Rabbits Foot

My mouth is burning. Pulsing like red coals in a fire. But I’m not in agony. I’m not panicking. The endorphins have kicked in. They’re soothing without being neutralizing. I can feel both the fire and the relief in a delightful extended balance - just like I like it. Oh, and the honey stout in front of me is contributing some delicious caramel notes.

I’m at the Rabbit’s Foot Meadery. It’s a Friday evening, and I’m introducing some co-workers to  mead produced down the street from our office. It’s been a good Friday. This is my second visit in the same day. Why two visits? A better question is why not two visit? I guess I’m just turning into their biggest promoter. I took a friend to the meadery after lunch. When I got back, some co-workers asked how my day was going. Soon I was back again introducing more folks to the mead.

Mead is probably the first alcoholic beverage that the human race ever made. And it all starts with honey. If you want wine, feed grape sugar to some yeast. They’ll go into a diabetic frenzy that results in that lovely brain-changing chemical called alcohol. If you want beer, grind up some grains and feed those carbs to the yeast. For mead, feed ‘em honey.

One problem - yeast can’t eat honey. It’s a preservative. I was told you can preserve an apple by submerging it in honey. I’m dying to try honey apple slices! Yum! Honey pear slices? Even better!!

But if you add some water, those yeast get a foothold. And then you can make all kinds of good stuff. Most of it sweeter than…honey. Honey wine. No grapes, just fermented honey. Honey cider. The hard kind. Infuse some fruit puree to get your flavor of choice. Honey beer. Let those yeasties munch on both honey and grains.

What does the capsaicin burn have to do with mead? Well…there was a food truck, you see. “Chutney Mary’s.” Fusion cuisine, because that’s what all food trucks do in the bay area. Asian Chicken Tacos, Chicken Wings, and Shredded Pork sliders on Hawaiian buns. With choice of hot sauce. On a scale of 1-10, we picked the 15. It was made from Habaneros and Ghost Peppers. Actually it was just a 9.5, but Californians are soft. (Well, you are.) Still, hot enough to get my attention.

And then it all came together. The bartender pulled out a special mead for us to taste. Golden and translucent. With a giant red ghost pepper floating in it. An exquisite balance of heat and sweet honey.

So why is it called the Rabbit’s Foot? The owner was home-brewing mead. After several failed attempts, he finally got a batch that looked like it was working out. Golden clear. The next day it was cloudy and discolored. For no good reason. Well. His daughter had dropped in her lucky Rabbit’s Foot to help him succeed. Yeah, ruined the batch with contaminants and coloring. But he decided that if he ever opened a meadery, he would call it the Rabbit’s Foot. And so he did.

78 Hours In Silicon Valley - My Brother Comes for a Visit

My brother Josh came to see me a couple of weeks ago. I wanted the optimum mix of novelty, conversation, and beer. I came up with enough to fill a week. Or two. Complex Excel spreadsheet were involved. Here’s how it went down, a la the New York Times “36 hours in…”

SATURDAY 

11 am.

1. Lunch For All Tastes

There are over 50 restaurants on Castro Street in Mountain View. By definition, the entire Silicon Valley is a Mountain View. Castro Street has multiple Mexican, Italian, Indian, Irish, Chinese, Japanese, Greek and American restaurants, to pick a view. We chose a greek restaurant called Ephesus. It was quiet on a Saturday afternoon and the food was delicious. While our food was prepared, I made Josh fill out some complicated questionnaires so we could start planning our days.

After lunch we walked the length of Castro street just to get some fresh air and exercise. Josh took photos of Le Boulanger, a bakery chain in the bay area. On the way back we passed Bier Haus - a favorite beer garden of mine - and saw we had just missed the free beer they were serving to celebrate their new name. Or not. The co-owner in - lederhosen - informed us the free beer was still flowing. I had a half-liter of delicious WinterBraun from Lost Cost. We realized we were sitting next to a guy I’d met on a previous afternoon at the same place. That’s a beer garden!

After the free beer we sampled the espresso at Red Rock coffee. If you like your expresso sour, this is the place for you. I needed chocolate truffles with mine.

1 pm

2. Nice to Mead You

We took a 30 minute ride on the light rail to the Rabbit’s Foot Meadery. Mead is anything brewed from fermented honey, whether it be wine, beer, or cider. Josh had the tasting flight: 2 wines, 2 beers, 3 ciders, and the Chocolate Raspberry Love port. I had a couple pints of Death By Raspberry, which is Raspberry Cider with a splash of Raspberry Mead wine and the Chocolate Raspberry port. The tasty room staff are as eclectic as the hip office park location.

