pesto, ocean trout stuffed with rosemary from the garden and baked on a bed of potatoes and mushrooms, cavolo nero sauteed with garlic until silky and radicchio salad dressed with good olive oil and curls of parmesan reggiano, it truly felt like Christmas. The next day too, and not just because we woke up to snow falling in big cottonball flakes that didn't slow until late in the afternoon.

We've tried to do a proper Christmas in our homes around Asia. Those failed attempts make for good stories. Maybe I'll share them next year, in a post written from somewhere not here. Somewhere properly Christmas-y. 

In the meantime, a Merry Christmas to all who are celebrating, and Happy Holidays to all!

Giveaway: Ten 2013 Magazine Subscriptions

Maybe you did a double-take when you read that title.

Because we are the no-freebie bloggers. We don't do sponsorship link-ups, or write reviews of amazing kitchen gadgets that we've been gifted, or tout hotels and rental apartments in exchange for a free night or two or talk up a restaurant that's given us a free meal. (We do accept advertising but potential advertisers seem more interested in giving us something in exchange for a write-up on the blog than in buying advertising outright. Make of that what you will.)

But, but .... 'tis the season of giving. We owe alot to you, our readers, and we know that. This offer comes with no strings attached, for you or for us. So, why not?

Zinio, web home to thousands of great magazines from around the world (including Travel+Leisure Southeast Asia, where Dave and I are both on the masthead and Saveur and SBS Feast, which we've been contributing to lately) is giving away 10 magazine subscriptions. You can browse and purchase subscriptions or single issues instantly from your computer or mobile device.

What you need to do to win a subscription: browse Zinio and select a magazine, then let us know your chosen magazine's title in the comments. You'll need to give us your full (and real) given and surnames, as well as your real email, to claim your prize.

(If you don't want to use your real name when you comment let us know and we'll contact you by email for it. And rest assured -- we will not use your email for any purpose other than this promotion, nor will we share it with others.)

The first ten readers to respond get the subscriptions. I need to submit the list of winners to Zinio by December 24, so hop to it and, again -- but be sure to use your real email in the comments!

From Dave and I, Happy Holidays! And thanks to the folks at Zinio for making this giveaway possible.

PS -- I moderate comments to keep out spam. I'll try to make them public as they come in so you know when the subscriptions have been given out.

UPDATE: The subscriptions have been spoken for! Thanks to all who participated and to everyone, thanks for reading this year. As a consolation prize, Zinio is offering 50% off through December.

A Hamsi Hunt for the NYT

Hamsi with herbs and onions, cooked in foil at a communal grill restauranton the Black Sea

For those not following on Twitter or Facebook: a story we researched and photographed in late November, on an anchovy-fuelled road trip along Turkey's central Black Sea coast, ran over the weekend in the travel sections of the New York Times and the International Herald Tribune.

Read it here and -- if you are as obsessed with anchovies (hamsi) as we are -- bookmark for 2013 or beyond. This was a fun and not overly challenging road trip along a mostly beautiful stretch of coast, doable at a comfortable and not too frenetic pace over 6-7 days.

This was our third trip to the region in less than two years, and we're heading back in a few months. Some readers have emailed to ask if we'd consider leading a Black Sea road trip/tour ourselves. Hm. Now, that's a thought.

Want more Black Sea? Check out Dave's audio-accompanied slideshow of our trip: fish, markets, lovely coastal towns and pretty landscapes.