Things I learned at the dinner party

{Gifts from the New World}

#1. If you say you're from Hawaii, people get very curious.

#2. No matter how smart you think you are, you'll feel dumb in a room full of famous Ivy League professors.

#3. About 60% of the world's crops originated in the "New World" - the Americas: tomatoes, peanuts, potatoes, avocados, zucchinis (courgettes), eggplants (aubergines), vanilla, chocolate...

Of course, #3 got me thinking (and taking a page from writer Bill Bryson) - not only did New World food get incorporated into foreign cuisines, it became the foreign cuisine...

Can you imagine Italian food without tomatoes?

Or Thai food without peanut sauce?

Or English fish and chips without chips? (Terrible thought!)

P.S. The Tea Maker - a short, sweet tribute to John Lennon.

And before I sign off, a big thank you to lovely Marilou at Twenty York Street for passing on a blog award! More soon!

(Images via Edible Portland, The Stir, iFood and Virgin Media. Some thoughts on food history are from writer-journalist Bill Bryson's At Home, chapter on "The Dining Room.")

A Midnight Turkey {+quiz}

I once co-hosted a Friendsgiving, to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday, with my urban NYC tribe.

To paraphrase a friend, we drew on one another's cooking skills to round out (and heck, overstuff) the meal. The turkey was served at midnight, but it didn't matter - the city never sleeps!

To see our Midnight Turkey recipe, just head on over here. :)

Meantime, I've been tagged by Ginta at Hunting and Gathering and Hitomi Neko to answer the I Love Your Blog quiz! Thank you! Ginta has a lovely way of mixing terrific 2nd-hand finds with current pieces to create something utterly new. Hitomi says she's a blogging newbie, but I've already enjoyed her film reviews. :) Here goes...

1. Why did you create the blog? I may have mentioned this before, but because of my nomadic life, it was a way to feel more connected to faraway family & friends.

2. What kind of blogs do you follow? I love blogs by people who have a passion or just good fun writing about their joys!

3. Favorite makeup brand? I'm not terribly loyal, I'll try anything that sounds promising. :)

Jason Wu's Spring 2011 collection

4. Favorite clothing brand? My latest kick is Jason Wu. So classic and feminine.

5. Your indispensable makeup product? Burt's Bees lip balm.

6. Your favorite color? For clothes, lilacs, dusky roses and rich browns. For interiors, bright colours (one of my last apartments was completely in primary colours!) or soothing neutrals.

7. Your perfume? These days, very occasionally, Kiehl's musk. Before that, girly Flor (and I'm not that girly, even!).

8. Your favorite film? Most recently, the French film Lady Chatterley - not at all rubbishy, more like a sensitive love story with the exquisite Marina Hands as leading lady.

Verona, Italia

9. What country would you like to visit and why? I'm dying to return to Italy, and always wanted to visit an old friend in Norway (I owe her several trips!)

10. Make the last question and answer to yourself: What invention would help your life? Something that instantly transports me to any part of the world! And anything that makes me look like I get 8 hours of sleep & workout 2 hours everyday!;) XO

(Images via Channel4, newbatteri, Travel Holiday, Fragrantica, and Destination360.)

Stuff that made my weekend

Finding this fuzzy photograph I took with a disposable camera, the view from my second-to-last apartment in New York City

Incredibly dense, moist chocolate babka

{Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows}

Hearing just British accents (and glimpsing London) again :)

{Isabel}

{Underligne by Doo.ri dress, SS/10}

More lovely photographs from Wai Lin Tse

Unpacking the last box from our latest move, yippee!

~ Wishing you an incredible week ahead! ~

(Top photograph was taken in Manhattan, of George Washington Bridge in the mist. Remaining images via Good Bread This, NY Daily News, Wai Lin Tse and GigPark.)

Complete food randomness

Since it's almost-Friday, something more kooky & random :)....

Random chocolate bar ingredients

Random food ad (desperately wish I could read this!)

Random imbibe-and-pedal mobile pub

Random cake show entry: Great Expectations Miss Havisham cake, complete with "vermin" (Would Charles Dickens approve?)

Random restaurant: Finland's Snow Village IceBar is made entirely of ice, even the tables and chairs! (And you can reserve it for igloo disco)

(Images via Cardullo's, Calvacade of Awesomeness, Ham at London Daily Photo, Hotham Street Ladies and delish. Thanks Ada for the cake link!)

When in Rome

Do as the Romans do!...Relish the eternal sites...

Colosseum

Forum
{Where Marc Antony cried: Friends, Romans...lend me your ears}

Savor modern wonders...

Vatican City

Spanish Steps

Remember Audrey Hepburn on the Spanish Steps in Roman Holiday?

Enjoy Rome's many fountains...

Trevi Fountain

 Charming Turtle Fountain (a fave :))

Soak in the peace of the Aventine Hill...

St. Peter's through the Knights of Malta keyhole, Aventine Hill



And if Romantic poets are your thing...