7 pm

3. Hot Hot Pot

If you have to wait 30 minutes for a table, it must be a good place. Shabuway on Castro Street did not disappoint. The thin-sliced lamb that you cook yourself in a boiling pot of miso broth is a delight on a cool evening. Maybe we shouldn’t have made it spicy, since they’re serious about it. At least it cleared out our sinuses.

SUNDAY

10 am

4. Grown Here

There must be a dozen Farmers Markets in the bay area, with vendors coming from all over California. Campbell is known for having one of the best.  Josh took photos of the stands and their arrangements as research. I took photos of colorful stuff. We hadn’t eaten breakfast before the market, so it was nice to get lots of samples: grapes, apples, and pluots (plum-apricot hybrids); cookies, hummus, and pie. Mmmm…pie. The bakery had a sign that read “I’m pie-curious”. At another bakery we had to ask what an epi was. (A denser baguette, baked to look like a wheat stalk.)

As the samples wore off we needed real sustenance - aka brunch. We decided on Aqui Cal-Mex. Josh got a fancy burrito. I had the turkey meatballs with mashed sweet potatoes and a polenta cake. And a mimosa with frozen margarita in the center.

Noon

5. Honky Tonk Blues

Up until the ‘80s, the entire Silicon Valley was orchards. Entertainment was Honky Tonk bars, like Saddle Rack. It has since moved out of the valley to Fremont, and is usually filled with city-folk celebrating a birthday or bachelorette party. Today there was a country dance lesson event. We met a couple of my Reno trip friends. After a line dance lesson, Josh worked on the beginner 2-step while I tried my hand at the intermediate class. After the lessons we stayed for a few hours dancing to whatever songs the DJ selected.

4 pm

6. Garden City

San Jose was once known as the Garden City. There are several new churches springing up to minister to the vast and divers population. Josh accompanied me to Garden City church and met all my church friends, who were all really excited to meet him as well. 

6 pm

7. House of Yards

The Yard House has a huge beer selection and gets its name from the half-yards of beer they serve. The six of us from church stuck to pints. Josh got to try some new dark beers that he really enjoyed. After dinner we walked past the fancy shops that make up the Santana Row outdoor mall.

MONDAY

9 am

8. Just Peaking

The Bay Area has tons of parks, “open spaces” and other areas to hike full of forests and mountains. Mission Peak in Fremont offers a well traveled path up to an amazing vista of the bay, the valley, and the Santa Cruz mountains. It’s 3 miles to the peak, and the weekends can be crowded, but the weekday was much quieter. We saw - and heard - cattle on the way up. Then we saw a fox. I still don’t know what the fox says. Then we heard the chirping of a smoke detector with a dead battery. Turns out it was actually a ground squirrel - probably on sentry duty, warning about the fox. Later on we saw a falcon perched on a fence post. It looked like it was in the mood for some squirrel meal. The 6 mile round trip took just under 3 hours, giving us plenty of time for a range of conversation topics.

Noon

9. Ramen Without Styrofoam 

For lunch we chose an authentic Japanese Ramen spot called Dohatsuten. It had good reviews on Yelp and lived up to them. Exceeded them, even. Afterwards we got espressos and chocolate-covered madeleines at Mission coffee shop. Still sour, but only half as much as in Mountain View. Enough to give me some extra energy for the hour-long drive to Josh’s farm.

2 pm

10. We’re Farming and We Grow It

The farm turned was a 10-acre organic oasis sheltered from the surrounding open-field crop rotations by a wall of Eucalyptus trees. Their main crops are figs, rosemary, and green garlic. An entire section was just rosemary bushes growing wild. Josh got tons of info. I got some good fresh air time. We stopped for another espresso before heading back to the South Bay. 

7 pm 

11. I Dance the Line

A local Meet-Up teaches line dancing in the bar area / dance floor of the Mexico Lindo restaurant in the middle of San Jose. It’s called Mojo Monday. Everyone was excited to meet Josh. He had a blast and we stayed until the place was about to close down. 

TUESDAY

10 am

12. The Monarchs Will See You Now

Natural Bridges park in Santa Cruz is an over-wintering station for Monarch butterflies. We made the drive over the winding highway 17 and stopped at Emily’s bakery for a hot turkey and cheese croissant a cheese scone and some lattes. Fueled up, we headed to the monarch grove. At first we only saw a couple monarchs flying around and I thought the trip might have been a waste. Then we read the signs explaining that the clumps of dead leaves in the Eucalyptus trees were dormant monarchs. Sure enough, a Stellar’s jay showed up and munched on one, ripping off the poisonous wings first, and causing several of the monarchs to scatter. Visit after noon and they’ll be more active, having soaked up the sun’s rays.

