A blog is born!

Well, ladies and gentlemen, yet another blog is born today. I will start with a brief introduction focusing solely on my life as it pertains to food.

My name is Lindsy and I was born in a very small town in Alabama to a mother from southern roots (think fried pork chops and turnip greens) and a father of southern Italian via Philadelphia roots (chicken cacciatore and meatballs in gravy). My mother was very disinterested in food, not one that enjoyed the art of cooking, but she could make the heck out of a Peter Pan peanut butter "flatsy." She hated casseroles "every bite tastes the same", tomatoes, olives, anything gooey and basically all sorts of things that I later learned to love. My siblings and I, all of us quite scrawny and lanky, sustained on mac-n-cheese, peanut butter sandwiches, pop-tarts and copious, if not obscene, amounts of kool-aid, mmm Purplesaurus Rex. We had a five-night rotating set of dinners: chicken and rice soup, spaghetti & meatballs (grandmom's recipe of course), "little men" with sides of broccoli and mashed potatoes, leftover pulled chicken (aka little men) with bbq sauce on buns, and chicken nuggets with sweet and sour sauce. The other two nights were affectionately referred to as "fend for yourself" and usually consisted of pizza, cereal, grilled cheese or pb&j. I was never what you would call a picky eater and still to this day, I admittedly like Campbells condensed soup and kraft singles made grilled cheese. Judge as you will.

At an early age, I opted out of home made lunches for school lunches and began to explore the other opportunities in the food world. I worked at the ball park concession stand, Baskin Robbins and finally at the food mecca that was (and may still be) Outpost 72. Oh Outpost, many a day was spent stuffing my face with pulled pork sandwiches, strawberry pie, made-from-scratch biscuits with ham & egg, backed potatoes the size of small dogs piled with pulled pork, sour cream, butter, cheese, bacon (yes, pork on pork), and chives. I darn say that this may have been as close to a religious experience as I may ever get. Who needs goals when you have such delicious surroundings? Sadly, I did move on, and the jury is still out as to whether or not it was to bigger and better things. During college, I was at a food plateau, forced to live on cafeteria fast food, Dominos pizza dorm delivery, and ramen noodles. I did, however, become acquainted with Starbucks and thus espresso in those years and that is not a relationship to overlook.

Grad school was really the beginning for me. The move out of rural Alabama to Berkeley, California was a digestive wake up call. Where had sushi and burritos been all of my life?? Forget chemistry research projects and course work, I had to learn to use chopsticks and correctly identify the raw fish I would be pulling from the sushi boat canals. The creative roll combinations, sauce options for Mongolian BBQ, burrito fillings, Ethiopian vegetarian dishes, the difference between Spanish and Mexican, Japanese and Chinese, Korean and Thai, I was hooked. Thankfully, the monetary limitations of grad school prevented me from gaining 200 lbs.

It was during this time that I also discovered travel. It started small with a trip to Italy & France with a friend from Alabama, then a trip with a boyfriend to Costa Rica, and finally to a road trip across the US. After those rather unsatisfying adventures, I discovered that the key to my travel happiness was being untethered. And so I leave you here, day 1 blog, with a hint of what is to come. My travel plans became about me, and solely me, where did I want to go and what was I going to eat while I was there. No longer would I be forced to eat at McDonald's because the idea of ordering from a French menu was too scary for my travel companion.

We will look at my trips to Chile, Indonesia, Spain and finally to my current place of residence, Paris!

I hope you enjoy the first installment. I want to make it clear that I do not consider myself to be a critic by any stretch of the imagination. I love food, plan and simple, thus one can't be truly critical if you love and appreciate everything. I do not cook, so the idea that someone took time (and dirtied dishes) to prepare a meal for me, counts for more than a Michelin star in my guide. Obviously, along the way, I will throw in some other interesting tidbits from my journeys.

Until then, Bon Appetit!