Pestilog

Glorious Day of "American Food"-like Food

Yesterday, I woke up on the couch in Stephen's room next to Brigette, wondering if Tyler was still asleep with his shoes on in the living room. This has all been known to happen before, and is always a sign that last night was a good night and today will be a phenomenal day. Seriously.

So, I may not have mentioned this earlier, but Brigette brought back a bunch of goodies from Texas after Christmas break. Its fabulous. I love the fact that she is from Texas and knows all the right things to buy. When Stephen is on the phone with parents and friends in Ohio who are sending care packages, he always asks what I want. Brigette and I scream out a slurry of "Oh! Oh! Masa! and corn husks! chipotles! and nopalitos!" Stephen usually tells us to go stick it and to order something that is American and that the average suburban can find in Canton OH. So so sad.

But Briga brought back a few excellent things, not the least of which is a prayer candle with the Virgin of Guadalupe on it, which totally makes me nostalgic for our old house in Portland with the Revelation and Our Lady of Guadalupe themed bathroom (coolest domestic space I have ever had the privilege to inhabit). She also brought back a can of chipotles, and can of jalopenos. So, this morning, for breakfast, we made a huge batch of scrambled eggs with onions and sour cream and jalopenos. And it was SOOOO GOOOOOOOD.

Look, Stephen's camera phone was able to reach out and capture my joy:

(All these images are really low res because my digital is in Berlin with Ben right now, so all we had was Stephen's Razr to capture the moments as they came.)

Brigette gasped when she ate it and said, "Oh my gosh. Its hot. I forgot what hot tastes like. Oh my word I love it. Real hot food!" In Hungary, 'spicy' generally means 'not creamy'. Its a sad state of affairs if all you want is some chili. Marko couldn't even handle a single bite of mild heat. We are just made of spicier stuff I guess. I miss hot, spicy food so very very much. And tamales. I miss those too.

Later in the evening, I tagged along with Stephen and Sanida, who were had plans to go to this Burger place that Petya had found sometime last term. I was skeptical, but this place allegedly had really really good burgers, and even though I don't eat meat, sheer curiosity and the hopes of some honest french fries lured me along on their adventure. We were also able to recruit Zoltan at the library. I mentioned the burger plan to him, and I watched him hover over his feet, eyes glazed over for a moment, then, with a sudden rush of blood to his face, say, "I think I'm going to invite myself along..." Ha.

So, the burger place is called "Gyros es Burgers" (original) and is just be Keleti Palyaudvar. I was astonished by what they offered. They had a menu of like 20 different burgers with bacon, cheese, fried egg, goose liver, cabbage, mushrooms, anything you could think of. They even had one called "fitness" which was a burger doused in every drippy, oily, cheesy thing they had, but with out meat. And here's the kicker. They even toasted the bun. It totally kicked the In n Out Burger grilled cheese sandwhich's ass.



Stephen and Zoltan each got a burger called The Lenin:



And I don't even remember what Sanida got, but it was gone fast.


This place also had Lowenbrau

which is totally not that great, but which I will forever defend as the only reliable beer in a can in this city (take that Borsodi!).

The food was nutritionally useless and totally good. Stephen and I trucked home after this, curled up around our pot bellies, and watched Twin Peaks. And it was a very good day.

Course, I am failing to mention the long hours of work I pulled during the day and after all this nonsense that had me up till nearly 5 am. I am really starting to stress about the phenomenal amount of work I have to stay on top of. Its kind of blowing my mind. But I am meeting with Yuriy (Юрій!) tomorrow to go over letters that I am sending out to harm reduction clinics in Ukraine, and Russ has been schooling me on how not to freak out over this grant, which I have no idea how to even start, and I got my funding for April, or at least some of it. 200 Euros is better than no Euros, and thats enough to float me through April for my field work. So, things are happening, just not in a very steady or timely fashion.

Ok, enough of this. I got stuff to do....

Labels: Brigette, Budapest, CEU photos, food, procrastiation, Sanida, Stephen, thin justification for my existace, Zoltan

posted by Veruka2 @ 3:45 PM