A bus load of school kids showed up and we took that as our cue to move to the beach. We listened to the waves, watched the pelicans, and admired the rocky “bridge” formation. A while later the kids followed us, so we headed back to the car. We pulled around for a different view of the natural bridge, and then cruised the oceanside drive. The rocky banks leading to the beaches are covered with an “ice plant”. It’s a succulent that a native of South Africa. Introduced to keep the ground cover, now it’s considered a menace, like kudzu in the South.

Noon

13. Sweet French Cookies and Celebrity Mug Shots

We stopped at a charcuterie and - another - bakery, where I got macarons, which are soft french cookies that form a sandwich around a sweet creamy filling. Yum! Then we went to a burger shop called “Burger.” We sampled about 10 beers each before deciding on some juicy dark pints to go along with our burgers. When we placed our food order, we were given a mug shot of Matthew McConaughey. Classy!

1 pm

14. Cruisin’ the Pacific Coast

W drove highway 1 all the way to San Francisco. Locals call it PCH - Pacific Coast Highway. Josh was fascinated by the farms along the ocean. The ocean views didn’t disappoint either, despite the grey, cloudy winter weather. We stopped in Half Moon Bay for even less bitter espresso, then continued up to San Francisco.

2 pm

15. Foodies in the Mission District

We had been given a mission to accomplish in the Mission District. Reconnoiter the bakery called La Tartine. We arrived after a perilous parallel parking performance. Research photos were taken, and a massive Lemon Meringue cake was purchased for a party that evening. From there we walked to the Yelp-recommended chocolate shop called Dandelion. They specialize in single-source chocolate beans from tropical destinations like Madagascar and Belize and you can see the entire production area. It was like a Krispy Kreme for chocolate bars. Next door is another artisanal bakery called Craftsman and Wolves. I ordered one of everything. Then I canceled my order because my stomach wasn’t big enough, nor was my wallet.

THE DETAILS

I'm not going to spell it all out for you. You can use Google to find the addresses and websites on your own. I won’t baby you like the New York Times does

LODGING

Josh stayed with me in Mountain View. The fold-out couch is always at your disposal.

Food, Friends, and Murrrder!

How’s that for a title? Here’s how it went down. Thursday night I ate dinner with five church friends from Mountain View. One of them is moving back to the East Coast, and had a craving for Ethiopian food before he left. So we carpooled all the way down to San Jose, where we enjoyed a delicious Ethiopian meal, family-style. No utensils, just our hands.

The topic of mead came up over dinner. Mead is “wine” made from fermented honey. I mentioned the Rabbit’s Foot Meadery in Sunnyvale. So a few of us went there Friday afternoon. OK - I left work a little early; it was the beginning of a long weekend after all. I hadn’t been there in a month and I was missing my Death By Raspberry. That’s Raspberry cider + Raspberry mead + a dash of Raspberry Chocolate Love port.

Saturday I was double-booked for the evening. Mountain View friends invited me to a townhouse-warming event with do-it-yourself yakitori. I had no idea what yakitori was, but it sounded like food, probably Japanese, so I was in 100%. It looks like yakitori is Japanese for kebabs. I was excited about the scallops, intrigued by the chicken hearts, and easily sold on the spicy japanese sausage. On a stick. The scallops couldn't hang on the skewer, but they were delicious anyway. It was all really good.

Next up was Sunnyvale for build your own taco night. One of the guests that night was a very friendly pug named Frank. That’s right, just like in Men In Black. Except he was doing a great job keeping his cover; didn’t say a word. The hosts are heading off soon for a vacation to Italy - which makes me very envious.

So that’s the deal with friends and food. What else was there? Oh, yeah! Murrrder!

My Wednesday night church group put on a murder mystery night. It was a western theme, and the 20 of us had to act out parts and discover who committed the murder. (No guests were harmed in the making of this event.) I was given the role of a fine, upstanding US Marshal. As a bonus, I got to check the pulse of the victim, declare him dead, and then perform a few speaking parts related to the instructions, the evidence, and lastly the revelation of the murderer.  As a bonus, I actually guessed the culprit. I didn’t pick up on any of the clues; I just had a hunch about the guy. Isn’t that how it works in real life?