Cemetery where Keats and Shelley are buried

Keats gravestone

Last but not least...

Do marvel at the ancient Roman table - could you also eat mice (a delicacy) or a prized seasoning called garum? Recipe for garum:

"Place in a vessel all the insides of fish, both large fish and small. Salt them well. Expose them to the air until they are completely putrid. In a short time a liquid is produced. Drain this off."

"This" is precious garum! Haha, do not try this at home!

P.S. A friend (who studies the ancient world) was not even fazed by garum, saying "it sounds like anchovy paste, actually."

(Recipe for garum is from MFK Fisher's Serve it Forth. Images via Wired Destinations, Europe Travel, VonEurope, Travel in Rome Italy, Finding My People, Top Things Europe, Vraatja at Waymarking, ElectricBaby81 at TripAdvisor, Feel Home in Rome, eternallycool, Tom Clark and Rodriguez PBWorks.)

Candy-colored Deneuve | Spooky Deneuve

Catherine Deneuve in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg

This bittersweet movie has been on my mind lately. (Have you seen?) It's not to everyone's taste - every word is sung - but there's a famous candy-colored set (the clothes and wallpaper match!)...

The opening credits (here) are so beautifully choreographed...

And the movie of course made Catherine Deneuve a star.

And since it's Halloween! Something from the spooky end of the Deneuve spectrum...

Deneuve plays a *very* unhinged woman in Repulsion, and it does a good job putting you in her shoes. Too good...

Cracking up, Catherine Deneuve in Repulsion

Because I seriously felt unhinged too! As I fell asleep, I could've sworn I heard my walls cracking (like the movie) & thumps in the flat, even though I was home alone (like the movie).

{Luckily: The next morning, I saw the plaster in the hall had cracked (the cracking noise) and fallen to the floor (the thumps). I was NOT crazy, yippee!}

~ Have a candy-colored and spooky Halloween! ~

(Images via Musicals in Vancouver, Flow TV, heavensabove, Film Forager, Movie Mail, Criterion Forum, Seattle Times, Somewhere in the Depths of Cinema, and "Repulsion" film stills via heavensabove.)

10 small pleasures I love {+lovely bloggers}

{I love long soaks in a bath - wouldn't mind this one}

Wonderful Stacey at Design Addict Mom and lovely Amber Blue Bird passed along the Happy award - Amber also passed along the Substance award. Thank you so much!

I've mentioned Stacey here before - I can't seem to get enough of her delightful posts (but it's a healthy obsession, heheh) and addictively-jaw-dropping images. Amber Blue Bird not only has the sweetest sense of style, but her awesome musings just make me smile :)

I'm to reveal 10 things I love, which I did recently, so I'll reveal 10 simple pleasures I love...because it's the small things, isn't it? :)

#1. Sipping Earl Grey tea (or a cappucino or hot cocoa:))

#2. Sushi

{Mastroianni in Fellini's 8-1/2, 1963}
#3. Hearing Italian, especially if Marcello Mastroianni is speaking

{Franz Schubert as a youth}
#4. Playing Schubert and Chopin on the stereo or piano

#5. That first sip of beverage when you're thirsty

#6. A package in the mail

{Latest magical sightings: Hawaii and Guildford, UK}
#7. Shooting stars

#8. Swimming at night (mentioned previously, bears repeating:))

#9. Singing at the top of my lungs in a car with girlfriends {Recently, we did so to this song (click here if music won't play)}

{A wonderful Alicia Keys ode to NY}

{Cape Town, South Africa}
#10. Watching waves - the best things in life are free!

I'm to pass each of these to 10 people, but many of you have these awards! I'll try to avoid the blogging police and give the award only if you don't have it (to my knowledge;)).

{Although you may not have time or inclination to make lists or pass on awards, I just wanted to let you know how much I've enjoyed your blog!}

Substance award to:
Stacey @ Design Addict Mom
Signe @ SignePling
Melissa @ Oh, My Darling
Connie @ Sogni e Sorrisi
Melissa @ So About What I Said

Tiffany @ Dancing Branflake
Jessica @ The Beat My Heart Skips
MarchMusings @ Style Nuggets
Jeanette @ Everton Terrace
Krysten @ After I Do

Happy award to:
Rowena @ Rubber Slippers in Italy
Kat @ Our Adventures in Japan
Ren @ Lady of the Arts
Lisa @ White Cotton Tee
Justine @ Justine Gordon
Rosie @ Rosie's World
Ashley @ browneyes.42
Annie @ All Natural Annie
Bombay Beauty @ bbNY
Nicole @ Scraps of Color

Thanks again Stacey @ Design Addict Mom and Amber Blue Bird!

(Images via Arzhine, Rsms, bluewaikiki, E-Film Blog, free-scores, Pedro Moura Pinheiro, Evie Marie, Science Facts, Bali Villa, Moneywise and neilalderney123. Joan and Justine, thanks for #9 :)).