SUPER TUBOS

On this foggy morning a little over a week ago, the swell really picked up.  We drove out to Super Tubos for Nathan to surf.  Unfortunately, after catching a few waves, he did something to mess up his shoulder.  After a few days of icing, stretching and ibuprofen, he is back, which means back to surf widow status for me.  Fortunately, we have reinforcements on the way.  The Teter's, Diane and Carol arrive tomorrow and the Chenard's and Brian later in the week.  Whoo hoo!

THE OCTOPUS TRIALS

On my birthday, we decided to experiment with making octopus.  We were inspired by a delicious octopus salad that we had in France, and wanted to recreate it at home.  The entire process ended up being quite involved with cleaning the guy (not for the squeamish), boiling, preparing the marinade and then grilling.  For the marinade I used olive oil, lime, cilantro, thinly sliced grilled red onions, sea salt and fresh ground pepper.  Along with the grilled yellow and red peppers, the flavors ended up being quite good.  The octopus however I would rank as just average.   The tentacle ends were tasty, but the thicker the tentacle became, the more chewy and less enjoyable I found it to be.  Hmmm.  Perhaps this is one to leave to the pros.  I would, however, definitely make the peppers in the marinade for a salad on its own.  All in all not bad, but not great, and definitely a learning experience.

SINTRA

About an hour south of where we are staying is a beautiful hilltop town called Sintra.  Lord Byron called this hilltop town a "glorious Eden" and I can see why.  The highlight being Pena National Palace, a palace straight out of a fairy tale.  It was if Sleeping Beauty and Jonathan Adler got together to make their dream home.  The amount of detail in tile work, sculpture, and architecture astounded me, as did the color palate of reds, yellows and blues.  It encompasses the perfect mix of mod appeal with Romanticism.  The surrounding gardens and the hike up to the palace are equally remarkable.  I wish that my parents had a few more days with us in Portugal to see it - I think they would have loved it.  Next time, perhaps? 

PIRI PIRI POPCORN

The Portuguese love to spice things up with their signature hot sauce, Piri Piri.  Both of us being big fans of hot sauce, we could not pass up a chance to indulge in a little Piri Piri.   Our new fave snack: Piri Piri Popcorn.  Yes please.

BALEAL

It is hard to believe that we have been in Europe for a month and a half and in Portugal for two weeks already! Time is flying by.  France already seems long ago, as does living in New York.  Portugal is so different than France, though equally as beautiful in completely different ways.   In many aspects I have been surprised and in others, it is just as I imagined.  We are staying on a tiny island called Baleal that is joined to the mainland by a sand bar.  The island naturally separates two beautiful sandy beaches on either side.  The beach to the south stretches in endless dunes all the way to the town of Piniche, which is a fisherman's village and where we go to do our shopping.  To the north, the beach has beautiful rock formations with cliffs that line the sea.   The beach to the north is the one I prefer given its dramatic landscape and amazing colors.  From our kitchen it reminds me a bit of the Santa Barbara coastline, but up close the cliffs take on amazing hues of red rock, ash blue and slate grey.  The north beach also provides a sheltered little cove from the wind and has great tide pools for Annabelle to explore.  The island of Baleal is up on a rocky cliffs providing dramatic scenery, particularly when the surf is big.  The climate in Baleal has a desert feel.  Despite being on the sea, not much grows here, leaving the island quite stark with the exception of succulents and ice plant.   Just a few minutes inland, however, is lush farmland and rolling hills.  The central coast of Portugal seems part undeveloped So Cal, part Mex, and part Greece all in the same country. 

We have come upon what Nate calls the "dog days of summer".  Many of the homes on the island have shut their storm shutters in preparation for the winter ahead, and everyday the beach seems more and more vacant. We have had a few chilly days with high winds that make you imagine what it is like here in the dead of winter, but also have had those long Indian Summer days where the sun still warms your skin late into the afternoon when the sun begins to set.  We shared our first week here with my parents and are looking forward to more visitors in the coming weeks.  More of Portugal to come...