If all that wasn’t enough, I also went to Spanish conversation night on Tuesday, got my car washed for free and signed up for French wine tasting on the beach next Saturday. All in all, a really fun week. And it was just capped off by a rainbow! (Double rainbow!!)

Language Hacking Success - Brazil

I'm back from Brazil now, and I have to say that Language Hacking really worked well for me. Kudos to Benny the Irish Polyglot. After two months of studying, I was able to have simple conversations and get complimented on how good my Portuguese was. In particular I was able to:

• Order and pay at restaurants - including asking about an incorrect bill
• Buy baked goods and other items at grocery stores
• Ask for directions
• Check into a hotel
• Get help shopping for gifts
• Ask people about themselves and their families
• Ask to have my flight changed to the same itinerary as my wife's
• Joke around

Brazilians make it very easy to practice Portuguese. They aren't uptight about the language and they love it if you smile and joke around. When I went into stores, very few people spoke English, which is really helpful. It avoids the situations where they feel the need to put you out of your language misery by speaking your native tongue. Instead, we would just smile and laugh while I used filler comments called connectors until I figured out another way to say what I wanted.

I was amused by the number of people who asked me if I used Rosetta Stone to learn Portuguese. They're definitely doing their marketing well - I even saw a kiosk in the airport.

Here are the learning techniques I used to prepare before the trip - mostly taken from Fluent in Three Months:

• Studied a Lonely Planet phrasebook for Brazilian Portuguese
• Found a co-worker who speaks Portuguese and had three conversation sessions with him
• Practiced greetings and pronunciations with a Brazilian vendor at the local farmers market
• Learned numbers, colors, food, phrases, and pronunciation from a language CD by Euro Talk Now
• Watched Brazilian movies from Netflix, first with English subtitles, then with Portuguese subtitles
• Used Anki Spaced Repetition Software (SRS) flashcard program and iPhone app to study connectors, phrasebook vocabulary, and finance-specific terms
• Wrote emails in Portuguese to co-workers in Brazil using Google Translate as a supplement
• Changed my iPhone, iTunes, and Facebook language settings to Portuguese

Once I arrived, I just kept in mind that I had to go out and speak in order to improve. And I had to replace the anxious look I get when I can't find the words or understand everything. Instead I focused on smiling, nodding, and using filler comments.

As an aside, some of my favorite words are "otimo" (o-chimo), meaning "great"; "legal" (lay-gow), meaning "cool", and "moleza" (mo-lay-zah), meaning "piece of cake". I also like that futebol (soccer) is pronounced "fu-tchy-bol" and PowerPoint is "powerpoin-tchy".

I can't write about a trip without a section on food, so here goes. I had amazing pizza there (who knew there was such a huge Italian influence?). I ate delicious cuts of meat at the Fogo de Chao churrascaria (Brazilian barbecue). Every lunch buffet was full of deliciously savory sauces and spreads. We went to a great sushi restaurant (who knew there was such a huge Japanese influence?).

The draft beers ("choppe") were heavenly smooth - with Devassa's Negra as my favorite. But the best was the Pao de Queijo - cheese bread. Not just lower-case cheese bread. More like a glorious merger of light francese rolls and melted longhorn cheddar cheese at perfect nacho consistency so that it pulls away in a long string and falls all the way down past your chin when it finally snaps. Good thing I have a ten-year visa, because I may have to buy another ticket soon.

I thoroughly enjoyed learning Portuguese, but it was even more fun to learn so many tips to learn any language. I plan to shift my focus from Portuguese, which means it will join my ever-fading traveler's knowledge of Italian. We're traveling to Zambia in two months, so I'm going to apply all the techniques I just learned to my study of Bemba. I want to see if I can accelerate my learning pace. At the same time, I'm going to start brushing up on Spanish, with a goal of being conversational by next summer.

What language would you like to learn?

What I Miss About Austin

Having lived in Austin for ten years until just recently, I often get asked what I miss about it. I still think it’s weird that I hardly knew Austin existed until the University of Texas invited me to come visit as a Junior in high school. I went on to spend a total of 15 years there, with a break in the middle for Peace Corps and graduate school. I’ve got the traveling bug, so I don’t know if I’ll ever stay that long in one place again. Here’s what I miss about Austin.

College Buddies 

James and Derry are certainly at the top of the list of what I miss about Austin. We went through UT together, living in Jester Hall and working as Resident Assistants. We watched each other graduate, get married, and find “real” jobs. I went off and wandered around the globe for a bit, but when I came back, they were still there for me.

