A few of my favourite things

Our forth day in Ubud we signed up to take a organic cooking class that was organized by a local Balinese man and his wife. The day started of by visiting a local market where we bought some ingredients and learned how the market is set up. The market has a whole section just devoted to daily and special offerings that people can purchase to lay out in their homes and shops. 

Daily offerings

Next it was back to the local village to see the rice fields and pick vegetables from the family garden. Hardly any of the fruits and vegetables have seasons so most can be harvested year round. We picked serval things including water spinach, cassava leaves and lemongrass.

The cooking class was small, just the two of us and a german lady. We made several things all revolving around the basic spice of garlic, shallots, chili, tumeric, lemongrass, ginger, garlic, salt and galangal. This mixture or variation of it is used in almost all the Balinese dishes.

Spices

Working away!

Fish Satay

By the end of the class we had made sambal tomato (which is kinda like salsa), Gule ayam (coconut chicken curry), tempe manis (fried tempe with sweet and sour sauce), jukut nangka (pork and jackfruit soup), jukut urab (vegetable with grated coconut), tuna fish satay and black rice pudding for dessert. It was a feast!

Some of our finished dishes

 To make the day even better we went to a evening yoga class at the Yoga Barn in central Ubud. It was great to stretch our tired and sore muscles from travelling.

Yoga Barn

Kuala Lumpur - A Day of Splurging

Petronas Towers - Park view

Our budget for this trip was not very large but we did allow ourselves one half day of splurging our first day in Kuala Lumpur. We arrived at our hotel which I booked as a surprise for Milos, telling him we were staying at Explorers guesthouse which was true for the next two nights but I actually booked one night in the Traders Hotel (Across from the Petronas Towers and has a Skyview pool and bar). Needless to say it was about 6 times our daily budget for accommodation but worth it for a night, even for just the shower alone.

Side Note: the morning breakfast was the most amazing array of food that I have ever seen. It satisfied every breakfast food from every culture including curries, pastries, sausage, cheeses, salmon and even sushi. No bacon though...

The facial expression when you first put your feet in

The normal fish pool

Since we were now over two weeks into the trip we decided, well maybe I decided, that we should get the "fish spa" that we have read about in the travel guide. This is where you put your feet and calves into pools of warm water with this small fish that eat all the dead skin off (you can get full body but we both agreed that would be a little over the top). The feeling was one I have never experienced and it is hard to keep your toes in when you have really tickle-ish feet. There were three fish pools, normal, strong and strongest. I only made it to strong but Milos got to strongest which didn't seem too bad. After the fish they offered us foot reflexology (it is everywhere here) for a "very good price". We didn't have any other plans for the afternoon so we thought why not have someone pound on your feet for 45 minutes?

Satay Center

After a bit more wandering, and some fresh feet, we ended up on the street of street food. One of the more popular stalls are the satay stalls which is where you pick and pay per stick and the boil and grill it right at the stall and serve it with a variety of sauces. I think it might be one of the best things we have ate so far!

Finish product

Penang - A place to eat!

So after one of the most terrifying drives of my life, we arrived in Georgetown, Penang at our guesthouse in the heart of China town. Side note, the trip was suppose to take 7-10 hours by minibus and we got there is 5...but yes we arrive safely.
I am pretty sure that Penang (well Malaysia in general) might be one of the most diverse places on earth. Touring the streets of Georgetown within one street we found a Anglican Church, Mosque, Hindu Temple, and Buddhist Temple, everything seems to be represented (minus we didn't find the Church of Scientology). The best part of all these cultures together... the food! Below is a visual description of how we spent most of our time in Penang...

Tandoori Chicken with Naan

Ice Kacang - yes there are beans, corn and noodles in our ice cream

Banana Leaf Curries!

Fruit Buffet  - Yes we tried Durian and yes it was awful!

Laksa Asam Soup

Wan Than Mee

Cendol - yes this ice treat also has pea flour noodles and beans

Okay okay, we didn't just eat while we were in Penang, we also visited many temples including the largest Buddhist temple in Southeast Asia, Penang Hill, a exotic fruit farm, batik factory, northern beaches and a coffee and chocolate museum. The last one was still food but we did learn a lot about chocolate and coffee production.

Buddhist Temple

Brussels

The original plan was not to have any time in Belgium, but due to come slight mix-up we ended up staying about 20 hours in Brussels before we heading to Iceland. Going from a Eastern European country to a western is always interesting as suddenly the infrastructure is more modern, there is a lot more diversity and eveything has doubled in price.

Downtown Brussels

Being in Brussels for only an evening we tried to make the most of it by wandering the streets and trying any beer or food item that caught our eye. I think that many tourist had the same idea, as well all seemed to wonder the small streets examining the architecture, cafes and graffiti.

French fries with mayo and ketchup

A trip to belgium would not be complete without a french fries and beer! We got tired pretty quick as  most of the Belgium beers have a higher alcohol content and we had to get up at 4am to get to the airport on time. A co-worker told me about this amazing beer place Delirium which has over 2000 types of beer, an overwhelming choice in a menu that resembles a dictionary. To my disappointment one of the American girls beside us was drinking Corona.

Delrium beers

Our trip to Brussels would not be complete without some Belgium waffles which we managed to find in the morning before our flight left for Iceland! 

Food, Friends and Family, but mainly Food

Our week spent in Serbia was filled with eating, visiting family and exploring around Zrenjanin. The downtown seemed like the place to be as we would start our day with morning lattes at a cafe and end the day strolling up and down the pedestrian street eating ice cream and people watching. 

Downtown Zrenjanin

There was a rarely a time when you didn't see Baba either preparing, cooking or serving a meal. The women always seemed on the go even at 2 am when we would head to bed or 7 am when we woke up. The lady was a machine, curing meat and harvesting vegetables and fruit from her gardens, it was like taking a step back in time.

No meal complete without homemade noodle soup!

Whether it was breakfast, lunch or dinner meat was always on the menu and Serbians know how to cook it! One afternoon, after a swim at the pool we stopped at a small fast food place and had sausages stuffed with Kajmak (basically butter and cream cheese mixed together) and wrapped in bacon. Our most elaborate meal was a Sunday dinner consisting of chicken, pork, beef and sausage with portions enough for 20 to only feed 6 of us! Thankfully vegetable were in season and we were able to get some greens in, but it makes you wonder what a vegetarian would do..

Typical breakfast, home cured meat and cheese

Sunday Dinner