Baleal

Baleal North and South Beaches

Pinniche

View from the Kitchen

Piniche

SO BUSY

TO MARKET

One of our favorite activities on our trip so far has been going to the different markets and experimenting with the local ingredients.  The markets in France were truly amazing with each vendor's stall overflowing in abundance, whether they were selling produce, meats, seafood, spices, nuts, breads or cheese.  Everything is so colorful and fresh, allowing our culinary imaginations to run wild.  Our favorite market was in Biarritz, where we could shop from stall to stall picking up our staples and then end the shopping trip sampling a half dozen oysters on the half shell and a glass of wine. Bon appetite!  In Portugal we have found a market equivalent, though it is a little more bare bones and not as fancy as the market in Biarritz.  This is just fine by us considering the prices are much more affordable.  In addition, we have recently discovered  an amazing seafood market on the North side of Piniche that offers a huge variety of fresh fish.  Our house in Portugal has an outdoor grill, so we have been firing up the barbie almost every night.  The grill has added a whole new dimension to our cooking.  With a little help from epicurious.com and youtube for technique, we have been venturing into uncharted territory.  Nathan has been mastering the art of grilling whole fish and I am working on my fillet-ing skills.  Tonight we are attempting octopus.  Should be interesting. Here are some of our other meals thus far...

Paella

Chicken and Ribs (for the non-veggies)

Arugala Salad w/ Beets & Goat Cheese

Nicoise Salad

Pasta Aubergine (Eggplant)

Dorado w/ Roasted Potatoes

FRIDAY CACTI

Cacti, a photo by CBell913 on Flickr.

PORTUGAL WEEK 1

SALAMANCA

Salamanca, Spain ended up being a wonderful surprise.  We stopped there for a night on our way to Portugal in order to break up the drive.  I chose Salamanca, based its location on our route, its distance between Biarritz and Portugal, and the brief description in my Lonely Planet book.  For being a city you never hear about, Salamanca is stunning - "an architectural splendour" to say the least.   In what seemed like the middle of the dessert, Salamanca emerged with its palate of warm oranges, tans, and browns.  Many of building were built using sandstone which provide this effect along with the Spanish tile roofs.  Our hotel was right in the heart of the old quarter and was extremely difficult to find.  There were plenty of narrow one-way streets, streets closed for construction, and others closed to cars all together that made our search for the hotel a bit trying.  Nathan, however, patient as always, navigated us in.  Our tiny hotel seemed a gem, particularly since our last night in France was mostly sleepless.  Annabelle and I both had developed a bad cold, that my dad also picked up along the way.  We experienced what I can only describe as the 'pacifier paradox'.  Annabelle can't sleep without the paci, yet, when her nose is stuffed she can't breathe with it in.  Therefore she spent most of the night, and the car ride to Salamanca, tossing and turning - almost falling asleep then scaring herself back wide awake crying.  Poor thing.  We were both zombies and quite a snotty bunch on the drive.  I was grateful to my mom who helped comfort Annie E on the drive.  Nani has become Annabelle's travel buddy in the backseat singing songs and animating finger puppets.  The clean hotel, comfortable beds and great view from our room was just what we needed to revive our spirits for the drive the next day.  We took in the sites of the Plaza Mayor, the Puerta de la Torre and the Roman Bridge, but our favorite was the Catedral Vieja which was built in the 12th Century. We also enjoyed exploring the winding cobble stone streets and had a nice dinner at a sidewalk cafe.  Although Salamanca does not get much love in comparison to Barcelona, Madrid and San Sebastian, I would definitely rank it as a Spanish city to visit.  Here are few pics from Salamanca...

MAMMA & ME

I was catching up on downloading our photos from France and came across this series that Nathan snapped of us in Guethary.

NANI & PAPA JOHN

After three days in Paris, my parents arrived via train in Biarritz.  Yeah!  We are so excited to have them here and Annabelle is enjoying spending time with her grandparents.  We had just one night with them in France so we showed them just the highlights.  We left the very next day to start the second leg of our adventure to Portugal.  All together the drive to Portugal was 10 hours which is a lot with a 15-month-old, so we broke it up and spent one night in Salamanca, Spain.  We arrived yesterday in Portugal and are ready for our first full day at our new home for the next month.  More on Salamanca and Portugal to come!