Each week I’d get together with one or the other of them for lunch. (It was more of a one-to-one setup than all three of us together.) I really miss those lunches.  They were always a great break from my day (and my desk). Sometimes we’d talk about important stuff like work, marriage, families, or dreams. Sometimes we’d just go on about goofy stuff.

Besides lunches, James was always up for finding the best beer Austin had to offer. Derry was more of the adventure type, including a kayak trip we took down Lake Austin. And either one was happy to catch a movie at Alamo Drafthouse.

Alamo Drafthouse 

This place gets its own section. What a great concept! Take out every other row of seats in the movie theater and add skinny tables and walkway for the staff. Serve food and beer before and during the movie. Compile a bunch of clips from movies and TV that are related to the feature being screened, and show them as pre-movie entertainment.

Once you’ve been to one of these, a regular AMC or Cinemark just feels mundane. I’m jealous I didn’t think of this first. I would totally want to start one of these somewhere, except I’m not willing to commit to one location for that long.

Fast Food 

That’s right. I miss Austin’s fast food. Not greasy burgers, greasy chicken, or greasy pizza. I miss Freebirds, Which Wich, and Taco Deli.

Freebirds was a hilarious find because it started in Santa Barbara, where my wife went to college. Boy was she surprised to see one in Austin. Why do I miss it? They had the amazing idea to offer barbecue sauce in their burritos. My favorite: spinach tortilla, half rice, black beans, steak, pico de gallo, guacamole, lots of barbecue sauce, and a few dashes of death sauce. Serve with Fat Tire.

Which Wich Superior Sandwiches took some time to grow on me. You design your own sandwich by selecting from different options for meat, cheese, spreads, and veggies. The toasty bread was what kept me coming back until I found my favorite combination. I call it “The Italian Burn”: Start with a Grinder (Salami, Pepperoni, and Capicola). Add cheese: Mozzarella or Provolone. Select Dijon mustard, but skip the mayos, spreads & sauces, and dressings. Onions: red. For veggies, pick: lettuce, tomato, olive salad, hot pepper mix. At this point, the oils and spices don’t matter much, but it doesn’t hurt to add some oregano, garlic, salt, and pepper.

You make your selection on a paper bag that you can watch make it’s way down the line. It helps to draw something on the back so you know which one is yours. Once it’s gone past all the stations, wait for them to call your name. Then enjoy your Burn.

Taco Deli didn’t become a hit with me until our last few months in Austin. That’s when I tried the original location, right next to the apartment we rented after selling our house. I was soon hooked on both the Mole Tacos and the Adobados tacos. Top them off with some hot green salsa and I was a happy camper. And you couldn’t beat the location next to the Barton Creek green belt.

Walnut Creek Park and Lifetime Fitness 

I never thought I’d miss a park. Maybe it’s because it was walking distance from our house for seven years. Maybe it’s just because I went there every week. Regardless, it was the best place to go for a run. Ever. Except during allergy season. When the weather was hot, the park was shady. The trails were dirt, so they were easy on the knees, but fun for the feet. There were butterflies and squirrels and rabbits, so I was always on the lookout. And the terrain never got boring.

I also never thought I’d miss a gym. Lifetime was pricey, but it was worth it. It was just down the street from my office, so I could go before work, at lunch, or after work. It had so many weight benches and treadmills that I almost never had to wait for anything. I loved the outdoor lap lanes in the summer time, and I appreciated the indoor lap pool the rest of the time. That made it really easy to train for my triathlons.

Comedy
A couple of years before I left, I joined a really great Toastmasters group called Laughing Matters. Every Thursday I'd have blast telling jokes and laughing at hilarious speeches from a great group of friends. The Black & Browns were a great addition.

Laughing Matters was also a great place to practice the material I was working on for my showcases at Cap City Comedy Club. I began taking classes there in October 2009, and did three spots before I left. Each one was less than five minutes long. Getting big laughs from a few hundred audience members is a huge rush.

Small Groups 

Lastly, I miss the small groups of friends from church that we met with on a regular basis. I had a great bunch of guys to meet with for a season to talk about what it truly meant to be a man and a husband. Then we had some groups of couples where we focused on our marriage relationship. Our last group explored the meaning and practice of being Christ-followers and supporting each other. We haven’t yet found that kind of community here in our new home, but we’re still looking.

Austin wasn’t perfect (e.g. 100+ degree heat in the summers), but it had lots going for it. Even though I miss friends and food and even a park or two, I’m glad we came to California for a season, and I’m looking forward to the next place we call home for a bit. And I’ll be visiting Austin soon.


What would you miss if you moved from where you live?